Tag Archives: Waco

On Letting Go

On Letting Go

 Another milestone. Last week, I moved out of the 118 North 30th Street house that has been home since early 1980. The beautiful old 1920s Arts & Crafts house has seen all of the usual things that old homes see over the decades: parties and wakes, birthdays and anniversaries, promotions and demotions, tantrums and tea parties. Our kids and grandkids romped through the house. A couple of dogs and a couple of cats, too.

I had band practice there. Many times, in fact, thanks to the patient indulgence of our wonderful neighbors. I played catch with Dan and Van in the yard. I wrote a BUNCH of books there. Mary and I danced in the lovely wood-paneled den when no one else was around. I read books and comic books. Rachel got dressed for a prom or two in the middle bedroom.

It was safe and warm and big and sprawling. It had a few familiar creaks at night, when the old oaken floors would breathe and sigh.

The laundry room was once a library, with floor to ceiling bookshelves constructed with the able help of my dad and Jim Hudson. It was there that I learned – too late – the value of “measure twice, cut once.” The library once held thousands of books and LPs. Both boys moved their bedrooms there at different times, staying up WAY too late reading comics and listening to U2 or Type O Negative.

Mary and I dressed for our wedding there. Then, years later, dressed for Rachel’s wedding as well.

We held watching parties for the Lady Bears and elections in the big den. We celebrated Mary’s Masters and Ed.D. there, too. And, at different times, when mom and dad passed, the den was big enough to hold the family where we ate Mexican barbecued chicken from the rolling taco trucks and told stories on them long into the evening.

On a couple of occasions at night, I’ve thought I heard Naomi’s paws pad across the bedroom.

The previous owners, Lt. Gov. Ben Barnes’ parents, told us the 118 N. 30th house had a ghost. A sweet, benign little ghost, a young girl. We never saw or heard her. Once, in abject desperation, after an hour of frenzied searching and fearful of missing an important meeting or something, I asked for her help in finding my lost car keys. When turned around, the keys were sitting on the stove top behind me.

Van and I drew for hours on the dining room table.

Mary wrote her dissertation in the middle bedroom.

I wrote a couple novels and a bunch of other stuff in the breezeway.

One night, I encountered a large golden possum in the backyard. He opened his mouth, lined with sharp little teeth, and hissed at me. I jumped and let him waddle off. It was like encountering something from Jurassic Park… possums are incredibly old looking. I called a humane animal removal company the next morning.

The house note has long since been paid off.

Brad Bailey stayed with us while we wrote Madman in Waco in 60 days. He brought to the house a modest but slightly disturbed woman from Fool’s Hill at the Branch Davidian compound. She had agreed to give him some information for the book in exchange for shower. Mary – bless her heart – forgave both Brad and I. Eventually.

It was in that house that Mary had the eerily prophetic dream the night before the FBI assault on the compound.

It was in that house that I stayed upon my return from my Rotary Fellowship in England. I was in the middle of a divorce and had lost my job. A great aunt loaned me the money to keep the house. And on the nights it was just Van and me, I was comforted by being there.

I was living in the 118 North 30th house when I met Mary, who lived just a couple of doors down.

There were nights when Mary and I prayed on our knees for one – and sometimes all – of our kids.

When Mary took the job in San Antonio, we moved most of the furniture out, and I stayed there during the school year. It’s a lot noisier when you’re by yourself.

It took two years to sell. We repeatedly dropped the price.

And last week, I packed up the last box. After the Guerra Brothers came and loaded up, the cleaning lady came. And when she was done, I walked out.

I’m an old military brat. We moved every two years. A house is a house. Home is where the Air Force sends us … and all of that. But I paused at the front door on the way out.

I patted the doorframe. “You’ve been a good house, old girl,” I said aloud. I don’t know why I’ve always thought of the 118 North 30th house as a “she,” but I do. I don’t know if I was speaking to the house, the little girl ghost, or the “angel” of the house.

“You’ve been a good old house,” I said again, and left.

And she was.

Marian Anderson and Civil Rights

Marian Anderson in Washington D.C.

My research into the influence of black sacred music on the Civil Rights Movement continues. In addition to Paul Robeson and Jules Bledsoe, I’ve been reading about the brilliant African American opera singer Marian Anderson, who overcome racism and sexism by the sheer force of her talent and gentle spirit. She’s probably best known today when her manager’s attempt to have her sing in Washington D.C.’s Constitution Hall in 1939 was blocked by the folks who ran the Hall, the Daughters of the American Revolution (the DAR). Eleanor Roosevelt and others withdrew their membership and a fierce debate ensued… the DAR simply wouldn’t budge. They would not allow blacks to sing in the Hall, even though it belongs to all Americans.

However, while all of this is going on, Anderson is purposefully NOT being made aware of the brouhaha. She’s on a grueling concert tour, one that will take her, for the first time, into the Segregated South.

At last, with the help of the White House, a massive outdoor Easter concert is arranged at the Lincoln Memorial, one that 75,000 will hear in person and millions more on the radio.

Anderson’s manager wires her the good news. So, where IS Marian Anderson at that very moment? She is …

… wait for it …

… in a hotel in Waco, Texas, following at concert in the city.

Jules Bledsoe and Civil Rights

Jules Bledsoe in Harlem
Jules Bledsoe in Harlem

If you know the name Jules Bledsoe at all, you probably know him as the African American baritone who originated the song “Old Man River” from the original production of the legendary musical Show Boat on Broadway. Bledsoe was a popular singer in pre-World War II America, despite the ferocious racism of his day. He was the first black man to appear in a national production of a grand opera. He was in great demand abroad, singing with the major opera companies and symphony orchestras of Europe. He was a composer. He even acted in a couple of pretty bad movies.

But for my research into the influence of black sacred music on the Civil Rights Movement, I’m most interested in Bledsoe as a crusader. I’ve found that he performed numerous benefits for the NAACP, spoke out against racism while appearing on many national national radio shows (often with Eleanor Roosevelt), and once defended his counterpart, Paul Robeson, from those who were slandering him.

Bledsoe, who never married, died in 1943.

And, oh yeah, he was born in Waco, Texas and spent his first 18 years here. He’s buried in Greenwood Cemetery in East Waco, with a tombstone that says, “Old Man River.”

P.S. One last note on Jules. During the height of his popularity, in November, 1933, Billie Holiday made her first record as vocalist for Benny Goodman’s studio orchestra doing the popular song “Your Mother’s Son-In-Law”, written by Nichols and Holiner for Lew Leslie’s Blackbirds of 1934. In the song, there is a reference to Jules — “You don’t have to sing like Bledsoe. You can tell the world I said so.”

Surprising Waco

IMG_0117My research into the period between the Civil War (the spirituals) and the Civil Rights Movement (gospel music) continues to take some surprising turns. I mentioned African American pianist/producer/arranger Sammy Price a couple of posts ago. Turns out, there were a number of black artists who got their start here during this era.

Also in Waco in the 1920s was Dick Campbell, a significant figure in the Harlem Renaissance. Campbell attended Paul Quinn College from 1922-1926, became and actor and performer with the likes of Ethel Waters, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson and Louis Armstrong before setting in Harlem, where he helped found the Negro People’s Theatre and co-found the famed Rose McClendon Players and Harlem Workshop Theater.

          Waco was also fortunate to have a number of venues for live performances, most notably the Waco Auditorium. From most its history – from its inception in 1899 to its closing in 1928 – the Auditorium benefitted from the management and booking skills of the remarkable Gussie Oscar. Oscar had an eye for talent and capitalizing on the city’s location mid-way between Dallas and Austin, she saw to it that the most famous names of the day – Will Rogers, Harry Houdini, Jascha Heitfitz, Sarah Bernhardt and even the Four Marx Brothers performed in Waco amid the usual operas and symphony concerts.

          Oscar was also very progressive when it came to race, in addition to the ever-present minstrel shows and so-called “colored revues,” she booked blues legend Mamie Smith and Her Jazz Hounds. She also brought Black Patti and Her Troubadores back on an annual basis. Black Patti was Sissieretta Jones, a gifted opera singer who could also sing vaudeville and show tunes and hers was one of the very few all-black legitimate shows to tour the Deep South.

So the Marx Brothers, Mamie Smith, AND Harry Houdini all visited Waco? As my son would say, “Whoa!”

Connections …

… researching Sister Rosetta Tharpe’s connection to the Civil Rights Movement (she played a number of benefits for the NAACP) leads me to “What Do They Want? A Jazz Autobiography” by Sammy Price. Price was a legendary pianist/arranger/song-writer during the ’40s and ’50s — sometimes known as “The King of Boogie Woogie.” He also produced some of Sister Rosetta’s biggest hits.

Turns out, Price lived in Waco until about age 18. He has vivid memories of the Cotton Palace, the fair, listening to blues on Bridge Street at the Gaiety Club, fighting with Baylor University students on the street cars, hearing Blind Lemon Jefferson on the downtown Waco square, and learning piano on an aunt’s 10-foot grand.

He also hears a chilling blues song about a horrific lynching in Robinson (then called Robinsonville):

I never have, and I never will/pick no more cotton in Robinsonville

At 18, he takes the Interurban to Dallas and makes a name for himself on Deep Ellum. But it begins in Waco …

Connections …