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By Tom Boggs

Comes a little harder recollecting names now that I’m a bona fide antique.  (Wonder if I have generated any antique value?)  Different folks conjure up different memory pictures when they hear a word like “church.” I first off think back on that little white wood frame Presbyterian church on the corner right down from Sunshine Cleaners in Linden, where I was raised. 

What about car?  What do you think?  I either ponder on Daddy’s two tone green 1957 Chevy or the first used car I bought, being a 1951 Chevy Coup, for which I paid about what it takes to fill up my present farm truck with gas. 

I’m just recollecting back to my Sunday School teaching days at First Presbyterian in Demopolis, where sweet Patty Horton was a member of the class. One day we were discussing how to remember folks’ names, and Patty spoke up, and said she used the Dale Carnegie method one time when she couldn’t remember Mr. Newton’s name out at the tire store, so she associated his name with a cookie, that cookie being a fig newton.  Makes sense.  Patty reported to the class that the next time she saw the tire owner, with a great deal of confidence, she smiled real big, and greeted him with “Well, how are you today, Mr. Graham?”

That broke up the class, but I have no doubt the Lord loves a good laugh Himself, and I know He loved Patty Horton, so everybody laughed that Sunday morning. 

I’m laughing myself right now as I think back to the fifties when a big, shy state trooper by the name of Hammock married the Home Demonstration Lady, Miss Shamburger.  Preacher McAlilly at the Linden Presbyterian Church did the ceremony.  After the preacher hitched the couple, he had them face the congregation, at which time, to the embarrassment of some, and amusement of others, Mr. McAlilly announced, “Ladies and Gentlemen, I present to you, Mr. and Mrs. Hamburger.”

I reckon I won’t pass up the chance to mention “Red Devils.”  Like in Linden Red Devil football team. I wrote a poem for our senior class of ’58, and part of it read, “If we had a son, Sir, I tell you what he’d do.  He’d join the Devils, and beat Demopolis like his daddy didn’t do.”

I’m not goner get into nicknames too much with the space I have left, but you know most of those unofficial handles do tell a tale.  How many folks you know with the nickname “Red” don’t have red hair, and I’m remembering my old friend, Raymond “Spect” Flowers, and his freckles. 

I’ll finish up with a name you might be expecting. Melvin “Moose” Glass, whose exploits I have shared many times in these writings, along with the story that he got his nickname from Coach Mr. Billy Quinney, and by the same token, Mr. Billy got his nickname of “Walleo” from my other departed best friend, Franklin Aydelott.

Now, watch out.  Somebody is liable to tag you with a pet name if you ain’t careful, but probably only because they love ya.  Have a good week, “What’s  Your Name.”

 

Tom Boggs is a columnist for the Demopolis Times and a native of Marengo County. His column, “Days Gone Bye,” appears weekly.

Read more at: https://www.demopolistimes.com/2025/03/03/days-gone-by-two-step-jitterbug-and-bunnyhop/