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James Hamilton, M. D.

Jeanine Eilers (Decker)

You must come to Arizona to experience Monument Valley (as well as the Grand Canyon, Sedona, the red rocks and Oak Creek Canyon) and the true beauty of the southwest.  I know a place you can stay.

James Hamilton, M. D.

Fred Clem

Speaking of John Wayne and movies shot on location in the southwest, has anyone heard the story behind "The Conqueror".   It was't a western but a story about Genghis Khan with John Wayne in the starring role.

The movie was filmed near St. George UT.  The site was down wind from the Yucca Flats NV atomic testing grounds.  It is felt the radioactive contaminated soil and dust caused an alarming number of cancer cases among the Hollywood cast and crew.  Here's a clip from an article on the subject:

Public interest was piqued by an article in the November 10, 1980 issue of People magazine, in which it was stated that “Of The Conqueror’s 220 cast and crew members from Hollywood, an astonishing 91 have contracted cancer.”

The article quoted Dr. Robert C. Pendleton, director of radiological health at the University of Utah: “With these numbers, this case could qualify as an epidemic. The connection between fallout radiation and cancer in individual cases has been practically impossible to prove conclusively. But in a group this size you’d expect only 30-some cancers to develop. With 91, I think the tie-in to their exposure on the set of The Conqueror would hold up even in a court of law.”

David Mitchell

Fred,

Somehwhere I read another article about how many movie crew people had come down with cancerous symptoms from the times they spent in and around that parrt of the country. Used to be a large open pit uranium mine owned and operated by the Navajo tribe. Biggest damn dump trucks you ever saw. I'm sure that's long since closed.

Jim,

There you go mentioning another favorite place - the area around Ridgeway. I started my real estate carreer in Telluride in 1972 (the year before thye began to build the lifts on the mountain). That and Ouray and the Silverton-Durango narrow guage railroad are about as dramatic as it gets for mountain scenery. I think they have filmed almost 100 movies on that railroad. My youngest daughter led a group up Mt. Wilson summit when she was about a freshman at Watterson. Took 'em almost 5 days walk.

Tim, 

You sould ride your bike over the Dallas Divide from Ridgeway to Telluride in the fall when the Aspens are turning - wow! (better take extra oxygen). Ridgeway wasn't much when I lived in Telluride but that was 40 years ago. It's the site of the opening scene from True Grit where the whole town came out to watch the "public hanging".

Jeanine,

How about Canyon De Chelly?  ("dee-shay") Wow! And let me know when Jim is done, I'll take the next reservation.

James Hamilton, M. D.

Jeanine Eilers (Decker)

Dave--My husband gave me grief for not mentioning Canyon de Chelly as he believes it outshines all but the Grand Canyon.  So, I stand corrected.  We have room openings in August.  Let me know when you will arrive.

David Mitchell

Jeanine, 

How about six months at a time? (should I bring Keith to keep me out of trouble - again?)

And yes, Canyon DeChelly is beyond compare. 

Jim,

About 18 so far - seriously. (still trying to figure out what I want to be when I grow up). Just took a giant leap of faith and got back into the mortgage business. Hardest damn course and exams I ever took. (Dodd-Frank Act = 2,300 pages of dizzying, overlapping, hair-splitting, mind-boggling legalese - yikes! - and that's with a B.S.B.A. major in Real Estate Development and heavy emphasis on Finance - and an R.E. Broker's license in 3 states!) I sweat bullets getting through the course. I think I was only 47 when I started the course last spring, but just turned 69!  I shoulda' stuck with helicopters - Jeesh!

Wish I could find the photo of Steve Hodges, Tom Litzinger, and myself in fron of my (short north) "D.W. Mitchell's (imported) European Antique" shop. After we moved back from Denver in the late 80's.  If I can find it I'll send it. 

(And another funny story of Steve and I with Mary and our kids at Disneyland in the early 80's - still looking for that photo too.)

Jeanine Eilers (Decker)

Dave--Please bring Keith.

Mark Schweickart

Uh, oh, party at Jeanine's house! Some of you know what that means. It was not for nothing that Miss Jeanine earned the sobriquet "hostess witht he mostest," now was it? As I recall it was senior year, and Miss Jeanine threw a party with her parents out of town. Is this coming back to you yet? Anyone rememeber Tim LaVelle and his posse dropping by for a short while, before deigning it below his standards of acceptable partydom, and blowing on out?  Too bad he left so early, because the party began to heat up.  I won't say that there was alcohol involved or that there was a certain amount of making out (is this phrase still in our vocabulary?)  going on among some of the attendees that night. I won't say that,  but there might have been. Well, in my opinion it was turning into a fine party indeed, and since several of us had lied to our parents about where we were going to be spending the night,  who knew where this innocent debauchery might lead?  (Grammer-boy McLeod, do I get extra points for creating an oxymoron in that last sentence?) Anyway, as I was saying, things were progressing nicely, in my opinion, when late in the evening Sheriff Lavelle and his posse suddenly stormed back in, took one look around, and, holy firecrackers, Andy, he did not the like the direction this party had taken without him. He reared up on his morally superior high-horse, and plunged into the fray as if he were Moses descending the mountain with his new commandments in hand only to be horrified at the sight of us worshipping our false gods in his absence. Does "making out" count as worshipping a false god? Who knows, but to Tim it certainly did. Cracking his metaphorical whip, he shouted "Upstairs, you Jezebels!" as he proceeded to separate the wanton harlots from the lecherous males, "And stay up there!"  And with that, all ardor cooled, all reputations saved, all prurience abated, and most of all, all minds completely boggled as to what had caused our ever-fun-loving Tim to change into Papa-G smiting the poor souls of Sodom and Gomorrah. I guess that is what can happen if a party happens without him.

The morale of this story, Jeanine, is: be careful about who you invite to come stay with you. John Brown, with white beard flying and eyes ablaze, might come busting through your door. And all you will be able to say, is "Oh, hi Tim."

James Hamilton, M. D.

For all you Canyon de Chelly afficionados we have had this R.C. Gorman print of his famous painting, "Canyon de Chelly, Night", hanging in our home for over 20 years. As many of you know he was one of the most respected of Southwest and Indian artists.

David Mitchell

Jim, 

I am shocked that someone else in our group even knows Gorman. Have loved his work for many years but even more so, the work of Earl Biss. One of his works depicting a number of braves on horseback riding away from the viewer in a heavy snow storm is simply breath taking! Got to meet him at a private party in Denver many years ago. 

Mark,

The party you refer to sounds familiar, but I seem to recall Keith and I arriving quite late. Or maybe this was a different time, because by the time we got to Jeanine's it was virtually over. Keith and I had been attending evening "services" down at the "Thirsty i ", hearing each other's confession and receiving the sacrament of Carling's Black Label (not from a chalice but from a pitcher). As the evening wore on, I had developed a temporary "speech problem", and I dropped a remark about my anatomy to Jeanine that Keith deemed sufficent cause to grab me and retreat from Jeanine's front door immediately. Not quite clear on just how I arived at my own home that night. I guess it must have been a fun night - who knows?

David Mitchell

David Mitchell

I can't seem to enter text with the video but the previous song is the inspriration for my "remark" at Jeanine's house that night. Keith and I and several other in the class (I want to say Jack Maxwell, Joe Donahue, Dick McNamara and Mike McLeod and some of the ladies were in the group ????) Anyway, we had replayed this song in the jukebox approxximately 47 times in a row while we stood on the chairs and sang it - over, and over, and over again. 

p.s. If memory serves, this had to be the year after our freshman college year  for us.

* And I would like to point out that my temporary speech problem was mostly healed by the next morning. 

Anybody remember being there with us - chime in.

Jeanine Eilers (Decker)

I finally told my mother about that party when I was 35 after my father died.  She was horrified.  The neighbors never squealed on us in spite of the garbage cans full of beer bottles.  I was still pretty innocent at that point (believe it or not) and had no idea what to expect when I invited "a few friends" over.  The "good" girls ended up upstairs but there was at least one female who stayed downstairs with the male sleepers.  That's about all I remember.  So much for being trustworthy at 17.

Timothy Lavelle

Memo to:      Mark Schweickhart

Re:               Your most recent post

Date:             20 April, 2017

Fm:               Tim LaVelle

Mr. Schweickhart, I was recently drafted (in the first round) by Bishop Hartley HS as a left-wing commentator on their "Do you remember me" message forum to bolster their current group of would-be "rememberers". They are so dumb they think I actually went to school there. Thus I have not been attending to the Watterson website with my usual regularity.

Imagine my dismay when I check-in to the WHS site to see my name taken in vain by an amateur author over a reported incident of makeoutus interuptus. I believe there is a sub-text in your writing of "Let's goad LaVelle into some nonsense". You are bored with the current postings? Yes? Possibly disagree with some items, do we Marky-Mark???

In my own behalf, I have to tell you, that in those days - just a mere 50 or so years back - I was extremely effected...my actions possibly affected...by those teachers who were so dear to so many hearts. Teachers that I looked back on in later years and thought were for the most part, crap. I admit that I did send a holiday greeting card to one Mousy-mouse, the head man what-was-in-charge, from Viet Nam the first Christmas I was there. "Thanks to you, I'm where I'm at today" was my pithy - I couldn't spell pissy in those days - message. I grant those teachers did have a positive influence on many children who were already interested in learniing or deathly afraid of their parents.

Mark, my strongest recollection supporting my Holy Behavior was the doctrine of "If you think you love a girl, and you want to touch that girl, you must really hate that girl because you are trying to take her to hell".  I believe this was taken from the Gospel of Saint Confusion of the Masses. This doctrine was taught to young Tim by those wonders of education, Da Nuns. Their idea, I assume was "let's take the most common need next to hunger and make it as evil as we can - after all we need to save these blobs of humanity from themselves." Followed by raucus evil laughter. Was I a confused young man? What do you think?

I am pretty sure I was...transmoral. Clearly I don't recall the event as well as you do but pretty sure this was while I was a charter member of the N.U.N. organization. Our motto: "I ain't gettin' None so U ain't gettin' None!"

Go to Sedona Mr. S. Stack some flat stones on top of each other. Suck up some of the vortex of energy karma and get off my flippin' back.

Yer bud, Tim

Mark Schweickart

Jeanine,

I think you may be being unfair to the girls. I do not recall any of you venturing back downstairs after whirlwind Tim blasted the room with his frosty air. 

Tim,

Do you recall who was in your posse that night. I recall there being two others shadowing you but not who they were. Pretty certain they were fellow Watterson-ites.

Dave,

Your Thirsty I description sounds like it must have been at least first year of college antics rather than Senior year of high school, especially since many of the class would not have turned 18 yet, so would not be hanging out at the "I". Therefore, it must have been a different Eilers' soirée that you tried to crash. However my guess is that you have the whole thing muddled in a Carling Black Label stupor, and is a memory not to be trusted.

James Hamilton, M. D.

Dave,

Back to art. I could not connect the name of Earl Bliss but looked up some of his work on the internet and I do believe I have seen his paintings in various western galleries.

One of our favorite artists is Michael Atkinson who is both a painter and a sculpter. We have two of his prints in our home - the one below is entitled "Long Way Home". At one time he had a gallery in Albuquerque but his work is widely displayed. My wife was a History of Art major at OSU and has introduced me to much art. We have often been through the galleries in Taos and Santa Fe (my sister lives in Albuquerque) where western art fluorishes with Gorman's, O'Keefe's and many others. Did you know that in the late 1970's Taos was the third largest art center in the world, just behind Paris and New York? Now it is not as good - individual galleries have given way to co-ops and consignment galleries. I think the internet has impacted the art world significantly and negatively inpacted galleries.

Anyway, here is "Long Way Home":

Janie Albright (Blank)

Jim, that painting is amazing. The concept is so unusual plus so beautiful. How lucky you are to be able to enjoy that every day. 

James Hamilton, M. D.

David Mitchell

"Is anybody goin' to San Antone,, er Phoenix,, Ar-i-zona?"

David Mitchell

Okay, I've had about all I can take of you people listening from behind the curtain and not coming out in the open forum where we can hear your voices. And you know who you are doggonit!  I'm having several very interesting "side" conversations with some people who have interesting and important things to contribute - but are refusing to do so.    Chickens!

And to make things even worse, one female classmate has even gone so far as to hint that I am an "old guy". Remember girl, there will be a "55th", and paybacks are hell !

(if your having difficulty expresssing yourselves - you can write to "Professor LaVelle's School for the Criminally Introverted" and take correspondence courses. I'm sure he would offer a special discounted class fee for his services)

Timothy Lavelle

Dave, I think your last post is apt. I did have to change the name from Criminally Insane to Criminally Introverted to seek a different clientele. Those Insane people were just, well, they're cray-cray.

I'm just going to hold off writing at this site. I really love and admire all you guys but I don't have the ability to "look back with rose tinted glasses" and to just go on agreeing that everything was just wonderful throughout our lives. There were great times leaving great memories but there were also not so great ones. Some thoroughly crappy. But I have to acknowledge that I may have a really caustic turn for some, leading to hurting feelings of people I honor and it is just better for me to go mow the lawn. And, the sun came out!!

Party on! Over and out.

Fred Clem

Dave,

I thought I was the only Charley Pride fan on this site.

David Mitchell

Not so Fred.

And did you know that Country Charlie Pride was Ernie Banks' roommate with the Kansas City Monarchs in the old "Negro League" - and life long best friend?