How It All Began
By Ruth Hucklebridge
September 25, 2010
My husband Ted Hucklebrige's life was dominated by three characteristics: love and devotion to athletics, a lust for travel, and the desire to help others. From the seventh grade, Ted decided he wanted to be a coach. In high school football, he was recognized as an outstanding player and was shot put and discus Southern California champion in track and field.
His grandmother, who raised him, encouraged Ted to join the YMCA and church youth groups to help provide a needed father figure. Hiking in the Sierra, camping at Catalina Island and hearing stories of other exciting adventures stimulated Ted's desire to travel. The "Y" and the church group also influenced his lifetime goals. At a YMCA retreat. Ted heard the motto, "Service is the rent you pay for your space on earth." He took this advice seriously and often repeated it as advice to our family.
As a junior at Stanford University, Ted took off a semester to drive a handicapped fellow student across country for treatments on the East Coast. The trip left him determined to see more of the world.
After five years in the Navy, Ted was hired as a track coach and instructor at Riverside Junior College. In 1947, he married me, a New Yorker, whom he had-met while serving as a physical education instructor at Sampson Naval Station. His enthusiasm for sports led Ted to join CAHPER (California Association for Health, Physical Education, and Recreation) where he served in various capacities including president. It was at an AAHPER (American Association ...) conference in Washington. D.C. when a member of the US State Department requested hosts for foreign Physical Educators in a new program to promote better understanding between nations. Ted volunteered and we had our first guests in March, 1952.
Two Japanese men arrived by train. They spoke flawless English. Ted showed them the facilities at Riverside College, introduced them to staff member and organized discussions on topics of interest. They stayed three days and two nights. We already had a two year old daughter, Katy, and I was expecting a baby in May. As I served meals, the men never seemed to look at me. However, when they said good- bye, the older man remarked, "You will have a boy." And we did, our son Mark.
. After attending the Olympic Games in Helsinki, Finland, Ted changed jobs to become a Consultant in Physical Education for Riverside City Schools. Under the auspices of the state department program, two guests arrived from Uruguay. They were more interested in social activities than physical education and were disappointed we did not hold a huge party in their honor, which they said they would have done in their country.
A fascinating young man from Israel came the following year. He was interested in the facilities, the programs and everything Ted showed him. At dinner, he told about the Arab-Israel conflict. As a member of the Israeli air force, he and others used parachutes, which had been discarded as unsafe by the British. His enthusiasm for his new country was overwhelming.
After a year of study at Stanford University, where our third child (Heidi) was born, we moved to Santa Rosa in 1955. Ted became a Consultant in Physical Education, Recreation and Safety for the Sonoma County Schools.
Our next visitor under the program came from Cuba. He had fought with Batista and was concerned about the political situation in his country. The last we heard about him, he was in jail.
What a coincidence! Our last visitor Musa Otthman , who was the Director of Physical Education in Jordan, arrived from Bethlehem. Musa and Ted became fast friends, each caring about children and totally dedicated to their work. I had planned a ham dinner only to find out, this was a "no, no' so settled for chicken. After he left, Musa continued to correspond with Ted.
In the sixties, Ted again attended another AAHPER (Dance had been added to the title) conference in Washington , D.C. He was called out of a meeting and asked to report to the US State Department. King Hussein of Jordan had requested help in forming an Olympic Team for the country. Ted was asked if he would be interested in the job. This was a dream come true. He only asked one question, "Could his family come with him?" When the answer was yes, Ted agreed to serve as an American Specialist in Jordan from 1963-64, taking a sabbatical leave from Sonoma County Schools. Details were worked out through many phone calls from Washington. D.C.
A Day at the Fair
by Robin Gail
September 25, 2010
I love going to the Sonoma County Fair, but the experience is different from when I was a kid. When I was a kid we went to the Midland Empire Fair and Rodeo in Billings, Montana. It was hot and dusty — summer days in August were regularly over 100 degrees. Nevertheless, expectation and delight were in the air. Everyone seemed happy to be there. As I remember it now, it seems like a movie scene with people in colorful clothing, singing and dancing, but of course it probably wasn’t really like that.
When I was little, my grandmother would pack a picnic lunch. She had an old black suitcase with special compartments for plates and cups, knives and forks, napkins, and a blue-checked tablecloth to spread on the grass. And food! There was fried chicken, potato salad, jell-O salad, and most important, chocolate cake. No fair food for us!
By the time we were 10 or so, my sister Virginia and I were pretty much free to roam around the grounds, riding carnival rides and eating cotton candy. I don’t remember if Nana provided picnics any more.
One summer we had practiced tossing pennies into saucers on the bed so we could win a duckling at the fair. In those days it was quite common to give away ducklings, baby chicks, chameleons, and gold fish for prizes. Most of them probably suffered an untimely end.
We won three ducklings, and we built a little pen for them in the back yard with a pan of water. But they grew up quickly, and we soon had a problem with the neighbors. Cute little yellow baby ducklings go “Peep, peep, peep.” Big white ducks go “Quack, quack, quack.” The neighbors complained.
We took the ducks out to the country and released them in a driveway leading up to a house with a pond in the field. Today we know this is a terrible thing to do with unwanted animals, but we didn’t know it then.
My father, a printer, had the race program concession. He wasn’t a betting man himself, so it seemed a little out of character. But the concession had belonged to his father, who was something of a sporting man and who enjoyed mixing with high rollers. For my father, it was just a hard job, but one profitable enough to do year after year. He sold ads in the programs to local businesses which is where the profit came from. The programs themselves sold for 25 cents. He would get the race information the night before — the horses and jockeys and post positions — along with a few handicapping tips and some colorful background information, and have the booklets printed by the local newspaper.
The bundles of programs were heavy and awkward for one person to load and unload, and my father had a weak right leg from childhood polio, so it must have been extremely difficult for him. But he never complained and would load the heavy bundles into his car and then unload and carry them under the grandstand to the race program booth. He contrived to attach wheels and a rack onto a folding chair so it doubled as a hand truck and a chair for him to sit on in the booth. He joked that he should patent it, but he never did.
Down under the grandstand was a fascinating place. It was cavernous and gloomy, even with the fluorescent lights overhead. It smelled of stale beer and cigarettes. It wasn’t a very pleasant place, but it was where the “real” people of the fair hung out. There were handicappers and horse owners and bettors from every economic class. They smoked cigarettes and cigars; they were loud and used rough language, even around women — in fact, some of the women were roughest of all.
When Virginia and I were little, we would be shepherded through the crowd and up into the grandstand where we could watch the horses and then the rodeo after the day’s races. We loved the rodeo — the calf roping, the bull riding, the bucking broncos. It was perfect Montana entertainment.
When I turned 16, my father invited me to come and help man the booth. My response was divided. I was honored to be asked to help, and I was intrigued to be down in the gloom with the “real” people, but I was afraid my school friends might see me, and I would be embarrassed to be seen working in such a raw and seamy place.
I was supposed to sit in the booth, sell programs, and make small talk with the customers. I was young and fresh-looking, and the handicappers came and hung out around the booth offering to place bets for me. I was fascinated and flattered.
But the job got worse.
After the races started for the day, I was supposed to go up into the grandstand and down by the horse barns barking, “Race Programs. Gitcher Race Programs!” I was mortified. I tried, but I just couldn’t do it! What if someone saw me!?
I should note here I had been well schooled with my grandmother’s Victorian sensibilities. You don’t do anything to call attention to yourself, and you absolutely must act like a lady at all times. I should also note that by the time I was 22 and on my own in San Francisco, I had abandoned all her teaching. But when I was 16, I simply couldn’t make a spectacle of myself in public, and timidly calling out “Race Programs,” just didn’t work.
My father was disappointed — he had to go up in the stands and hawk his wares himself — while I sat in the booth and flirted with the questionable people. I don’t remember if I worked the booth the next summer.
Every year, from the 1940s until the 1960, at the end of a day at the fair, after dinner, after the booth had been closed up and the leftover programs dumped into the trash, after the last Ferris Wheel ride, my father would drive us up to the Rimrocks (a natural sandstone rock formation above Billings, lining the Yellowstone River for several miles) where we would park to watch the fireworks at the fairgrounds. They were beautiful, and we would carry the memory of them sleepily home with us to cherish until the next summer.
Liver Reverie
by Eleonore Miller
September 25, 2010
It's because both Uncle Steve and Uncle Joe were butchers, I mumble into the still, black air. Punching my pillow to get just the right contour I snuggle back down into my reverie. It's that time of the night when I am not asleep nor yet fully awake, when memories invade my mind...
I am six years old sitting at the far end of the supper table, as far away from my father as I could get, but since I was opposite, I was also in the direct line of fire. I knew tonight's meal would be an ordeal long before my mother came in bearing her big platter of sickening sweet shoe leather liver. I had smelled it as the greasy sweet smoke wafted through our bungalow like a killer fog.
My older, almost-twin sisters sit; one to my left, one to my right, peering at me through their windowpane glasses while grinning in unison. Their unspoken message got through..."Oh,oh, Queenie's favorite meat. Now we'll see what happens."
My mom turns to my dad who is already plowing into the serving plate with gusto.
"Eleonore doesn't like liver, Dear" she states, suggesting he take my portion also.
"Well, it's damn good food and I work damn hard for it, so she'd better eat it!" comes his quick retort while my sisters snicker.
When it's my turn I quickly choose the smallest of the remaining pieces which is still quite large because my older sisters, being "closet-liver-haters", have already chosen much smaller pieces.
O.K. So, there it is ,waiting for my knife and fork. I push it about looking for some sort of portal of entry but its symetrically curled edges give me visions of eating a turtle shell or perhaps some hobo's shoeflap fell off and my mother found it on her way home from the market? Ah, there, a crack, I spy, and insert my knife carefully partitioning a minute piece. Placing it in my mouth I notice a large hole from a missing molar. Using my tongue tip I stuff the liver into the hole and pretend to chew. This'll work! I'm excited now. Cutting, stuffing, fake chewing, cutting, stuffing, moving my jaws. Do I look real? But I can feel my cheeks expanding. No one's looking. Now, if I can just get to the bathroom, then...
"Daddy, Eleonore's not chewing." Oh, no! It's my eldest sister, Margaret, Daddy's girl. The little stoolie.
I freeze in mid-stuffing. Heart pounding. Eyes round in terror. Daddy looks up.
"Eleonore, is that true?"
Unable to speak with my chipmunk jowls, I vigorously shake my head in denial.
With an all too familiar scraping of his dining room chair my father gets up and stomps to my side. I feel his hot, smelly, liver breath on my neck. Then taking his thick thumb and forefinger he squeezes my cheeks. My sisters are now in hysterics while I am in hysteria. I gag. I spit. Some goes down. Some shoots out upon my plate. A new scene erupts as Daddy is trying to reintroduce the half-digested, slimey mess into my clamped mouth.
Mama FINALLY interferes. "Now, Les, she's eaten some of it."
He glares at me. "Well, O.K. this time, but next time, you'd better eat it all"
Stirring in my bed I roll over to look at the clock. Five a.m....then smiling, I remember my quasi-dream.
"Well, Dad, sorry to disappoint you, but I'm a big girl now. No more next times."