The Boys of '59

By RJ Burroughs

R.J. Burroughs is at it again with the next volume of his Boys series in The Boys of ’59.You laughed out loud reading about Sonny and his four best friends with their 1958 antics. Now it's time to follow the boys into the summer of 1959 as they meet up with a so-called Vampire, toss a live grenade off the river bridge, and get even with the train conductor. Chuckle as you travel with the boys on their first “dates” and shiver with fear right alongside Sonny and his comrades on a trip to the haunted house.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Martin Sisters Publishing
• Release date: Apr 3, 2013
• ISBN: 9781311275073

RJ Burroughs

R. J. was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, in 1946. He attended no less than a dozen elementary schools as his family traveled working with the pipeline up until the 4th grade ,finally settling in Chickasha Oklahoma . R.J. graduated in 1965 After Graduating he spent four years in the U.S. Navy. After leaving Uncle Sam he worked his way up in construction to the position of civil superintendent, the field he still works in to date. R.J. and his wife Marsha collectively have two daughters, one son and two grandchildren. Writing is R.J.’s golf! When others head off to the greens, R.J. enjoys writing. He has written several different types of novels throughout the years from suspense to horror. However he believes writing humor is what he enjoys the most.

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Martin Sisters Publishing

Published by

Martin Sisters Publishing, LLC

Smashwords Edition

www. martinsisterspublishing. com

Copyright © 2013 R.J. Burroughs

The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is illegal. Criminal copyright infringement, including infringement without by monetary gain, is investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation and is punishable by up to 5 (five) years in federal prison and a fine of $250,000.

Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or publisher.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system,

without permission in writing from the publisher.

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by

Martin Sisters Publishing, LLC, Kentucky.

ISBN: 9781-62553-015-8

Fiction/Humor

Printed in the United States of America

Martin Sisters Publishing, LLC

I attended Verden Public Schools from first grade to third grade. I used Verden as the setting for my novels because it is where my grandmother lived. I lived with her during 1958, 1959 and 1960.  I will always have a soft spot for Verden.  I thought it would be great to have the students from Verden create the art for the front cover for The Boys of ‘59, this volume in my Boys series.

It went so well I plan to hold a cover contest as each new book in the Boys series is released.

Although the characters in my books are all fiction, the town is real, and, yes, there is still that little jail at the end of Main Street.

If you ever get a chance to visit Verden, Oklahoma do so, as the folks in town have lots of stories to tell, please believe me your life will change forever if you have the chance to drive down Main Street, and of course visit the old jail.

- R.J. Burroughs

About the cover and title page artwork:

Book Cover Art by:

Austin H. Patterson

Age: 16, Grade 11, or Junior

Verden High School

Canadian Valley Tech Student

Medium: Colored Pencil

2nd year art student

Title Page Art by:

Alexis C. Brown

Age: 16, Grade 11, or Junior

Verden High School

Medium: Colored Pencil

2nd year art student

Art Teacher: Susan McCaughtry

Dedication

To all the Staff Members and Students of Verden School System, past and present.

Thanks for all your help; I plan to take this one a very long way.

Chapter One

This was the day the boys had been waiting for all year: the start of another summer vacation.

Three complete months, no school, sleep late, stay up late, do just about anything they wanted as long as they stayed out of trouble, or at least tried their very best to stay out of trouble. Staying out of trouble wasn’t what they were best at, however they all seemed to have the knack at getting out of it.

One afternoon, walking back into school after playing softball workup during recess, Charlie said, "You know guys, I think even if we could all move in with them nuns living in Chickasha, and pray all day and night like they do, for some strange reason, one of us would get the others into some kind of trouble. It’s like we have a guardian angel that watches over us that gets a kick out of getting one or all of us into some kind of something.

The others didn’t answer him, other than shake their heads yes.

They had lots of fun the previous summer; they did seem to get into a lot more trouble than the rest of the kids around town. There had been the little run in with the bull, the fainting goat, and the little trip to the river that didn’t do them much good or improve their reputation in Verden.

No, this summer, all five of them made a pact to have fun, lots of fun, but with no trouble involved.

Sonny’s mother must have said a thousand times to him last year, Boy, you have me at my wits’ ends; I don’t have a clue what to do with you.

I’ll sure enough tell you what to do with that boy. His Grandmother would seem to always chime in. We could just kill him and his no account friends, go to church Sunday morning and tell God that they just died of something or other.

Sonny knew his grandmother didn’t really mean it, because there was always a big old smile on her face whenever she said it.

Sonny knew that his grandmother loved him, would never do anything to harm him, well other than swat him with that stupid old flyswatter she kept with her all day, sleeping with it just in case she got a chance to swat him with it during the night. He caught her with a big smile on her face several times while taking a nap on their old blue couch. He didn’t think normal people smiled like she did while sleeping. It even kind of gave him the creeps. He asked her about it one evening. She said she was smiling because in her dreams she got in a couple of good licks on him with the fly swatter.

The boys made plans that morning to meet at the park after class. Some of the classes let out at different times, so whoever got out first would wait for the others to show up.

Sonny and Charlie had Mrs. Eagleton for homeroom. They thought they were pretty darn lucky to get her for homeroom teacher. First, she wasn’t very old. They figured around twenty-five. Neither of the boys could build up enough courage to ask her how old she was. That was called getting too personal, something thirteen year old boys just didn’t do.

Bobby Won made that mistake a couple of years ago. The story was still very fresh around the school. Seems Bobby Won had been adopted by a solider from one of the islands the Japanese held during WW11. Bobby’s dad moved to Chickasha, a town a few miles from Verden, married a lady that worked at the five and dime, then moved to Verden. Bobby’s new step-mom took up with Bobby right from the start, however she changed Bobby’s name from Kim Sin Yon to Bobby. Said Kim Sin Yon was way too much of a name for a small boy to have; besides, she said it made her tongued tied trying to say it.

His parents tried to change his last name to their last name, but would have to adopt him in order to do that. There was a problem with that. The solider who found him wandering around wouldn’t adopt him until he could take Bobby back to the island where he was found, in order to see if he wanted to live in America or his home island.

The problem was compounded because Bobby’s family couldn’t afford to take him back for a visit. To add even more to the problem, Bobby’s step-dad said that the only way he would ever go back to that godforsaken place would be if someone shot him graveyard dead, and then took his body back. From that day on, Kim Sin Yon was called Bobby Won, no questions asked.

Bobby was four years ahead of Sonny and the boys. What happened when he got too personal with a teacher came to them by word of mouth. We all know how word of mouth sometimes has a way of changing as time goes along or because of the number of times the story is told.

Bobby was in Mrs. Greenwoods’ class. Every boy in school tried to get into her class. A couple of the boys that wasn’t lucky enough to get in during the year tried to get held back in order to get another shot at it.

Mrs. Greenwoods was very well endowed. Very well endowed, really weren’t the words that most of the boys in Verden used, however. Their words were like Big Boobs. Some called her, Giant Tits Greenwoods. Others stuck with, monster boobs.

There were a lot of the boys, even some of the girls, if they would let it be known, and even some of the other teachers who wondered if they were really all hers, or if part of them might be paper towels or a couple of hand towels rolled up in her bra. One kid thought she might have stuffed her bra with straw, since a person could get it in abundance around the area. Everyone knew better than that because straw would have been sticking out like that scarecrow in the Wizard of Oz. It wouldn’t do at all, having a teacher come to school with straw sticking out from under her shirt.

There was more or less of a contest going around school that year. The first person who found out if Mrs. Greenwoods shape was real or not, would win. No one had any idea what they would win, but being the one who found out the truth about the boobs would catapult that person to instant fame, something that would be talked about for years to come. For most that was prize enough.

Every boy in school that was old enough to know what boobs were was after that fame.

Bobby Won wanted to win more than anything else in this world. If he had the chance to get his name changed from Bobby Won to Bobby Simpson or win the boob contest, you can bet he would have chosen boobs hands down. He said years from now my parents will be dead. Chances are, I will be dead or lying on my death bed somewhere or other and I may not have accomplished anything in life other than finding out about them two boobs. Still, I would have secured my place in history, same as Abraham Lincoln, Custer and even the fellow who discovered America.

One afternoon during math class, Bobby couldn’t take it any longer, watching Mrs. Greenwoods sitting at her big brown desk at the head of the class, eating some chips she brought from home that she wasn’t able to finish at lunch. When she dropped a couple crumbs on her right breast then brushed them off, that drove Bobby over the edge.

Getting up from his desk, Bobby headed for Mrs. Greenwoods. His eyes were not on the kids he walked by, or on Mrs. Greenwood’s eyes. His eyes were on Mrs. Greenwoods’ monster boobs. He was a man on a mission.

Reaching her desk, but not looking at her, Bobby said Crumbs. Nothing else, just Crumbs. Then, as if he had been doing it all his life, he reached down as if to brush the crumbs off her, but instead he got his finger in between the two buttons holding her shirt together over her monster boobs. With one quick hard jerk, both buttons popped off, one hitting Stacy Zeller just above her right eye. Stacy screamed because she was startled by the flying button. Mrs. Greenwoods screamed when both her bra-covered boobs popped right out of her shirt.

Bobby couldn’t say a word. All he could do was look at the two bra-covered boobs that were a few inches from his face. The two boobs filled her complete bra, no rolls of paper towels, no hand towels or any other objects that didn’t belong there. There was just boob flesh, boob flesh that was trying to poke out of her bra.

Mrs. Greenwoods jumped up from her chair behind the desk, pulling her shirt together as best she could with her left hand, and with her free right hand, she slapped Bobby with all the might she could muster, knocking him to the floor. You would have thought that slap would have knocked the smile off the boy’s face, but if anything, it made him smile even bigger, knowing those crumbs of potato chips and that slap would secure his place in Oklahoma history, if not history throughout the world. Maybe even the people from the island he was born on would raise a statue of him.

Bobby was expelled from school. Mrs. Greenwoods was asked for her resignation because apparently it was against school policy to slap a student with your right hand, even if said student popped your shirt open, exposing your bra and your two monster boobs, thus making you hold your shirt together with your left hand.

Bobby had to move with his folks to Anadarko eight miles away in order to finish school.

Mrs. Greenwoods moved with her husband to a small town in South Dakota.

We heard she and her husband started a sheep farm somewhere not far from the Black Hills.

Chapter Two

After Bruce, Jake, and Gary show up at the park we decided we would go over to Jake’s house to hang out until we either decided on something else to do, or we’d go home to supper. It really didn’t make that much difference. It was exciting enough just being out of school for the summer.

I planned to spend the night with Bruce that night, something I really didn’t care all that much for, but he had been asking me for weeks. I would much rather stay the night with Charlie. His mother always had cake, or homemade candy, something to snack on while watching a few hours of TV.

The only problem with spending the night with Bruce was his seven year old sister Lindsey. Lindsey was a great little girl. She wasn’t always under foot like other girls her age, and she stayed mostly to herself if no friends were around to play dolls or make-up with.

The problem was at night. She slept in the same room as Bruce did. Whenever I spent the night, I slept with Bruce in his big double bed. Lindsey slept on her twin bed on the other side of the room. It never failed. Sometime between midnight and first light, she would wake up screaming at the top of her lungs. She would sit straight up in bed and scream.

The first time it happened, I almost wet myself. I was lying there deep asleep, when all of a sudden she started screaming. I had no clue what was going on, seeing her in the dim light sitting up in bed screaming. I was sure a killer had broken in and was about to Murder Lindsey, then Bruce and myself, then on to his parents. I did what any boy my age would do: I started screaming at the top of my lungs as well.

Bruce sat up looking at me as if all of a sudden I went nuts. Lindsey sat there looking at me the way a young girl looks at that old worn out Bear in the Chickasha zoo as if she were see it for the first time.

Bruce started smiling at me. It’s okay. She has nightmares, he said.

Nightmares! I answered him, still looking at the little girl who was looking back at me.

Yes, happens all the time, he said to me as I lay back down.

By the way, you scream like a little girl, he said snickering.

I made my mind up that would be the last time I would ever spend the night in that house. I like Lindsey a lot, but not enough to sleep in the same room with her. I know that boys my age were not prone to have heart attacks, but one or two more nights of that little girl, my folks would be looking for a spot in the cemetery to put my body.

That’s why Bruce had to ask me over and over to spend the night again. Not until he promised that he would get Lindsey to sleep with her parents, did I say I would.

All went well that night. However, I did hear Lindsey scream out early that morning. It didn’t scare me this time as much, because as hard as I tried, I just couldn’t fall asleep waiting on the little girl to start screaming sometime awful during the night.

After breakfast the next morning, I went home. My grandmother was taking biscuits out of the oven when I got there. You hungry boy? she asked.

After just eating toast and gravy at Bruce’s house, all I could say was, Yes. I wasn’t really hungry, but my grandmother’s biscuits and eggs were to die for. Besides, who was to know if I would be around for lunch. Eat