PENNY WISE, MEMORIES FOOLISH
by Bryce Martin
I have a baseball signed by Mickey Mantle. Signed in 1955.
Owning such an item, and telling someone about it, always draws a response such as this: "Hey, I bet that's worth some money!"
I believe I understand why many people equate autographs from famous people with dollar signs, disregarding any possible emotional attachments the holder might enjoy. My belief is that people feel insecure around star power, and asking for an autograph is an easy ice-breaker. I mentioned to my sister years ago about interviewing John Wayne for a magazine article. "John Wayne," she exclaimed. "What did you say to him?"
Having met and talked with several major and minor celebrities over the years, I have never asked one for an autograph. I cannot imagine why I would. I was in their presence and we exchanged words and I will remember the occasion - most of it anyway. That is enough for me. Am I supposed to get one to impress someone else with later?
Having been a sports memorbilia collector most of my life, I know quite a bit about autograph collecting. An Abraham Lincoln signature is rare and worth more than a Bill Clinton one. That is, if all you have is a signature from either of the two - not one from Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, or from Clinton's swearing-in document. Clinton freely gives autographs and, as such, they are common. Lincoln will sign no more. Bill Russell, the old Boston Celtics basketball great, has purposely acted stingy over the years in putting his name on anything. No so with Shaquille O'Neal. The big Los Angeles Lakers center has written "Shaq" for multitudes of autograph hounds, countless times more than Russell. The value of a Russell signature may diminish over the years as his name fades from public memory. Mark McGuire, the retired baseball slugger, in his latter years refused to sign any longer on the "sweet spot," thus making his older signatures more valuable. McGuire's signature, it is interesting to note, went from easily distinguishable to illegible as he became more and more famous. Must of the value for signatures and autographs from famous people and celebrities is determined by the signer's popularity, what the signature or autograph deals with, the condition of the signature, and its rarity.
In Nashville, years ago, a young waitress at a steak house became so excited that the Grand Ole Opry's ancient man of sorrow, Roy Acuff , was in the adjoining room, she had to tell me about it when she came to my table. "Did you get a good tip from Mr. Acuff?" I asked her later. She was still beaming. "No," she said, "he gave me his autograph." Her gushing enthusiasm indicated she felt that was the better deal of the two. "My dear, you should have pushed for the tip," I told her. But, I was wrong. "I am going to mail it to my dad. He loves Roy Acuff." And that is why I was wrong.
My grandfather drove to Commerce, Okla., that day in 1955, just he and I. It was a short drive from his house to Mantle's. When we arrived, Mickey and his teammate buddy, Billy Martin, were coming out the front door. A hunting trip in some Oklahoma woods was on their minds. (I remember the day well, but I do not remember why Martin's signature is not also on the ball.) Shotguns stood stacked against an outside wall. The sky was clear and the fall day near perfect.
My Mantle baseball is signed on the sweet spot, where you want it for ultimate worth, but the baseball is a Little League model. My grandfather pulled it from a pants pocket for signature. It reads: Best Wishes Mickey Mantle. For maximum worth, it should have been an official American League baseball, the league Mantle played in during his career with the New York Yankees. That enhances the signature's value and significance. My baseball is dingy and the ink from the autograph has dimmed. The baseball should be white or, at least, a near-white and the signature should be clear and sharp. Worse, even before Mantle signed it, mine had written on it: 1955, Little League City Champs, printed neatly in ballpoint. That is a real value killer. Instead of having a single-signed Mickey Mantle autographed baseball, I own a defaced Mantle signed baseball. It has little monetary value.
Yet, I do not even have to see the baseball for it to have value. I can just picture it while away at work or driving down the highway, and when I do, it revs up an old movie projector stored in my very essence, rolling and stirring up the images from that grand day, from that time. That's some worth, there.
WORN-OUT COUPLES: juicy tidbits, angst ridden, rising discontent, viable alternative, finding closure, seeking solace, political upheaval, implementing measures, sea change, buoying up, seemingly secure, political correctness, sexual orientation, gender baiting, lingering doubt, emotional stability, faux pas, current restrictions, work related, fashion apparel, dress shorts, parting shot, needless excess, party crowd, financially secure, time tested.
TODAY�S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: �If you ate a rock, he ate a boxful.�
...
Tell them how the weather was... -- Ernest Hemingway bryce_martin_1@Lycos.com
Thursday, February 20, 2003
Wednesday, February 19, 2003
MY ONLY TOP TEN LIST
This was originally published under my byline, Bryce Martin, on Jim Rome's Fox Sports Website, under a heading titled "Orenthal Smack," in April of 2001.
My Freshly Original Top Ten Little-Known Things About O.J. That May Have Swayed A Jury Had It Been Aware:
(From No. 10 to No. 1, of course)
10. In high school: class cutup
9. In college: class cutter
8. In pro football: cut-and-slash runner
7. Title after football: athlete-slash-actor
6. Role he wanted: cut man, in Rocky
5. Favorite movie cue: cut!
4. Favorite music purchases: cutouts
3. Favorite movie: Cutter's Way
2. On dance floor likes to: cut a rug
1. In people situations that make him uncomfortable he is prone to: cut a trail
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "I came here with nothing, and I still have most of it."
...
This was originally published under my byline, Bryce Martin, on Jim Rome's Fox Sports Website, under a heading titled "Orenthal Smack," in April of 2001.
My Freshly Original Top Ten Little-Known Things About O.J. That May Have Swayed A Jury Had It Been Aware:
(From No. 10 to No. 1, of course)
10. In high school: class cutup
9. In college: class cutter
8. In pro football: cut-and-slash runner
7. Title after football: athlete-slash-actor
6. Role he wanted: cut man, in Rocky
5. Favorite movie cue: cut!
4. Favorite music purchases: cutouts
3. Favorite movie: Cutter's Way
2. On dance floor likes to: cut a rug
1. In people situations that make him uncomfortable he is prone to: cut a trail
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "I came here with nothing, and I still have most of it."
...
Monday, February 17, 2003
COLOR MY WORLD
by Bryce Martin
Having a passion for colors, I am constantly being seduced by their endless variations and combinations. From an early age, I was hooked by the tones and hues from the labels of my stacks of 45 rpm vinyl records, and even drawn in by the individual diskettes from a tubular pack of Necco wafers. Some of the best appear when you are least expecting. Earlier in the week, for example, I glanced up from some reading just as a blast of beautiful colors on the televison screen froze my gaze. They were vivid and vibrant, a freshness of color and quality of detail out of the ordinary. A man on Antiques Roadshow had several old empty canned food tins he found after excavating an old building. They were all from the same "find." One had a date of 1876. No one on the show recalled ever seeing such cans. The men who built the structure had tossed their food cans after group lunches. They had dined in what would become the building's crawl space. The owner of the treasures said the cans discarded in the dirt had rust. Those tossed on wood chips were in mostly mint condition. The can's labels are what makes them valuable. These labels were chromolithographs. This process, now a lost art, is what produced the spectacular colors. Modern day dot-pattern photograph printing processes are artless in comparison. Though the labels depicting salmon and green beans are ephemera, and, as such, count as advertising or commercial art, they looked like fine art to me.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "She wasn't wearing enough clothes to flag a handcar."
...
by Bryce Martin
Having a passion for colors, I am constantly being seduced by their endless variations and combinations. From an early age, I was hooked by the tones and hues from the labels of my stacks of 45 rpm vinyl records, and even drawn in by the individual diskettes from a tubular pack of Necco wafers. Some of the best appear when you are least expecting. Earlier in the week, for example, I glanced up from some reading just as a blast of beautiful colors on the televison screen froze my gaze. They were vivid and vibrant, a freshness of color and quality of detail out of the ordinary. A man on Antiques Roadshow had several old empty canned food tins he found after excavating an old building. They were all from the same "find." One had a date of 1876. No one on the show recalled ever seeing such cans. The men who built the structure had tossed their food cans after group lunches. They had dined in what would become the building's crawl space. The owner of the treasures said the cans discarded in the dirt had rust. Those tossed on wood chips were in mostly mint condition. The can's labels are what makes them valuable. These labels were chromolithographs. This process, now a lost art, is what produced the spectacular colors. Modern day dot-pattern photograph printing processes are artless in comparison. Though the labels depicting salmon and green beans are ephemera, and, as such, count as advertising or commercial art, they looked like fine art to me.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "She wasn't wearing enough clothes to flag a handcar."
...
Saturday, February 15, 2003
TOO MUCH LEAD IN OUR PENCILS
by Bryce Martin
A kidney-shaped region on a geologic map represents the most polluted territory in the United States. The region takes in parts of Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri, and is part of a massive clean-up operation funded by our federal government. Today's children living on the contaminated soil have lead blood levels high enough to cause immediate concern. Mining activities ceased decades ago, but a full clean-up will take decades more.
My grandfather, Noah Martin, was born in 1879 in Tipton Ford, Mo. A wagon trail led from there directly to Joplin, Mo., the largest town in the vicinity. In the late 1890s, he ended up near Joplin just over the state line in Galena, Kans, which was then a lead and zinc boom town with a Main Street known as "Red Hot Street."
Miners were often paid in silver dollars. Companies came and went and record-keeping was not much of a priority. When he reached retirement age, he could not draw his pension because he either did not have proof of employment and earnings or he was not always supplied with such information. He had to work into his 70s to become eligible, and he went back to the lead mining business.
I imagine he was given some consideration because of his age. He worked graveyards as a derrick "hoisti'man" in his latter years. That's how he pronounced it. It might have been "hoisting man," or hoistingman." The derricks were rickety and seemed ready to topple when the winds blew. It was his job to lower men in a barrel, with the aid of winch and cable, down into the shaft, and to bring the barrel back up when the men filled it. He would then tip the contents of the barrel down a chute. Fortunately, such work in his younger days had left him with a strong grip
On paydays, I would sometimes go with him. I was once treated to a fabulous display of colors. Laid out on the ground, on half-shingle size strips of balsa wood were core samples. The samples, like strips of toothpaste, were of just about every clay color imaginable, but leaning more toward pastels. I had thought there was nothing under the ground except brown dirt. The company geologist was explaining to my grandfather what it all meant. All I could decipher was that it meant work, and a job.
After he finally retired, he would sometimes pull his truck off the road at a pasture between Galena and Joplin. Just over the fence and in some weeds was a rusted piece of machinery with big iron wheels, a relic from his wood cutting days. He said it was a "widder-maker," that some less fortunate he had worked with were killed using such a machine. It was tricky to use and dangerous. He would sit and study its machinations from a distance, the gears, brakes, sprockets and chains. Each time he would come to the same conclusion: It had been a killer machine and a lot of poor boys had been its victims.
Long after the mines played out, the ground around Galena was littered with chunks of lead ore and jack (zinc). Broken chunks of lead were as smooth as glass and shone like a mirror. Now, those chunks are all gone. Lead became valuable enough that townspeople, many too young to even remember the bygone mining days, rounded it all up and sold it.
...
by Bryce Martin
A kidney-shaped region on a geologic map represents the most polluted territory in the United States. The region takes in parts of Kansas, Oklahoma and Missouri, and is part of a massive clean-up operation funded by our federal government. Today's children living on the contaminated soil have lead blood levels high enough to cause immediate concern. Mining activities ceased decades ago, but a full clean-up will take decades more.
My grandfather, Noah Martin, was born in 1879 in Tipton Ford, Mo. A wagon trail led from there directly to Joplin, Mo., the largest town in the vicinity. In the late 1890s, he ended up near Joplin just over the state line in Galena, Kans, which was then a lead and zinc boom town with a Main Street known as "Red Hot Street."
Miners were often paid in silver dollars. Companies came and went and record-keeping was not much of a priority. When he reached retirement age, he could not draw his pension because he either did not have proof of employment and earnings or he was not always supplied with such information. He had to work into his 70s to become eligible, and he went back to the lead mining business.
I imagine he was given some consideration because of his age. He worked graveyards as a derrick "hoisti'man" in his latter years. That's how he pronounced it. It might have been "hoisting man," or hoistingman." The derricks were rickety and seemed ready to topple when the winds blew. It was his job to lower men in a barrel, with the aid of winch and cable, down into the shaft, and to bring the barrel back up when the men filled it. He would then tip the contents of the barrel down a chute. Fortunately, such work in his younger days had left him with a strong grip
On paydays, I would sometimes go with him. I was once treated to a fabulous display of colors. Laid out on the ground, on half-shingle size strips of balsa wood were core samples. The samples, like strips of toothpaste, were of just about every clay color imaginable, but leaning more toward pastels. I had thought there was nothing under the ground except brown dirt. The company geologist was explaining to my grandfather what it all meant. All I could decipher was that it meant work, and a job.
After he finally retired, he would sometimes pull his truck off the road at a pasture between Galena and Joplin. Just over the fence and in some weeds was a rusted piece of machinery with big iron wheels, a relic from his wood cutting days. He said it was a "widder-maker," that some less fortunate he had worked with were killed using such a machine. It was tricky to use and dangerous. He would sit and study its machinations from a distance, the gears, brakes, sprockets and chains. Each time he would come to the same conclusion: It had been a killer machine and a lot of poor boys had been its victims.
Long after the mines played out, the ground around Galena was littered with chunks of lead ore and jack (zinc). Broken chunks of lead were as smooth as glass and shone like a mirror. Now, those chunks are all gone. Lead became valuable enough that townspeople, many too young to even remember the bygone mining days, rounded it all up and sold it.
...
[2/14/2003 11:38:56 PM | Bryce Martin]
SKEWED SOUTHERN MANNERS
by Bryce Martin
Southerners, by most all accounts, have a lock on politeness, reverence to traditional manners, and overall goodwill. You cannot be unaware of all the catch phrases - "southern hospitality," "down-home manners," "southern charm" - and all things genteel.
Arriving in Nashville 10-plus years ago from Bakersfield, California, and judging on my own, I am not entirely convinced. In comparison between the two cities, all manners fly out the window in Nashville when it comes to navigating by car by cart or by foot.
In Bakersfield, Calif., and in all California communities I have spent time in, the pedestrian in a crosswalk is king. Traffic going both ways slows and comes to an orderly stop, with an occasional screeching of tires, and remains stopped for as long as it takes the pedestrian or pedestrians to cross safely. Okay, certain crosswalks are dangerous enough to have their own Website, like the one that warns motorists of local police speed traps. But, in Bakersfield and throughout California, crosswalks have a history. Pedestrians really do have the right of way, and it is a clear and mostly observed law. The idea is purely alien in Nashville.
Crosswalks are identified by painted lanes in California. Their existence is a way of life, as familiar as a line of palm trees. You grow up with the words �PED XING� - painted on the asphalt between the crosswalk lines. The habit is so embedded that you see people in the middle of a sidewalk so reluctant to cross over that they walk to the end for safe passage at the crosswalk.
Minorities, especially, know the rules in California. �You don�t get no money if you get hit outside the lines,� a young black man once told me.
Driving in traffic? Honey, hush. In Bakersfield, the freeway traffic during prime driving times may be humming along bumper to bumper at 70 miles per hour. This creates a �herd effect.� You go with the herd whether you like it or not. Slow down and you may be crumpled; speed up and you may exchange more than paint. You are part of a group, with no room for individualism. As bad as it sounds, it works amazingly well.
In Nashville, there are not as many vehicles during prime driving hours as are moving in Bakersfield, allowing the problem of varied drivers to display their own personalities. Vehicles yo-yo dangerously and create chaotic ebbs and flows in traffic speeds and patterns. Bakersfield traffic moves fast and linear; Nashville traffic does the herky-jerky.
In Bakersfield, if, say, six cars are stopped at a red light and all will continue in a straight line once the light turns green, a pattern will quickly emerge: Once the light turns green, all six cars will soon be going the same speed and with the same distance in between. That is partly due to the habits picked up with the �herd effect,� and more to do to in being considerate of drivers behind them. In Nashville, that sixth car will be lucky to even see a green light, since the drivers of the cars in front show no consideration for the trailing drivers. Some cars in the line will nearly touch and huge gaps will space out the others.
Going shopping is another exercise in bad manners in Nashville. In Bakersfield, large businesses have signs on front doors. You enter on the right and you exit on the right. Inside, you have right aisle traffic and left aisle traffic. It is orderly and pleasantly efficient.
In Nashville, no such signs or traditions exist. If you try to take a cart in the right door, someone is coming out that door, and the other door, too. The aisles are even worse than the entrances and exits when it comes to a balance of order.
Nashvillians, in my estimation, could learn much from those rude and laid-back Californians.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "Cuter than a new speckled pup in a red wagon."
...
SKEWED SOUTHERN MANNERS
by Bryce Martin
Southerners, by most all accounts, have a lock on politeness, reverence to traditional manners, and overall goodwill. You cannot be unaware of all the catch phrases - "southern hospitality," "down-home manners," "southern charm" - and all things genteel.
Arriving in Nashville 10-plus years ago from Bakersfield, California, and judging on my own, I am not entirely convinced. In comparison between the two cities, all manners fly out the window in Nashville when it comes to navigating by car by cart or by foot.
In Bakersfield, Calif., and in all California communities I have spent time in, the pedestrian in a crosswalk is king. Traffic going both ways slows and comes to an orderly stop, with an occasional screeching of tires, and remains stopped for as long as it takes the pedestrian or pedestrians to cross safely. Okay, certain crosswalks are dangerous enough to have their own Website, like the one that warns motorists of local police speed traps. But, in Bakersfield and throughout California, crosswalks have a history. Pedestrians really do have the right of way, and it is a clear and mostly observed law. The idea is purely alien in Nashville.
Crosswalks are identified by painted lanes in California. Their existence is a way of life, as familiar as a line of palm trees. You grow up with the words �PED XING� - painted on the asphalt between the crosswalk lines. The habit is so embedded that you see people in the middle of a sidewalk so reluctant to cross over that they walk to the end for safe passage at the crosswalk.
Minorities, especially, know the rules in California. �You don�t get no money if you get hit outside the lines,� a young black man once told me.
Driving in traffic? Honey, hush. In Bakersfield, the freeway traffic during prime driving times may be humming along bumper to bumper at 70 miles per hour. This creates a �herd effect.� You go with the herd whether you like it or not. Slow down and you may be crumpled; speed up and you may exchange more than paint. You are part of a group, with no room for individualism. As bad as it sounds, it works amazingly well.
In Nashville, there are not as many vehicles during prime driving hours as are moving in Bakersfield, allowing the problem of varied drivers to display their own personalities. Vehicles yo-yo dangerously and create chaotic ebbs and flows in traffic speeds and patterns. Bakersfield traffic moves fast and linear; Nashville traffic does the herky-jerky.
In Bakersfield, if, say, six cars are stopped at a red light and all will continue in a straight line once the light turns green, a pattern will quickly emerge: Once the light turns green, all six cars will soon be going the same speed and with the same distance in between. That is partly due to the habits picked up with the �herd effect,� and more to do to in being considerate of drivers behind them. In Nashville, that sixth car will be lucky to even see a green light, since the drivers of the cars in front show no consideration for the trailing drivers. Some cars in the line will nearly touch and huge gaps will space out the others.
Going shopping is another exercise in bad manners in Nashville. In Bakersfield, large businesses have signs on front doors. You enter on the right and you exit on the right. Inside, you have right aisle traffic and left aisle traffic. It is orderly and pleasantly efficient.
In Nashville, no such signs or traditions exist. If you try to take a cart in the right door, someone is coming out that door, and the other door, too. The aisles are even worse than the entrances and exits when it comes to a balance of order.
Nashvillians, in my estimation, could learn much from those rude and laid-back Californians.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "Cuter than a new speckled pup in a red wagon."
...
Thursday, February 13, 2003
WIRED FOR SOUND
by Bryce Martin
Our insightful media recently reported the great breakthrough when Iraq agreed to let U.N. inspectors interview a Baghdad scientist without a minder present, and, even better, at a location chosen by the inspectors. Hot diggety. We should be able to get a lot of useful info from this whistle blower, huh? It is a totally useless exercise. Saddam would have briefed the scientist on what not to say, threatened him and his family, and fitted him with a wire to monitor his every word. Although this would seem an obvious outcome of such a meeting, nobody in the media has made such a mention. The talking heads miss on another one. They're too busy asking the tough questions to Al Sharpton, as if someone who pronounces "asked" as "axed" could share any illuminating thoughts, and bowing to Bill Clinton as he spouts his revisionist history.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "Quicker than a minnow can swim a dipper."
...
by Bryce Martin
Our insightful media recently reported the great breakthrough when Iraq agreed to let U.N. inspectors interview a Baghdad scientist without a minder present, and, even better, at a location chosen by the inspectors. Hot diggety. We should be able to get a lot of useful info from this whistle blower, huh? It is a totally useless exercise. Saddam would have briefed the scientist on what not to say, threatened him and his family, and fitted him with a wire to monitor his every word. Although this would seem an obvious outcome of such a meeting, nobody in the media has made such a mention. The talking heads miss on another one. They're too busy asking the tough questions to Al Sharpton, as if someone who pronounces "asked" as "axed" could share any illuminating thoughts, and bowing to Bill Clinton as he spouts his revisionist history.
TODAY'S FOLKSY EXPRESSION OVERHEARD: "Quicker than a minnow can swim a dipper."
...