Champion News

CHAMPION – October 7, 2007

        The “pull of the past” pulled many Champions all the way to Yates for the fifth annual Pioneer Descendants Gathering on Saturday and Sunday.  Betty and Dale Thomas host this charming event on their farm that boasts a mile of Bryant Creek running through it.  The weather was unseasonably warm and those attending strolled slowly around the perimeter of the expansive fields viewing the many exhibits and demonstrations.  It was a treat to see a horse drawn sickle bar mower in action.  There are plenty of them around rusting in farm yards being overgrown with briars or being used as landscape features, but to see one sailing along the edge of a field of tall grass behind a pretty pair of horses is just a delight.  As the grass lays right over, the driver, perched on his spring seat, looks as comfortable as can be.  That may not be the case, but there are few these days who know for sure.

        Over the course of the two days Levon and Karen Lambert ground 120 pounds of corn meal both yellow and white.  Levon has a gas powered grinder that’s a little on noisy side but the cornmeal is choice.  He said that when he was a kid living up Fox Creek from Champion his family would sit around the heat stove and shell corn.  When they got a toe sack full his Dad, Furley Lambert, would carry it down to Henson’s Store.  Ed Henson had a big old ‘hit & miss’ mill and he would grind their corn.  He also said that his Grandmother Lambert would grate corn from the cob on a grater that was used for cutting cabbage.  She would make corn cakes on the wood stove which he said were delicious.  When asked how long he had been grinding corn, first he said, “Well, yesterday and today,” then he said, “Quite a while.”  (Harlan Davis said that Levon Lambert could remember when rainbows were in black and white.)  Not to be missed are Karen’s lovely corn-husk dolls.  The pioneer ideal of utilizing everything available is exemplified in her deft crafting of these beautiful pieces.

        “Home is the ultimate value that humans venerate,” someone said recently.  Kirk Dooms met his Aunt Esther Wrinkles at the Pioneer Gathering and took her on a short ride over to the old homeplace of some of their ancestors and it was a real treat for her to touch this home base again.  Sometimes just a short time away from Champion can cause a great longing for home though the journey be a pleasant one and full of happy meetings and alluring sights.  Wandering Champions now home include Fae, who spent her birthday in Branson kicking up her heels.  Her sister, Kaye, had her heels wet out in the Atlantic Ocean.  It will be interesting to learn if Richard rolled up his britches legs to step out into the surf.  They spent Sunday with their niece, Linda, over in Murfreesboro , TN and then headed home.  Louise sashayed over to Poplar Bluff and came home with a new car for her birthday.  Zoey Louise, who has the same birthday also has a new car for her birthday, though hers’ is pink and has pedals.

        A court mandated trip to Ava brought a Champion some splendid adventure in the big town during the last week.  With jury duty canceled this Champion was left wandering about on a fairly deserted Monday morning Square and was brought up short to see a roadrunner in the storefront of Memory Lane, Antiques, Etc.  The startled Champion pulled out her digital camera and maneuvered perilously into the street to attempt a photo.  The bird was too fast, however, and soon was perched on the window sill of the florist on the North East corner of the square.  As the photographer approached and without so much as a “Beep Beep!” the chaparral cock crossed the street and made as to enter the law offices there.  A woman exited the door about that time and the bird took a quick left and ducked around the corner and then up the alleyway parallel to the North side of the square.  It was an exciting moment…it all happened so quickly.

        There were Civil War re-enactors at the Pioneer Gathering in authentic dress and armed with some of the best weapons of that time.  A conversation was overheard at the Gathering about a new weapon which is a bomb that only destroys magnetic fields.  “The implications are enormous,” they said.  All electricity would go down including everything with an alternator or a generator, every computer and ATM machine, cash register, dialysis machine and on and on.  It certainly gives pause for thought.  A family sending their boy off to the Civil War did so with the understanding that they might never see him again and might never know what happened to him.  Today CNN and other entities have websites on the internet that routinely post the names and photographs of those killed in action.  It is a different world now.  One searching through the alphabetical listings of those names with morbid trepidation hopes not to find the name of a family member, friend or loved one.  Just in Iraq since the conflict began 3,811 fatalities have been confirmed by the Department of Defense with four additional as yet unconfirmed.  Two countries to the east of there in Afghanistan, Champion’s own soldier, SSG Raul Moreno Jr. is serving over on the north east border with Pakistan at FOB Naray.  Love and Gratitude go out to him from Champion Friends and  to all his fellow Soldiers serving there and in every dangerous place.  Cards and letters of encouragement and appreciation can be sent to him at SSG Moreno, Raul /4-319 TF SABER / FOB NARAY / APO AE 09354.  It just takes a regular 41¢ stamp.  His email address is: raul.morenojr(at)us.army.mil  Some others who are serving on active duty from this area are Seth Barbe, Keith Baty, Adam Bresler, Christopher Brown, Dustin Brown, Andrew Dale, Chad A. Davis, David Fry, Clay Hatcher, Thomas Hutchinson, Brian Jarrett, Daniel Keene, Timothy Kelly, Cory Morris, Trevor Pence, Amos Reed, Matthew Rossignol, Lyndall Spangler, Arlin Stigall, Brian Thompson, Matthew Thompson.  There are many more as well as this new war touches every neighborhood in the land.  Every Soldier who serves is a Champion.  Anyone wishing to have a Soldier’s name appear in the Champion Items may send it in my mail or email together with any other information about him or her.

        Comfortable things, venerable things, or things that pull, sashay, or allure are welcome to be reported to Champion Items, Rt. 2, Box 367 Norwood, MO 65717.  Startling things or things that happen quickly need to be emailed to Champion News.  They don’t grind corn at Henson’s Store any more, but there is frequently someone there who remembers when they did over on the North Side of the Square in Champion—Looking on the Bright Side!