Memories Of My Journey: Stories From My Youth

By Ed Hearn

My first book, "Memories Of My Journey…Stories From My Youth" includes a variety of short stories that span from the age of five through my early to mid-teenage years. Growing up with two brothers and a sister offered many opportunities to experience life in a unique way during the fifties and sixties. As a family, we went throu

• Language: English
• Publisher: Legacy IV Books
• Release date: Sep 10, 2019
• ISBN: 9781734036916

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Copyright

LEGACY IV BOOKS

Published by Legacy IV Books

[e-mail]

Published 2018 – First Edition

Copyright © 2018 by Ed Hearn

Printed in the United States of America

Set in Times New Roman

Editing and Proofreading by Trent Armbruster

Cover Design and Concept by Sara Morris

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

Dedication

This book is dedicated to my two wonderful children

John Edward Hearn and Matthew Robert Hearn

Contents

Copyright

Dedication

Preface

The Photo

My Earlier Years

Captain Scuttlebutt

New Puppies

Memories from the Past

Magical Christmas

My Younger Brother

First Days of School

First Grade Experiences

The Yo-Yo Contest

My Sister’s Birth

Being with Dad

Great Holiday Memory

Gaining Some Culture

Bows and Arrows

Speed Racers

More Memories from my Earlier Years

The Y in the Road

The Bus Stop

The New House

There Really Is a Santa Claus

Mrs. Trigg

Childhood Memories

Mom’s New Job

A Young Child at Christmas Time

Growing Up on the Lake

Catching Crappie with Dad

Snakes, Snakes and More Snakes

Boy Scout Camp

The Catch of the Day

Fishing the Easy Way

The Night of the Monster Catfish

Lessons Learned

Tell Your Brother You Love Him or Else

An Influential Person

A Day at Cascade Plunge

The Private Phone Call

Fourth of July Excitement

Playing Darts

A Night of Mischief

Blue Ribbon Road Kill

Uncle Jewel’s Christmas Lights

High School Basketball

Crazy Kids

High School Football

One Night at Shoney’s

Tennessee Preparatory School

A Special Cup Full of Memories

About the Author

Preface

My parents were Travis Lee Hearn, Jr., born February 23, 1921, and Alyne Fleta Tidwell Hearn, born September 7, 1919.

Travis Lee Hearn, III was my older brother and born on May 11, 1945. His birth occurred while my dad was in the Navy on the USS Mazama, an ammunition supply ship in the Pacific Ocean, during World War II. My mom had become pregnant shortly after they were married.

The first few years of my life, starting June 26, 1949, were spent in a very small block home that my dad built by himself in 1947 and 1948, which was originally intended to serve as his simple workshop. It was located near the small community of Woodbine, just on the outskirts of Nashville, Tennessee.

Eighteen months after I was born, my younger brother, James Thomas Hearn, arrived on January 8, 1951. We moved to a slightly larger house for our growing family shortly after my sister, Gail Alyne Hearn, was born on December 31, 1955.

Our family was very poor, but Dad was willing to work hard. His first job before joining the military was as a factory worker at Avco in Nashville, where airplane wings were being fabricated for the war. Shortly afterward, the company shifted to manufacturing appliances. After coming back from the Navy, he worked for Moore Handley Hardware Store, which was a large, wholesale supply house for smaller family-owned hardware stores around the South. At the time, we owned one car. It was a beat-up dark blue Plymouth, which my mom used to drive my dad back and forth to work with a car full of kids.

This is the first book in a four-part series titled, Memories of My Journey…Stories from My Youth. It includes only my individual short stories. I mention that fact because there are other books containing some of my stories that were published as a collaborative effort. The names of those books are Pieces of Life and Reflections of Life.

The three other books in this series are named, Experiences Along My Journey…Stories from A Life Well-Lived, Reflections from My Journey…Stories Worth Repeating, and Travels While on My Journey…Major Trips from My Life. I think all of them offer entertaining and thoughtful stories you will enjoy about my life.

The first story in this book is about my dad, who was a special person and a good father. I hope you like it and all the rest that follow.

The Photo

Recently, I walked through our spare bedroom, and for the first time in many years my focus was pulled to a small black and white photo mounted in a silver-colored frame that sat quietly on an end table beside the bed.  That image, in its old frame, captured a special moment when I was only five years old. 

It was a simple photo that showed me with my left arm around my dad’s neck as I leaned toward him, while standing slightly behind his favorite chair.  That old chair of worn red leather, which was badly wrinkled, was located in our small living room.  I remembered the color of the chair, as well as the color of my favorite cap I was wearing, which was two-tone dark blue and yellow with alternating panels on the top. 

In the photo, my dad was slumped down in the chair, where he usually sat shortly after arriving home from a long day at work.  He was wearing a long-sleeve, white starched shirt and blue industrial pants that were considered his work clothes.  We were both smiling and looking directly into the camera. 

Looking at the photo, I could smell the scent of used motor oil coming from my dad’s hands.  He worked with metal parts in a large hardware supply store, and the metal items were always coated with oil to keep them from rusting. 

Dad had reached up behind himself with his right arm and put it around me in an effort to give me a hug.  His hair was still dark black and had not yet become solid white, which was the way I remembered him most.  At the time that picture was taken, he was only thirty-three years old. 

I stared at that old photo for a long time in deep reflection as if I had never seen it before.   Many fond memories of my dad began to move slowly through my mind.  I remembered how much time he had spent with me over the years as we went hunting, fishing and boating together. I remembered how we worked together on various projects around the house where he was always determined to teach me the correct way to get things accomplished.   

He told me regularly, I’m not always going to be here to show you how to do these things, so you need to watch and learn. You will need to know how to teach your own children.

My dad was that way, and he did it all with love in his heart.  He was a kind man who was devoted to his family, and we all knew it.  He has been gone now for twenty-three years.  I miss him.  That photo on the table quietly reminded me that time constantly moves forward and continually removes people we care about from our lives. 

In my adult life, I married and had two sons to whom I tried to pass along the same qualities my dad gave to me.   Both sons have now grown up and are fine young men of which I am very proud.  Maybe one day, they will be able to look at an old photo of me and have the same positive feelings I experienced recently when I noticed that picture with my dad…one that had been ignored for too long.

My Earlier Years

I remember quite a lot about my earlier years during the time my family lived at 89 Elberta Street in Nashville, Tennessee. Dad built our small house just before I was born in 1949, and according to Mom’s memory, she and Dad spent only $400 on materials for its initial construction. Many years ago, she showed me her old paperwork with an inventory of the cost. I was amazed at how cheaply the house had been built.

At the time, my dad worked at Moore Handley Hardware Store, which was a large, wholesale supply house near the fairgrounds. He was a jack-of-all-trades type of guy and worked in the tool crib taking care of all the tools and supplies. Most of his spare time went into building our house after work. It was a simple rectangle built on a concrete slab with concrete block sides. Inside, there were just a few windows and only a few wall dividers that separated the open space. Outside, there was a small front porch with two square support posts holding up a tiny, pitched roof. Most of the inside concrete floor was covered with dark green vinyl tiles on which I remember playing with scraps of angled wood that I imagined being little ships. I’d cruise them all over the cold floor while still wearing diapers.

One of my earliest recollections was a time when I was two and a half years old and my younger brother, Jim, was one. Mom was rocking Jim and me in a wooden rocking chair. She sang and hummed softly to us as she rocked back and forth. We were held closely, and both of us knew instinctively we were loved. When we got tired, she would put us in a crib with vertical prison-like wood slats that was positioned near the kitchen. Looking out, I would cry myself to sleep while listening to an oscillating fan and the sounds of our old clothes washer across the room.

I remember on warm days, looking through the open doorway that faced the backyard, seeing brightly colored clothes hanging from our clothesline blowing in the wind. In the evenings, Mom would clang dishes in the sink while cleaning up after dinner. She generally had a small cream-colored radio playing soft music nearby. One song Mom loved went like this.

Sugar in the morning, sugar in the evening, sugar at supper time; be my little sugar and love me all the time.

She would sing along as she wiped the dishes dry and put them in the dish drainer beside the sink.

During that time, we only owned one car, as did most people during the early to mid-1950s. In the evenings, Mom drove the car to Moore Handley with Travis, Jim and me to pick up Dad after work. We would usually arrive early and wait outside. During our wait, Mom would try her best to keep us under control because we always seemed to fight or play aggressively in the back seat.

One day, Dad came out to the car and told Mom, I want to take the boys into the building and show them where I work.

Mom said it was fine, and that she would wait in the car.

I was excited and quickly got out of the car and entered through the large front doors with my two brothers and my dad. As we walked through the warehouse, I saw the large, open areas in the back with lights hanging high in the ceiling. Dad showed us the small area where he worked, which was about midway back in the warehouse. There were large concrete floors and a variety of inventory with cardboard boxes stacked everywhere on metal racks. We walked up to the front offices that were much different and saw wooden desks, beautiful moldings and nice pictures on the walls. That was where the owner and salespeople worked during the day. They had already gone home, and there was no one in the front offices when we walked through.

One time when we went to pick up Dad, Mom let us get out of the car, and we wandered up a small dirt bank to the back of the building near the loading docks. Before she knew it, we were on our butts sliding down the dirt hillside. After three or four trips down, we had worn a slick spot on the bank. That allowed us to pick up some speed on our next ride down. Mom saw how dirty we were getting and put a stop to it. Before we got in the car, there was plenty of dusting the dirt off our butts to get rid of the yellow-red clay from our pants. We had been having a ball, but our fun was cut short.

Just a few years ago, I drove past that building, that can now be seen from the interstate, and saw the dirt bank in the very back. Fond memories of sliding down that hillside with my brothers, over sixty years earlier, flashed through my mind.

I remember early winter mornings when I was five. All of us kids would rush into the kitchen to stand around a small, black cast iron stove that burned wood logs in the center of the room. Mom and Dad would have gotten up earlier to have it burning and putting off heat before we came in to eat breakfast. As we stood near the stove, we would watch Mom cook eggs and bacon. We had to be very careful and not touch the sides of the hot stove or we’d get badly burned.

Mom would sit at the kitchen table after breakfast and read through the morning newspaper. She would catch up on what was happening in Nashville and always checked out the horoscope section. Mom was always interested in astrology and enjoyed the daily predictions. She believed strongly in what was written.

Sometimes, during those early days before starting school, I would watch Mom give herself a hair permanent in the middle of the day. The brand she used was Toni and its kit included pink plastic rollers and white papers to wrap her hair around. She would look into a small round mirror on a metal stand and apply the liquid chemical solution to her hair. After the treatment was completed and her hair dried, it would be wavy and full of curls. The part I vividly remember was the strong, undesirable smell of that solution. It would linger in the house for hours after she finished.

Jim recently asked me to include in this story one of the times when the two of us went outside and played in the dirt. We were very little guys and still in diapers. Jim and I wet the dirt and formed it into little mud cakes. After patting out a few of those, it was time for me to take a bite. I remember eating one of those tasteless mud pies and thinking nothing about it.

Mom found out about a week later what I’d done when she changed my diaper and found a couple of small earthworms in my pants. As was explained by our doctor, the mud contained the eggs of worms that had hatched inside me. After maturing, the worms crawled out of my butt and into the diaper. That caused a stir at the Hearn household, and I was instructed to never eat dirt again.

Captain Scuttlebutt

At bedtime, when my two brothers and I were very little, Dad would gather us in our big bed to tell stories before we went to sleep. The ones we loved the most were the stories about Captain Scuttlebutt, a make-believe sailor in the Navy.

When Dad would say, It’s time to get in bed. I’ll tell you one or two stories if you’ll hurry, I would always rush to be the first, so I could climb up in his arms.

We would get very quiet and listen to every word as Dad made his stories come to life. We never wanted the stories to end because they were so entertaining. In my mind, I was right there in the middle of each adventure.

Captain Scuttlebutt was a daring character that lived on the high seas. Each night he got into some new dilemma, and Dad would find a way for him to come out as a hero.

At that time, I didn’t know where he came up with his adventures of Captain Scuttlebutt, but when I was older, it was obvious those events where centered on what had happened to him while he was in the Navy.

Dad had joined the Navy near the end of the Second World War in 1944 when he was 23 years old. That was during the last period of heavy war activity. He was stationed on a large supply ship in the middle of the Pacific Ocean near some of the intense fighting. His ship was huge. Dad told us it was as long as two football fields. There were small anti-aircraft guns on its deck to discourage enemy planes, but the ship relied mainly on protection given by other gunships that traveled close by.

Dad’s biggest fear while on the supply ship had to do with the fact it was carrying large quantities of live ammunition, along with food, clothes, gasoline and medicines needed by all the other ships. The Japanese planes were always looking for the supply ships because they were easy targets, if not surrounded by other fighting gunships. Torpedoes from enemy submarines and suicide Kamikaze planes were feared by everyone on board. They seemed to come out of nowhere. Dad told us about seeing both.

I remember him describing the first time he spotted a live torpedo heading toward the ship. Everyone panicked when the horn sounded, indicating the ship was under attack. He got a brief look at the long, white line near the surface heading directly for his ship as he ran for general quarters, which was his position during a time of danger. The