Around Main Street Smiles and love weave through delightful tales Vinnie Williams
“Through the years,” that lovely old song, is the theme of this, the ninth OCONEE THE MAGAZINE. “Smiling” and “love” thread through the song and this issue. There are tales of toy trains whistling through a home, an old house built on a racetrack, and four retirees whose smiles light up the pages. So does that of Miss Louise who looks back at 99 years of happy memories. Life is not for cowards, Miss Louise’s smile says. If you are young and itchy with life, a writer’s 10 favorite books will reassure you: The Lord approves of blue jeans and His book heading the list. “Goosebumps,” “Blue Like Jazz,” and “The Art of Fielding” also appear in our top 10. Inevitably the earth and its fullness thereof is not forgotten: a farm family still anchored to the land, a sworn-to-protectthe-law dog, and a quail-raising House. Eight sets of siblings are profiled in cross-country racing—the family that laces together races together. There is also the
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local woman who took up a fitness challenge after an injury left her over weight. The arts—poetry to painting to pottery—have made Oconee County familiar far beyond Southern bounds. Craftsmen and artists from coast to coast exhibit their work here. OCONEE THE MAGAZINE tries to keep up with the sparkler-like inspiration and exuberance of both students like those at Oconee County High School
to professionals exhibiting at the Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation. “Through the years” is a loving hugyour-neck for those who are pictured in this magazine. What would we have done without you?
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Vinnie Williams is the owner and publisher of The Oconee Enterprise newspaper in Watkinsville, Ga., and OCONEE THE MAGAZINE.
Dusty and Tanner Diget could spend all day playing with their grandfather’s train collection. Fred Benson has been collecting trains all his life and loves nothing more than to pass down his love for trains from generation to generation. Photo by Michael Prochaska
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In This Issue...
8 Toys that Transcend Time
22 The Retirees
32 Miss Louise Turns 99 40 Born to be a Farmer 52 A Novel Idea
In Every Issue... 62 Family Ties 4
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Around Main Street Antiquities Agrarian Life Academia Animalia Active Living Artspeak
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Volume 3, Number 1
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Publisher and Editor Vinnie Williams Advertising Director Maridee Williams Contributing Writers Blake Giles, Jim Pinneau, Michael Prochaska, Kathy Russo, Erik Schmidt, Charles D. Warnock, Derek Wiley, Vinnie Williams Contributing Photographers Blake Giles, Walker Montgomery, Michael Prochaska, Kathy Russo, Erik Schmidt, Derek Wiley, George Windate Graphic Design Allyn R. Jenkins George H. Windate Sales Representatives Cameron Gunter, Tracy Harmon, Beverly Rodgers
e-ING IS BELIEVING Subscribe to The Oconee Enterprise through our website, www.oconeeenterprise.com, and you’ll receive free access to e-editions of Oconee County’s oldest and most trusted newspaper, the traditional print editions and all our companion publications such as:
• Oconee the Magazine • our annual prep football preview guide • Home and Garden tab • Graduation Salute • 4H and FFA sections • and much, much more Don’t delay. Visit www.oconeeenterprise.com today, click on the “subscribe” link and secure your print and e-editions of The Oconee Enterprise.
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Circulation Maridee Williams, Jay Hanley
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OCONEE THE MAGAZINE is published quarterly by Oconee Enterprise, Inc. No portion of this publication may be reproduced in any manner without express written consent of the publisher. This includes advertisements designed and produced by OCONEE THE MAGAZINE. OCONEE THE MAGAZINE accepts no responsibility for unsolicited manuscripts, photographs or artwork, and none will be returned without a self-addressed, stamped envelope. Address inquiries to: P.O. Box 535, Watkinsville, GA 30677 or oconeethemagazine@gmail.com
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© 2012 Oconee Enterprise, Inc. All rights reserved.
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A IL
O SS IN
Toys To
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RO Transcend A D
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Story and Photos by Michael Prochaska
The imagination of a child, they say, is limitless. History and politics and a world of fixed science are abstruse concepts yet to be developed. We are born and nurtured to fancy the impossible, our brains consumed by whimsical tales and bursts of idealism. In time, our worlds are jostled by the realities of every day life, and we come to appreciate fiction not as an ideal but as an art form. This is a story of a man who never lost sight of that sparkle. Fred Benson grew up around Atlanta in the late 1940s when toy trains whistled around Christmas trees behind the snowy glass of department store window fronts. Like many young boys, his eyes would light up at the sight of a new toy under layers of bows and wrapping paper. After riding the Man O’ War, a passenger train that ran from Columbus, Ga., to Atlanta, his childhood fascination for everything locomotive soon blossomed into a lifelong pursuit of fanciful escapism. Benson remembers the joys of ordering grilled cheese sandwiches and RC Cola for under a dollar At left, the entire second floor of Fred Benson’s house contains an extensive layout of model trains and train memorabilia spanning decades of his life. Above, Benson recreates aspects of real life into his collection. Around the model towns are several one-room church houses named after his family’s church, Connecting Point, in Bogart.
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A Model Town
Whether shopping for Harley-Davidsons, visiting the library or playing carnival games, the figurines of Fred Benson’s creation never have a dull day.
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while gazing out the window in awe. The railroad bumps and engine chugs were music to his ears. For most of his life, aside from the much-regretted age of 16 when he sold some of his collection to finance a car and a girlfriend, Benson discovered a diversion from the real world as an architect of his own world. His collection could span over a mile if laid out in single line, but instead, the trains twist and turn through mountains, tunnels and cities that line the walls and extend in long treks around the spacious second floor of his pale yellow house. The house itself was designed specifically for his miscellany of locomotives, and the eclectic landscapes were inspired and built as a blend of Benson’s life and a reality that exists only in his mind. An entire town populated with scaleddown fire stations, libraries and familyowned stores carries the name “Victoriaville” in honor of his wife, Victoria, who goes by Viki. You can spot his
Fred Benson reflects on his favorite locomotives.
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After years of accumulating novelties and trains, this landscape would span miles in the real world.
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church in about three separate towns, as well as Athens’ ABC Printing and about a dozen Harley Davidsons resting outside a model Cycle World of Athens. Diget’s Amusement Park, an effulgent mingling of carnival fun fair that includes a luminously romantic Ferris wheel and a towering roller coaster, serenades the surrounding populace of figurine boys and pocket-sized girls. Diget is the surname of Benson’s son-inlaw, David Diget, who has no professional affiliation with amusement parks or carnival rides. “Things just come to me,” Benson says simply. “It can be about anything you want it to be.” And so it would appear that the imagination of a model train enthusiast is as limitless as a child. “You’re creating your own world,” explains Lewis Collier, owner of Memory Station, a model train store in Watkinsville. “That’s what most of us do. My personal layout is, more or less, a perfect world in the 1950s.” He pauses, before admitting that this “perfect world,” of course, never existed. Collier has a theory that in the model railroad world, politics are what you want them to be. Benson easily skirts around politics in conversation but his 27-year-old son,
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Chance, butts in to proclaim John McCain president of the second floor, which, aside from a small guest room wreathed in locomotive machinery, is one big open backdrop for the Hollywood remake of “The Great Train Robbery.” “I just told him I wanted everything I had
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Inset, Lewis Collier, owner of Memory Station in Watkinsville, says Fred Benson is a regular customer. Sometimes he knows exactly what he wants. Other times, he just enjoys browsing and looking at Collier’s own extensive model train layout in his store.
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olidays
to do on one floor. I didn’t care if he went up, down or out,” Viki says amusingly. “Friends will come over and the husbands will go and look at the trains and the wives will come back down and say, ‘Why do you let him spend so much money on those trains?” Among all the replica steam engines, freight trains and motley memorabilia, Benson admits that he’s never had an appraisal on his prized possessions, and at this point, he has lost track of the accumulated costs of such an extensive collection. Collier says an appreciating exhibit of metal freights is almost nonexistent in this economy. Train collectors do not take pride in the financial worth of their treasure trove, he claims, but in the creative desire of personalized design. Benson constructs all the scenery and accessories with the help of his son. He’ll
take household items like canisters and turn them into silos. Toothpicks become bridges and cat litter is scattered across insulation board to replicate dirt. Chance assists with the electrical wiring and the digital graphics that label the train containers and buildings. They come from a familial line of handymen, as Bensons’ parents made caskets and later opened up a cabinet store when he was a child. Now Benson, who at 72-years-old is far from completing his collection, shares his trains with five children, 13 grandchildren and seven great grandchildren. It’s obvious the trains receive a great deal of attention from the playful hands of children around holidays, and for this reason, Benson’s showcase is neither pristine nor perfect. He does show some degree of attention to the value of his treasured trains by preserving the original boxes in one corner of
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In God We Trust Beneath the tracks is an intricate layering of wirework and mechanical controls.
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Diget’s Amusement Park is named after Fred’s son-in-law, David Diget.
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the room. But at the same time, he’ll store Little Debbie Nutty Bars in a cooler under a village platform and encourage visitors to touch, play and have fun. It’s clear the Norfolk & Western rail carriers are meant to be touched. A Barnum & Bailey Circus animal cracker box rests on top of one train to
indicate that above all else, these trains are toys, not lavishly high-end art. That childlike adoration seems to be one of the traits that Viki fell in love with more than 45 years ago. “She will tell you the same thing my wife will tell you,” Collier says of Viki. “She loves
Fred and Viki love nothing more than taking time out of a busy day and admiring his creations.
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Fred’s son, Chance Benson, spends almost as much time as his father playing with the trains. He grew up with trains, after all.
the train man, and it’s a matter of supporting the train man more than the train hobby.” Viki articulates that sentiment herself when she replies humorously, “If I die before he does, he’s got something to do besides look for another wife.” Viki refers to Benson’s possessions with an almost spiritual respect. “Everything’s got a reason,” she says of its layout and design. “It’s the life and adventures of Fred Benson.” The trains and their molded plastic patrons tell a story. They tell the story of a love for passions, whether for bright yellow Union Pacific trains, 1950s pink Corvettes, or dangerously metallic Harley-Davidsons.
They tell the story of thriving businesses and of the gift of leisure, fun and uninhibited imagination. But the most significant story being told here is that of a father and the family he raised. “God takes care of me,” Benson says proudly. “He’s given me everything I needed in life.” Benson stops for a second to list the blessings he is grateful for—a loving wife, five children and a roof over his head. He does not include model trains. And in that moment, it becomes clear that the trains are a greater blessing for those who know Benson, and that we are to be grateful to have shared in his passion and imagination.
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Fred also collects model cars, some replicated to look as old as the cars of the 1930s.
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Antiquities
Working farm a work in progress One of the oldest homes in Oconee County rests on an old racetrack. The Douglas farm, a working farm on Price Mill Road in Bishop, is shaded by oaks, pecan and Southern heritage apple trees. Nearby are a flock of Jacob sheep, pigs, chickens and turkeys. “Let’s not forget Jefferson the cat, dogs Dooley and Rosie, Okay Dixie the cow, and Buck the horse,” cautions Lisa Douglas standing near her newly-turned winter garden. “They’re part of Hedgerow Farm. Bill and I love the legacy of the land that God has lent us.” In 2008 the Douglases bought the house that was built circa 1900. It led the list of four of the 279 “oldest houses” in Oconee
County that Property Appraiser Allen Skinner developed. “There are 279 houses built between 1790 and 1912. I’m not a deskbound appraiser. I do field work. Likely I’ve driven or walked about every road in Oconee County since I came in 2006. So have my field appraisers,” says Oconee County’s chief appraiser. Skinner reminds that the courthouse burned twice and records were destroyed, so knowing the precise origin of some homes is problematic. “We depended a lot on the memories of the occupants, what they’ve researched about the house, old residents of the neighborhoods, and generally on the style and lo-
Lisa Douglas loves the ambiance of the wide and welcoming outdoor Southern porch. Photo by Kathy Russo
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cation for our dates, ” says Skinner. One interesting note: of the 279 old houses, there were 148 built, like the Douglas house, in 1900. “When owners were uncertain of the date they usually said ‘around 1900,’” adds Skinner. As for the dates 1790 to 1912, these were chosen after consultants with Georgia historical societies. Skinner points out that the oldest house, the county-owned 1790-built William Daniell house on Founders Boulevard, leads the list. “Oconee County purchased it from individuals, thus saving it from moving or destruction,” points out Skinner. The Douglas homestead on Price Mill Road has been treated lovingly by its newest occupants. Lisa and Bill Douglas are high school sweethearts who come from Warner Robbins. When Bill became associated with the far-flung Coca-Cola Company, they lived in Spain, Norway—although children Will and Ella were born in Atlanta—England, and finally Greece. “Coming back to Georgia is coming back home truly,” Lisa says. Meanwhile looking for the farm that Lisa wanted, they found the perfect locale, called “the Steinemann place.” The Steinemann’s were the last owners of several hundred acres that John Whitlow farmed in the early1800s. James Clarence and Robert Edward Branch, horsemen, bought the property in 1888 and laid out a racetrack for sulky racing.
Horses gave way to dairy cows owned by the Turnbull families, then the Steinemanns about 50 or 60 years ago. When the Douglases bought it in 2008, Lisa went to work. “It’s still a work in progress,” she admits. “After we bought it—I dubbed it Hedgerow Farm—we added on to the original 2,500 square foot farmhouse.” Bill asks, “When will we be finished?” I tell him, “Never.” Lisa Douglas bubbles over with energy, enthusiasm, plans and poetry in her soul. Out-buildings and a small cabin have been restored. “And,” Lisa looks about with love, “the honeybees began it all. They produce honey which I give to neighbors and friends.” Then there are the Jacob sheep which come at Lisa’s call. “When I look at them, all the passages in the Bible about sheep come to life.” Farming means the land, outdoors, but the interior of the old house is a tribute to Lisa’s good taste, although she credits it to historically-minded and gifted craftsmen, artists and friends. Even her big pantry is artfully decorated. At the end Lisa Douglas looks around at what she and God have wrought and says, “It’s about the people who came before us, and honoring the history and integrity of the families who lived on this land.”
Lisa Douglas and Tennessee Walker Buck have been training to ride the old horse track. Photo by Kathy Russo
Okay Dixie has taken it upon herself to be guardian of Lisa and Bill Douglas’ flock of Jacob sheep. Photo by Kathy Russo
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Vinnie Williams is the owner and publisher of The Oconee Enterprise newspaper in Watkinsville, Ga., and OCONEE THE MAGAZINE and Kathy Russo is a freelance writer and photographer living in Athens.
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Lisa Douglas’ pantry is a work of art in and of itself. Photo by Kathy Russo
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Oconee Portraits
The Retirees By Vinnie Williams
ke Giles hoto by Bla P n e k u L Jim
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Kim Argo Photo by Blake Giles
Fall 2012
Charles Grimes Photo by Blake Giles
Frank C hrista
Photo by Blake Gil es
Retirees find enrichment in volunteering and in family Lob Lie-by-the-Fire was an English spider. It draws its long legs up and basks in idle warmth. Not so a lot of lobs called “retirees.” Many can’t bear idleness: they must be up and doing. It’s called “volunteering.” Lucky are the communities that have them. They fill in the cracks by serving on necessary committees, boards, councils and departments—Oconee volunteer fire/rescue, for instance—and their only pay is the satisfaction of serving.
Only there is another payment: grandchildren. These four retirees have, among them, 12 grandchildren. Volunteers believe, although not consciously, that they are helping lay loving foundations for these children. Oconee is rich in volunteers. Those profiled on the following pages were chosen at first thought: Jim Luken, Charles Grimes, Kim Argo and Frank Christa. Beyond them are many, many more.
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The Server ildren with grandch es m ri G s le har to Patsy and C harlotte. Submitted pho C Henry and
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Charles Grimes the salesman who found a home Like a gold thread, grandchildren run through the lives of our four retirees. “It’s what life is all about,” says Charles Grimes. “Grandchildren are a second chance at making the world better.” And that’s what volunteering is all about: love of a community, the earth—love. Never did the gold thread shine as brightly as on Sunday, Aug. 19. That is when 36 people gathered for three days in the big rented house at Lake Oconee. The occasion was the celebrating of the sixth birthdays of Charles and Patsy Grimes’ twin grandchildren: Henry and Charlotte. The big 2-story house, rented for three days for the festivities, bulged with happiness, laughter and goodwill, all punctuated by the barks of the family’s black Shih Tzu. “It rained one day, but didn’t dampen the celebration,” says Charles. “The birthday presents? Heaped high! We were a wilderness of crumpled gift-wrappings.” Charles and Patsy had flown to England in 2011 and visited son Chris and the twins. Their only child, Chris, a University of Georgia graduate, began his professional career in New York City as a writer for the Financial Times. Five years ago he was transferred to London. “It’s been a wonderful life and still is,” Grimes says. “I was born in Milledgeville, graduated from UGA, and began traveling for a wholesale drug company. One of my stops was Eddie Mills’ drugstore in Watkinsville.” One thing led to another, Charles and Patsy Grimes bought a home in Oconee and Charles got involved in the Oconee Rotary Club and the Oconee Chamber of Commerce, where he became president in 2003-2004. Among his volunteering is the Oconee Fall Festival whose meetings he attends once a month, as well as manning the Welcome Center Wednesdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., Friends of the Oconee Library and Area Churches Together Serving. Most retirees travel when they shed the shackles of a daily job, and Charles and Patsy Grimes were, and are, no different. “We’ve traveled through New England, taken bus tours, and will likely fly to London again. Oconee, though, is where we live—and I mean that in more ways than dwelling in my house,” he says. “Where you live is what you can do for folks,” he says smiling, “especially for grandchildren.”
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The Transformer
Happy Holidays! And a nutty one too!
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Jim Luken the mayor who changed Watkinsville Who does not remember the Watkinsville mayor who changed “a small, dusty little town” by planting roses on Main Street, naming it “The Artland of Georgia,” and calling its small businesses “the lifeblood.” The son of a Cincinnati mayor and a career U.S. Marine—he served 26 years and was in the Tet offensive in 1968—he rose to the rank of colonel. When he retired, he spent 10 years as head of security for a large Atlanta firm. Luken met his wife, Marlene, in North Carolina. They had sons enrolled in the University of Georgia. Wanting to be near them, they bought a home on Third Street. Unfortunately, it had become a cut-through with speeders, so Luken began attending Watkinsville council meetings. Speed bumps were installed. When Mayor Toby Hardigree decided against running again in 2003, Luken qualified and won without opposition. In three terms, he helped transform the “dusty little town” into the thriving small city that it has become. Its greatest assets, he says are the Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation, Ashford Manor, Town Center and Chappelle Gallery. The Lukens have two sons, Christopher, who has three children, and Josh, who has none.
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Kim Argo loves traveling with her grandchildren. Submitted photo
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Kim Argo the teacher who serves Attending college and getting a degree in education once assured women of a lifelong job, usually benefits, and the respect of the community. Now, when a young woman graduates with a degree in education, it is harder to find employment. Bad times have hit schools, too. Many teachers have been released. Kim Argo retired in 2010 after 26 and a half years of teaching students from the fifth grade through high school. When she left the classrooms, she was an assistant principal in the Walton County School System. Why is a teacher among our tributes to retirees? It’s because of the mark that not alone she but all good teachers leave, not alone on their students, but in the community. After retiring, many volunteer, but Kim Argo has always volunteered. One of her former fifth-grade students, Jay Hanley of The Oconee Enterprise, suggested her for these recognitions of retirees. “Remember,” he says, “not only was she a wonderful teacher, one of those who made this county noted for its good schools, but after she retired, she was still concerned about kids so she became a member of the Oconee County Board of Education.” Kim Argo’s belief that children are the hope of the future is reflected in her grandchildren. “My daughter Alicea Flanagan has four children, so we’ve traveled to a lot of places, historic ones.” she says. “I’ve been on a mission trip to Wisconsin. I’m a charter member of Briarwood Baptist Church. I teach Bible studies on Wednesday.” Although she taught in Oglethorpe and Madison counties, she spent 18 years teaching in Oconee County, which has earned a reputation for its good schools due to its good teachers and paternal support. Besides serving on the BOE, Kim Argo was part of Oconee Little League, Oconee Booster Club and chairman of the Oconee Advisory Committee on Tourism and Cultural Affairs. When she was chairman of the latter committee, the name for the new Oconee County park was suggested as Oconee Community Complex. Kim Argo was approached by members of the Oconee Veterans Memorial Foundation with a suggestion: Oconee Veterans Park. At a meeting, when the new name was proposed, Kim Argo conducted the members and visitors through Robert’s Rules of Order, crisply, by the book. When the vote was taken, Oconee Veterans Park was approved. Kim Argo, born in Savannah, daughter of a U.S. Air Force officer, was reared in Toccoa and received both a bachelors and masters degree from the University of Georgia, then specialized degrees. She was married to Robert Jasper Argo who was in construction in Vietnam. He died in 1993. The couple had two children, Scott, who is single, and Alicea, who has four children. “Lately we’ve been to Disney World, Philadelphia, and plan on visiting Washington, D.C.” As a grandmother, Kim Argo is still teaching. “All the sites are part of American history. Even Disney World,” she says.
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Happy belated birthday to Frank Christa and to The Oconee Enterprise Editor Blake Giles. Along with the late Frank Sinatra, singing in the heavenly choir now, all were born on Sept. 24. Clearly a day of grace. Although Sinatra has passed on, Frank Christa, who retired in 2002, has quit putting on airplanes like shoes and is back home in Oconee. “In the words of Dorothy leaving Oz, there's no place like home,” he says. This, after visiting 43 countries with wife Peggy, all the states in star-spangled America, and forays into Canada. And in the midst of all these, he continued volunteering and talking proudly about his four grandchildren who, if they take after him, will continue moving and shaking their worlds ahead. Frank Christa's impressive biography can be found on the Internet, but he can't get tacked down. Best known as the founding president and director of the Bank of Georgia in Oconee, he continued serving as senior vice-president for four years when it was sold to Synovus and merged with Athens First Bank and Trust. “Those were fine, challenging days when the Bank of Georgia was organized in 1985. Oconee was growing and the time was right,” Christa said. Seven men organized the Bank of Georgia: Coleman Whitehead, Mike Power, Gene Higginbotham, Jim Thaxton, the late Don Norris and the late Jim Bowers.
“Banking, we believed, was not a high-flying business. We were thrifty and we made a profit every three months. The directors had a lot to do with development. It was a good board and a good location,” said Christa. Born in Verona, N.J., Frank Christa graduated from the University of Georgia with degrees in history and education. He also earned a graduate degree in banking. During those days America was called The Sugar Daddy of the World. No call for help was too far, nothing was beyond America's capabilities. It was a time of growth, especially in this region, and Frank Christa was up to his optimistic persona in it. Among volunteering was as an organizer of the Oconee County Community Center, a director of the Oconee Chamber of Commerce, chairman of the Athens Technical College Board of Directors and its treasurer. Rotary Club, Boy Scouts, Touchdown Club, Oconee Education Foundation, Clean and Beautiful—the list continues. Before all that, Frank Christa served in the Army, taught at South Cobb High School, and coached sports. And it all began in 1965 when Frank Christa became a financial analyst with Dun & Bradstreet. Wife Peggy, a North Carolina girl, has been at Frank's side over the years, at home and abroad. Their children are Dr. Michael Christa, who has two daughters, and Cathy Martin, who has two sons.
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Miss Louise Turns
99
Looking back over a lifetime of memories By Kathy Russo
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he’s a church-going lady who’s been a wife and mother, a career girl, a volunteer, a worldtraveler, and a Foolish Virgin. She even has a theme song. Her gentle demeanor somewhat belies her feisty nature as she ventures into her 100th year here on earth, just as her lovely and youthful bearing denies the multitude of those years. Louise Shearon looked to celebrate her 99th birthday Oct. 11 with the style she’s exhibited throughout a lifetime. Born in Chicago, she spent most of her life in suburban and rural areas of Illinois, entertaining life in the South first as a snowbird with her husband Ken in Florida. Later she followed two of her four sons, Dave and 32
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Jim, along with Mario Castro, as they opened Ashford Manor Bed and Breakfast in Watkinsville, a place she now lovingly calls home. “A community icon,” Pat Adams calls Miss Louise, as she’s fondly referred to. “Everybody just loves her,” Adams says. “She’s such a gentle, kind, caring woman.” “She’s incredible,” says Joe Ruiz, executive director of Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation, where Miss Louise was a volunteer for years. “She’s very together, and very sharp for a woman her age.” He echoes the thoughts of many when he says, “I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone else like Miss Louise.” Ruiz said they used to sort of joke about her. Fall 2012
“She’s kind of like ‘Where’s Waldo?’ because at any big gathering of people, wherever you go, there she is,” he says smiling. “She loves coming out in the community. She’s nearly 99, and still finds a way to make it here to openings and events. I think it’s fantastic.” Cindy Farley found Miss Louise’s volunteering a great aid when Farley worked at OCAF. “She was such a dedicated volunteer, and so good at what she did,” Farley says. But one thing that strikes Farley strikes everyone about Miss Louise. “Isn’t she beautiful?” Farley asked rhetorically. “I just love her,” she continued. “She’s such a sweet person. And she’s always had
Miss Louise Shearon, left, and her son Dave relax in the main living space of her home which is tucked away in the middle of town, yet has the feel of a country getaway. Photo by Kathy Russo
such a positive attitude, which I think has a lot to do with her longevity.” Farley shared one of Miss Louise’s favorite sayings: “Worry is like a rocking chair; it doesn’t get you anywhere.” Farley says she finds Miss Louise inspirational. “It’s one of those things that will stay with me forever,” Farley says of Louise and her rocking chair quote. A recent knee replacement has Margie Phillips and other caregivers assisting her, but up until that operation Louise lived at home quite independently, just around the corner from her son Dave who, along with his partner and her “adopted son” Castro, continues to run Ashford Manor. Jim, now deceased but still well-known
and beloved in the Oconee community, designed the home with no square rooms, since after Miss Louise lived briefly in a retirement community, she wanted nothing to do with rooms reminiscent of that stay. “Mario, Jim and I moved here in ‘97,” Dave explained. After his father passed, his mom would continue trekking back and forth from Illinois in the winter to Florida in the summer, “stopping at Ashford Manor and taking one of our rooms out of commission.” Her current home was designed as a stop for her when she visited, and as a second B&B when Miss Louise wasn’t in Watkinsville. “But Jim did too good a job designing this house, and for maybe a year mom did Fall 2012
this back-and-forth thing, then shortly thereafter she checked in, and she hasn’t checked out,” Dave says. Miss Louise was born Anna Louise Timberlake in 1913. She legally changed her name, partly because “my mother would go, Anna Louise!” but mostly because “The boys across the street made a little naughty verse about me,” she says. It went like this: “‘Anna banana Louisiana, Kentucky, Missouri—manure pile!’ so I changed to Louise when I went to high school.” Just part of the feisty, rebellious nature hidden behind that demure exterior. “Unfortunately it’s a family trait,” Dave admitted. “We all know how to get up on
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Miss Louise is a frequent flyer in the Watkinsville Christmas parade. Submitted photo
our high heels when we need to. I don’t know if we learned that from mom, or if it’s in the genes, but we’re known to speak our minds.” Her father had passed away when she was 13, and Louise’s mother supported her, her two sisters, and the oldest, a brother.
Miss Louise shows off many decorated Louise masks and a cut-out photo of her husband, Dr. Ken, at a gala party celebrating her 95th birthday. Submitted photo
Louise was the baby, as is the son she now lives by. Miss Louise attended Northwestern University, then, “Because it was the Depression year, ’29, why, I got a job.” It was then she became a member of the Foolish Virgins Club. The girls named
themselves that “because we were young and eligible but unmarried.” They would hang out in the Pump Room of the Drake Hotel in Chicago, of Sinatra fame, and try to meet bachelors and get married, as was the order of the day.
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But it was Louise’s career as a dental assistant that eventually led to her meeting the handsome Dr. Kenneth Shearon. As World War II was in full swing, Louise and her mother traveled to San Francisco, where Ken was stationed. “My father never knew when he was going to be called,” Dave says. “He told mom ‘One morning I just won’t be there.’ They were married in ‘42 at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. She literally left her heart in San Francisco.” “That’s my theme song,” Louise says. “‘I Left My Heart in San Francisco’ by Tony Bennett.” After Dr. Kenneth returned from service in the Navy, the couple made up for lost time. Louise had four boys in five years. Bill, the eldest, now lives in Florida. Jim came along 11 months later, followed by Gerry, who’s been dead some 35 years. “I will say, I have very talented sons,” Louise asserted. Dave recently won dancing accolades and most money raised for Project Safe through its Dancing with the Stars. “When I won the second award, she threw her arms up and nearly flipped over her wheelchair,” Dave says. Dave graduated cum laude from Boston University, and Jim worked with the likes of
Pavarotti, Streisand and Prince. Louise claims she’s not an artist, but “She’s modest, but she’s extremely creative at what many women of her era were,” Dave says. “Throwing parties, but then again it’s probably in the genes because we’re known for a little bit of that ourselves, but we learned that from mom.” uch like the classic ‘50s and ‘60s soirees made famous in the TV show Mad Men, she threw wonderful dinner parties and set the tone for the evening, Dave said. Famous doctors were the norm at their parties, and Louise often had to serve as memory for her husband, as Kenneth had a terrible sense of people and names, their son recounted. Dr. Kenneth died in 1991. Louise dealt with his death by taking a trip around the world, traveling 103 days by herself. The couple had traveled a good deal. “There’s an interesting map that covers the wall in the Safari room of the Manor house, with little red dots of every place she’s been,” Dave shared. Louise is a regular church-goer. “My parents went to a congregational church, and my two sisters and I were told that we could go to any church we wished,” she says. “Here it’s the Ashford Memorial Church.”
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Bill, Jim, Gerry and Dave were Louise and Ken Shearon’s four boys, all born within five years. Submitted photo
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ave says she recently stood up and gave an eloquent appeal to the congregation to pray for the family of his cousin and her famous nephew, Neil Armstrong, who recently passed. “He was sort of humble,” Louise says of Armstrong. “It’s hard to characterize him other than what all the papers said, because he was really that way,” Dave says. “He was extremely interesting to talk to, but of course very unassuming. Never at all would you know there was anything significant about his life.” Louise and Ken attended what they called the blast-off. “There was a great article about her at the launch,” Dave says about his mom. “She was hollering, ‘Go Neil!’ sort of like at a football game, as it was blasting off.” Armstrong, of course, was the first man to walk on the moon. Louise has a tremendous social circle in Oconee County, Dave said.
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“We celebrated her 90th birthday, and I don’t think she was even here more than a year or so, and there were almost 200 people,” he recalled. Louise is active in the Newcomers Club, the Garden Club, and the Stitch and Chat Club. She’s been in several Watkinsville Christmas parades. “The first year she was on the front page of The Oconee Enterprise,” Dave says. “She held a sign, ‘Looking for husband; must have own money.’” She has a loving cat, Cornbread. “She’s hiding under the bed,” Louise says. “David and Mario gave her to me the first year I was here.” Louise also sponsors a Labrador retriever through a program in Florida, as her son Bill has a service dog. Louise has five great grandchildren. The eldest, a boy, recently turned 19. She takes afternoon tea daily, and enjoys a glass of wine as well. Recently, at Dave’s
Fall 2012
and Mario’s prodding, she gave up the keys to her car. About living to be 99? “I never even thought about it!” she exclaimed. “Now I probably do more exercise than I ever did in my life,” she says. Louise claims no secrets for longevity. Keeping active and positive may be two of the traits that have brought her to this landmark of a birthday, along with living a healthy life. She does attribute her lovely skin, which a dermatologist recently clocked at more than 15 years younger than her actual age, “to my mother who lived to be 96, and she used Pond’s cream,” which Louise uses along with Oil of Olay. She also has all her original teeth but one. She plans to celebrate “the fact that I’m still living, with no plans except to have a lot of friends that are invited to come,” she says. “I’m very happy here,” she added. “I’ve met wonderful people here.”
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Agrarian Life
House houses house quail Looks can be deceiving. From Astondale Road, the long structures on the Ricky House farm look like chicken houses. Instead, thousands of quail inhabit the buildings. Ricky House is Oconee County’s only quail grower. House used to be in the poultry business. His specialty was producing eggs, but when he lost his contract, he cast about for something else to grow in the houses. He hooked up with Quail International of Greensboro.
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Like poultry farmers, House grows his birds for human consumption. There are farmers who grow “pen-raised” quail for hunting preserves, but House raises a different breed of quail than is common in the fields of Georgia. The Bob White quail is the hunter’s prey. House grows pharaoh quail on his farm. Growing quail is similar to growing chickens, but different too. The requirements for temperature control are different, for example. The quail do not grow as large as chickens, so the grow-out period is shorter.
Those first days, however, require practically around-the-clock attention before the birds mature a bit. The interior of the quail house is a jigsawpuzzle maker’s nightmare—or dream—as tens of thousands of birds mill about. They are drawn to light and to movement. If turned loose outside, they could fly, said House, but they stick to the ground in the house. Quail is a specialty livestock item in Georgia. The latest Farm Gate Value Report for the state, 2010, notes that poultry production in Georgia was the No. 1 agricul-
Ricky House has been raising quail for commercial consumption for more than a decade at his farm on Astondale Road. Photo by Blake Giles
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The sea of birds in the House house make for a puzzle-maker’s dream—or nightmare, depending on your point of view. Photo by Blake Giles
tural product in the state. Broilers alone accounted for $4.6 billion of farm gate value in Georgia. That is not counting eggs and breeder pullet units, which rank third and 12th in the state in farm commodities. Quail rank 37th, right below ag-based tourism and right above straw. The farmgate value in 2010 was $30.8 million, down from a record $41.6 million in 2009. With Quail International based in Greensboro, it is no shock that Greene County is the state’s most prolific quail producer, accounting for 44 percent of the state’s harvest. Oconee County—translated House— was eighth in the state. House bristles a bit that the quail industry does not do more to promote the bird as a food option. But his task is to grow them for market, and he has been doing that successfully for more than a decade.
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Blake Giles is the editor of The Oconee Enterprise newspaper in Watkinsville, Ga.
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House raises enough quail to rank the county eighth in the state in production. Photo by Blake Giles
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Born to be a Farmer By Blake Giles
Discovering a new calf is still a thrill for farmer Charles Osborn. Photo by Blake Giles
Charles Osborn knows his cows. Cows have always been a central part of the life of Charles and Vickie Osborn. They even have scrapbooks dedicated to cows. And the people who showed them, of course. Looking at those photos, Charles points with equal pride at the cows and at the young people showing them. “That’s Katie Bell,” he said, pointing to a cow. Standing with the cow is Sidney Bell, former agriculture teacher at Oconee County High School, and the Osborn’s baby daughter Katie. Sometimes, there have been more tangi40
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ble reminders around the house of the cattle trade. Kelli, the oldest of their three daughters, once remarked, “You might be a redneck if you have a semen tank in your breakfast room.” Out on the farm, which includes 210 acres on Greensboro Highway, plus rented land elsewhere in the county, the Osborn herd is smaller than it has been. “Right now I have 210 mama cows,” Osborn said. “I have had as many as 400. The price got too good that I got to selling them.” Osborn prefers English-bred cattle, such Fall 2012
as Charolais, Hereford and shorthorn. But he has Angus cows too, because successful marketing has made that breed so popular. At first he was not a big fan of the shorthorn because it’s hide could have too much white. Even though consumers don’t know the color of the hide from whence came their beef, black has become the preferred color. Credit the Angus breed for successful branding. But what Osborn discovered is that the shorthorn calves would weigh about 150 pounds more when he sold them, and that was a lot of money. So that was what he started with.
Charles Osborne has put 450,000 miles on his Chevrolet truck, replacing the transmission multiple times. Photo by Blake Giles
Not only does he know about his cows, he seems to know his cows on an individual basis. Listen in to half of a conversation as he drives a visitor from pasture to pasture. o “That calf is on the borderline of going out of here. She doesn’t give enough milk. I want them to give a lot of milk. She is about to become hamburger.” o “These three right here, they are out of some of my cows. I have it written down when they are supposed to come in. Actually, their mama is in here with them. See her with that old, black and white face and the white above her neck?” o “I can look at that calf and tell she is kin. She is beginning to get a big teat. I
will keep that heifer for a brood cow.” o “That’s her baby there. I have not seen that calf.” o “She is getting old, but she raises a good calf.” o “There are two of my registered Angus. I got them AI out of a bull called Sleeping Easy.” AI stands for artificial insemination. o “I bought that cow at the University. I bought a bull and two cows. I gave $1,100, and people said that was high, but I sold their calves for nearly about $1,000.” o “That old red shorthorn cow laying down, both of them kids showed them. One of them, Clint Gantt, he is in college. His mama used to tell everybody that I was babysitting her Fall 2012
son, and he was getting paid. I told people that the only reason I let him stay around was because he had a good-looking mama.” There is probably a story with every four-footed animal on the Osborn farm, and many of them relate to family and friends. Not only has Osborn grown his share of animals, he has nurtured a lifetime of relationships. The aforementioned Gantt, for example, is one of dozens of Oconee County young folks whose paths to success in life intersected with the Osborn family. In the spring of 2012 the Junior Cattleman’s Association surprised Osborn with a special presentation at an informal cookout. “Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for coming out tonight,” said Anna Kelley, then
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vice president of the Junior Association. “This dinner is in honor of Mr. Osborn.” In unison the people in the room turned to look at Osborn, whose mouth was agape. They had pulled off the surprise. “He has given countless calves and bags of feed to livestock show-ers,” Kelley read from her speech. “He is an icon to the agricultural community and has encouraged youth to remain active in agriculture for generations to come. His servant heart allowed students to show, who otherwise would not have had the chance.” Maybe Osborn is so invested in young people because he knows that decisions made at a young age can pay dividends for decades to come. Before he was old enough to drive, he chose his profession, his pastime and his life partner. Osborn grew up in Dark Corner, the westernmost portion of Oconee County roughly defined by Ga. Route 53 on its north border and U.S. 78 on its east border.
Charles Osborn built several pig pens like this. Photo by Blake Giles
“My daddy was a builder,” Charles said. “Osborn and Mobley. I could have been a carpenter. I didn’t like it though.” Except when it fits into his farming. He pointed with pride to a hog pen he built,
and to chicken houses he modified and to a barn he is building, with an apartment on the second floor. W.A. Osborn also had chicken houses and raised cotton. He had a few cows. The
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labor of farming captured Charles at a young age. Back in the ‘60s, Jack Montgomery, whose brother Woodson farms today, would hire teenage boys to help haul hay. Charles earned 25 cents a bale. “I’d see four bales of hay, and I would think that is a dollar,” he said. The work of farming never bothered him. In fact, he embraced it. And he figured out early how to make it pay. He bought his first car with a cotton crop. “It was a brand new ‘66 Galaxy 500 with a 390 high-performance engine, four speed,” he recited. “We were showing pigs at the fair, and I was not quite 16. I had the money in my pocket, and they wouldn’t sell it to me.” For all his earnest labor as a farmer, Osborn was an indifferent student at best. He was a poor reader as a child. He remembers his mother taking him to remedial training at the University of Georgia before he was old enough to drive. The treat was getting to swim in Stegeman Pool after the classes, which helped. Vickie said that Charles probably should have been held out a year before starting first grade after he was afflicted with pneumonia. They passed him along for a while, but eventually he failed a grade. And then his father got sick. “My dad was in the hospital and Mama needed some help, and I just didn’t like going to school,” said Charles. So he dropped out of school, working at a service station in Athens. But two things led him back to the classroom. He missed showing cows, and the U.S. Army was about to draft him and send him to Vietnam. Though younger than Charles by a couple of years, Vickie graduated from Oconee County High ahead of him. She grew up on the farm where they now live, the daughter of Charles and Ruby Hardigree. She and her future husband did not meet until she was in high school. But he had already picked her out. Her photo had been published in The Oconee Enterprise in
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1964. He clipped it out and posted it on his wall at home, a pinup girl of sorts. The cutline under the newspaper photo said that cotton harvesting was expected to be late, after Sept. 1. But what interested Charles was the photo of the pretty young girl in the cotton field, and this bit of information in the middle of the cutline: “Vickie Hardigree, 13, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Charles L. Hardigree is checking their cotton crop on the Greensboro Road.” The two met each other at a 4-H camp. “I was dating Mary Jo Morrow then,” said Charles. When Charles and Vickie did start dating, it was an on-again, off-again courtship. “He was from that end of the county, and I was from down here,” she said. “I dated a time or two, but not a lot. It was like when it stuck, it stuck. I really don’t know what kept us together. Of course, he had a background in farming, and I did too.”
When Charles returned to Oconee County High, it gave him the chance to play football. He was a defensive tackle on the second team that Oconee County fielded. Vickie was one of the cheerleaders. Charles enjoyed football, but he had a passion for something entirely different: racing cars. Charles got to going to Athens Speedway with some friends, and by the time he was 19, he was racing in the hobby class. “I loved it,” Charles said. “I didn’t care if I won as long as I had a good time.” He won his fair share. In the early ‘90s he was a track champion in Class B. He raced at Athens, Winder, Lavonia, Hartwell, Swainsboro, Cordele, even Jacksonville, Fla., and Phoenix City, Ala. He was never injured, though he wrecked from time to time. He remembered slamming against the wall one time, and that was related to another incident
Charles Osborn clipped this from The Oconee Enterprise in 1964 and posted it on his wall before he ever met his future wife.
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from his past. He wrecked because he felt a pain in his left hand while driving. Charles is missing the ring finger of his left hand. As a young man, he was hopping down from the back of a truck while holding on to the gate. His FFA ring caught on the gate, ripping his finger off. As a result, he’s never worn a wedding ring. Racing cars was the only other thing that Charles might have chosen over farming. But he never had the money to pursue it seriously, plus he always preferred sliding on the dirt tracks to racing on asphalt. The Osborns wed Aug. 14, 1971. Vickie went to Athens Tech. But Charles was done with school. Vickie says to this day that if Charles could have mastered the schooling, he would have made an excellent veterinarian. Instead, his education as a farmer has been hands-on, though he reads his farm magazines from cover to cover. Vickie worked first for the Cooperative Extension Service at the University of Geor-
Racing cars was the only other pastime that came close to farming. Submitted photo
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gia for a decade before she came home for a few years of full-time mothering as their three girls were born, Kelli, Kristi and Katie. Later she worked for 22 years at the school district as a bookkeeper. The first two years of their marriage, the Osborns lived on the Hardigree farm, but then they moved to Dark Corner. Charles dove head first into farming, raising chickens, pigs and cows. Vickie and the girls chipped in where they could. For Kelli, growing up on a farm was nothing out of the ordinary. For Katie, most of her friends did not live on farms. Kristi had a bit of a mix. That was the transition that was going on in Oconee County as neighborhoods began to develop all over the county. But farming was for the Osborn family. “Absolutely, I picked up dead chickens,” said Kelli Powell of her farm chores. She is now a preschool teacher’s aide at Mars Hill Baptist Church. Her husband Tony is a builder, and they have two girls, Alli and Leah. “I cut the grass,” she said. “We had a lot of days of worming cows. We were always a part of things.” Even when friends were visiting, they were often invited to join in a posse to round up cows.
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Kristi, a banker now married to Justin Greer, a landscape architect, remembered her childhood as fun. “We had a lot of opportunities to be outside and to learn what it meant to be a hard worker,” she said. “I believe being in a farm family is what taught me how to work. I remember scooping up cow poop at a cow show. Whatever it took, we jumped out there and did it. Our parents taught us respect for the land and not to be wasteful.” Kristi said she even remembered crawling under her father’s racecar and handling the socket wrenches. The family for a while went to the tracks on Saturday nights, but after too many late Saturday nights of washing the red clay out of three blonde heads, Vickie decided that she could just stay at home and read. Saturdays became girl time. None of the girls considered Charles an absentee father, but Vickie said there were times when it was just her going up and down to the road to softball and basketball games. Charles admitted that he was prone to come in late from chores—midnight was the norm—and getting up early, 7 a.m. He still is prone to keep late hours, but he sleeps later these days. The racing ended in the early ‘90s. It
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Showing cows has been something that has kept the Osborn family together through the years. Submitted photo
Fall 2012
might have been a remark from Katie as he headed for the track. “Daddy, are you going to start doing that again?” Katie’s own interest in showing cows captured Charles’ heart too. He gave up racing for showing cows with Kristi and Katie. Farming can be a hard life. Osborn himself marks time somewhat by the bad years. 1976 and 1980, for example. “Those two years liked to have broke me,” he said. “The price for hogs that were bringing 60 cents a pound went to 27 cents a pound. It was not even paying what they cost.” It would seem that his diversification saved him. If it was a bad year with the hogs, then the income from chickens saved him. Vickie has her own take. She sees it as nothing less than the providential hand of God that has protected their family through the inevitable ups and downs of life. “I just have to say that God has worked in our lives,” said Vickie. “Losing my Daddy
was tough. I was a daddy’s girl. If we had not moved down here, I don’t know that the girls would have met their husbands. And then we were able to sell his daddy’s land. We sold it, and then everything quit.” The Osborns anchor their faith now at Antioch Christian Church. That was where Kelli met Tony Powell. For a while he became the son that Charles and Vickie never had, throwing his hand in on the farm. Sort of like Jacob in the Bible, he was motivated. Katie met her husband, Justin Woodall, now a Realtor, at the University of Georgia. She teases him that even if he is from Waycross and used to show hogs, he is a city boy because he lived in a neighborhood. Kristi met her husband, Justin Greer, at nearby Hot Thomas’ barbecue. He lived a mile down the road, had been in her class in school, had attended the University of Georgia at the same time, and yet they had never laid eyes on each other until one Saturday afternoon when Kristi stopped by
Hot’s to pick up dinner. He started calling right after that. It was a tragedy that led the Osborns to pull up roots in Dark Corner and move across the county. Vickie’s father committed suicide in 1980. He had been a turkey farmer, and suddenly he couldn’t get birds. He also was diagnosed with a tumor. In a moment of depression, he took his own life. It would be several years after that event that the Osborns would finally move, but coupled with the purchase of family land across the road, it gave them enough territory to farm. Charles rents hundreds of acres elsewhere in the county too, expanding his operation beyond his own territory. Perhaps it was the hard work, and perhaps it was his nature, but Charles had a reputation as a hard man. “He is just a hard worker who doesn’t like to see somebody sitting around,” said Vickie. “He thinks everybody should work hard.” His girls, of course, see the softer side of
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Charles and Vickie Osborn raised three children, and now delight in having their four grandchildren around. Submitted photo
their father, and removed from the home recall their childhood as an idyllic one. “There was always something going on,” said Katie. “Whether it was a calf being born or seeing about the chickens, there was always excitement. There was never a dull moment.” The Osborn homestead was a gathering place. There was no sitting around playing video games. Instead, they were riding 4wheelers or go-karts, chasing cows or shucking corn. When the girls started leaving the home for social activities, Charles made a hard and fast rule that they had better be home by 11 o’clock. Vickie would fret the whole time, because she feared the reaction if they ever violated that curfew. “I finally told him that he needed to trust those girls,” she said. “They had never done anything to give us any trouble. I worked in the school district, and I knew what bad kids were. These were good girls. We have been blessed.” At 63, Charles is still working hard, though he paces himself these days. With no sons to pass the farming operation on 48
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to, he is not sure what will eventually happen to the farm. He’s found a right-hand man in Neil Boss, a newlywed who will live in that apartment of the barn that Osborn is building. Maybe young Lane Woodall will assume the mantel. Katie’s first child was a girl, Kara. When Lane was born three years ago, he was the first boy in two generations. To say that he and Charles have a special bond is an understatement. Charles has already picked out a cow for Lane to show. All he has to do to get a tractor ride is ask, and they have been known to make a few trips to get ice cream. The man who wanted to be a farmer learned long ago how to make chickens and hogs and cattle grow. Somewhere along the way he and his bride raised a crop of three children. “Daddy’s passion is he just loves to see things grow,” said Kristi. “He wants to see people do good. He is always wanting to hear a good success story. “I hope I can have a little piece of my Fall 2012
parents as I parent my little girls,” said Kelli in perhaps the highest compliment she could give. “I want them to understand reallife values. I can’t say enough how blessed we were to grow up in a home where the golden rule was preached.” Out on the farm, Charles was driving his 1995 Chevrolet truck, the one with about 450,000 miles on it, showing off his herd. “I see something,” he said, interrupting his stream-of-consciousness dialogue. “I see what might be a calf, or a dead calf. I hope it isn’t dead. There is something I haven’t been seeing in the grass.” Osborn smiled when he saw movement. “That is the calf I have been hunting,” he said. “That is a big calf. It must have been born last night.” “It’s a bull. I wanted a heifer. That is a big calf. I’d say it weighs close to 100 pounds. First calves usually weight about 70 pounds. Let’s ride and see if we can find her,” he said, meaning the calf ’s mother. “She probably went to get some water. She will come back up.” Charles Osborn knows his cows.
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Academia
James Pinneau celebrates career at OCHS This is my 25th year teaching art at Oconee County High School. A few things have changed over the years, but one thing has remained the same—the joy that I find in providing a safe and creative space for young people to explore the world of visual arts. Teaching is often rewarding, and sometimes frustrating. You must be entertainer, acrobat and a disciplinarian. You must, “provide the opportunity for each student to be successful each and every day,” (and convince them that they can and want to participate and succeed!) I was a ceramics major at UGA when I met Andra Nyman, an art education professor who liked to work in the clay studio. She asked if I had ever considered teaching, and I took the bait. The exciting world of teaching reeled me in. At UGA I was fortunate to work with the fine faculty of the Lamar Dodd School of Art including Dr. Robert Nix, Dr. Robert Clements and Dr. Andra Nyman in art education and a number of other fine visual art professors including ceramic artist Ron Myers and sculptor Horace Farlowe. I volunteered in local schools, taught lessons with local high school teachers, and substituted in classrooms—all of the things that would help me to become better prepared for the classroom. When OCHS artist and teacher Mary Padgelek decided to return to UGA for a doctoral degree, I was ready to take up the torch. It has been a lifechanging decision. The personal growth that teaching encourages is palpable: reflecting and adjusting to each new group of 50
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students, developing and refining the art curriculum, learning to be a motivator, facilitator, and art director, and understanding and being a friend to young people who are often just starting to understand themselves. Teaching is a wonderful journey that has enabled me to grow and change in ways that are difficult to explain. It is like trying to explain to someone what it is like to have a baby—it changes everything. To my former students, I want to let you know that not a day goes by without my being reminded of some of you. Many of you have touched my life. Go forth in life and do great things. And pay it forward!
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James Pinneau is a teacher in the fine arts department at Oconee County High School.
Kitty Michelle Graham
Fall 2012
Su Youn Kim
I Am Not a Teenage Boy I am not a teenage boy. I don’t wonder how rockets work. I don’t hear the quarterback yelling, “HUT!” I don’t see the importance of buying a three hundred dollar game system. I don’t want to be able to bench two hundred pounds. I am not a teenage boy. I don’t pretend to be king of everything. I don’t feel upset when I lose my football game. I don’t touch the fish when taking it off the hook. I don’t wonder what the next thing I’m going to light on fire is. I don’t cry when I wreck my truck. I am not a teenage boy. I don’t understand how to tie a tie. I don’t say, “Dude.” I don’t dream about being six feet tall. I don’t try to impress girls. I don’t hope to be getting a new video game soon. I am not a teenage boy. Kate Adams
Beauregard LaFayette He’s precious and lanky as can be Some say he kinda resembles me He’s white and grey and soft and furry And never seems to be in much of a hurry He prances along the bright green grass And his demeanor just screams “hey I’m full of sass” He bites my ankle when he wants some food Most people would probably think that’s pretty rude He’d rather sleep and eat in the house Because he’s too lazy to even catch a mouse When he wants some love he jumps in your lap And soon he curls up and takes a nap He is a mess that’s for sure But it’s all worth it when you hear him purr Ali LaFayette Haley Savage
Corynne Gamboa
Chase Kane
Joseph Maxwell
Inhale.. What secrets lie in those seemingly painted stars? What do they know? What have they seen? It scares me; I am frightened. They listen yet never speak. Here, beneath the darkened sky.. So exposed and so willing. Can you feel it now? Don’t move, don’t think . . .just breathe.. .
Sara Struges
Eyes closed, I listen softly. What is it that I am hearing? The newest symphony, a phantoms whisper, it’s all as if they tempt me. Strings descend, I am watching as they touch my skin ever so slightly The universe is my puppeteer, my master of destiny.
. . Exhale Elizabeth Shugart
Fall 2012
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A
Novel Idea By Derek Wiley Photos by George Windate
Before we begin, I have a confession to make. I have not always enjoyed reading. The summer before tenth grade, I was supposed to read Charles Dickens’ “A Tale of Two Cities” for Mrs. Bagwell’s Sophomore English class. But I did not read “A Tale of Two Cities.” I didn’t read any of it, not one page. No CliffsNotes. No SparkNotes. Not “Tale of Two Cities for Dummies.” Nothing. Instead, I borrowed an old test from the smartest girl I knew, who happened to be two years older and lived in my neighborhood. I memorized that test and made an ‘A.’ Unlike high school, I did read in elementary school. It was fun then. Instead of 400-page novels about the “best of times and the worst of times,” there were buttons, stickers and free pizza. Thanks to Pizza Hut’s Book It! program, I read and ate pizza all the time. While I’ve always loved pizza (thanks to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and pepperonis), I truly fell in love with books and reading after high school when it no longer felt like a chore and I could pick my own material. Here are my 10 favorites.
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The Bible For as long as I can remember, I’ve had The Bible on my bookcase. My first Bible had pictures. Then I moved up to a teen’s study Bible and then to an adult study Bible. Today I do most of my Bible reading on a Kindle E-reader. I also grew up attending Sunday School so the first stories I knew were Noah’s Ark, David and Goliath, Daniel in the Lion’s Den and Jonah and the Whale. As I’ve gotten older, The Bible has shaped how I live. It has taught me how to love others more than myself, which is an everyday battle.
Event Calendar
Wine Fest Sunday, Oct, 21
Exhibit: OCT 5 - NOV 9 Reception OCT 5, 6-8 PM
Find the perfect gifts! Nov 30, Dec 1 & 2 Fri 5-9 PM, Sat & Sun 10 AM - 5 PM $3 Admission 16 and up, free parking
A wine & food tasting fundraiser to benefit OCAF, sponsored by Ashford Manor Bed & Breakfast. Tickets $35 in advance at OCAF.COM
KATHY PRESCOTT
Art activities for kids & pictures with Kris Kringle too! Fun for the whole family!
TRANSFER COLLAGES
Saturday December, 8
Exhibition: SEPT 28 - Nov 2 Reception: OCT 5, 6-8 PM
2 Sessions: 10 AM to 12 PM & 1 - 3 PM Admission: 1 unwrapped toy per child or $2
All Exhibitions are free to the public unless otherwise noted. For further information see us online at www.ocaf.com or call 706-769-4565. OCAF is located at 34 School St. in Watkinsville GA. Open: TUES - SAT 10 AM - 4 PM.
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Fall 2012
Goodnight Moon by Margaret Wise Brown Written in 1947, “Goodnight Moon” is classic children’s literature centered on a bunny saying goodnight to all of the objects in its bedroom. “Goodnight bears. Good night chairs. Goodnight kittens and goodnight mittens. Good night clocks and good night socks. Goodnight little house and goodnight mouse.” The illustrations by Clement Hurd are what I remember most about the book my mom would read me before bedtime.
Goosebumps By R.L. Stine From 1992 to 1997, 62 “Goosebumps” books were published and I read nearly every single one. Most of the free pizza I ate through Book It! came from reading “Goosebumps.” For those not familiar with the popular series, “Goosebumps” is a series of children’s horror fiction novels written by R.L. Stine. Each book is about 100 pages and up until a couple years ago, I still owned most of my collection. However, I decided to donate them to a friend with a younger brother in elementary school. I hope he enjoyed them as much as I did. My favorite book from the series is “The Cuckoo Clock of Doom” (1995). About a 12-year-old boy named Michael with a bratty younger sibling who enjoyed getting him into trouble, I could somehow relate. In the book, Michael tries to return the favor by breaking an old cuckoo clock and blaming it on his sister but instead spirals back in time.
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Blue Like Jazz by Donald Miller If I had to pick one book that got me back into reading after high school, it’s “Blue Like Jazz.” I devoured its 240 pages in one summer weekend. “Blue Like Jazz” is a collection of 20 essays written by Donald Miller, who grew up in the Bible Belt of Texas but moved to Portland, Ore., where he experienced something far different, especially while auditing classes at Reed College, a private liberal arts and sciences school which was named by the Princeton Review as the No. 1 college where “students ignore God on a regular basis.” It also earned the top spot in the “Birkenstock-Wearing, Tree-Hugging, Clove-Smoking Vegetarians” category. That being said, Reed College is full of geniuses. The average GPA of high school students who enroll is 3.9 and Loren Pope of The New York Times called Reed “the most intellectual college in the country.” Much of “Blue Like Jazz” focuses on Miller’s experiences at Reed, the friends he met there and what they taught him about Jesus and Christianity. A “Blue Like Jazz” movie hit theaters in April and was released on DVD in August.
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Fall 2012
by Shane Claiborne In the opening pages of “Irresistible Revolution,” author Shane Claiborne writes, “Most good things have been said far too many times and just need to be lived.” In the next 350 pages, Claiborne tells the story of how he has lived those “good things.” Like Miller, Claiborne grew up in the Bible Belt. He called East Tennessee home but moved to attend Eastern University, a Christian college in Philadelphia. There he co-founded an organization called The Simple Way, which provides aid to the homeless. Claiborne also worked alongside Mother Teresa during a 10-week term in Calcutta. In March 2003, when the United States began dropping bombs on Iraq as part of a shock and awe mission, Claiborne spent three weeks in Baghdad with the Iraq Peace Team. He visited homes, hospitals, families and worship services with hundreds of Iraqi Christians. “I was invited to worship services nearly every day while in Iraq,” Claiborne wrote. “The Christians in Baghdad gave me so much hope for the church.”
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Irresistible Revolution
Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut I was introduced to Kurt Vonnegut’s writing with “Slaughterhouse Five,” a satirical antiwar novel. While I’ve read most of his work, “Slaughterhouse Five” remains my favorite. The book is centered on Billy Pilgrim, an ill-trained American soldier who is taken by the Germans during World War II. He also travels both backwards and forwards in time where he is captured by extraterrestrial aliens from the planet Tralfamadore. They then exhibit him in a zoo with a B-movie actress. One of my favorite moments comes when the aliens treat an everyday human bath experience like a sporting event. “There were no walls in the dome, no place for Billy to hide, “ Vonnegut wrote. “The mint green bathroom fixtures were right out in the open. Billy got off his lounge chair now, went into the bathroom and took a leak. The crowd went wild.”
Fall 2012
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W hen you’re alone And lif e is making you lonely, You can always go…
to Downtown Watkinsville ★ Friday, October 5 6 p.m. – 9 p.m. First Friday
Face painting, balloon animals, and much more Sponsored by the Oconee County 4-H Club
★ Wednesday, October 31 4 p.m. – 6 p.m.
Downtown Trick or Treating Sponsored by WTTA*
★ Friday, November 2 6 p.m. til dark First Friday
Authentic American Indians perform Sponsored by Attic Treasures
★ Friday, November 30 6 p.m. til dark Christmas Tree Lighting Sponsored by the City of Watkinsville
★ Saturday, December 1 11 a.m. Christmas Parade
’Twas the Night Before Christmas Sponsored by the City of Watkinsville and The Oconee Enterprise
*^The Watkinsviille Trade and Tourism Association is a downtown business group that created First Friday 6 years ago. Any business in the city limits of Watkinsville may join. For more information call (706) 769-5175.
www.watkinsvillefirstfriday.com
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The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test by Tom Wolfe After watching a special on the History Channel titled “Hippies,” I decided to learn even more so I picked up Tom Wolfe’s “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” after seeing a New York Times review that said the book “is not simply the best book on the hippies, it is the essential book.” Wolfe began his writing career as a reporter at the Springfield Union and then The Washington Post in 1959. Three years later he took a job at the New York Herald Tribune before writing “The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test” in 1968. The book follows a wild group of hippies led by author Ken Kesey (“One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”) called the Merry Pranksters. The Pranksters, high on LSD, drove all over the country, including a quick stop in Georgia, in a Day-Glo school bus while Wolfe recorded nearly every moment.
High Fidelity by Nick Hornby I was assigned “High Fidelity” in a fiction reading class I took during my senior year of college. The British novel begins with Rob, a record shop owner who recently broke up with his girlfriend Laura, listing his “desert island, all-time most memorable split-ups, in chronological order.” The book features many top-five lists including his favorite books: “The Big Sleep” by Raymond Chandler, “Red Dragon” by Thomas Harris, “Sweet Soul Music” by Peter Guralnick, “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams and something by William Gibson or Kurt Vonnegut. Rob’s top five films are “The Godfather,” “The Godfather Part II,” “Taxi Driver,” “Goodfellas” and “Reservoir Dogs.” The lists are great but my favorite parts of “High Fidelity” and what I relate to is the stuff about growing up. “We’re like Tom Hanks in ‘Big,’” Rob says. “Little boys and girls trapped in adult bodies and forced to get on with it.” When Laura’s dad dies, she and Rob question “whether it’s the thing that makes you feel grown-up, finally.” In 2000, “High Fidelity” was adapted into a film starring John Cusack and Jack Black.
Born to Run by Christopher McDougall In the Copper Canyons of Mexico lives a hidden tribe of running people called the Tarahumara. They live on a diet of carbohydrates and corn beer but are able to run more than 100 miles at a time. The best of the Tarahumara run 300 to 400 miles. And they don’t do this wearing Nike shoes on paved sidewalks or treadmills but barefoot running up and down steep canyon trails. The Tarahumara are also extremely healthy. They don’t get diabetes and their cancer and heart disease rates are barely detectable. Christopher McDougall’s Born to Run is about these running people. McDougall also follows elite American long-distance runners like Ann Trason. “One Saturday, Ann got up early and ran twenty miles,” McDougall wrote. “She relaxed over breakfast, then headed back out for twenty more. She had some plumbing chores around the house, so after finishing run No. 2, she hauled out her toolbox and got to work. By the end of the day, she was pretty pleased with herself; she’d run forty miles and taken care of a messy job on her own. So as a reward, she treated herself to another fifteen miles.” I have yet to reach the heights of Trason or the Tarahumara but I did finish the Athens Half Marathon last October and plan on running it again this year.
The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach After getting a Kindle for Christmas last year, I began searching for the best books of 2011 and at the top of nearly every list was “The Art of Fielding.” Chad Harbach’s debut novel centers around Henry Skrimshander, a shortstop on the fictional Westish College baseball team with a golden glove. Skrimshander gets the attention of Major League scouts and approaches the NCAA record for most consecutive innings without an error. But then he delivers an errant throw into the dugout, striking a teammate and is never the same. He can no longer make the easy throw to first base and follows the examples of former baseball players Steve Blass, Chuck Knoblauch, Rick Ankiel and Mark Wohlers, who because of a psychological disorder can no longer control where they throw the ball. Along with all of the baseball, which is the main sport I grew up playing, “The Art of Fielding” is chock-full of references to classic literature. Westish College’s mascot is the Harpooners because “Moby Dick” author Herman Melville visited the school in the 1880s. Fall 2012
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Animalia
There’s a doggone good force protecting Oconee County Dogs can be lovable pets and protectors. They can be a great motivator for exercising, and a companion lending a cuddly
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feeling of safety a security system just can’t match. In Oconee County, a few of them are loaded weapons, paired up with members of the Sheriff ’s Office, keeping citizens safe and aiding law enforcement. Since 2005 Oconee has had a K-9 unit, officially a one-dog unit, with two emergency back-up dogs belonging to their owners, not the county. Shane Partain is sergeant in charge of the K-9 unit and special operations for the Sheriff’s Office, and owner and handler of Oconee’s official working dog. First came Spike. Partain looked upon his canine companion as a weapon, much like a sidearm or taser. Never before an animal person, Partain admitted, “I grew a whole lot more attached to my dog than I ever thought I would.” Spike became some-
what of an Oconee legend, and the whole community mourned when he was laid to rest in 2010. Working with canines taught Partain patience, a virtue he had never before entertained. He said working with the dogs made him a better person. Partain got Orion, a Belgian Malinois whose name means the hunter, in 2009. Trained and brought up in Holland, the dog obeys Dutch and German commands as well as those in English. Though the cost of a police dog at that time ran $8,000 or more, Partain said the taxpayers footed about a $200 bill, and the rest was taken care of. Pet Supplies Plus supplies the food, which could run $2,000 annually, and Dr. Monica Kutcher offers veterinarian care for half price, so the cost to the county is negligible, he said. Partain also is experimenting with Tshirts and stickers so the community can support the program and make it its own. Contact him at spartain@oconeesheriff.org to lend a hand, and sport a shirt. Orion, who’s “spun up and nervy with tons of energy,” is all business when it comes to work. His job is sniffing out narcotics, and he also tracks lost children, fugitives, even Alzheimer’s patients.
Sgt. Shane Partain stands beside his loaded weapon. “Whether people like to admit it or not, he can hurt somebody really bad,” Partain said of Orion. Photo by Kathy Russo
Fall 2012
Lt. Griffin Attaberry’s English foxhound “ain’t nothin’ but a hound dog” who tracks; Munson’s non-aggressive nature makes him less suited for more intense police work, but great for finding lost kids and the like. Photo by Kathy Russo
Deputy Brad Williams’ Cap is a plush coat German Shepherd capable of sniffing out narcotics and sniffing out fugitives. Photo by Kathy Russo
Another dual duty dog, owned by Deputy Brad Williams, is Cap, a plush coat German shepherd. Lt. Griffin Attaberry owns an English foxhound, solely a tracking dog, who works for the force. He’s named Munson after the great one, because “He has a very distinctive bay.” They’re working dogs, and the hope is the force will someday expand, but they’re companions and loving pets as well. Partain even has other pets at home now, including a fru-fru rat terrier he claims is for his wife and girls. Hmmmm.
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Kathy Russo, formerly a reporter at The Oconee Enterprise, is a freelance writer and photographer living in Athens.
Sgt. Shane Partain wears his heart on his sleeve. The tattoo’s in memory of Oconee’s first police dog, Spike. Photo by Kathy Russo
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Family TiesRQ Story and Photos by Erik Schmidt
It’s August and sunny. Yet a steady breeze makes conditions unseasonably comfortable on this Thursday afternoon. Most grateful for the temperature break are those training on the campus of Westminster Christian Academy. Cross county coach Amanda Tingle calls out times as each runner nears the rest area, a storage facility/locker room/weight room equipped with a shaded patio area and picnic tables. As the kids catch their breath, they move to the edge of the overhang and cheer for those yet to finish. Their voices are many, and this alone is an anomaly. Not just for this cozy school with a K-12 enrollment of approximately 250, but for this team. In past years, WCA has offered a varsity girls’ cross country squad. If males com-
peted, they did so individually, not as a team. However, this year boys’ varsity plus JV sides have been added, and numbers support the decision. Twenty-nine runners from high school and middle school comprise the program, a monumental leap from 2011 when Tingle coached five females on varsity and one or two middle-schoolers who competed individually on the JV level. “It’s impressive because it’s just so unexpected,” Tingle said. “This is my fourth year coaching cross country here and the most we’ve ever had on our team was six. So it’s more unbelievable than overwhelming, but obviously it’s a whole different feel with 29 people out here than four girls and two guys.” The big story here is not volume,
Eight pairs of siblings run in the Westminster Christian Academy cross country program.
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though. It’s the Lions’ makeup. A true reflection of the school, eight pairs of siblings run for WCA: David and Daniel Lanclos, Morgan and Foster White, Brett and Megan Reeves. Abigail and Rachel Snyder, Amelia and Braden Delameter, Grayson and Caroline Goss, Jackson and Sean Mulkey and Hayden and Elliana Splichel. For those counting, that’s roughly 55 percent of the program. So, apparently, the family that laces together, races together. “It really is a picture of Westminster,” said Tingle, who has coached two sisters-inlaw during her time at WCA. “Really, everything we do here is like that. You’re with your family or with your siblings all day in school. They play sports together. They have similar friends. They do things together. It’s special. I have a twin sister and we never
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played a sport together. We were in a huge public high school and we didn’t even see each other. We didn’t have classes together, we didn’t have any of the same friends…so this to me is a whole different experience from how I experienced high school. It’s really fun, though.”
XXX Morgan White is a junior. If anyone thinks she’s older, they have that right. Morgan lettered in cross country and soccer beginning in eighth grade and has excelled as one of her school’s premier athletes—male or female. During her sophomore season she led the Lady Lions to a second-place finish in the GISA Region 2-AA Championship. Finishing in 22:35, Morgan took silver. She was followed by four teammates— and only four teammates—including thensenior Katie Tingle. Tingle ran the race despite sustaining a head injury on a recent school field trip. Had she skipped the event, WCA would have lacked the minimum five necessary to qualify as a team. “It’s so different this year going from a couple years of having five people to having [almost] 30,” said Morgan. “It’s amazing. The first years you’re wondering if the cross country team would even make it through the year. Now, I think we’ve got a pretty good chance.” A good chance indeed. And a good chance for years to come. Morgan’s younger brother Foster is one who might keep the cross country torch burning at Westminster. At 12 years old, Foster attends middle school as a sixthgrader. Per GISA rules, middle-school athletes are eligible for JV teams. Eighth-graders, as Morgan did at that age, may compete on varsity. Foster is still a step or two slower than Morgan at this stage in their careers. When asked if his big sister takes it easy on him during family competitions, he offered a smile and a shake of his head. 64
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Morgan, left, and Foster White run on the varsity girls’ and JV boys’ teams respectively at WCA.
No way. Still, Foster remains undaunted. In fact, he says he enjoys running in the same program with Morgan. “It’s good,” he said. “It always gives me something to look forward to, to try to beat her in the future.” “In the future?” he’s asked. “In the future.”
XXX Tingle might have more recurring Fall 2012
nightmares than the average coach. Missing a meet, falling short in a big race—those are traditional worries that plague the nighttime unconscious of most in her field. For Tingle, though, add in a healthy flu phobia. Or pink eye. Or, let’s face it, any contagious illness. True enough, such conditions would hurt most programs. But think about the affects it has on a team where so many athletes live in the same homes. “The stomach bug is a big fear,” Tingle
said with a laugh. Then, adding logic to the equation, “We only have one pair of siblings on the same team, though. David and Daniel are both varsity boys. Everyone else is split, either JV and varsity or men’s and women’s.” JV and varsity men and women gathered in Walton County on Aug. 25. The occasion? The Lions’ Prowl hosted by Loganville Christian Academy. Westminster’s girls won the varsity event. The boys’ varsity got a top-10 finish from Daniel Lanclos. It was WCA’s first meet of the season, and Tingle’s first experience managing four teams in competition. Fortunately, as the song says, she got by with a little help from her friends. And she truly appreciated the assistance. “I was exhausted, but it doesn’t feel fair to say that because you’re not running,” she smiled, two days removed from the meet. “We started at 10 and finished at 12:30, so I was back and forth between a finish line
It really is a picture of Westminster… really, everything we do here is like that. You’re with your family or with your siblings all day in school. They play sports together. They have similar friends. They do things together. It’s special. Amanda Tingle and a mile marker and another spot on the course for four races. “But, two things that it showed me. One, how amazing the parent support is at this school. We probably had as many parents
there as we had athletes. They were setting up tents, making sure kids were drinking water and walking the course with kids. I had parents at the 2-mile marker because I could not make it to the 1, the 2 and the fin-
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ish for four races. And two, the leadership on my team. Morgan and Sarah (Rawls) and those people that had been there before making sure everyone was warming up when I couldn’t be there to make sure they were warming up, and I didn’t feel any anxiety about that. I knew they were doing what they needed to do and they weren’t messing around.”
XXX As noted earlier, Daniel and David represent the only sibling pair competing on the same team. Although neither has run cross country before, they are no strangers to endurance events. Daniel, a 14-year-old sophomore, and David, 13, a freshman, have both competed in road races. Over the summer, the two entered a sprint triathlon at Mistletoe State Park in Columbia. Typically, these events require a quarter-mile swim, 12 miles of cycling and a 3.1-mile run. Daniel took second in his age group. David placed fourth
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David, left, and Daniel Lanclos are entering their first years of cross country after previously competing in sprint triathlons.
Both said they’re enjoying life in the Lions’ cross country program. “I like it,” Daniel said. “It’s fun. It’s nice to be able to compete.” “It’s fun,” David agreed. “But he’s way faster than me.” Like the Lanclos boys, the Snyder sisters have endurance experience. Despite their tender ages—Abigail, 13, and Rachel, 12— both have been running for a year or two. As an eighth-grader, Abigail is currently the Lady Lions’ No. 1. She finished third overall at the aforementioned Lions’ Prowl and actually won a combined JV/varsity 5K held at Monsignor Donovan in Athens last season. Rachel placed eighth in the same race. “It’s fun,” Abigail said of running with her sister. “She’s surprising. Sometimes she’ll catch right up.” Rachel, accustomed to running with a smaller group, is adjusting to the atmosphere change.
Rachel, left, and Abigail Snyder both ran for Westminster Christian’s junior varsity team last season.
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“It’s different, but I think I like it better,” she said. “It gives you more people to run with.”
This is a family affair. Amanda Tingle
XXX On Dasher, on Dancer, on Prancer…you get the picture. Most folks know the handles of those eight tiny reindeer plus that one with the nose disorder thanks to the poem and spin-off song. Tingle could likely use a rhyme scheme or catchy tune to memorize her mostly related roster. Matters are made more confusing when she tries to equate where she met whom. “It’s interesting because which sibling I knew first varies,” she said. “The older group I have known from coaching them in soccer or cross country. But then in the younger group, the middle schoolers, I taught several of them in second or fourth grade before I had my kids [and stepped away from full-time teaching], so I may have known their younger sibling before I
met the older sibling. I’m still trying to pair everyone together and figure out whose name I’m calling and how I know who.” Identification is a minor issue in the grand scheme, however. As Tingle explained, supervising a small group of experienced runners versus a herd mixed with high school kids and pre-teens has its challenges. Chief among those is accounting for everyone’s whereabouts, or as Tingle put it, “There are some really practical things involved now, like don’t lose a child. Make sure everyone made it back from their run.” As of this story’s writing, Tingle had not misplaced any youngsters. And, in fact, she’d already uncovered an unexpected bright side to the program’s growth. Sure, it’s great the team will be compet-
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itive throughout this season and the future looks grand. But Tingle has stumbled across a personal chore that’s been simplified by the relative nature of her kids. Correspondence. “I was trying to send a letter to all the families [during the summer], and so I was trying to get all the emails to Betsie [Herrin], our administrative assistant,” Tingle began. “And so I was sending her the list of the parents I needed and I realized I was pairing, ‘Oh, I don’t need both David and Daniel’s [Lanclos] mom. It’s the same person.’ So I was putting David and Daniel, Rachel and Abigail, Morgan and Foster, Megan and Brett, and I realized, oh goodness, this is a family affair.”
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Active Living
Hanson makes the time Watkinsville’s Casey Jo Hanson is not someone to whom you make excuses, especially in the fitness realm. A single mother of two with a demanding full-time job, Hanson is nonetheless a regular at the Omni Club in Athens. Sometimes with a trainer, sometimes without, Hanson busts her tail in both the
weight room and cardio arena. Her form is measured; her focus unwavering. And her gymnast-caliber physique is proof positive that dedication leads to results. Exterior benefits aside, Hanson is equally satisfied with the physical vigor exercise provides. “I think it allows me to do just more in general,” says Hanson, who is somewhat 40ish. “I find that energy levels and doing more with the kids, we get out and we do a lot. I think there’s a benefit in that...They’re very much into outdoors. We have a really big side yard so we get out and we throw the football and they’ll get out and they’ll play manhunt and I’ll sit out there with them. You know, it’s just all-round better and it makes for a lot less stress.” It’s hard to find someone without stress. Hanson certainly has her share. Her career position, a senior account manager with Dalton Carpet One Floor &
Hanson dropped 16 pounds during a fitness challenge at her health club. Photo by Erik Schmidt
Home, sometimes takes her out of state. Her sons Dylan and Miles, 13 and 11 respectively, can take her out of mind. Student-athletes at Oconee County Middle, Hanson describes them as “true brothers.” “They’re each other’s biggest fans and the next minute they’ll be each other’s biggest enemies,” she laughed. “True brothers. As I am today [indicating her striped dress], I wear black and white and wear a whistle half the time.” Hanson credits the boys as key ingredients in her workout regimen. Operating from a checklist, Dylan and Miles are tasked with the basics, brushing teeth, getting dressed, turning off the lights, as well letting the cat outside and punctually boarding the school bus. Most recently this show of independence
Working out provides more energy to keep up with her two sons, says Hanson. Photo by Erik Schmidt
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allowed Mom to surpass her goals at the Omni Club’s March Fitness Challenge, a “Biggest Loser” type of contest wherein entrants look to shed body fat for prize money. Hanson, an active person prior to the competition, found herself in need of the Challenge after undergoing an ACL procedure. She tore the ligament during a beach festival and had replacement surgery on June 16, 2011. Recovery rest followed as did football season, Thanksgiving, Christmas, “and all the good food that comes with that,” she smiled.
The end result was an unpleasant weight gain of 16 pounds. “I couldn’t dry any of my pants, none of my jeans, so I would air-dry my pants to get them on,” said Hanson. “At that point it was like, ‘OK, I’m not happy about this. You can either lose it or not,’ and it was cheaper to go on a diet and get serious about my health again and lose weight than it was to buy a whole new wardrobe.” With the Challenge accepted, so to speak, Hanson lost all 16 pounds. More, she improved her body fat result from a previous contest, dropping from 16.9 to 16.4 percent.
Hanson works with RUGA at Dalton Carpet One. Photo by Erik Schmidt
And her kids still made it to school. “A lot of times people say they don’t have the time,” said Hanson. “I just make the time and after being physically forced to stop, I had to make a choice. The easy thing is to not do it. The hard thing is to make it work.”
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Erik Schmidt is a former personal trainer, a fitness enthusiast and the sports editor for The Oconee Enterprise newspaper in Watkinsville, Ga.
A mix of weight training and cardio is utilized during Hanson’s routines. Photo by Erik Schmidt
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Artspeak
New techniques showcase old images From the artist’s viewpoint, the concept of “Through the Years” may mean the amount of time and energy many of us put into becoming an artist. Or it could also be representative of the body of work we have generated. However one artist, Kathy Prescott, has taken the concept “Through the years” literally and has developed a series of transfer collages that incorporate iconic and present day images. Her source materials include drawings and prints from the early 15th century to present day advertisements found in popular magazines. “Drawing with other people’s marks,” is the way Kathy describes her transfer col-
Bees. Photo by Walker Montgomery.
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lages rendered on wood board. She produces unique works of art that harken back to early stages of photography, drawing and printmaking. Utilizing the transparent characteristics of transferred photocopy images, she is able to achieve a luminous quality to her work while maintaining sharp crisp lines that act as directional indicators to lead the viewer through the storyline of each piece. She combines Renaissance portraits, textile patterns, 19th century photographs, contemporary advertisements, Japanese woodblock prints and other images to produce an ethereal aspect in her work that draws the viewer in and compels them to discover the story behind the images. One example is “Bees”, in which she combined Rogier van der Weyden’s, “Portrait of a Young Woman in a Pinned Hat”, c. 1435, oil on panel, with “Bees”, Ashmole Bestiary, 13th century and an advertisement featuring a Slinky. It is the juxtaposition of these images that makes the image so appealing. Kathy’s works are often influenced by the photographs of Julia Margaret Cameron, which are saturated with art-historical references. Like these early photographs, many of her collages are rendered as portraits but encompass more for the viewer to ascertain and identify. In “Parasol”, she combines one of Mrs. Cameron’s photographs, “Maud” from 1857, with a modern fashion advertisement with a parasol which may evoke a memory of a sunny afternoon for some viewers. Although Kathy Prescott’s images are in black Fall 2012
Parasol. Photo by Walker Montgomery.
and white with shades of grey, they are powerful, compelling, and thought provoking. Kathy Prescott’s work embodies the concept of “Through the years” and gives us a chance to see how images from the past and the present can be combined to form a unique and different style of art. Her work will be on display in the Member’s Gallery at Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation (OCAF) in Watkinsville Sept. 28 through Nov. 2, with an opening reception on Friday, Oct. 5 from 6 to 8 p.m.
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Charles D. Warnock is the Visual Arts Director for the Oconee Cultural Arts Foundation.