You Should Have Been There

By Richard Norton

So many people have told me I should write a book because I almost always could come up with a true story for most any situation happening. So I am succumbing to all the prompting and writing down the many stories I have stored in me. It's impossible to just sit down and write everything at once. I have to wait until an event happens that triggers my memory. For instance, when I was in the army, I recorded many of the happenings of army life that I thought funny or unusual. Stories I write will mostly be about other people that happened into my life and not necessarily about me, but I was there, an observer as much as a participant. I've relied on the opinions of generous friends who think my stories are worthwhile. I'm fortunate to have crossed paths with many luminaries and have been exposed to lots of humanity, both good and bad.

I went from high school into army intelligence for three years during the Korean War. After being discharged, I attended Wayne State University for one year and sold cars for a short while. Then I went to the Chrysler Engineering Institute. I graduated from Chrysler and became a body design engineer. After a while, big layoffs got me looking for employment again, and I went to work as a mechanical engineer for several years at companies that were into the space programs. I drifted into acting and modeling and was one of the most working models around Detroit. I was in over one hundred movies and TV commercials in that career for nineteen years and worked all over the country.

In 1980, I moved to the Palm Beach area in Florida and, after a short time engineering again, was hired as a salesman at one of the largest art galleries in the world. I spent sixteen years at the gallery and then retired as part owner. In retirement now, I occupy my time painting, golfing, and cruising around the waters in my boat. This book is about the unusual happenings in my varied life and of the many famous people I met and worked with. Every story is true and written as best I can recollect.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jan 15, 2016
• ISBN: 9781504964524

Richard Norton

I was born in the Detroit East Side General Hospital, one of the first babies born in that new hospital. My birth was one of the front page headlines in the Detroit News newspaper that day. It read: Beauty Queen Now Rules Nursery. A few years earlier, my mother had won the title of the most beautiful teen in America.

Book preview

AuthorHouse™

1663 Liberty Drive

Bloomington, IN 47403

www.authorhouse.com

Phone: [phone]

© 2016 Richard Norton. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 1/13/2016

ISBN: 978-1-5049-6451-7 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-6452-4 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015920027

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

8339.png

Contents

Foreword

My formative years

My Uncle Ralph

The Ford Willow Run bomber factory

My first paid job

Salt mine under and around Detroit

High school baseball

Traveling with my father

Arthur Murray and dancing

My 3 years in the Army

First Christmas in the Army

Troop ship to Germany

First Christmas in Germany

Some very short stories

The dog and the hare

Army athletics

Surprised at Nuns

Visiting Paris

Delivering a Christmas basket of goodies

Christmas shopping in Copenhagen

Swapping Holiday Greetings with the Russians

From soldier to civilian

Marriage and College

Lost wife

At Wayne University

Golf with an older little lady

First painting sale and getting into acting

Lookalikes

I loved speed

Help on the golf course

Gears and other engineering

Vacation in Aspen

A winter rally near Detroit

CEO of a box Company

The spat

Selling Real Estate

Singing in a night club for a comedian

Fish fly season

At our favorite bar after a rehearsal or performance

Performing at a nursing home.

Voice projection

Actors blowing their lines

People in the mall thinking I was a mannequin

Ad for Marlboro

A directive from President Nixon

Insulation OOPS!!!!!!

Coca Cola

Illustrating a book

The tailor

A frigid job with a bunny

Feature for Playboy magazine

Being cast in a TV series

Like a scene from a TV show or movie

Judge at Miss Michigan contest

Hallmark audition

Ad for a steel company

As a motorcycle cop

Movie with Wally Schirra, the Astronaut

Meeting Gordie Howe

Marathon gasoline commercial

The Billboard for Corby’s

A model we’ll call Joe

SAG party with Kathleen Freeman

Move to Florida

Burt Reynolds Theater

Commercial with Buzz Aldrin, the Astronaut

Senior Olympics and fire ants.

Modeling for a soft cover book.

Illustrating a book sponsored by Liz Taylor

Big city and K-Mart

Vacation to Nova Scotia

Meeting Will Sampson

Short comments on some luminaries

The Judge

Two week vacation in Hawaii

Time with Jack Paar

Michael Pearman, a friend who knew everyone.

Another trip to Las Vegas

Opera

Michael Caine

Retirement

Designing and building my cottage

Hospitals for atrial fibrillation and cancer

Hospital error. A close call.

Stopped by a highway patrolman

FOREWORD

So many people have told me I should write a book because I almost always could come up with a true story for most any situation happening. So I am succumbing to all the prompting and writing down the many stories I have stored in me. It’s impossible to just sit down and write everything at once. I have to wait until an event happens that triggers my memory. For instance, when I was in the Army, I recorded many of the happenings of Army life that I thought funny or unusual. Stories I write will mostly be about other people that happened into my life and not necessarily about me, but I was there an observer as much as a participant. I’ve relied on the opinions of generous friends who think my stories are worthwhile. I’m fortunate to have crossed paths with many luminaries and have been exposed to lots of humanity, both good and bad. I went from high school into Army Intelligence for 3 years during the Korean War. After being discharged I attended Wayne State U. for one year and sold cars for a short while. Then I went to the Chrysler Engineering Institute. I graduated from Chrysler and became a body design engineer. After a while, big layoffs got me looking for employment again and I went to work as a mechanical engineer for several years at companies that were into the Space programs. I drifted into acting and modeling and was one of the most working models around Detroit. I was in over 100 movies and TV commercials in that career for 19 years and worked all over the country. In 1980 I moved to the Palm Beach area in Florida and after a short time engineering again, was hired as a salesman at one of the largest art galleries in the World. I spent 16 years at the gallery and then retired as part owner. In retirement now, I occupy my time painting, golf, and cruising around the waters in my boat. This book as about the unusual happenings in my varied life and of the many famous people I met and worked with. Every story is true and written as best I can recollect.

My formative years

I was born in the Detroit East Side General Hospital, one of the first babies born in that new hospital. My birth was one of the front age headlines in the Detroit News newspaper that day. It read: BEAUTY QUEEN NOW RULES NURSERY. A few years earlier my mother had won the title of the most beautiful teen in America.

1.tif

I figure that was the equivalent of today’s Miss Teen Age America. She was offered Hollywood contracts, but since she was dating my father his family had her reject the offers. The date of my birth was also auspicious as an anniversary of Custer’s Massacre, June 25. It also happens to be the date the Korean War began. The ups and downs of my life have gone to extremes to this day, and therein lay all the stories. I was brought home from the hospital to where my parents lived. My father was an undertaker and worked for his father. Our Funeral Home was the largest and oldest in Detroit and had been started by my great grandfather. It wasn’t far from downtown Detroit. Of course the first couple of years I have no memory of, but I do remember things about living there the next three years of my life. The Funeral Home had 4 floors. The first floor was for the kitchen and dining and large rooms for the funerals. The second floor was large bedrooms where the family members stayed. Each had it’s own bath. The third floor had apartments and a dormitory for the hired help. The fourth floor was a dance and party hall. The house had an elevator, dumb waiter, front and back stairways. In the basement was the embalming room, billiard parlor, and laundry room. The garage was huge and attached to the house. It had a turntable so when the hearse was driven in to the turntable, it could be turned around so it could be driven out frontwards all the time. There was a fish pond in the lot adjacent to the house and it had a duct so the fish could come indoors to the indoor pond for the winter. When I could walk and get around by myself I was free to wander anywhere in the house. When I wandered into the garage, the men would let me stand on the turntable and they would give me like a Merry-go-round ride. I had a very happy time and got lots of love from everyone. We had a parrot in the kitchen, named Polly (of course), and I used to play around it. Even the parrot liked me and I could get closer than anyone. I’m surprised I can remember things from when I was only 3 or 4 years old. I remember lots of things before I was 9. I’ll put a couple more in here. My mom divorced my dad and we went to live with my grandparents who were wonderful. I was too young to remember when this happened, but was told about it when I was in my teens. I fell down a flight of stairs in my walker as a baby. My face was smashed and my nose shoved over under one eye. I didn’t get taken to a hospital or doctor. My grandmother just pushed my nose back where it belonged, but it was crooked for the rest of my life and I could never breathe through one nostril. Another story that my mother and grandmother often told was about me when I was around 4 years old. It’s very short, but every time my grandmother or mother told it everyone would break up laughing. One time my mother was out and I was left with my grandmother. In the evenings my grandmother used to either crochet or read True Story magazine. When she read True Story magazine she always ate crackers with limburger cheese. One night my mother came home and found my grandmother sitting in a chair laughing her head off. She wasn’t reading or anything and the radio wasn’t even on. She was alone and laughing violently. My mother went to her, wondering what was so funny. My grandmother couldn’t even speak she was laughing so hard. My mother kept asking what happened. My grandmother, still laughing, got up and pointed to the bathroom. They both went to the bathroom and there I was. I adored my grandmother and because she liked limburger cheese I wanted some too. They found me with my head over the toilet and a towel stuffed in my mouth and me trying to wipe out the limburger cheese. Then both of them laughed. I was so cute. We lived with them through my kindergarten year at the local school. Then mom got a new husband who didn’t want any kids around. So my baby sister and I were boarded at a licensed boarding home run by a very mean couple. I was just in first grade and my sister only 4 years old. Being boarded at this home was like a cruelty scene from the movie ANNIE. I only had to walk a few hundred feet to get to the grade school. My little sister would sometimes toddle over the school to play in its big sandbox. We had no supervision except when we did something that the couple watching over us didn’t like we’d get punished by making us hold our hands and arms over our heads until the pain was so great we couldn’t take any more. We were not allowed in the bathroom to the toilet, but each kid had their own potty kept under our beds. Sometimes we would be locked in a closet with our potty as punishment. My sister and I would cry and scream when my parents came to visit. I won’t mention other happenings here, but they loved punishing all of us kids and we seldom knew why. After a year or so, mom had us taken out of there and we were boarded with another family that was wonderful. The father in the family drove a truck for a casket company and had been delivering caskets to our funeral homes for years. That’s how the families met. This made the third school I had to adapt to within 3 years. This family had a son that was 2 years older than me but we got along great, though he bullied me a bit at times because he was bigger than me. When we both grew up, he was much shorter than me and I could throw him in the pool. Their son eventually became my brother in law. Mom’s husband that had us boarded out is one of the men who started the ORIGINAL PANCAKE HOUSE restaurants. Mom divorced him after a couple of years. Then I was sent to live with my father for a year at his new funeral home which was across the street from the largest school athletic field in the whole city of Detroit. I could run across the street and find other kids to play with. I was only 8 years old and in my 4th school. The grade school, intermediate school, and Northwestern High School were all located next to one another at this enormous playground. Often I would run across the street to the playground when men were playing baseball and I would chase the foul balls for them and throw the ball back into the game. I think that had a lot to do with my strong throwing arm when I grew and became a pitcher. My little sister went with mom back to my grandparents. That year was 1939, the year of the first Detroit race riots. From the windows of our school rooms we could watch the soldiers camped on our playground. Then my mother found another man and married him. At one time he had worked for my grandfather in the funeral home. He bought a newly built house in area of Detroit that was developing. My sister and I finally had a real home. It was a bungalow with only 2 bedrooms, but had a full attic and basement. Our new stepfather was very good to mom and us 2 kids. The local grade school was about 3/4 of a mile away and we walked to school every day, rain or shine. From the ages of 5 through 10 I had already gone to 5 different schools. This new school we had to attend was Detroit’s experimental school where they would test all kinds of things to be used in the school system. So we were taught many things that were not in the usual grade school curriculum. In the 4th grade we were taught languages such as Spanish, French, and Latin. In gym class, not only did we do the usual gym things, but also the Olympic Decathalon sports and dancing. Imagine, being in grade school and taught to waltz, fox trot, western dancing, and tango. At the time, I accepted it as just normal schooling, but years later found that it put me way ahead of other kids when I got in high school. I was popular with the girls because I knew how to dance. Also I made the high school varsity baseball team when only a freshman. One big thing that was discovered about me was my artistic talent for drawing and painting. Through my grade school art teacher I was sponsored by the city of Detroit to take special training at the Detroit Art Museum. I guess I was some sort of prodigy. I attended that for a couple of years. In my spare time at the museum or before I left to go home, I would wander through the museum and enjoy everything it had to offer. That served well through many occupations I had throughout my life. Later in this book I talk more about my art and what I did with it. World War 2 broke out and I had gained 2 more sisters with my new stepfather. During the war my stepfather and mother both went to work in the factories to help the war effort. I had to take care of all my sisters, the baby still in diapers. That was a lot of responsibility for a boy only 10 to 14 years old, but I handled it. The knowledge did come in handy after I was married and had children of my own because I had to teach my wife those things.

2.tif

My Uncle Ralph

When WW2 started I was 10 years old. Shortly after it started, my mother’s brother enlisted in the Army Air Force. That’s what it was called back then. My uncle Ralph was my hero as I grew up, mostly because of all the stories my grandfather would tell me about my uncle’s baseball prowess. My uncle went to work for the Detroit Edison company right after high school. It was the only company he worked for all his life except for his military years. He had built his own radio when he was 9 years old and was a ham operator all his life. When I would visit him he’d let me sit in on his ham radio transmissions all over the world and let me talk to the person on the other end. That was thrilling for a little kid like me. He was