Memories, Part 2
There was no question in my mind a week ago that I would not be able to detail a Top 10 list of stories I’ve covered during my career in one column, but it was a good start. Thinking back over nearly 45 years hurt my head, so I’ve decided to avoid a headache this week and write about some of the more enjoyable, or just plain fun, stories I’ve had the pleasure of bringing to the attention of my audience through the years.
Before I get started, let me make something perfectly clear. From the very first broadcast on WEEL in Fairfax County, Virginia, when
I was still in high school, I have been acutely aware that the most important people are the audience. If people aren’t taking the time to listen to their radio, or read the newspaper, then I’m of no significance at all. You are No. 1 in my book and always have been.
A story from my five years that I’ll never forget was the time an alligator wandered out of the Okefenokee Swamp and just parked himself, or herself, right in front of the double glass doors of the roller skating rink, which was located on U.S. 1 on the south side of town. It was a pretty big gator and it just plopped down right in front of the doors and no one was going to go in, or come out.
I don’t remember how I found out about it, but I was out there doing play by play of sheriff’s department personnel doing their best to encourage the gator to move on. It was a hoot, to say the least. The gator wasn’t budging and this went on for hours. Seems like the DNR gator getter at that time was on another call, and for whatever reason there wasn’t anyone else available.
I was doing to best to imagine teenagers inside the roller rink calling their parents on a pay phone (remember those) and trying to explain why they weren’t at home on time. “Yeah right, you’re blocked in by an alligator and can’t get out.” If mom and dad had been listening to the radio, they would have known the kids were telling the truth!
The DNR guy finally got there and was able to remove the gator but, as best as I recall, it was very close to midnight, if not a little later.
I also remember broadcasting basketball games from the old barn of a gym in Homerville at Clinch County (they pronounce it Cleeench County). The sheriff at that time would send some of his deputies into the visiting stands in uniform. It was a clever way of keeping the visiting fans from getting too rowdy during games. We all know how momentum in a basketball game can swing on the enthusiasm of a crowd. The Clinch County girls were very good in those days.
Here in Rome, I was fortunate enough to have management at the Rome NewsTribune allow me the time to fly with the DNR folks when they performed their mid-winter aerial survey of bald eagle nests across North Georgia on two different occasions. I got some really unusual and interesting photos from the helicopter and was able to detail how well the effort to repopulate bald eagles across Georgia was going.
I’ll never forget, on one of those flights, an adult eagle hopped out of the nest near Lafayette where it was watching over two young and actually chased after the helicopter briefly. The DNR pilots with their sophisticated gear always kept the appropriate distance from the nest when circling a couple of times for biologists to check how many young were there. This one bird apparently thought we were a little too close. I couldn’t help but laugh as I thought how this eagle thought it was going to run off a helicopter — but at the end of the end, I reckon the critter felt like it had done its job to protect its young.
Another couple of wildlife stories stand out here in Rome. They both involve black bears that had wandered into town and created quite a stir. People almost always overstate the size of the bears when they call in a sighting to 911. The first bear showed up in Ridge Ferry Park and had meandered close to the Georgia Power substation on Riverside Parkway, where I encountered it and got some decent pictures. It was early, and a bunch of people who had been walking on the trail between the library and the park needed a change of clothes that morning.
Several years later a bear was seen in Garden Lakes and, as the word spread via social media, Garden Lakes developed quite a traffic problem with people trying to find the bear. I finally found it up a tree, a block or so off Lake Conasauga. It was amazing how many people were out, both in cars and on foot, trying to get a glimpse of the critter.
It’s been a lot of fun and I hope I can keep it up a few more years.