Fifth anniversary of Return to South Carolina

On  January 18, a Sunday I was struck by a truch with wide mirrors on Hwy 68 between the Redlight downtown and I 59 about a mile out where I was going to Jacks to watch some of the football playoffs. I had left the China House and spoken to Jackie Myers in what turned out to be my last exchange with him.

    I was knocked in a ditch and taken the emergency room in Ft Payne. Checked out about two hours later. Had one bad bruise and soon related post concussion maladies. I grew concerned and over two weeks was in touch with my brother and sister.

     They came to get me on Saturday February 1 and it was a year and change before I returned to Collinsville, Alabama after a 33 year stay from Dec 15 1986 to the aforementioned Feb one 2020.

     I lived in Gaffney SC from January 1962 to middle of July 1978. Gaffney I consider home but I lived in Bama twice longer.

     In a better situation here though I miss the front porch and swing, and Lookout Mountain right out the front door, Sacred Heart Singings and just the general nonsense of small town life where my Mother's family goes back to the 1840s.

    I grew to be quite wel known in Collinsville almost as acquainted with the general populace as Thomas Barksdale who played football for both Bear Bryant and bobby Bowden. I even had a few conversations with Randy Owen of Alabama over the years, one good one at the Cracker Barrel.

    Of some notoriety as a substitute teacher there I brought to Town Brett Morgen who got a six minute standing ovation at Cannes Film Festival three years ago, Olympic hurdler Charles Foster, Essayist and novelist Sam Hodges who editted For the Love of Alabama, state archivist and author of the Bicentennial state history Ed Bridges and SCOTUS Justice Hugo Black grandson Stephen Black with a visit by the mother in law of Alberto Gonzalez, 43 Atty General.

      So I was a presence. Also on statewide television for thirty minutes July 22,1992. Brought an August panel of Baptist moderates including David Currie to town whereupon Donnie Myers inquired publicly "Why bring it here." Martha Barksdale was impressed this episode written up in U Tenn collection Exiles Lost Generation, Churchin in Alabama

    But I am back in Bama now, have access to the CatBus , near Furman my alma mater where I hope to see some tennis matches this spring.

    In two hours or less I can get to Bridges BBQ in Shelby NC and another route to Gaffney in an hour twenty with perfect driving.

     My name is on a brick at the History Museum in Gaffney where Central Elementary used to be and Tommy Brittain and myself disccovered Rosie Mac now Andie Macdowell as a beautiful young girl when she was in first grade 

The Bastard Trump and other maters for 2025

I think this will be my first blog of the second Bastard Trump era. The Old testament rightly understood defines Trump as a Bastard no matter what Franklin Graham thinks. The site Baptist News Global is on to his mendacity and shenanigans. If you are a thoughtful Christian, check it twice a week. If a not history will consign you to Hell with Katie Britt and Nikki Haley, the choice is yours.

     Furman is having an interesting conversation these days in the world of FUATT or  Somebody is just now catching up with Southern Exposure 1977 Cover issue It's Great to Be Home in SC.

    Looks to be a promising conversation, I'm just hoping they can walk and chew bubblegum at the same time and put a focus and Willie Timmons framed in the Atwater Nword memo Robert Jones shown the light on at Religion News, Shutting CRT Debate, an easy google

      Other concerns include Sarah Perry and her novel Enlightenment dedicated to a "good Baptist" and in the hopper for the Mann Booker award. See several articles and investigations in the Guardian.

    The Gaffney Indian girls basketball team is making a run on the state title, and I hope to see the Chesnee boys and other upstate SC boys talent. The Duke Tennis phenom from Spain is coming to Clemson in a couple weeks, and the Furman Paladins still show Promise in the SOCON. Donnie Littlejohn is new Head Coach of Gaffney Indian football, a new era. Proud of him

    If Trump brings his collateral deportations to NE Alabama, look for Bradley Crawford and Jason Barnett to take a stand against Tommy Tuberville and Jordan Douefexis

 

  I had brief sightings and chats with President Carter over the years, the most recent in his Sunday school class about seven years ago. I asked him about Judge Frank Johnson, the great Lincoln Republican of Alabama. I like to think my Grandfather Jordan born in 1881 had things in common with Frank Johnson. Carter said Johnson was the greatest American of his life time 

    Carter was a great American. Even Marshall Frady came around to saying as much after taking his measure in the seventies in Life magazine.

     I first saw Carter in 74 at Furman. Earlier he had lunch with Furman Chaplain Jim Pitts and Furman legend  Martin England, a friend of Martln Luther King. That was on the occasion of SC SBC presenting their Civic leader of the yearOn Sunday Jan 12 Trave Robertson with Jane Robelot on WYFF in Greenville SC said Carter's New South Governorship in Ga had reverberations up I  85 corridor in Upstate SC with the Jewish Mayor of Greenville Max Heller into the governor era of Richard Riley. Lot of industry can be attributed to the Carter era in SC. My cousin Tim Wood married the niece of SC Treasurer  Grady Patterson. Paterson said SC refused to take bonds from South Africa because of the vision of Carter and his reverberations.

   My friend at Dartmouth Randall Balmer wrote the political history of Carter and was present June 2 2017 when researching the book. Adrian Rogers, Jesse Helms and Paul Pressler are the bad boys in that story.

      I talked to Carter in Americus 2012 or so during a convocation there. Told him about Baxter Wynn as nephew of Lester Maddox. He may have already known.

   Remarkable life and remarkable man kind of Baptist of my Dad's generation chocked full of integrity and moving forward for the times.

2024 in Review

     This past year was pretty much like 2023. I think my Bama neighbor Carl hood died and the Myers boys the year before. I read some books ending in a flurry with Night Flyer about Hillary Clinto heroine Harriet Tubman.  The Review in the New Yorker was grand. Off the Rim by Fred Hobson about early sixties NC Basketball, Curtis Freeman Pilgrim Journey on the essence of the Christian Faith, and the Barn about Emmett Till

     You could almost imagine Collinsville's The Shed in the Tribe Motif developed in the Barn. Carl was pretty much a charter member. His cows got out in some tense negotiations with the sale of Uncle Bill's 120 acres. He even refused to open a certified letter my sister sent him as she and my cousin Anne were the negotiators on the sale. I told the story to Mike MackPheerson and Jeff Graves. Mack Pheerson was almost cramping beating his steering wheel and crying at the hysteria of my predicament.

     He and my neighbor Dillard Wilson a veteran of the Battle of the Bulge had an incident about fifteen years ago but we all lived likely to die of natural causes, them gone and my exit possible within seven years.

     Maybe more later but good teaser for now. Three of his cows were electrocuted when a bolt bit  a big oak tree in the pasture in his back yard. Got a lot of views on social media

     The Myers boys were key leaders in Collinsville Baptist Church and education. Jackie an elementary school principal and Donnie a consummate Rook player a former assistant to the Supe of Dekalb Schools. His daughter brother in law in Superintended for Public schools of the state of Alabama.

     Other things happened I will report soon include the rise of Calvinism in the church my Mother was baptized, and the reelection of the Mother Fudd Rucking SOB Donald Trump. See Baptist News Global weekly on what a disaster he is including the scorching report up today about Nikki Haley's Turning Point USA Ralley in Phoenix two days ago. I made a post at Furman University Facebook about it

Marney's Myers Park fires Pastor Boswell for preaching prophetically about Trump

 

   Reports deacon chair Marcy McClanahan is key in this disappointing story of one of the most Clear Headed Churches in the Baptist Tradition where Marney was great in the sixties, Myers Park in Charlotte letting their pastor go in short notice after a beautiful sermon a few weeks ago on how to do church in these Days of the Bastard Donald Trump.

     Baptist News global has a story up and their have been reports in the Charlotte Observer. The MPark facebook page is on fire.

     Coincidentally when I saw the news Friday I had just been rereading the John Carey book on Marney from 1980 with the Introduction by Samuel Hill. Marney was a boundary person one of a handful of that era that included the world of Will Campbell and several people from Furman. Two of those LD Johnson and Theron Price had been classmates of Marney at Southern Seminary.

     More later as lot of drama and opinions to come in short order.

An Asterisk on Furman's Timmons Arena

     The morning of November 14 I had a fourteen minute conversation with Congressman William Timmons of SC 3rd District. Just elected to his third term he has pledged to step down in four years if reelected twice more.

      His grandfather loved basketball and gave the key gift to build Furman's Basketball arena on campus after a glorious run in Greenville's Downtown arena where Frank Selvy scored his hundred and Clyde Mayes led a great decade in the seventies. 

    I am concerned about the Current William Timmons embrace of Turmp and  the fundamentalist christian nationalist politics of North Greenville Tony Beam and his so called "christian" world view. Marty Cohen's book Moral Congress is great look at how the third got this way from Liz Patterson to Trey Gowdy and now Timmons.

     Timmons family runs in the blue blood circles of old Greenville and Christ Church Episcopal Congregation and Prep School.

     In a delightful but times charged conversation Timmons wanted to know why a "crazy old man would want to disparage" his grandfather's love of Basketball.

    I said it was not about his grandfather, but about him and his current extended family that may embrace the mendacity of Trump. I said there seemed to be a big disconnect between Furman's Seeking Abraham initiative of 2017 and his embraced of the CRT Debate, silence on Project 2025 and the mendacity of Trump politics.

     He said he thought the Abraham initiative was a "piece of revisionist history Furman would come to regret". His father resigned from the Board of Trustees over the initiative and it appears most of his current extended family shares the view of the father Rick Timmons.

     Seeking Abraham is a strong look at the slaveholding of Furman's founders. Many of the names that once adorned the campus have been diminished and names of their slaves or other people of color during Jim Crow replacing them

  Come back Tuesday and WEdnesday for the conclusion of this blog

  Part two will include examination of Timmons relationship with Trump DOJ nominee Gaetz and a look at the Atwater N Word memo as a foundation for CRT politics Billy Tee has embraced not to mention Project 2025 and the politics, the mendacity of his politics of abortion, guns etcs and the dumbing down of History education 

    Part two

      In 1988 the Timmons family made a four million dollar gift to Furman for an on campus basketball arena in honor of their grandfather who got a degree from Furman right after WWI. He loved Basketball. You can google on article on the Timmons family generosity to Furman and the Greenville community the last half of the 20th Century searching for Keep on Trucking, Timmons and Greenville.

     Lee Atwater got Greenville native Carroll Campbell to US Congress in late seventies with a campaign One Of Us spotlighting Campbell opponent Max Heller as a Jew. The President of Furman, a Baptist preacher's son Gordon Blackwell endorsed Heller and publicly campaigned for him

     Early 80s Atwater was a rising star with the National GOP and wrote a memo where he said you can't say "Nigger Nigger Nigger" anymore so we have to adopt some other impassioned issues to replace race baiting. Thus ushered in the mendacity of the politics of abortion, CRT, prayer in schools and Guns. My friend at Dartmouth Randall Balmer has done scorching research on Paul Weyrich spotlight on abortion to replace race baiting. You can google Robert Jones, Shutting down CRT Debate, religion news to see how nefarious this campaign is.

     So here we are with the mendacity of the GOP that was key to the reelection of Trump with the endorsement of Timmons and the super Trumper activism of folks like super Trumper Eric Metaxas and his ideologue friends at FBC Spartanburg SC inparticular in the heart of Timmons land.

      Balmer has also written about basketball with his stellar chapter quote by Kareem Abdul Jabbar "When it is played the way it is supposed to be played, Basketball happens in the Air. Flying Floating. elevated  above the floor; Levitating the way it has always been in the dreams of the oppressed people of the earth"   

    When the talk was thick nationally a few years ago about Stone Mtn, noted Clemson historian and Furman grad (69) Vernon Burton suggested a carving beside General Lee etc with  some context. PBS Iconic America series has done an excellent job on the context of Stone Mtn.

     Maybe a similar statement, an asterisk of sorts is now appropriate for Timmons arena

      Kareem's vision of basketball is  quite a different vision from the current willie Timmons who has perverted his grandfather's love into the darkness the evolution of Race Baiting. When the arena opens this fall listen as you walk in the Foyer of Timmons arena, hear a rising valence as you pass the plaque endorsing the family and hear the faint echoes, whispers of Atwater's N Word Memo

Rough accounting of my voting history

   I cast my first Presidential ballot in 1972 at the National Guard in Gaffney SC just down from the High school. Fall of my sophomore year I was inspired by Albert Blackwell who set a big McGovern Shriver Table outside the cafeteria of the Dining Hall at Furman just three years out of Harvard Divinity School. There is a picture in the 1973 Bonhomie the Furman yearbook.

    The Fourth Sunday in August of 1983 McGovern joined us for the Helton Reunion at the Waldens Creek UMC just outside Pigeon Forge Tn. I think that was the year MLB HOF Todd Helton, a distant cousin; his Mother was there also. McGovern stayed around for lunch.

   I voted at the Alice Bell elementary school east Knoxville school in 80 againsnt Ronald Reagan. Remember Bruce Bowen at the polls and a girld visiting from Kentucky. I think Cormac McCarthy had just left town when I got there.

     Eighty four I think my polling place was on Kingston hwy where I voted for Mondale. I talked about him a lot while subbing in the schools. A few years later a kid walked by the tennis courts downtown Rome and was haiving a hard time placing my face and finally said "Walter Mondale"

     The Legion House out ut near the Rck Store on the Kingston highway was once visited by Lester Mattox or it was the most solid percentage vote for him of any precinct in the state. Uncle Nolan Richey was active rural pol. Were he still alive I'm certain he would be a solid Trump vote, may even Marge Taylor Greene.

   For thirty years voted at the National Guard up from the Shed just off 68 in Collinsville Alabama. Poll workers there were usually the Preacher John Morgan, now deacon Ronnie McReynolds who is Mark Petty's father in law,  Marie Wilson now deceased a former homecoming queen who only dated boys in the backfield in the forties and former Mayor Willingham's wife who has a picture of relative on first name basis with FDR himself.

   Somebody should do a national piece on the shed. A founding member says they are hundred per cent Trump this year. Its where the class of 83 hangs and all the local decisions are made there; the city council etc are just a front.

     Voted here in Upstate sC at nearby Library. Another Library in Pendleton closer to a Zabys and a scenic ride to Culvers on 81 outside Anderson that refuses to get their Television fixed; the Pendleton Library had long sometimes donstentious lines for early voting.

    Sadly the Cherokee Chronicle of Gaffney has an outrageous endorsement of Trump in Nov 4 issue.  A lot of folks there no better but the Know Nothings have captured the mindset, its in the water. Maybe Joe Dean Spencer won after all

     This year I voted the Sanity Party, the One NOT chocked full of Mendacity; I voted with the US Olympic Team, Nick Saban, the Baptist Fellowship and the Alliance, Dawn Staley, the Girl Scouts, Trevor Lawrence, Neal Thrash, Peggy and Susan Weaver and the Auburn Democracy Project and Dave Matthews Center for Civic Virtue. And Randlall Balmer and the legacy of Marshall Frady

    My brother's son just called from Greer South Carolina, the heart of Trump land whose former congressman was Trey Gowdy. He stood in line for two hours at a church even after Early voting in the Upstate for ten days. The region is eaten up by Trump world and right wing radio and Tony Beam and his so called Christian World view at North Greenville College which has along with FBC Spartanburg SC embraced Super Trumper Eric Metaxas, a garbage collector. My parts of the family who vote Trump are not Garbage. But Trump is Bastard Garbage and it is sad a Lot of Jack Leg Preachers have been complicit in the Trump era