1979 I. H. Hall, Sr. House

79 0131 04
January 31, 1979
The I. H. Hall, Sr. house on Georgia Avenue dated back to 1908. A standard L-shaped structure with chimneys on the two side gables. Clayton Stephens told me that Mr. Hall moved to Soperton from Dodge County. His sons became prominent in the community. Banker R. A. Perry told me of having lunch with Mr. Hall and Mrs. Dolly every Friday -- a big baked fish. The house was never painted inside, but when Mrs. Dolly insisted enough, Mr. Hall hired painters who took lots of time painting and delaying on the front. That would alleviate Mrs. Dolly's pressing. The painters moved on before the job was done.
The Hall's unplanted garden spot (adjoining our backyard) was a playground for me and my siblings when we were growing up.
After Mrs. Dolly and her sister, Lee Gillis, were both deceased, I bought the property and later sold the house to Willie Shivers, Jr., who moved it to First St. (now MLK Drive).

Others that week: Railroad repairs, Eagle Mark Hutcheson, Lions Club program, Basketball.

The accompanying color picture of the I. H. Hall lot was made today, as it provides parking at Sammons Funeral Home.
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Signs from the Sign Man 01/30/09

Remember To Pray for Buddy Rogers.

Congratulations Katisha F. Chatman, Dean's List, GA Southern University. May God continue to bless.

Happy 39th Birthday Mike Kight. We love you. Family and Friends.
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1974 Freeman Miller's Mule

74 0130 01
January 30, 1974
Freeman Miller had no concern for fuel prices, as the mule he used to plow gardens also provided his transportation. When Police Chief A. J. Posey wrote a ticket for parking on the wrong side of the street, Freeman explained that it was the mule's idea. Miller, Posey, and all standing out of camera range had a good laugh. Alas, in 2009, there's hardly any mules in town. Will the recession give us another thought about mule-power?

Others that week: Junior 4-H, 3rd grade mural and bulletin board, Defender Rehabilitation program by Coueys and Kight, a new house, Mrs. Edge's class visit the printing plant, 6-7 grade Social Science Fair, and many basketball photos.
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Signs from the Sign Man 01/29/09

THS Class of 79: Kelly Collins, one of the best drummers in THS history.

Happy 13th Birthday, Shacouria Jackson. Love, Mom, Dad, and family.

Double-R-Signs: Birthdays, Anniversaries. (Congratulations, too.)

Cemetery Lawn Care Services
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Signs from the Sign Man 01/26/09

We will honor the Class of 79 til June. See it online also.

THS Class of 79: Cheryl Burns, Angie Meeks, Denise Posey, Marcie Salter.

Ricky Reese. Double-R-Signs. Class of 79 is online.

God bless the President.
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Southeast Georgia Today

For those who haven't already seen it, check out

http://www.southeastgeorgiatoday.com

If you've already been tuning into the Vidalia Communications website, you know that you are already being transferred to Southeast Georgia Today.
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1979 THS Outdoor Education

79 0124 02
January 24, 1979
H. H. Glisson's outdoor education class hiked from Soperton to Sweat's Barbecue. The Soperton Sign Man made the trip, but not this picture. Other members of the Class of 79 are shown. (Photo at the railroad overpass.)

Others that week: TPS kids, wreck at Main St. and First St. (now MLK Drive), Sportsmen Club officers and directors, and lots of basketball.
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1979 THS Class Graduates Mug Shots

Newspaper photos of 79 grads. Pages shot by handheld camera.

Signs from the Sign Man 01/23/09

In Memory of T. C. Little, great leader and friend. Pray for his family.
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1974 Experienced Teachers

74 0123 04
January 23, 1974
Teachers serving 25 years or more (l-r): June Harrell, Bernice Young, Laura Hall, Pauline Blount, Bernice Brown, Lillian Phillips, Roy Harrington, Blanche Hunter, Ira Dell Miller, Rubye Phillips, Jessee Hodges, Lillian Smith, Ling Stephens.

Others that week: Science Fair, Boy Scouts court of honor, lots of basketball.
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1979 THS Class Graduates

Graduates of the THS Class of 1979 were:

Stanley Bernard Alderman, Terry Marie Atkins, Eugene Kennice Beacham, Jr., Antonius Laffette Blair, Paula Jean Bowers, Noah Dale Boyette, Angelia Carol Braddy, Mary Barbara Brantley, Ricky Lamar Brooks, Cheryl Lynn Burns, Robert Hugene Burns, Jr., Shufrounia Victoria Castleberry, Marquinta Rena Ceasar, James Elbert Clements, George Kelly Collins, Connie Lagail Cox,

Sidney Shane Davis, Daniel Garland Donaldson, Terry Frances Drawdy, Danny Fred Dukes, Jeffery Lynn Durden, Toni Ann Everett, Ray Dean Fordham, Sherri Adel Gillis, Terri Idella Gillis, Joseph Junior Griffin, Jerry Anthony Habersham, Jackie Lash Harper, Yolunda Venise Harper, Suzanne Harrell, Pamela Carmen Heath, Terri Marie Hester, Veronica Clarissa Holton,

Jimmy Edmond Hutcheson, Mark Aaron Hutcheson, Don Thurman Johnson, Frank Daniel Johnson, Jo Ann Johnson, Lori Jean Johnson, Robin Lynn Keegan, Sharol Lynn King, John Owens Koon, Evenda Renae Little, Mitchell Glenn Manning, Lucille Dawn McCranie, Angelia Kay Meeks, Mary Elizabeth Miller, Shelby Jean Miller, Gregory Feshay Nobles, Massie Lynn Phillips,

Dale Alexander Philyaw, Melanie Denise Posey, Catherine Leevien Powell, James Ricky Reese, Elizabeth Renfroe, Brenda Faye Walker Richards, Patricia Eileen Richards, Marcie Blanche Salter, Jo Ann Shivers, Margaret Victoria Smith, William Alan Smith, Felton Odell Strickland, Earl Damon Sumner, Frances Sweat, Kathleen Thigpen, Danny J. Thomas, Danneil Glen Toler,

Kay Sandra Tompkins, Jennifer Stephanie Wadley, Winifred Wadley, Edward Walker, Jellont Jerry Walker, Jr., Jonathan Garland Warnock, Phillip Richard Warnock, Cheryl Lena Williams, Ronnie LeVell Williams, Sharon Denice Williams, Tracy Steven Willis, and Kenneth Edwin Young.
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Signs from the Signman 01/21/09

THS Class of 1979: TELL YOUR CLASSMATES ABOUT OUR BLOG. JUST GOOGLE SOPERTON 1979 AND CLICK ON ANY REFERENCE POSTED BY billricksofsoperton.







GOD BLESS THE PRESIDENT

1979: Terri Hester and Connie Cox attend State Leadership Conference.

THS Class of 79: The twins, Sherri and Terri Gillis.
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Appeal for Veteran Justice

The Atomic Veterans (NAAV) distributed this January 2009 editorial:

Obama and Shinseki Should Let Vets Get Their Benefits

by Aaron Glantz

President-elect Barack Obama should make it easier for disabled veterans to get their benefits.

The VA routinely delays disability claims by wounded soldiers for months and years, often shunting them into poverty and homelessness.

On Jan. 14, retired General Eric Shinseki, Barack Obama’s pick for Veterans Affairs Secretary, will testify before the Senate. At the confirmation hearing, senators should press him to change this policy.

Former Lance Corporal Bob O’Daniel’s story is far too common. The proud Navajo has been fighting for more than 17 years to receive the veteran’s benefits he earned.

During the 1991 Gulf War, O’Daniel worked on board the USS Nassau, which was stationed in the Persian Gulf. Even before he came home, O’Daniel knew something wasn’t right. He was always tired, and he couldn’t see or sleep properly. He experienced sexual dysfunction and “just a lot of things that a young man shouldn’t have,” he told me.

O’Daniel suffers from Gulf War Syndrome. This comes with a range of symptoms including – but not limited to — rashes, stomach distress, brain legions, fatigue, severely swollen muscles and memory loss.

“Memories are what all people cherish,” he said. “Good times, bad times — whatever. But I was missing a lot of those things.”

Pentagon doctors now believe Gulf War Syndrome affects more than 175,000 veterans of the 1991 conflict. A blue-ribbon government report released in November said the condition is most likely due to exposure to toxic pesticides and pills that were given to soldiers to protect them against nerve gas.

But even though O’Daniel’s VA doctors tell him he has the syndrome, bureaucrats at the Department of Veterans Affairs refuse to grant him the benefits he earned in combat. O’Daniel lives in his wife’s parents’ home in North Carolina, subsisting off their charity with his wife and two children while they wait for the VA to begin paying his claim.

Across the country, more than 600,000 wounded veterans find themselves in the same position, twisting in the wind as they wait for the government to keep its promise to care for them.

Many descend into poverty during the months and years of waiting.

Others are simply unable to outlast the bureaucracy. In the six months leading up to March 31 of last year, 1,500 veterans died while they waited for the VA’s response.

There is a better way to handle military disability claims: Trust the vets.

In her exhaustive study of the long-term costs of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Linda Bilmes, who teaches management, budgeting and public finance at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, notes that almost all veterans tell the truth in their disability claims, with the VA ultimately approving nearly 90 percent of them. Given that reality, Bilmes suggests scrapping the lengthy process described above and replacing it with “something closer to the way the IRS deals with tax returns.” Great Britain, Australia and New Zealand all use similar systems to compensate their injured veterans.

Obama and Shinseki should streamline the benefits process. Our disabled vets have waited too long already.


Personal note from Bill Ricks: Please support our new President in bringing justice in VA benefits. That's not a give-away program, but what veterans have earned and deserve. Several veterans have told me that those handling military disability claims follow a motto: "If we can keep them waiting long enough, we won't have to pay them anything."
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Inauguration Day Signs

DOUBLE-R-SIGNS
JOHN 3:16

THAT THIS NATION,
UNDER GOD, SHALL HAVE
A NEW BIRTH OF FREEDOM

PRESIDENT ABE LINCOLN
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Our Military Unknowns

How many steps does the guard take during his walk across the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier?

Find the answer at this URL:

http://www.snopes.com/military/unknown.asp

While you are on snopes, look around. The site tells the truth and reveals lies on a number of popular forwarded e-mails
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Signs from the Signman 01/19/09

The 1st annual Sign Man Potted Meat Supper.

THS Class of 79: Rena Ceasar, Jackie Harper Lady Vikings basketball stars.

Pray for the Holton family.
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1979 Jury Box Revised

79 0117 01
January 17, 1979
Judge W. M. Towson met with Sheriff Joe Mullis, Clerk R. H. Warnock, and the Board of Jury Commissioners about revising the jury box. Left to right: Mullis, Horace Harrell, Warnock, Jack Ellington, Towson, Evelyn Hutcheson, Manning Mimbs, W. W. Kea. Thomas Coney (absent).

Others that week: Forestry Commission, Honor Roll students, Sparks library repair, FBC new social hall began, Radford & Peterson, WYOK March of Dimes.

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1974 Mistake Pageant

74 0116 01
January 16, 1974
At the third annual Mistake Beauty Pageant, Greg Willis (ctr) was crowned by Tri-Hi-Y President Cathy Davis (l) and Vice-President Phanetta Wilkes (r).

Others that week: Basketball, Holton Lake monument, log trough, cork tree, tobacco curer, Eloise Phillips and Lula Bell Evans discussed plans for the new Recreation Center with Sen. Sam Nunn's aide.

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A Lot about a Little Word

Another forwarded e-mail, received in 2008:

There is a two-letter word that perhaps has more meanings than any other two-letter word, and that word is "UP."

It's easy to understand UP, meaning toward the sky or at the top of the list, but when we awaken in the morning, why do we wake UP ?


At a meeting, why does a topic come UP ? Why do we speak UP ,and why are the officers UP for election and why is it UP to the secretary to write UP a report?


We call UP our friends and we use it to brighten UP a room, polish UP the silver, we warm UP the leftovers and clean UP the kitchen. We lock UP the house and some guys fix UP the old car.

At other times the little word has a real special meaning. People stir up trouble, line UP for tickets, work UP an appetite, and think UP excuses.!


To be dressed is one thing but to be dressed UP is special. And this up is confusing:


A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP .


We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night. We seem to! be pretty mixed UP about UP !


To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP , look the word UP in the dic! tionary. In a desk-sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4 of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions


If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your tim! e, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more.


When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP . When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP . When it rains, it wets UP the earth.

When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP


One could go on & on, but I'll wrap it UP , for now my time is UP< I> , so ....


Time to shut UP! .....!


Oh...one more thing:!
What is the first thing you do in the morning & the last thing you do at night?


U P


Don't Mess up . Send this on to everyone you look up in your address book.



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Signs from the Signman 01/16/09

THS Class of 79. In Memory of Lori Johnson.

1929. Soperton Cemetery, 25 acres at Sugar Ridge.

1979. First Baptist Church starts work on new fellowship hall.

Happy Birthday Becky Hooks, Jan 16.

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Do you know Bonnie Clabber?

While we were e-searching the origins of "cyarn" (the source of the ultimate stink) we got off on a tangent, wondering if cyarn may have come from Scottish. The spelling of some Scottish words contain "augh" and possibly cyarn might be cyaughn. Not so, not so.

A few miles from Soperton is a river site in original Montgomery County called Bonnie Clabber Bluff. The late Clayton Stephens showed us an early map of the Oconee River on which the site was listed in the correct spelling "Baugh-naugh Claugh-baugh".

CORRECTION 01/18/09:
A mental twist caused an error. While Berryhill Bluff is on the east side of the river (original Montgomery County), Bonnie Clabber Bluff, GA 30428, is on the west side in Indian territory until 1800 when it became part of original Wilkinson County and in 1807, original Laurens County. It is a few miles from Soperton as the crow flies, but about a half-hour drive. The county road from Ga. 19 and Rock Spring Rd. is properly spelled Baughnaughclaughbaugh!
For a map try http://maps.google.com/maps?f=q&source=s_q&output=html&q=Bonnie+Clabber+GA

Our e-search came up with a genealogical reference of the Godwin family:
"About Clotilda Godwin by Mildred M Holladay [ca 1938]
Unfortunately her ideas in general have not come down to us but some of her spelling methods still linger--among them that dairy delicacy bonny clabber, which she spelled b-a-u-g-h N-a-u-g-h c-l-a-u-g-h b-a-u-g-h."

From google books we found:
"Virginia Cookery-Book
Bonny-Clabber
* Spelled in dictionaries Baugh-naugh Claugh-baugh.
"delightful dish may be enjoyed daily in hot weather. It is simply milk that through heat has "turned" or thickened until it is of the consistence of baked custard. It should then be set upon ice, or in the coolest part of the spring-house, and set to table not a moment before it is to be helped out."

There is no mention of the milk being sour, only thickened by heat. Honey and spices could be added to make a wonderful dessert. Was it like yogurt?

From merriam-webster.com
"Main Entry: bon·ny·clab·ber
Pronunciation:\ˈbä-nē-ˌkla-bər\
Function:noun
Etymology:Irish bainne clabair, from bainne milk + clabair, genitive of clabar sour thick milk
Date:1605
Northern & Midland : clabber"

From The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language
"bon·ny·clab·ber (bn-klbr)
n. New England & Central Atlantic U.S.
Thick, soured milk eaten with cream and sugar, honey, or molasses.
[Irish Gaelic bainne clabair : bainne, milk (from Middle Irish, drop, milk, from Old Irish bannae, drop) + probably clabair, genitive of clabar, dasher of a churn.]"

From Wikipedia
"clabber appears to have come from the many Scottish nannies who at one time took care of the children of the Virginia gentry. In fact, clabber is still sometimes referred to as bonny clabber (originally "bainne clàbar", from Scottish Gaelic bainne - milk , and clàbar - mud)."

And if you Google the name of the bluff's current spelling, you will find that Bonnie Clabber is a real lady from California!
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QUESTIONS TO PONDER

Questions raised in 2008 that I'm still pondering:

Once you're in heaven, do you get stuck wearing the clothes you were buried in for eternity?

Why does a round pizza come in a square box?

What disease did cured ham actually have?

How is it that we put man on the moon before we figured out it would be a good idea to put wheels on luggage?

Why is it that people say they "slept like a baby" when babies wake up like every two hours?

If a deaf person has to go to court, is it still called a hearing?

Why are you IN a movie, but you're ON TV?

Why do people pay to go up tall buildings and then put money in binoculars to look at things on the ground?

Why do doctors leave the room while you change? They're going to see you naked anyway.

Why is "bra" singular and "panties" plural?

Why do toasters always have a setting that burns the toast to a horrible crisp, which no decent human being would eat?

If Jimmy cracks corn and no one cares, why is there a stupid song about him?

If the professor on Gilligan's Island can make a radio out of a coconut, why can't he fix a hole in a boat?

Why does Goofy stand erect while Pluto remains on all fours? They're both dogs!

If Wile E. Coyote had enough money to buy all that ACME stuff, why didn't he just buy dinner?

If corn oil is made from corn, and vegetable oil is made from vegetables, what is baby oil made from?

If electricity comes from electrons, does morality come from morons?

Do the Alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star have the same tune?

Why did you just try singing the two songs above?

Did you ever notice that when you blow in a dog's face, he gets mad at you, but when you take him for a car ride, he sticks his head out the window?

Signs from the Signman 01/14/09

Happy 31st Anniversary, Johnny B. Johnson and Denise Johnson. Love, Your Family.
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1979 New Councilmen

79 0110 01
January 10, 1979
Judge J. Clayton Stephens (r) swore in (l-r): Reggie Evans, Curtis Thigpen, and Mayor Frank Radford. Also serving were Jack Pournelle, Hayes Fowler Lawton, and Gerald Smith.

Others that week: Painting watertank, basketball, TPS kids, family group.
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Stinking to the Max!

Our southern forefathers and foremothers had a way of expressing the ultimate stink, the smell to high heaven where the buzzards soar. They would say "It stinks like cyarn!"

Now that we have Google, we can learn more about rare topics such as cyarn. First we found that some people spell it with a "k" - kyarn.

If Gary Carden is not the expert on cyarn, at least he seems to be the person most fascinated about it. In Appalachian Rant he writes: "Well, several weeks ago, I published an article in two regional newspapers asking for responses from folks who had ever heard anyone use the word "cyarn" which usually refers to "carrion" or something dead in the woods. The response was amazing and contradictory. I got responses from Winston-Salem, Kentucky, Maggie Valley, Sylva, Bryson City, and Seaford, Virginia. Most responses was very firm in the belief that the word did mean "carrion," but the most interesting one was from a columnist on a Winston-Salem paper who insisted that the word was Scot in origin and was spelled with a "k" (kyran) and referred to manure. Interesting disagreements. My own grandmother definitely said "kyarn" and she definitely meant that something was rotten." - Dec. 23, 2004

Carden was responding to Richard Creed's comment in a Winston-Salem newspaper: "the word was Scottish, not Irish, in origin, that it was spelled with a "k‚" and that the meaning which I had given (a variation of the word "carrion") was also incorrect since the word actually denotes manure."

Urban Dictionary uses the "k" spelling:
Kyarn
(n) A southern derivative of the word carrion, meaning dead and/or decaying flesh.
That bag of rotten potatoes smells like kyarn.
Yuck! This tastes like kyarn!
You are as lazy as kyarn.
keyarn keeyarn kiyarn qyarn carrion carcass dead

Carrion and carcass have similar sound, spelling, and smelling to the word cyarn.

We asked a writer friend to give the pronunctiation and quick definition of the word spelled c-a-i-r-n. She pronounced care-n meaning death.

Webster's online dictionary describes cairn: "Middle English (Scots) carne, from Scottish Gaelic carn; akin to Old Irish & Welsh carn cairn, 15th century: a heap of stones piled up as a memorial or as a landmark."

But McFarlane's Gaelic-English defines the word "cairbh" as carcase, dead body. (The term Gaelic refers to Scottish and Irish.)
CAIRN, Carn(e), Cyarn, Kairn
A pyramid of stones specially built in memory of the dead.
"Cairns of stones, heaped up above layers of flat stone-coffins, replete with human bones, are to be found all over the shores of Scotland."

Therefore cairn is more than a pile of stones, it surrounds a dead body. In the days before embalming, it was a rotting body.

Nowadays we heirs to the "Cracker Culture" (Google it) still wrinkle our noses at the mention of cyarn.

What stinks more than a decomposing body, especially a human body? Call it carcass, carrion, or cairn, it still stinks like cyarn.

Comments invited.
Posted by Bill Ricks of Soperton
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Signs from the Signman 01/12/09

Signs last few days:

Class of 79, Suzanne Harrell and Paula Bowers chosen for UGA Redcoats.

Tebow is the Heisman.

The year was 1974 and Butch Henry catches a 28 lb. catfish. Very good racecar driver, too.

Happy Birthday Zamian Latimer. Love, Mom, Dad, Family. 01/09/09

The year was 1974 (January). Marnie Smith was 18 months old, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Edward Smith.
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Things to remember

TWENTY THINGS TO REMEMBER

1. Faith is the ability to not panic.

2. If you worry, you didn't pray. If you prayed, don't worry.

3. As a child of God, prayer is kind of like calling home every day.

4. Blessed are the flexible, for they shall not be bent out of shape.

5. When we get tangled up in our problems, be still. God wants us to be still so He can untangle the knot.

6. Do the math. Count your blessings.

7. God wants spiritual fruit, (probably) not religious nuts.

8. Dear God: I have a problem. It's me.

9. Silence is often misinterpreted, but never misquoted.

10. Laugh every day, it's like inner jogging.

11. The most important things in your home are the people.

12. Growing old is inevitable, growing up is optional.

13. There is no key to happiness. The door is always open. Come on in!

14. A grudge is a heavy thing to carry.

15. He who dies with the most toys is still dead.

16. We do not remember days, but moments. Life moves too fast, so enjoy your precious moments.

17. Nothing is real to you until you experience it, otherwise it's just hearsay.

18. Its all right to sit on your pity pot every now and again. Just be sure to flush when you are done.

19. Surviving and living your life successfully requires courage. The goals and dreams you are seeking require courage and risk-taking. Learn from the turtle, it only makes progress when it sticks out its neck.

20. Be more concerned with your character than your reputation. Your character is what you really are, while your reputation is merely what others think you are. No matter the storm, when you are with God, there's always a rainbow waiting. Leave gentle fingerprints on the soul of another for the angels to read.

1974 Incoming Councilmen

74 0109 03
January 9, 1974
Judge J. Clayton Stephens (left) swore in the new-term City Councilmen: (l-r) Glen Wilcher, Crow Moxley, Jack Pournelle.

Others that week: TPS students, and lots of basketball!
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Remember When

A FEW INTERESTING ITEMS CAME MY WAY IN 2008. FOLLOWING IS ONE FOR PEOPLE MY AGE PLUS OR MINUS A FEW YEARS.

REMEMBER WHEN

When being sent to the principal's office was nothing compared to the fate that awaited the student at home?

Basically we were in fear for our lives, but it wasn't because of drive-by shootings, drugs, gangs, etc.
Our parents and grandparents were a much bigger threat!
But we survived because their love was greater than the threat.

Remember
Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys, Laurel and Hardy, Howdy Dowdy and the Peanut Gallery, the Lone Ranger, The Shadow Knows, Nellie Bell, Roy and Dale, Trigger and Buttermilk.

Remember
Summers filled with bike rides, baseball games, Hula Hoops, bowling and visits to the pool, eating Kool-Aid powder with sugar.

Remember
Candy cigarettes, Wax Coke-shaped bottles with colored sugar water inside, Soda pop machines that dispensed glass bottles, Coffee shops with tableside jukeboxes, Blackjack, Clove and Teaberry chewing gum, Home milk delivery in glass bottles with cardboard stoppers, Newsreels before the movie, P.F. Fliers, Telephone numbers with a word prefix...(Jackson 9-5555), Party lines, Peashooters, 45 RPM records, Green Stamps, Hi-Fi's, Metal ice cubes trays with levers, Mimeograph paper, Roller-skate keys, Cork pop guns, Drive ins, Studebakers, Washtub wringers, The Fuller Brush Man, Reel-To-Reel tape recorders, Tinkertoys, Erector Sets, Lincoln Logs, 15 cent McDonald hamburgers, 5 cent packs of baseball cards -with that awful pink slab of bubble gum, Penny candy, 35 cent a gallon gasoline, Jiffy Pop popcorn

Remember when
Decisions were made by going "eeny-meeny-miney-moe"?
Mistakes were corrected by simply exclaiming, "Do Over!"?
"Race issue" meant arguing about who ran the fastest?
Catching the fireflies could happily occupy an entire evening?
Having a weapon in school meant being caught with a slingshot?
Saturday morning cartoons weren't 30-minute commercials for action figures?
"Oly-oly-oxen-free" made perfect sense?
The worst embarrassment was being picked last for a team?
War was a card game?
Baseball cards in the spokes transformed any bike into a motorcycle?
Water balloons were the ultimate weapon?

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1979 Cancer Chairman Kay Hall

79 0103 02
January 3, 1979
Treutlen ACS President Katherine McLendon (r) presents recognition to Kay Hall (l) for leading the Crusade during 1978. Volunteers Will Peterson (ll) and Ruthie Mae Ashley (rr).

Others that week: PFC Vickie Brantley, TPS kids.

1974 Eagle Scout Chuck Ellington

74 0102 01
January 2, 1974
A smiling Chuck Ellington completed his service project of some interior painting at the hospital. He received his Eagle Scout badge later in 1974. (In 2009, he is conty school superintendent.)

Others that week: Hospital, Chuck Ellington, Mr. and Mrs. Clyde Phillips.

AS WE START A NEW YEAR, WE RECALL EARLY 2008, WHEN WITH AMBITION WE LAUNCHED A 35 YEAR PHOTO FEATURE. AFTER TWO WEEKS, ALL THE BLOGGING CAME TO AN END. PANCREATITIS AND PSEUDOCYSTS CAUSED AN EXTENDED HOSPITALIZATION. IN LATE SPRING WE BEGAN CATCHING UP ON THE 1978 PHOTOS, BUT NOT THE 1973 PIX.

NOW WE TRY AGAIN, CONTINUING 30 YEARS AND RESUMING 35 YEARS. JUST LOOK FOR THE DATES IN THE TITLES.

1978 Varsity Basketball

78 1227 02
December 27, 1978
Boys Basketball was very exciting way back when.

Others that week: Party for low incomed, Braddy twins, Soperton Manufacturing service awards.

Signs from the Signman 01/02/09

Happy Birthday Denise Johnson. Love, your family.

THS Class of 79. Wow! It's been 30 years. Seems like 30 days. Signman was part of it.

First COGIC Youth Fundraiser fish fry. $6 plate. Fri 12-5 p.m. Canady Ave.

The Sign is about to go digital in 09.