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Some Reflections on Memorial Day, Part Four:

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Hundreds of people were at the Speedway as I drove out of town last Monday morning. A few were at the start-finish line—Felix Rosenqvist, his owners and crew for the annual victor’s picture taking. The rest, armed with brooms, shovels, and other equipment, were cleaning up the 500 tons or so of trash left behind by Sunday’s huge crowds. The speedway pays volunteer groups $125 per person to do the cleanup work.

 

Several years ago, I narrated Aaron Copeland’s A LINCOLN PORTRAIT with the Jefferson City Symphony and some of the words began to come back to me as I drove through the rich, flat prairies of the two states.  “He was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, and grew up in Illinois….” 

The way to Indianapolis on I-70 takes people through Vandalia, once the state capital of Illinois.  The old capitol still stands, and the House of Representatives where Lincoln began his political career has been recreated.

I wanted to go on a northern route home that would take me through Springfield, where Lincoln lived and owned the only house he would ever own, where he prospered as a railroad lawyer, and from which he left to become President.  This trip, however, was to take me to the little village to the west where he grew up.

New Salem.

Lincoln struck out on his own after his brief stay in the Decatur area and spent several years in this little village as a laborer, and as an unsuccessful store owner.  It was in New Salem that he began the study of the law and began to practice as a lawyer.  It was in New Salem that Ann Rutledge entered his life and departed from it, a relationship romanticized by many through the decades.

Abe Lincoln was a quiet man; Lincoln was a quiet and a melancholy man.

However deep the Lincoln/Rutledge relationship was, it has been recorded that her death left Lincoln deeply depressed, depression being a condition he dealt with throughout his life.

One of the recreated buildings in the little village is the Rutledge Tavern where Lincoln stayed—a “tavern” being a place offering room and board for visitors and travelers (Missouri’s first official state historic site is the Arrow Rock Tavern, if you want to see what a tavern was in the early 19th Century).

The park was closed the day I stopped on the way home, “closed” meaning the visitors center, restrooms, and the village buildings were unoccupied by staff and reenactors.  But visitors could take a quiet walk among the businesses and homes, the mill and the gardens and the stores.  And I did.

Copeland’s narration and his music went with me.  The composition was created in 1942 but its passages from Lincoln’s speeches seemed appropriate that day as I walked where he had walked. I remembered pieces of the narration and when I got home I pulled the script from that performance with the symphony.

The first segment:

Fellow Citizens, we cannot escape history.  That is what he said. That is what Abraham Lincoln said.

Fellow-citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration, will be remembered in spite of ourselves. No personal significance, or insignificance, can spare one or another of us. The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation…. We — even we here– hold the power, and bear the responsibility.

The second:

He was born in Kentucky, raised in Indiana, and grew up in Illinois. And this is what he said. This is what Abe Lincoln said:

The dogmas of the quiet past, are inadequate to the stormy present. The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise — with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew. We must disenthrall ourselves, and then we shall save our country.  

Both were from his 1862 message to Congress, what we call the State of the Union today.  The third segment:

When standing erect, he was six feet four inches tall. And this is what he said:

It is the eternal struggle between these two principles — right and wrong — throughout the world. They are the two principles that have stood face to face from the beginning of time; and will ever continue to struggle. The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings. It is the same principle in whatever shape it develops itself. It is the same spirit that says, “You toil and work and earn bread, and I’ll eat it.” No matter in what shape it comes, whether from the mouth of a king who seeks to bestride the people of his own nation and live by the fruit of their labor, or from one race of men as an apology for enslaving another race, it is the same tyrannical principle.

Lincoln said that during his last debate with Stephen A. Douglas, in Alton, Illinois in 1858. Lincoln lost the race for the U. S. Senate that year but his debates with Douglas brought him national attention.

Segment four:

Abe Lincoln was a quiet man; Lincoln was a quiet and a melancholy man. But when he spoke of Democracy, this is what he said. He said:

As I would not be a slave, so I would not be a master. This expresses my idea of democracy. Whatever differs from this, to the extent of the difference, is no democracy.

Again, from 1858.

And the concluding segment:

Abraham Lincoln, 16th President of these United States, is everlasting in the memory of this country.  For on the battleground at Gettysburg, this is what he said:

From these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

“That cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion,” he said—-referring not to the war but to the re-commitment to the document that created the Union, that created a government “by the people, for the people,” the Declaration of Independence.

I have had a front row seat to the operation of the people’s government for many decades and as I walked the quiet streets where Abraham Lincoln walked I was reminded that the people’s government requires a people’s responsibility whenever there is a “stormy present…piled high with difficulty.’

“We must disenthrall ourselves and then we shall save our country,” Abe Lincoln said.

Today, it seems, we are locked in “the eternal struggle of these two principles—right and wrong…The one is the common right of humanity, and the other the divine right of kings.”

“Disenthrall:” —to free ourselves of the present condition, “and then we shall save our country.”

This, again, is what Abe Lincoln said to us in 1862:

The fiery trial through which we pass, will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation…. We — even we here– hold the power, and bear the responsibility.

Tens of thousands of ours have died creating this country, creating and defending a nation that can celebrate its holidays with great noise, great drama, and frivolity while pausing for a few minutes to be grateful for their sacrifices and recommit to keep their faith—–

From these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

After about an hour or maybe an hour and a half, I resumed my drive home. I crossed the Mississippi River with my dashboard telling me I had seventeen miles worth of gas left in the tank. A hundred yards from the bridge at Louisiana Missouri, I put 15.6 gallons of cheaper Missouri gas into a tank that’s supposed to hold 15.5 gallons.

And then I came home.  I had decorated no graves on Memorial Day but I was glad that I lived in a country that those in their graves protected for us, a united nation despite our differences that  pauses for a  gaudy celebration of its existence even in a “stormy present,” knowing that we have the power to restore our nation to one that is of the people, by the people, and has the ability to be made better—-

—-for the people.

(Various prominent people are on YouTube narrating A Lincoln Portrait. I suggest you look at one, or some, of them.)

(Picture credits: City of Vandalia; Bob Priddy)

 

 

Reflections on Memorial Day, Part three  (5/30/26)

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Sunday, things got very serious.

And incredibly intense.

And scary.

The 350,000 fans who would watch the Indianapolis 500 (or just have a big party) had started arriving days earlier, many setting up their tents and mobile homes in the numerous parking lots around the track, some spending the night before the race in their cars on 16th Street.

They began surging through the gates when they opened at 6 a.m., many wearing shirts for their favorite drivers, shirts for cars’ sponsors, and shirts commemorating the event about to unfold before them. The souvenir facilities quickly were swarming with people wanting to buy memories of what they were about to witness.

The grandstands were filling by the time the Borg-Warner trophy was moved to the start-finish line for the race about 9 a.m.

The cars were rolled to their starting spots at 10:30, drivers soon to follow, passing through a few thousand reporters, guests, sponsor representatives and car crews.

Pulses start to quicken with each step of the opening ceremonies saluting veterans and first responders with the presentation of colors, a prayer by Indianapolis Archbishop Charles Thompson, a fourteen-gun salute and taps. Indiana composer, singer, and band leader Emphraim Owens did “America,” and Grammy Nominee Jordin Sparks performed the Start Spangled banner ending with a flyby over the main straightaway by F-16s from the South Dakota National guard.

And then comes the goosebumps moment for thousands—Jim Carnelison’s annual performance of the state song, “Back Home Again in Indiana,” punctuated by a return, east to west by one of the F-16s.

And at last, Roger Penske’s order, “Drivers, Start Your Engines.”

Should you want to share the entire opening ceremonies:

2026 Indy 500 Opening Ceremony | INDYCAR

Weather forecasters for several days had warned that rain could interrupt or even shorten the 110th running of the Indianapolis 500.  The race would become official after 101 of the 200 laps. The pressure was on from the drop of the green flag for drivers to get everything them could get before the rain ended the race. The rain generally stayed away although enough drops fell to pause the race for a few minutes before the intense race against rain resumes.

More than one-fourth of the race was run under caution, the cars circulating at 90-95 mph while crash debris and car remnants were removed from the track. The green flag was out for 149 laps.  The intensity of the competition is reflected in these statistics:

There were seventy lead changes, a record.  Even more telling is this:

One-hundred and thirty seven of the 149 full-throttle laps produced a margin between first and second place of less than one second.  Cars lapped at better than 220 miles an hour, weaving in and out of lines, passing and re-passing.  Thirty-three started; 24 were still challenging one another at the end of the race. Eighteen were on the leader’s lap, the top four within four-tenths of a second of each other.

If you have the endurance, here is the entire race as seen from Rosenqvist’s car—and hear his spotter and his conversations with his crew chief (be prepared to be seated for more than three hours):

https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=rosenqvist+cockpit+video&view=detail&mid=3BB33C474F5056FF64F83BB33C474F5056FF64F8&

Marcus Amstrong took the lead at the start of the last lap with contenders  David Malukas and  teammates Pato O’Ward and Felix Rosenqvist and David Malukas tightly behind racing at speeds forty miles an hour faster than the takeoff speed of my son’s Southwest Airlines 737.

The race evolved into a 23-second duel between Malukas and Rosenqvist. Want to take a white-knuckle ride with Rosenqvist on that last lap?

https://www.bing.com/videos/riverview/relatedvideo?q=felix+onboard+for+the+last+lap+of+the+500&refig=6a18ca50d02f4504805071

Malukas led out of the fourth turn but Rosenqvist had the momentum.

Rosenqvist by 0.0223 second, the smallest victory margin in Speedway history.

The win was worth $4.3 million of the record $30 million purse.  By the time Rosenqvist took the ceremonial last lap around the track, in the back of a pickup truck, so the crowd could appreciate what he had done, and he and his crew knelt at the start/finish line for the traditional kissing of the bricks, a light rain was falling.

The finish was bitter for Malukas, who wept when he stepped out of his car. He had finished second to Alex Palou last year by 1.142 seconds, meaning he has been separated from two straight wins in the Indianapolis 500 by a combined 1.7 seconds. But he wasn’t the only one disappointed.

 

Santino Ferrucci, whose uniform reflected the nation’s patriotic 250th anniversary theme of the day, finished in the top ten for the eighth straight year. Pato O’Ward, racked up his fifth straight top five including two runner ups.  O’Ward was only 0.4271 seconds behind Scott McLaughlin, finishing fourth. Ferrucci was 8th, 1.571 behind.

Will their time come for Malukas, Fdrrucci, and O’Ward?  Or will they join the long list of men who year after year were within reach of being immortalized on the trophy but never made it.

They’re all yet young and God willing, there will be more chances for their faces to join those of Rosenqvist and 76 others on the big trophy.

Shortly after the 500 ended, the longest race of the NASCAR season was helping Charlotte, North Carolina, observe Memorial Day.  In a few weeks, those cars will roar around the first race track in the world to use the word “Speedway” to describe itself. The cars will be bigger and one-third slower but the fans will be as devoted to them as IndyCar fans are devoted to their cars and drivers, and the competition for a prestigious Brickyard 400 victory at the greatest race track in the world will be equally fierce.

The great track is silent now. But in a few weeks a new roar of engines will be heard as the great track once again knows he heat of racing cars being driven by people doing heroic things.

For me, it was time for a long, quiet ride home, hoping I could make it back to Missouri before having to buy more of that awfully expensive Illinois gas. I found myself thinking of the era that gave us this holiday. After all, I was going to spend the day in the land of the man who was the central figure in it all.

Join me in that ride, if you wish, on Monday.

(picture credits—Bob Priddy and Rick Gevers; Borg-Warner; Finish—The Guardian)

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Some Reflections on Memorial Day, Part One 

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This was a Memorial Day that has taken some time for us to process.  The holiday’s origins are easily overlooked each year by the rush of noisy celebrations that seem far removed from the original intent of the day.  I was awash in those contrasting “celebrations” that have overshadowed the “observance” and “commemoration” originally intended. But I found toward the end in a closed state park a quiet reminder of why Memorial Day is and should be recalled for its origins—and why this contemporary noisy version of Memorial Day anticipates the next great holiday that this year will challenge our honesty about who we have become.

This might be written more for my benefit more than for yours and I hope you will excuse me for these ruminations.  I didn’t plan on them stretching into four chapters but a lot was going on, not the least of which was “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing.”

We’ll talk about the race but this series is not all about racing for the race is only part of the story.

The weekend had been spent in a city that observes/commemorates Memorial Day throughout the entire month of May. I know of no other city that rivals Indianapolis’s Memorial…..Month.

Indianapolis is a prototype that diminishing cities might use to reinvent themselves.s  through the course of several decades and several setbacks, Indianapolis has emerged as a dynamic, livable place of major league proportions in spirit and enterprise. And each year it throws one big party in May.

Reconciling the big party in that prototype city with the solemnity the holiday was originally created for, reconciling what men and women in the military died for in the war that created Memorial Day dwith what we are and what that the city is provided the ingredients for a lot of thinking on the long drive back to Jefferson City on Monday that took me through a lot of American history and some of my own.

I was born in Decatur Illinois, a town where Abraham Lincoln’s family briefly lived after moving from Indiana. I was raised in two small central Illinois towns, Mt. Pulaski (population about 1,500) and then Sullivan (a bigger place of about 3,300 when we moved there in fourth grade). Abraham Lincoln practiced law in both places as a circuit-riding attorney.

Lincoln scholars point to 1843 as the first time Lincoln and a couple of friends first quoted the phrase from three of the Gospels that “a house divided against itself can not stand” as they helped organize the Illinois Whig Party.

Fifteen years later, he spoke them again in accepting the nomination to run against incumbent Senator Stephen A. Douglas: “If we could first know where we are, and whither we are tending, we could then better judge what to do, and how to do it. . . .A house divided against itself cannot stand. I believe this government cannot endure, permanently half slave and half free.”  He lost that election but it paved the way to the presidency two years later and the great test that followed that determined the correctness of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and by 1858 Abraham Lincoln.

A civil war that tested that assertion took Lincoln to Gettysburg on November 19, 1863, where more than seven-thousand soldiers from both sides had been killed and more than forty thousand had been wounded. He paid tribute to those who died defending the Declaration of Independence’s proclamation that our nation had been “conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

He called upon the nation that day to complete what he called the “unfinished work”  and “the great task remaining before us,” not referring to the war but to the words of the Declaration. He called for the people to recommit themselves to that cause so the nation should have a “new birth of freedom” flowing from, by, and for the people—a united people, a house NOT divided.

A 1904 newspaper article reported that in October 1864, almost a year after Gettysburg and about six months before the Civil War ended, three women in Boalsburg, Pennsylvania decorated the graves of Union soldiers.  Boalsburg, an unincorporated area of 4,600 today, makes the disputed claim that the event was the earliest documented observance of a memorial day.

On May 1, 1865, just three weeks after Lee’s surrender and two weeks after Lincoln’s death, as many at 10,000 people in deeply Confederate Charleston, South Carolina dedicated the graves of Union soldiers who had died in a Confederate Prison. Reports tell us many in the audience were Black.

Waterloo, NY claims to have held the first FORMAL annual observance of a memorial day on May 5, 1866. Local druggist Henry Welles is credited with thinking of the event.

The first national observance was on May 30, 1868 when former Illinois white supremacist John A. Logan, who had become became strong Lincoln supporter at the start of the war and abandoned his racist sentiments after fighting alongside black troops, issued a national proclamation calling for “for the purpose of strewing with flowers or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country. ” Logan, a wartime Union General, was the Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, an organization for Union Army veterans such as my great grandfather. The day originally known as “Decoration Day” was expanded after World War I to honor all of our country’s military dead. It officially became Memorial Day in 1971 when it became a national Monday holiday that now is most often considered the unofficial beginning of summer.

Logan County, where Mt. Pulaski is, was named after Logan’s father. My great grandfather enlisted in the Union Army in Moultrie County, where Sullivan is.

My journey Monday, the now designated Memorial Day, took me back through that area of Lincoln and Logan, and Private Robert T. Priddy—who served under General Sherman at Vicksburg—where Logan was with another Union Army unit.  I had been thinking a lot about the cacophony that the holiday weekend had become as the miles of pavement disappeared beneath my car, I found myself in a quiet place that helped me put the day, the weekend, into a context.  I’ll take you from the cacophony to the quiet in succeeding chapters.

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Notes From a Quiet Hill 

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In case you are wondering—-

Triple-A says the highest recorded price for regular unleaded fuel in Missouri was $4.683 on June 16, 2022. The record for diesel was set just nine days later at $5.375.

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We either are still in Indianapolis or on the way home after witnessing two races—one of which we hope to have more about later (and we don’t mean tomorrow). We took this picture last year of the starting field—only six cars, if you want to call them that.

This year was the second annual Wiener 500.  All six of the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile raced for two laps, each with a two-person crew (both college students who have spent a year touring the country promoting Oscar-Mayer products.  It was so much fun they decided to do it again Saturday, weather permitting (we are writing this on Wednesday night before heading to the Circle City Friday morning).  We’ll have a full report.  Last we knew, two young women from the MU Journalism school had been part of the traveling show. If one of them drives one of these machines to victory, she will be the first woman to win a race in the 117-year history of the Speedway.

Last year, the 500 broadcast crew had fun with their straight-faced coverage:

Inaugural Oscar Mayer Wienie 500 🌭 Full Race | INDYCAR on FOX

Unofficially, the last 2.5 mile lap was turned in 3:17.5, about 65.2 mph.

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Another example of the political amateur hour in Washington crossed our desk a few days ago when Interior Secretary Doug Burgum told the House Natural Resources Committee advocates for solar energy are wrong because, “”All of these projects …in Nevada have one thing in common. When the sun goes down, they produce zero electricity….The whole machine doesn’t work when the sun goes down. And there’s examples from around the world of this happening.”  He suggested committee members have secret briefings about how solar energy doesn’t work.

California Congressman Jared Huffman couldn’t resist a response, asserting there is an “amazing new technology that apparently the secretary is unaware of, it’s a battery.” And solar system batteries hold the day’s electricity for use at night.  Burgum seems to have been in the dark about that. Ignorance such as this in this administration stopped being a surprise a long time ago.

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I’m an immensely popular guy. Or maybe a lot of people are interested in my welfare. My phone is ringing from sunup to sundown from people wanting to make sure my Medicare program is good enough. Even when my caller identity says they’re call from some town in Missouri (and other places nationwide) it turns out that they’re not calling from those places at all.

And many voices sound as if they’re coming from places without Medicare.

A dozen calls a day probably is below average. I answer the calls because I don’t want to fill up the answering machine with non-messages. The thing beeps and drives me crazy.

One day our caller ID told us we were calling ourselves. But we recognize our own voices and the voice calling us was neither of us.

It’s time we re-examined the Attorney General’s no-call list to see if we can have a law (maybe it has to be federal) that says any call originating from someplace other than where the caller ID says it’s coming from is a crime.   It has been many years since we heard of the Attorney General racking up a big fine against a robocall company.

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Here’s something that is really, really serious in our country’s politics.  There are conspiracy theorists who claim that President Trump faked his assassination attempts. While there is no Christmas card exchange between his mailbox and ours, we can’t see how that assertion is true. If it is true, it means that Donald Trump planned for the death of one or more onlookers—Corey Comperatore, who did get fatally shot, and two other people on the platform who were wounded in Pennsylvania. There are those floating the idea that he somehow convinced some guy from California to give up the rest of his life as a free citizen to go to Washington and do something at the correspondents’ dinner to justify tearing down part of the White House and building a ballroom that is more secure than the Washington hotel ballroom where the dinner was scheduled this year.

All of that is rubbish. Perhaps the discussion we should be having is about what Trump does and/or says that has encouraged three unbalanced people to try to get him in their gunsights.

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Here’s a way to end Mr. Trump’s war with Iran.  We buy all of its enriched uranium and make an exclusive contract with Iran to be our exclusive supplier, with American management involved. Payments for the uranium would come from the funds this country has confiscated from Iran not only to pay for the uranium but to constitute reparations for our bombings. Turn management of the Strait of Hormuz to the United Nations which could charge reasonable fees that would finance programs in the world’s poorest countries.

Maybe we could make Iran our 51st state. Or the 52nd.  Or the 52rd.  Or 53rd.  We almost need a scorecard to keep track of the possibilities.

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Sports: Ahmad Hardy Shot; NCAA Tournament Greed, and More 

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(HARDY)—Missouri’s  record=breaking running back Ahmad Hardy was shot in the left leg at a concert at a biker club in Laurel, Mississippi early Sunday morning. He’s undergone emergency surgery and is in stable condition.

Missouri is three months away from opening the 2026 football season. ESPN reports there is “optimism” that he will be able to play football again although it’s too early to establish a timetable for his return to strength.

Police say another man also was shot. Three people are in custody. Hardy is 20, a Mississippi native. He set a new Tiger rushing record last year.

Laurel police say the shooting took place during a “melee” after a rap concert. Reports n Laurel say the cause of the shooting is still being investigated.

The Tigers had been looking forward to a 2026 season with the return of its one-two backfield punch from ’25 of Hardy and Jamal Roberts.  Roberts ran for 753 yards on 124 carries last season and scored six touchdowns.  Hardy went for 1,649 yards, a new school record, with 16 TDs and was a finalist for the Doak Walker Award.

Hardy and Roberts made Missouri the only team in the  SEC with two running backs in the top ten in yardage last season. Coach Eli Drinkwitz told reporters last season that Roberts “is as good a back as there is in the country.” Hardy had been expected to go high in the 2027 NFL draft after staying out of the transfer portal. Roberts did the same thing and has two more years of eligibility remaining.

Missouri does have some depth at running back if Hardy isn’t ready by the start of the season. The Tigers picked up a couple of portal transfers in Hawaii native Va’aimalae Fonoti III, who moves over from Montana, an FCS school. He’s 5-11, 207 pounds with three years of eligibility left. He was 84/418 rushing with five touchdowns. Last season.

Also coming in is Houston Christian;s Xai’Shaun Edwards, who averaged five yard a carry for 1,019 yards last year for another FCS team. He scored a dozen touchdowns.

Missouri also will have true freshman Maxwell Warner on the roster.  Warner is from Chicago and went to the same high school that Mizzou basketball coach Dennis Gates attended. He was considered the top running back in Illinois. He also played defensive back.

(NCAA)—It’s going to be easier for our Missouri teams to get into the NCAA tournament in the future. The men’s and women’s basketball tournaments are being expanded by eight teams to 76 teams.  The plan has come under some harsh criticism but an association spokesman says none of the 32 conferences in the NCAA opposed the plan.

Ben Portnoy of the Sports Business Journal thinks the new plan gives the Power Four Conferences and their “increasingly bloated size” more dominance in college sports. In the pas five year’s tournaments, twenty teams were listed in the “first four out.” Thirteen of them were frm those four conferences.

“Let’s not kid ourselves, this is being done, at least on some level, to appease the richest and most powerful leagues in the country.” The new format opens dozens of new sponsorship opportunities and a subsequent jump in association and school revenues.

(CARDINALS)—The Cardinals have finished their toughest part of the season so far—going 9-7 in seventeen days against the Dodgers, Mariners, Pirates, Padres, and Brewers.  All of those teams are playing better than break-even ball and all are considered playoff contenders.

The Cardinals finished the week 23-17, three and a half games behind the Cubs, tied with the Brewers for second place in a division in which all five teams are playing better than .500 ball.

(WHERE ARE THEY NOW?)—Where are the major names that left the Cardinals in the last couple of years and how are they doing.

Nolan Arenado is hitting .273 with six homers and 18 RBIs for the Diamondbacks.

Sonny Gray is 3-1 with a 3.54 Era for the Red Sox

Willson Contreras, also with Boston, is batting .259 with eight homers and 23 ribbies.

Paul Goldschmidt, in his second year with the Yankees, is batting 200 with two homers and seven runs batted in.

Brendan Donovan is hitting .295 with 3 home runs and 8 runs batted in.

Miles Mikolas is 1-3, 7.44 in eight games, five of them starts.

(ROYALS)—The Royals continue working back to break even after their eight-game losing streak. They finished the week wining seven of their last ten and pulling to 19-22. The Tigers ended Kansas City’s five-game wining streak Sunday.

(FIFA)—Arrowhead Stadium as a name doesn’t mean much to the millions of people worldwide who will be watching the World Cup Soccer Tournament (or as the official soccer folks call it “football.”)  So the place will just be Kansas City Stadium when FIFA brings six pool play tournament games next month along with a match in the round of 32 and a quarterfinal contest.

The AP’s Dave Skiretta reports the Hunt family has spent millions of dollars reconfiguring the football field into a soccer field’s dimensions. The first teams to play on the redesigned field will be Argentina, the defending World Cup champion, against Algeria on June 16.  The final contest is scheduled for July 11, giving the Chiefs a month turn Kansas City Stadium back into Arrowhead.

Tickets for those games aren’t cheap. For the first four games, ticket prices will range from $140  to $410. Some seats in the nosebleed section can be had for as little as $60 but don’t expect any kind of intimate viewing experience. Round of 32 matches range from $160 to $440.

If you want to take in the quarterfinal match, be prepared to cough up $485 to $1,125. If you buy previously=sold tickets through the FIFA World cup platform, be prepared to pay a 15% resale fee.

(CHIEFS)—The Kansas City Chiefs invited 76 undrafted free agents to their rookie camp this year.  Only three were signed to contracts:  WR Xavier Loyd, DB Marlen Sewell, and OT Kahlil Benson.

Lloyd in a Kansas City native who played at K-State, Illinois State and at Missouri. He was in 12 games for the Tigers. Sewell spent five years at Vanderbilt, had 52 tackles in 45 games.

Benson played 12 of the 16 games Indiana played on the way to last season’s national championship. He allowed only 24 quarterback pressures on 382 pass-blocking snaps last season.

They’ll be part of the squad for the offseason training program that starts later this month.

(BATTLEHAWKS)—The St. Louis Battlehawks head into the last weeks of the UFL season in a three way tie for their division lead.  St. Louis, DC, and Orlando all are 5-2.  Jarveon Howard of the Battlehawks leads the league in rushing with 354 yards.  The ‘Hawks have the league’s best defense, giving up 247 yards a game, which they need because they’re last in total offense. But they’re pretty efficient. They are second in scoring average behind the DC Defenders, 30-23.

St. Louis beat Columbus 31-20 last week. There are three games left in the regular schedule, two against Houston and one against Dallas. Houston is 2-5. Dallas is 3-4.

(REMEMBER?)—Kansas Center Greg Ostertag, who played for the Jayhawks 1991-95 and then had an eleven-year NBA career, has been elected mayor of Mount Vernon, Texas, a town of about 2,500 about 100 miles northeast of Dallas.  At 7-2, he is now the world’s tallest public official.

Now: Where the rubber meets the road:

(INDYCAR)===It’s been a long time between wins for Chistian Lundgaard—47 races, in fact—but he heads into IndyCar’s biggest race as a winner.

Lundgaard finished almost five seconds ahead of David Malukas on the road course at Indianapolis, his first win since July of 2023

The race had its chaotic moments beginning as the field surged into the first turn and things got too crowded and the cars of Scott Dixon, Felix Rosenqvist, Pato O’Ward, and Caio Collett tangled, triggering a full course caution.

Rosenqvist was able to run eight more laps before retiring in 23rd place.  Dixon rallied back to fifth at the end. O’Ward and Collett finished on the leader lap but were 18th and 19th.

The race turned for many competitors when Alexander Rossi’s car quit because its hybrid power system failed and he rolled to a stop on the main straightaway. He fumed, ““It’s pretty annoying to have failures on the car because of a product we didn’t ask for that doesn’t improve the racing.”

Rossi sat in the safety of his stalled car as competitors roared past at racing speeds before a full=course caution came out.  He finally climbed out and walked across pit lane where he told an interviewer, “The fact that it took that long to throw a full-course caution when the cars on the front straight were going by at 170 miles an hour also seems insane when they don’t let us drive in the wet yesterday.” Qualifying had been called off  the day before the race because of unsafe conditions caused by rain, although IndyCar has run races in the rain several times.

David Malukis finished second after leading the most laps but giving up the lead to Lundgaard        and Graham Rahal claimed the last podium slot.”

Qualifying for the Indianapolis 500 will be next weekend. The race will be on the Sunday of Memorial day weekend, May 24th.

(NASCAR)—Shane Van Gisbergen’s historic drive to the win on the Watkins Glen board course already is considered an epic.

The acknowledged master of NASCAR road courses (he’s 7-1 in the last three years) came out of his last pit stop in 26th place, 29.2  seconds behind the leader with 24 twisting laps ahead. .

He overhauled all of them and pulled away for a 7.3 second lead at the checkered flag.

His win leaves him only two short of Jeff Gordo’s all-time NASCAR Cup Series record for road course victories. Van Gisbergen has yet to win on an oval.

Connor Zilisch, a rookie in the Cup series, appeared to be the only driver capable of keeping Van Gisbergen in sight until a tire let go. He finished 20th.

NASCAR’s next points race will be Sunday night, May 24th, the annual 600 miler at Charlotte. Next weekend it will hold its annual All-Star Race, this time at Dover.

(photo credits: Hardy— Kris Sand, Columbia Missourian; Lundgaard—IndyCar; Van Gisbergen—Rick Gevers)

An 18th Century Dying Syphilitic, an Old West Killing, a Legendary Couple, and a Famous Western Song

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(Preface: I once heard the Sons of the Pioneers explain the difference between country music and western music.  Western music is about the outdoors—the trails, the mountains, the clean air; country music is about indoor stuff—fightin’ and lyin’ and dyin’)

Funny how things are connected.

A few days ago I was writing a new episode of Across Our Wide Missouri about Big Nose Kate, the girlfriend of Doc Holliday. She once lived in St. Louis and there is some story, legend, myth or whatever that while she was there in 1872 she met a fresh graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Dental School, John Holliday, who was there visiting a classmate during the summer.

What’s ahead is another example of how historians start pulling on a loose string and before long there’s a tangled heap of interconnected threads. Hang on because we’re going to unravel a whole historical sweater today.

Part of Kate’s story has her in Dodge City, Kansas working at Tom Sherman’s Barroom in some capacity or another. She already had a reputation of selling her services, if you will.

In the vicinity was a young Iowa native named Frank Maynard, who wrote poetry to keep himself occupied in slow times.  His poetry isn’t bad. One of his works reminded me right off of the writings of Robert W. Service who authored the great poems of the Yukon—The Shooting of Dan McGrew, The Spell of the Yukon, The Land God Forgot, and the Cremation of Sam McGee:

There are strange things done in the midnight sun

By the men who moil for gold;

The Arctic trails have their secret tales

That would make your blood run cold;

The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,

But the queerest they ever did see

Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge

I cremated Sam McGee.

One of Maynard’s poems begins:

There’s a wild and rocky canyon

Where the panther rears its young

And where somber, gloomy shadows

By the Cedars are flung.

There’s no signs of human presence

How e’er closely you may scan.

Yet within its dark recesses,

Dwells an exiled, ruined man.

Sorry, folks, one of the dangers of researching and writing is how easily one is distracted.  That’s one of the joys of doing research—and one of the frustrations because sooner or later you have to get back to what you came for.

Tom Sherman was a great big guy, even in our times—six feet-six or seven—and apparently at times as mean as a snake—as on the day that he killed a man named Burns (first name maybe Charley) at his bar in Dodge City, Kansas.

Young Frank Maynard noted the incident briefly in his journal for March 13, 1873 and later wrote in his memoir, “I could see some fellows gathering and I could discern a man down and moving his legs & arms. Possibly he may have had consciousness enough to feel that he was fleeing from his pursuer with whom I almost collided. This was Tom Sherman, a big blubbery fellow, who ran with a limp. He had a large caliber revolver in his hand which he was emptying into the boy that was down…Tom, panting for breath, said to those gathering, ‘I’d better shoot him again, hadn’t I boys?’ He stepped at once to where he lay struggling, stood over him holding the big revolver in both hands, aimed at his forehead and fired. The bullet went a little high and scattered his brains in his hair…All I could learn was that Sherman had killed a friend of Burns and thought it would be safer to have him out of the way.”

The incident led to the creation of a poem that became one of the most famous songs to come out of that frontier era.

A few years ago, Maynard’s memoir and his poems were put into a book by folklorist Jim Hoy, an English Professor at Emporia State Univeristy and published by the Texas Tech University Press.

Maynard was an Iowa City, Iowa boy who headed west of the Missouri River when he was sixteen and wound up in Towanda, Kansas, a town then of fifty people or fewer southwest of Kansas City (just off I-35 today).  He soon was a buffalo hunter and later he and his father (the rest of the family had moved to Towanda) ran a freighting business between Emporia and Wichita. He became a real “cow boy” in 1872 when he was part of a crew that drove a herd of horses from Kansas to north central Texas. When he went back to Towanda, he became one of the drovers on a cattle drive.

Three years later he witnessed the killing in Dodge City.

In 1876, Maynard was wintering a herd of horses on the Kansas-Oklahoma border until the Wichita market opened. “I had often amused myself by trying to write verses, and one dull winter day in camp, to while away the time, I began to write a poem which could be sung to the tun of ‘The Dying Girl’s Lament’ in which a dying young woman says her lover did not tell her he had syphilis.” It began:

When I was a young girl I used to seek pleasure

When I was a young girl I used to drink ale.

Out of the ale house and down to the jailhouse

Right out of a bar room, shown to my grave.

Its 18th century antecedent, perhaps dating back as far as 1740, was The Unfortunate Rake, an English folk song about a young soldier also dying of venereal disease. It began:

“As I was walking down by the “Lock”  (the hospital)

As I was walking one morning of late,

Who did I spy by the own dear comrade

Wrapp’d in flannel, so hard is his fate. “

In one version the rake tells his friend:

“Get six jolly fellows to carry my coffin

And six pretty maidens to bear up my pall.

And give to each of them bunches of roses

That they may not smell me as they go along.

Muffle your drums, play your pipes merrily

Play the death march as you go along

And fire your guns right over my coffin

There goes an unfortunate lad to his home.”

Maynard explained to young newspaper reporter Elmo Scott Watson for the Colorado Springs Gazette and Telegraph edition of January 27, 1924, the poem, called “The Dying Cowboy” that he “sang it to the boys in the outfit. They liked it and began singing it. It became popular with the boys in other outfits who heard it and after we had taken our herd to market in Wichita the next spring, and from that time on I heard it sung everywhere on the range and trail.”

It began:

“As I rode down by Tom Sherman’s bar-room,

Tom Sherman’s bar-room so early one day,

There I espied a handsome ranger

All wrapped up in white linen, as cold as the clay.

‘I see by your outfit that you’re a ranger,’

The words that he said as I went riding by.

‘Come, sit down beside me, and hear my sad story,

I’m shot through the breast and know I must die.”

The chorus was:

“Then muffle the drums and play the dead macrhes;

Play the dead march as I’m carried along;

Take me to the churh-yard and lay the sod o’er me,

I’m a young ranger and I know I’ve done wrong.”

Maynard’s ranger was a cowboy who rode the range tending and herding cattle.

He wrote that other trail herders changed the lyrics over time and replaced “Tom Sherman’s Barroom” with “Streets of Laredo” and the song evolved into the more familiar version we hear and sing today.

In 1949 Ray Evans and Jay Livingston wrote a version as a theme song for a motion picture, Streets of Laredo¸ starring William Holden, McDonald Carey, William Bendix and Mona Freeman.  The three were outlaws who rescue Freeman’s character from a racketeer.  Two of them later joined the Texas Rangers while the third continued his outlaw ways. The movie ends in a big showdown in which, as one source put it, “loyalty, love, and vengeance collide.”

Doc Holliday died at in Glenwood Springs Colorado at age 36 in 1887. He and Kate never got together again. It is said that when he died, he had a derringer given him by Kate later acquired for a large sum of money by the Glenwood Springs Historical Society.  But its authenticity has been seriously questioned and the society offered to give back donations used to buy the weapon.

Big Nose Kate died in 1940, within a few days of her 91st birthday.

As for the young cowboy poet—

Maynard was “weary of the hardship and the tragedy incident to life on the plains” when he headed home to Towanda in 1877. ‘it is not to be supposed that I had wandered all these years heartwhole and fancy free, for I had had my dreams of love and home that ended with a rude awakening, and now at the age of twenty-four I was growing cynical and I had often exultantly declared to myself, ‘I will die as I have lived, a wild free rover of the plains.’”

But he was invited to a party and found “one pair of eyes that held a strange fascination for me. They seemed to wear a far away expression, and in their luminous depth there seemed to be a touch of ineffable sadness. Somehow the thought came to me, ‘Here is a woman that I might love, that might save me from the reckless life I have been drifting into.’”  Her name was Flora Longstreth.

However,  “When I finally screwed up my courage to put the question, which would have such a bearing on my future, I did not get a direct reply.” When she refused his invitation to a party, he wentt back to cowboying in the spring of ‘78, finally concluding the relationship would never work. He wrote her a farewell letter and spent the season herding cattle, fighting a prairie fire, and having some brushes with Indians unhappy with the encroachments on their lands.

But he never forgot Flora and eventually he  convinced the girl with the faraway eyes his cowboy days were over. They were married April 24, 1881, moved to Colorado Springs six years later where Maynard made a good living as a Carpenter. He probably started compiling his reminiscences about 1888. He died March 28, 1926.  Hoy notes the headline on his Denver Post obituary read, “Plains Bard and Pioneer of Earliest Cowboy Days is Dead.” Flora, born three years after Frank, outlived him by five, dying in 1931.

Frank’s reminiscences include his early days as a buffalo hunter, days in which hundreds of the animals were killed for their hides. He wrote without pity about those times although by the end he laments to the fate of the buffalo and the people who relied on them for so many purposes.

Names of people who are now legends drift in and out of his thoughts and his life; Dave Rudabaugh once was a herder with him and later a member of Billy the Kid’s gang in New Mexico.  Bat Masterson, Bill Tighlman, and the Earps are part of the narrative as are Buckskin Joe, Colorado Bill, Prairie Dog Dave and Tiger Bill, whose barroom murder he likened to the death of Wild Bill Hickock; the Northern Cheyenne chief Dull Knife and many others forgotten or only words in history books were part of his world. .

He wrote of the ending of his era:

On Boot Hill they’ve built a schoolhouse

And the W.C.T. U.

Holds an annual convention

Where once corks and stoppers flew;

There are sermons, there is singing,

Where was pistol rack and flame.

Dodge, the erstwhile wicked city,

Has built a better name,

And the lamb now skips and gambols

Where was heard the grey wolf’s wail,

The survival of the fittest,

Marks the ending of the trail..

As with so much of the story of Doc and Kate, the real story of the free range west is part of legend and Western myth and preserved history.   The only thing that seems certain is that a young cowboy named Frank Maynard witnessed a killing on a Dodge City street at a tavern where Kate once worked and he wrote a poem about it. It was included in a book of his poems published in 1911. His poems and some other writings are in the Texas Tech book.

One of the joys of studying history is the people you meet along the way, the people who kept diaries or wrote memoirs in which we see how those we see in movies or on television really were—just people in a gritty time when law was tenuous and life sometimes was cheap.  But in those writings, they’re alive in their time with never a thought of being  a legend.  Good or bad, they become real and the mental images of their days carry with them new understandings of the humanity of our ancestors.

One string leads to another and to another, and one beyond that and maybe more.  And in the end, a historical sweater of many colors becomes a pile of string.  But oh! What fun the unraveling has been!  And how richer we have become in the unraveling.

(Photo credits: Kate and Doc: Tom Kollenborn Chronicles; saloon—facebook; Book—Barnes & Noble; album Tower Records; Flora—the book)

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Sports: Lots of Chiefs Draftees and Other Things.

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By Bob Priddy, Missourinet Contributing Editor

(TIGERSDRAFT)—Here’s a sign of the times for college football.

Six Missouri Tigers were chosen in the NFL Draft for the second time in three years.  That ties a record for most draftees from a single class since the league cut back to seven rounds of the draft in 1994.  Six Tigers from the 2009 and 2015 teams—Gary Pinkel was the coach then—established the record.  The only other time in school history this has happened under current circumstances was two years ago.

These six raise the total NFL draftees from Missouri to fifteen, the most for any three-year period since the NFL merged with the AFL in 1970.

In 1981 when the NFL went twelve rounds, seven Tigers were picked.

None of the six in this draft was a home grown Tiger.  All six were NIL carpetbaggers.

The top Mizzou draftees, defensive end Zion Young and linebacker Josiah Trotter went in round two, Young to the Baltimore Ravens (45th choice) and Young to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers (choice 46).

Two other guys were drafted in the third round with Green Bay taking defensive tackle Chris McClellan and the Rams taking right tackle Keagen Trost. They were choices 77 and 93, respectively.

Day three saw wide receiver Kevin Coleman Jr taken in the fifth round (#177) by the Dolphins and cornerback Toriano Pride Jr., (#220) by the Buffalo Bills.

Missouri has had seven draft picks in a class before. In 1981, when the NFL Draft lasted 12 rounds, the Tigers sent seven players to the NFL as draft picks.

(RELATED)—A lot of people, Tiger fans included, were surprised that Vanderbilt QB Diego Pavia, a runner-up for the Heisman Trophy, didn’t get drafted. He certainly look pretty Heismanish when the Commodores played our Tigers.  He’s the first Heisman runner-up to go undrafted since nobody wanted Iowa’s Brad Banks 23 years ago. He’s the first Heisman finalist since Jordan Lynch form NIU in 2014 to go undrafted.   Both buys wound up playing in Canada.

(CHIEFSDRAFT)—The Kansas City Chiefs went aggressive in the NFL draft, trading places to get the people they most wanted.  They haven’t had a first round pick 2017, they year they took Patrick Mahomes.

The Chiefs went shopping for a cornerback in the first round, trading with the Bears to move up from 9th to 6th in the first round. They snagged LSU cornerback Mansoor Delane. They hope he’ll plug a hole created by the losses of Trent McDuffie and Jaylen Watson to the Rams. With their second pick in the first round, they went to Clemson DT Peter Woods.

Round two:  They took Oklahoma edge rusher Mason Thomas, a choice that surprised some analysts, one of whom forecast the choice could “go down as one of the biggest surprises in recent Chiefs draft memory” because he is “an undersized, bendy defensive end,” the kind of guy defensive coordinator Steve Spagnola likes.

They had no choice in the third round but in the 109th player picked, in round four, was Oregon small cornerback Jadon Canady who also can play safety. Nebraska running back Emmett Johnson was the fifth-round pick (#161). He also catches passes. A second choice in the fifth round was WR Cyrus Allen of Cincinnati who, some analysts think, has some special teams talent.

Nothing doing in the sixth round so their final choice (#249) was LSU quarterback Garrett Nussmeier, who is considered a “developmental pick.”

“This is the first time the Chiefs have picked in the top 10 since dealing up for Patrick Mahomes in 2017, and the first time they’ve gone into a draft day with a top-10 selection since Andy Reid’s first year in Kansas City (’13), when they held the No. 1 pick,” Breer wrote. “That, to me, is why GM Brett Veach has been so active looking at both moving up and potentially moving down. This is a rare opportunity for the Chiefs that might not come along again for some time. I think if Kansas City moves down, then Oregon tight end Kenyon Sadiq will be on the radar.”

UDFA: Houston Cornerback Zelmar Vedder, Sand Diego State CB Bryce Phillips, Oklahoma RB Jadyn Ott, Louisville OT Pete Nygra, Iowa Safety Xavier Nwankpa, Miami LB Wesley Bissainthe, Wyoming TE John Michael Gyllenborg, Cincinnati WR Jeff Caldwell, DT Cole Brevard of Texas, CB D’Arco Perkins-McAllister from Louisiana-Monroe, Duke edge rusher Vincent Anthony Jr., LSU guard Josh Thompson, and Toledo LB Anthony Dunn.  Other UDFA signings: Virginia Tech RB Terion Stewart, Iowa DL Ethan Hurkett, Michigan DT Damon Payne

The Chiefs also are going to look at several guys in their spring rookie minicamp: Temple receiver Kajiya Hollawayne, Montana CB Kenzel Lawler,  Pittsburgh OL Jeff Persi, safety Desshon Singleton of Nebraska, Washington WR Omari Evans, WR Jacob DeJesus of Cal, Charlotte LB Shay Taylor, USC WR Jaden Richardson, three guys from UConn—Punter Connor Stutz, LB Donovan Branch and TE Louis Hansen—and Tennessee Tech S Tim Countras, Washington kicker Grady Gross, Rice DL Blake Boenisch, LB Colby Taylor of West Florida, K-State S Gunner Maldonado, Liberty DB Brylan Green, three guys from Pitt: CB Rashad Battle, S Javon McIntyre, TE Justin Holmes; Eastern Kentucky DB Jaheim Ward. An offensive tackle from the International Player Pathway program, Felix Lepper, has been invited to the camp.

One other UDFA—in an intriguing move, the chiefs picked up E. J. Smith, who played for Stanford and for Texas A&M.  His four-year college stats are nothing to write home about: 207 total carries,  969 yards, nine TDS. He also caught passes for 470 yards and another touchdown. Sometimes it’s the pedigree more than the statistics that makes someone worth a look. E. J. Smith is the son of Emmitt Smith, the NFL’s all-time rushing leader.

He has a tough row to hoe if he ever gets to see much playing time. The Chiefs, remember, signed Kenneth Walker, the star of this year’s Super Bowl.  They drafted Nebraska running back Emmett Johnson and picked UDFA Jadyn Ott from Oklahoma.

For most of these guys, this is just a cup of coffee in an NFL locker room. A few might make the practice squad. Most will hope for a long shot chance with another team. Look for some of these names on the UFL rosters in the next season.

Speaking of the UFL:

(BATTLEHAWKS)—The St. Louis Battlehawks, who had split their first four games of the season, went on the road to play the undefeated Orlando Storm last weekend—and dominated the Storm in the first half, storming to a 25-0  lead. The defense held Orlando to just 29 yards of offense as Orlando went just 3 of 14 on third downs.  Orlando got 14 points in the third quarter and a field goal in the fourth, but St. Louis emerged with a 25=17 win.

The Battlehawks played without former Mizzou kicker Tucker McCann, who aggravated a quadriceps injury during warmups. Punter Ryan Sanborn was the fill-in. He got a couple of field goals in the first half but missed a couple of PATs.

The Battlehawks are 3-2 now although they have been outscored 112-116. Orlando and DC lead the league at 4-1.  St. Louis plays Louisville Thursday to wrap up a three-game road trip. Louisville is 2-3.

(MIZZPORT)—Missouri hasn’t seen the last of T. O. Barrett.  They’ll have to deal with him at least twice in the next season when they play Vanderbilt. Ant Robinson II has signed with Florida State. Jacob Crews and Sebastian Mack are still waiting for calls and Jevon Porter hasn’t heard if he’ll get a redshirt.

The portal closed on the 21st with Missouri still having three slots to fill.  As of now, six players from the last season will be back: Trent Pierce, Trent Burns, point guard Aaron Rowe, forward Annor Boateng (whose season ended early with an injury), forwards Luke Norwether and Nicholas Randall

The Baseball.

(CARDINALS)—The St. Louis Cardinals spent last week sinking back toward .500 and started this week 14-13 after wasting an outstanding pitching performance from Michael McGreevey. The offense got him two runs but the bullpen couldn’t hold the lead.

The crusher came from Seattle’s Rob Refsnyder, who challenged a called third strike and got it overturned—-then ripped a JoJo Romero pitch 412 feet over the fence to give Seattle the 3-2 win.

The Cardinals have not been below .500 this season.

(ROYALS)—The Kansas City Royals scored six runs in the last two innings, with Lane Thomas’ walk-off three run homer in the ninth to snatch a win away from the Angels 11-9 Sunday. The win completed a sweep of the Angels and upped their record to 11-17.

Joe Caglianone had tied the game in the ninth with a two-run shot. The Angels got a run in the to of the tenth before Thomas ended it.

Starter Seth Lugo had a rugged outing. He went 6.1 innings but gave up seven earned runs on 14 hits.

The Royals started the week having climbed into a tie with the White Sox for last place in the division. They were only one game behind the Twins in their bid to escape the cellar in a competitive division in which the leading teams are only one game above break-even—Cleveland and Detroit are only 15-14.

Movin on to Moving On Sports—

(NASCAR)—-What to talk about after the first race of the year at Talladega?  The “big one” that involved 26 of the forty cars in the field?  The continued criticism of this generation of race cars?  Carson Hocevar’s first Cup win?  His victory celebration?

The wreck was not the biggest of the big.  The record is 28 cars that got tangled up in October of 2024.

Carson Hocevar’s first Cup win is memorable not only because he survived racing at Talladega and the way he held competitors at bay for several closing laps, but especially for his unique way of celebrating.  Hocevar, one of the tallest drivers in NASCAR at 6’4” tall, figured out how to work his clutch and throttle while sitting outside of his window, waving at fans.  Some folks worried he was endangering himself but NASCAR apparently liked it.

Hocevar has a ton of charisma, is a 23-year old Michigander who was the rookie of the year in the Cup series in 2024. He’s been racing since he was twelve.

He got through the big wreck without damage to his car, drove into contention in the third phase of the race, dueled with Chris Buescher, for the last 37 laps.

Hocevar took the lead from Buescher on lap 151 of the 188 lap race. Buescher took it back on 156 but gave it up to Hocevar for laps 1570169 before surging back into the lead for 151=165. Hocevar held it for 166. Buescher was in front 167-172 before Hocevar led two and Buescher took the led for lap 175. Hovercar led two, Buescher one before Hocevar led two more. Buescher was in control for four laps before Hocevar pulled ahead for two laps. Buescher got his last lead on 187 but Hocevar got him at the end and won by .112 seconds.

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(MODRIVERS)—-Missouri drivers in NASCAR have been hard to find in the last few years, but two drivers we’ve followed are going to be putting on the helmets and strapping into cockpits this summer.

Joplin native Jamie McMurray and sometime Missourian Clint Brawner (who hails from Emporia, Kansas—just across the border from Missouri–has had a place at the Lake of the Ozarks, thus earning him consideration as an adoptive Missourian) will each drive a truck race for Kaulig Racing this summer

Kaulig is bringing Dodge back to the sport under the Ram pickup truck label.  Bowyer will drive the truck at Dover on May 15. McMurray will be in the truck at the inaugural road race at the San Diego naval base June 19.

Both Bowyer and McMurray at part of the FOX sports broadcast crew that covers Cup races.  Bowyer won ten Cup races in his career and likes the short tracks. Dover, he says, is “a beast—concrete, tight and unforgiving.”   McMurray has seven Cup victories including the Daytona 500 and the Brickyard 400 in the same year, 2010. He has road racing experience, co-driving the winning car in the 2025 Daytona 24-hours.

(INDYCAR)—The Indianapolis 500 is guaranteed to have the traditional 33 starters this year with an entry from A.J. Foyt’s team to be driven by Katheirne Legge who will make her fifth start in the race.

Legge brings back her sponsorship by a cosmetics company and has new support from General Motors, one of the two engine suppliers for the series. Legge’s best start in the 500 is from 29th. Her best finish is 22nd.She’s the tenth woman to compete in the race and holds the one-and-four lap qualifying records for a woman driver, more than 231 mph.

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IndyCar runs on the Indianapolis Speedway road course next weekend then begins the buildup for the 500.

An Old Testament Story for Our Times

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With President Trump, some of his cabinet members, and his evangelical supporters finding Bible verses from either testament to justify what has been going on since he resumed office, we thought we would offer an Old Testament story that should be a cautionary tale for our situation.

We have enjoyed several of Malcolm Gladwell’s perceptive books (and are likely to enjoy more) one of which carries the title of the story from the Bible that gets to today’s situation in the Mideast.

Here’s Malcolm telling the story.

The unheard story of David and Goliath | Malcolm Gladwell

Our President is learning that being big is no guarantee of being superior. We are sure, given his statements about his favorite book that he has read the seventeenth chapter of First Samuel. We wonder, therefore, being the student of the Bible that he claims to be, why he hasn’t connected the dots.

There’s a cease fire as we write this. It’s a great chance for the Iranians to stock up on more stones.

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A Noisy Awakening 

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Nancy’s newest birth anniversary was last Friday. I took her out to eat and then to see a movie.

Kind of the way things were back in our courting days.

We went to our GQT Capital 8 Theatre and we bought our popcorn and our sugar-free soft drink and sat down in some nice roomy seats.  Just as the pre-movie trivia game was about to start for the three of us in the theatre, one of the theatre employees told us tornado sirens were blowing and we needed to take refuge in the bathrooms.

After an hour or so in what became two unisex bathrooms, the theatre folks gave us passes for some other night.

So we went back Saturday with our visiting daughter Liz, used our free passes and our free concessions tickets and settled into watch A GREAT AWAKENING.

We watched the charming young lady from Noovie host the various short word games or trivia questions and then theatre exploded with a deafening display of the latest in DOLBY sound technology.   Then the previews came on—one movie featuring real people and four or five featuring cartoon people.  All at beyond maximum volume, apparently to make the explosions that replace plots in today’s flicks more fearful.

Finally, we got to the feature. It was so loud I took out my hearing aids and even then it was so loud that I decided, as I told Nancy and Liz later, that I was eager to see the movie on TV so the sound level wasn’t so distracting as to spoil the story.  I walked out of the theatre that night feeling exhausted.

Not only that, but the popcorn was mediocre.  I get better popcorn at a convenience store on the other side of town.

Come to think of it, the best part of the experience was being able to go to the men’s restroom without some women in there, too.  It was a safe experience in the bathroom but a danger to my hearing in the auditorium.

The movie?  Pretty good for an almost-Hollywood production. Interesting story that, on reflection, lacked a little of the sophistication in story-telling and dialogue that the major studios produce.

It was produced by Sight & Sound Films, a Christian-themed spinoff of Sight and Sound Theatres, the company that has produced Biblical-themed shows in Branson for some time. In case you missed the point the movie was trying to make, the producers give it to you during the credits: “True liberty comes through Jesus Christ.” I found the statement in conflict with what I had just watched (or endured).

The movie tracks the unusual relationship between the passionate English Methodist evangelist George Whitefield (he pronounced it as if it had no “e” in the middle), who was trained as a stage actor, and the calculating and politically savvy printer, later inventor and sage who was a key to writing the Declaration of Independence and the U. S. Constitution, Benjamin Franklin, played impressively by John Paul Sneed.

Franklin realized he could profit from printing Whitefield’s sermons. Whitefield realized he could reach more people if he allowed Franklin to print and circulate his words.

(George Whitefield—The Genevan Foundation   (With his “lazy left eye” sometimes George Whitefield was derisively called “Dr. Squintum” by his many detractors)

Whitefield is portrayed by a young and handsome actor with no English accent and no resemblance to the real Whitefield an instantly-inspirational figure who spoke to thousands who quickly became “saved” by his dynamic sermons.  Franklin is the Franklin of our familiarity—a Christian, generally, who differ from those who think the only way to God is through Christ, which is Whitefield’s message.

Continue reading →

Monstrosity

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President Trump says he wants to build a 250-foot tall arch to celebrate this country’s 250th anniversary.  It is yet another project that wreaks of excess and of self-promotion.  Whatever its official name becomes, it’s always going to be known as the arch that Trump built. Arch deTrump, some already are calling it.

The only thing taller in the area that stretches from the Arlington National Cemetery east to the Library of Congress across from the Capitol is the Capitol itself, and by only a few feet.

Grace, beauty, and appropriateness have never been in his lexicon.  Gross, ugly, and inappropriate too often define him to an increasing number of people.  Last week, in an oval office reveal of the design for this monstrosity. CBS reporter Ed O’Keefe asked the President who the arch is for.  “Me,” he said.

The fact checkers who have built their careers on Trump’s lies had a day off on that one.

The Commission on Fine Arts refers to it as the Triumphal Arch. To be honest, the  letter “i” should replace the “h.”

The only manmade arch that we have been able to find that is bigger than this is the one on the St. Louis riverfront.

Napoleon’s Arc de Triomphe in Paris is almost 100 feet shorter, at 164 feet.  The Monument to the Revolution in Mexico City is only 220 feet. The Arch of Triumph in Pyongyang, North Korea tops out at 197 feet.

The four-sided arch that is the Pennsylvania State Memorial at Gettysburg, honoring the 34,500 Pennsylvania soldiers who fought there, checks in at 110 feet. Not far away, the National Memorial Arch at Valley Forge honoring those who wintered there 1777-78 is sixty feet high.

The top of the Memorial Arch in Huntington, West Virginia is only 42 feet from the ground. The Camp Randall, Wisconsin arch honoring Civil War veterans from that state needs only thirty feet to dignify them. The Bushnell Soldiers and Sailors Memorial Arch in Hartford, Connecticut is but 116 feet and the Washington Square Arch that commemorates George Washington’s inauguration in New York City gets the job done in 77 feet.

“It’s going to be beautiful,” he says.  Philip Kennicott with the Washington Post offers a brutal opposing view:

It is an insult to the men and women who risk their lives to protect democracy, who have fought in wars against fascism, who have actually achieved victory rather than merely declared and celebrated it. Its symbolism is borrowed and confused, and it will block a sacred vista that connects the Lincoln Memorial to the final resting place of the Civil War dead, and veterans from every major war and conflict this country has fought.

This is a subtly that escapes people such as Trump who think symbolic as well as real sledgehammers and wrecking balls are among mankind’s greatest inventions. The arch will stand at the southern end of the Arlington Memorial Bridge, interrupting the flow of history from the Lincoln Memorial to the peaceful hillside that is Arlington National Cemetery, a cemetery on land confiscated from Confederate commander Robert E. Lee as a resting place for those who defended the Union in the Civil War.

Some critics say the planned arch will obscure much of he cemetery but will frame Lee’s mansion at the top of the hill beyond. Is that intentional?  Who knows, although Trump has expressed a fondness for honoring Confederate leaders.

Trump has said it will be 250 feet high as a symbol of the nation’s 250th birthday. As of last week, however, it is only colored drawings.  The first shovel of dirt for the project has not yet been turned and Independence Day is less than 90 days away.  As one critic put it, “If it isn’t going to be done this year, it really has nothing to do with the 250th Anniversary, and as Trump said, it’s for him.”.

Kennecott concludes, “It perverts a fundamentally American idea about war. We have fought them, we have died in them, and we have brought war to too many people who did not deserve our meddling with their politics and sovereignty.

“But no matter the cause, no matter how great the victory, we fundamentally honor sacrifice and service. We celebrate the end of wars and the achievement of peace, not victory. Roman victory arches are lovely to look at, but they were primarily political statements, assertions of personal power and propaganda by ambitious men”.

Caesar Trumpus wants his arch.

If it can’t be finished by July 4, maybe he can complete it in time to celebrate his glorious victory over Iran.