Cherokeean Herald (Rusk, Tex.), Vol. 159, No. 17, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 18, 2008 Page: 3 of 16
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Cljei'okeeai} Herald ■ thecherokeean.com
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
3A
EDITORIAL BOARD
Whitehead Enterprises Inc.
publisher
MARIE WHITEHEAD
editor
TERRIE W. GONZALEZ
managing editor
FAST I f°rward
Where does the buck stop in Austin?
A terrible fire at the
Governor's Mansion
in Austin left punc-
tures in the roof,
water-soaked wood and
holes in our hearts.
The likely cause: arson.
My sorrow for this ir-
replaceable, 152-year-old
piece of Texas history has
transformed into anger.
How did this happen?
Texas Gov. Rick Perry
moved out of the home
last October so that a $10
million renovation project
could begin. Only $1.8 mil-
lion of the work had been
completed, and no one was
hving in the mansion when
the fire started June 9.
A single, Department
of Public Safety trooper
was on guard at a car-
riage house at the rear of
the property. The Austin
American-Statesman re-
ported last Wednesday that
some of the video surveil-
lance cameras were not
operational.
Where does the buck stop
on this goof-up?
As a native Texan, as a
taxpayer, as someone who
loves the very foundations
of this great state, I want
to know why there was
only one trooper and why
cameras weren't opera-
tional.
Only two years ago. Gov.
Perry chopped $5 mil-
TERRIE GONZALEZ
herald@mediactr.com
hon into a border security
camera system that would
allow home computer users
the ability to monitor the
Texas-Mexico border via
webcam
The idea was to create a
modern-day border posse
and have all of us volun-
teer recruits peering at
our computers, watching
for bushes to move in the
black of night and call the
authorities.
A Border Patrol officer
said the concept was not
practical. He said that
well-intentioned phone
calls would overextend the
capabilities of Border Pa-
trol and bog them down.
Other critics said the bor-
der cameras were a useless
duplication of technology
already in place and called
the plan "out of focus," The
website, www.texasborder-
watch.com, quietly closed
amidst questions of wheth-
er the surveillance system
was even legal.
Gov. Perry tried to create
an emotional frenzy when
he came up with this cocka-
mamie idea to stop border
crossings and save us from
illegal immigrants wanting
to come here and get a job.
Forget about the real
terrorists, who slipped into
the United States through
Canada.
Gov. Perry's idea of
securing the homeland is
to put up webcams on the
Rio Grande and ask all of
us citizens to monitor it for
free.
The Texas Historical
Commission is still trying
to determine if the mansion
is a total loss or whether
it can be restored. And of
course, it's too early to have
cost estimates to repair the
mansion.
Just once, I'd like to hear,
"The buck stops here on
my watch. I apologize to
all Texans for wasting $5
million of their money on
a useless camera system
on the border. I know now
that money could have
been better spent on other
things, like fixing property
taxes or funding educa-
tion.''
Working cameras at the
Governor's mansion would
be a great place to start.
SCENE I in Passing
H
The Overall Club meets
quarterly at 11 a.m. and
continues until everyone
leaves for their naps.
ow quickly time
flies. School finally
came to a conclusion.
Splash Day officially
opened the swimming sea-
son and the annual Tomato
Fest was celebrated. The
suggestion that our favorite
fruit/vegetable might be the
culprit in spreading salmo-
nella failed to dampen folks'
appreciation for an art
form in everyone's kitchen.
I mean, who can eat sand-
wiches or hamburgers with-
out sliced tomatoes? There
will surely be another cause pinpointed.
How can anything so delicious be bad?
It was good to receive a phone call
last week from your friend, our friend.
Dickey McGaughey. He and spouse Rena
have lived on beautiful Emerald Bay
since retirement. This is near Tyler but
they actually have a Bullard address.
He presents a question which I prom-
ised to share with you all. The missing
information stems from a photo we re-
cently published. Do you recall the photo
of Adam Hicks in the June 4 issue of
the Cherokeean Herald announcing his
participation in the high school all star
team?
The backdrop for
the picture was a
sign saluting the
Eagles' past histo-
ry of achievements
in baseball. Years
of victories in
playoffs — district
champs, bi-district
champs and regional tiles — began with
1965 all the way to 2003.
By now, you may have guessed, or
perhaps you noticed it when you saw
the picture, but a very winning period of
time Was omitted from the sign.
This is the way Coach McGaughey
phrased it. "Omitted is any reference
to the District and Bi-District Cham-
pionships won by the 1967 Rusk Eagle
Baseball team.
"This was the first year the Eagles
advanced to regional. This was my first
year to coach in Rusk. We beat Little Cy-
press for bi-district and lost to Kount.ze
for the regional championship.
"The School annual does not reflect
anything about the baseball team be^
cause it (the annual) was published be-
fore the season ended. I am sure this can
be validated by veteran, die hard base-
ball fans still in Rusk such as Wayne
Townsend or Mike Crysup. Steve (Mike's
brother) was our centerfielder. At any
rate, someone might want to make that
correction on the sign.''
Well, it's a hard ball to throw a histo-
rian when the very nature of all history
must rest on a firm bed of truth. To
Coach McGaughey's urgent request for
truth in publication, we can only add a
second to his motion. Now, do some of
you wish to add your memories of that
time frame or, do you have thoughts
for how to fix the problem? Deliberate
mistakes, errors, are not possible. They
are accidents and something was over-
looked. And don't think for a minute that
MARIE WHITEHEAD
mwhitehead@mediactr.com
anybody is accusing any-
body. This is called track
adjustment.
When historians fail
to correct past mistakes,
the ground has been lev-
eled for future playing,
over the past errors. And
baseball fans do not cozy
up to errors. I vote for a
new sign that has been
corrected.
Do I hear any votes of
"yes?'' Send your thoughts
and/or money ASAP.
It would have been diffi-
cult to fill this space today without help
from Coach McGaughey. He says that he
and Rena still miss their time in Rusk,
"We consider these some of the best
years we have had.''
This bit of information verifies Dick-
ey's true feelings.
"A lot of us old(er) Alto boys have
decided to meet for lunch each quarter
to fellowship and tell old 'war stories'
about our youth and complain about all
our ailments. We currently meet the
last Thursday of each quarter at Jan
Pate's Legends restaurant on Hwy. 84
west in Rusk. Our next meeting will be
Thursday, June 26.
We arrive about 11
a.m. and stay until
everyone leaves for
their nap. Since most
of us are retired and
spend our leisure
time in our overalls
and coveralls, we are
informally the 'Over-
all Club' and encourage those attending
to wear theirs. This get together is open
to any guy that attended Alto schools,
regardless of age. Any publicity the
Cherokeean Herald can provide will be
appreciated since We are just beginning
these meetings.''
He closed by sending greetings to ev-
eryone from Emerald Bay.
Well, your writer did not attend school
in Alto, but I have a deep, abiding love
for AISD. I am not a boy and don't have
any overalls, so you might think I could
not qualify for membership in the Over-
all Club. But see that phrase above, "and
complain about all our ailments,"' Well,
that does qualify my attendance because
I suspect I have more ailments than all
those fellows put together.
It is so good when former friends in an
earlier time stop to remember. This new
club has my best wishes...and I wouldn't
think of crashing their party well maybe
for just a couple of minutes? But I did
attend SFA. Does that count?
Condolences are conveyed to the
bereaved families of Mary Ella Bolton
and Birdie Jones MoGill. Good wishes
for continued better health are extended
to our own Sam Florian, Ike Daniel and
Jim Turner, right here in the Bonner
Street neighborhood and across town
to Houston and Freddye White off U.S.
Highway 84 East and Mildred Chapman
off Wight man Lane. What we like to see
is full and complete recovery. Raymond
Ross Vermillion is one of these.
Keep smiling. The best is yet to come.
a
lIMik
IKlMEIi®
lMiMiiyjca
&
77
III
©
©
1
Published weekly each
Wednesday by
WHITEHEAD
ENTERPRISES, INC.
Texas' oldest continuously published
weekly newspaper, established as the
Cherokee Sentinel, Feb. 27,1850.
Consolidation of The Cherokeean
The Alto Herald and the Wells News
& Views
ecaij
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Marie Whitehead
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(903) 683-2257 ext. 105
mwhitehead@mediactr. com
Terrie Gonzalez
managing editor
(903) 683-2257 ext. 107
herald@mediactr.com
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advertising sales
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rgonzalez@mediactr. com
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general news
(903) 683-2257 ext. 106
news@mediactr.com
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general news
(903) 683-2257ext. 109
chreporter@mediactr.com
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classifieds, subscriptions
(903) 683-2257 ext. 100
classifiedads@mediactr. com
Sam Florian
advertising sales
(903) 683-2257 ext. 103
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HIGH POINTS !*■ El Camino Real
Summer is in full
swing and the
Fourth of July is just
around the corner.
Folks around here are
coming and going along El
Camino Real heading to or
coming from their favorite
summer vacation spots.
It might be a fishing hole
around here or an airplane
trip to a foreign land. It's
different strokes for dif-
ferent folks, and hopefully
everyone is getting to do
what they want to. People coming and
going hke they axe makes it pretty easy to
gather up four bits' worth of news, if I can
stop long enough to find anything out.
Kevin Blakemorei, an Alto High School
junior was seriously injured in a car ac-
cident in Rusk on Saturday. Kevin is a
nice young man who has a lot of friends
pulling for him. The last word I heard wag
encouraging, but we need to keep him in
our prayers for a full recovery.
Jimmy Selman flagged me down in
town last week to tell me about a summer
vacation trip to the Dominican Republic.
Jimmy had never flown in an airplane
before, so Alto Café owner Barry Bonier
carried Jimmy up to the Cherokee County
Airport and took him for a ride in his
plane to prepare him for the trip.
With the help from Barry, Jimmy was
ready to fly when the group headed out on
June 2. The travelers consisted of Jimmy
Selman and his mom Billie Selman, along
with Randy and Shanna Selman and their
daughter Josie, Juanita Hicks, and two
other couples.
I think Jimmy said their last names
were Barry and Sadler. The group flew
out of Houston to Miami and then on to
the Dominican Republic. Jimmy said that
when he got there he just roamed around
and looked at all the tropical birds and
other critters that you don't see around
Alto.
He spent the rest of the first day just
checking out the beach. On Thursday
they took a tour of the whole island and
he said that it was pretty interesting
—specially the way they harvest their
sugar cane using oxen to pull loads out of
the fields.
Jimmy said that all the people were
very nice to him wherever he went. I
guess Jimmy and I are looking for the
same thing when we go somewhere. If the
people aren't friendly, I don't care any-
thing about giving them my money. On
Friday night they went to some kind of big
dancing show.
The rest of the trip was spent relax-
ing and enjoying the tropics before they
headed back to East Texas and home.
That place probably wouldn't be very in-
viting during hurricane season, so we are
glad that the home folks got home before
all that starts up.
Christie and Gary Davis' boys were
raising a ruckus in town last week while
CHRIS DAVIS
elcaminoreal@consolidated.net
their mother was working
in Terry Black's office.
Somebody showed the
boys how to do their arms
up and down and make
the 18-wheelers passing
through blow their air
horns.
With all the oil field
trucks coming through town
the boys had plenty of op-
portunity to try their luck.
The trucks just kept blow-
ing until the boys finally
tired of the game and went
back inside.
I'm glad somebody is taking time to
teach httle boys important things hke
this. I spent many an hour making big
trucks blow their horns when I was a kid,
and I don't know whether I've taken the
time to teach my boys the trick.
A big thanks to the these boys for
reminding me of a fun memory from my
past. Keep'em honking, boys!
Youth from A Frank Smith United Meth-
odist Church just returned from a mission
trip to Ceta Canyon Methochst Retreat in
the Palo Duro C anyon south of Amarillo.
The young men and women worked hard
making improvements to the camp and
helping some of its special visitors. Young
people learning to work for others is a
very special thing to be a part of. I'm sure
those West Texas folks got a real blessing
from a great bunch of Alto kids.
The great tomato scare of 2008 seems
to be drawing to an end, and hopefully we
didn't lose anyone around here.
I don't know much about salmonella or
how dangerous it is, but if you have looked
at the prices of tomatoes in the grocery
store lately you would be more likely to
drop dead of price shock than Salmonella.
I feel really lucky that I survived the
whole ordeal and wound up with the nic-
est crop of tomatoes that I've ever grown.
I just wish that my neighbor Virgil
Schochler was still around so I could show
off a httle bit. The main problem that I'm
experiencing now is not salmonella, it's
small bread slices.
I can't find any bread big enough to hold
one of my slab tomato shces, much less a
piece of bacon long enough to reach across
a slice. The challenges that I'm forced to
deal with everyday are more than most
people could bear.
I wish I knew something else that
needed telling but this just about winds
it up for now. I guess in the next issue I
could tell you about all the people who are
just staying under the air conditioning
everyday and saving their sweat.
I don't' know what folks are going to do
with all of that sweat they are saving up.
I've been giving mine up freely every time
I step outside.
If anything is going on around your
place, I'd appreciate it if you'd let me
know. I'll see ya next week! And remem-
ber, The love we give, is the only love
we keep!
K
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Whitehead, Marie. Cherokeean Herald (Rusk, Tex.), Vol. 159, No. 17, Ed. 1 Wednesday, June 18, 2008, newspaper, June 18, 2008; Rusk, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth152839/m1/3/: accessed May 8, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Singletary Memorial Library.