muddys.org

January 9, 1958

Lloyd Noland Hospital

Fairfield, Alabama

That’s where I was born. My folks lived on 41st Street right down the hill from the hospital. At the time, I had one sister a year older than me. In 1959 my first brother was born and in 1960 my second and last brother came along. I don’t remember much about that house. I know the three of us boys shared a room. It had a bunk bed. I was on the top no doubt because I was the oldest. My sister had her room and of course my parents had their room. I can remember the old black and white TV in the living room with the big knob used to change the channels.

I don’t know who the kid was but once we were playing some game, chase, hide and go seek, something, and were running through the house. Obviously that was a big no no. The kid rounded the corner and opened the door to the basement running through it and falling down the stairs into that dark, dirt sided basement. It scared all of us but I don’t think he was hurt that badly amazingly enough.

We were there until right before I went to the first grade. Up until then we had a place on the Warrior River at Howton’s Camp. It was a three bedroom place but still small. A common room in the front, a smallish front porch facing the river and three bedrooms in the back. No bathroom. Our room, the kids room, had a bunk bed and a double bed. The middle bedroom is where my parents were and the other room had a two twin beds in it. There was a big common room where the kitchen and the living area were. Up in the corner was a stuffed fox hanging on the wall. I remember that. I’m not very clear about the rest of the furnishing. I do remember an abundance of MAD magazines laying around no doubt from my sister’s friends. The outhouse was in the corner of the lot closest to the river.  I never used it for obvious reasons. I’m not sure any of us ever used it. There was a common bathhouse on the grounds made of concrete and cement blocks. It had that smell of a  wet stadium bathroom which I hated. I avoided that place at all costs. I’m not at all sure what my parents did for personal hygiene but us kids bathed in the river with Ivory soap. It floats ya know. We spent our summers there every year.

My Dad worked at US Steel and made that long, curvy drive to the river through what was then woods whenever he wasn’t working. He owned a brown 53 model Chevrolet and he was pretty much owned by the mill as I understand it.

Our cabin was located near the front of a slough. There were maybe 6 or 8 cabins along the bank. At one end of the slough was a store where one could buy gas, fishing tackle, etc. We rarely ever went there instead we used Howton’s store located in front of the camp on the bank of the river. Mrs. Howton was alive then and we could go and load out pockets full of candy and goodies for a dime. Candy cigarettes, the little wax coke bottles filled with some sort of colored, sweet liquid, bubble gum and who knows what other cavity making substances were there.

There weren’t many catastrophes that happened at that place on the river but there were a few. I got my second somewhat major injury at the river. My first was done on my tricycle. I was riding it in the house and ran over the floor grate for the heater and landed on my chin. That little episode got me the first of hundreds of stitches I have gotten in my lifetime. The second injury was a broken arm. It was my left arm I believe. I had climbed a tree next to the cabin and I fell out of it breaking my arm.

My grandfather was climbing the wooden ladder on the front of the pier and a nail caught his leg and cut it pretty badly as he climbed out. That landed him in the hospital.

The only other real injury I recall was when my brother climbed up on the roof of the boathouse and got into a wasp nest. If I recall he was stung pretty badly by the swarm of wasps. That was bad. But he recovered without any real long term effects.

There were a couple of other things that happened that were pretty funny.

A couple of doors down there was a guy that had a cabin. His name was Jim Brady. He thought he was a pretty cool guy and had what appeared to be a pretty fancy boat. He liked to show off and was out on the main river cutting up in his boat. He began to run his boat in circles and managed to flip the boat over. No one was hurt but I recall thinking he deserved it.

Another time, my sister, myself, a friend of hers and maybe a couple of others were in our boat with my Dad. Now my dad was a pretty big guy and he hated sitting down in the seat so he sat up on the back of the seat most of the time when he drove the boat. We were out on the big river and he fell out! My sister was the oldest and she couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen and of course had no idea how to drive that boat. My Dad wasn’t hurt and we weren’t going that fast. People on the bank had to holler out to us and instruct her on how to get the boat back.

Another time we had a cousin come down and visit. She had jumped off the pier into the river and her wedding ring (or engagement ring, I forget which) came off her finger and obviously went straight to the bottom. Naturally she was beside herself. My Dad was at work and of course we had no hope of ever finding it. The water wasn’t that deep, maybe 8 or 10 feet but the bottom was this think gray mud that would just coat your feet if you ever touched it. My Dad got home that afternoon and was told what happened. He got a bucket and jumped into the river going straight to the bottom and scooped up a bucket full of that gooey mud. He found the ring! That still amazes me.

But as I was soon to enter the first grade, my life changed significantly for the first time. We moved to Atlanta.