Broadcasting on Sundays was once a sea of sermons. If you turned on your radio or television, you’d hear or see a minister delivering his weekly message. From sunup (when stations signed on) until at least noon, it was solid preaching.

Today, depending on where you live, it’s still a lot like that. But the once unthinkable programming decision to air something other than a church program, eventually crept into our Sabbaths.

Unless you grew up during the mid-20th Century, it’s hard ...

Red Skelton. Ed Sullivan. Carol Burnett. Dean Martin. Flip Wilson, Rowan & Martin. The Smothers Brothers. Make the connection yet?

Variety shows. American variety shows.

From the 1940s to the 1980s, Americans were entertained by a cross-section of talent, all compacted into one hour of television. And every week, our RCA console TV in the house on Beech Street in Ashdown, Arkansas, was tuned in to most of the variety shows. Especially Red Skelton. My sister and I loved Red.

Red Skelton was ...

The City of Texarkana dates its official beginnings to 1873. Like many cities and towns of the era, railroads brought people, who brought businesses. The same was true for Ashdown, Arkansas, my hometown, located just north of Texarkana.

The railroad connected people. It brought the mail, needed supplies, and communication. In the 1960s, another communication system came to Texarkana: cable television. The installers strung cable down the utility poles until many homes had the opportunity to connect. By the early 1980s, ...

It was the 1970s, and my uncle was behind the wheel. His 1969 Cadillac Convertible was a true land yacht. Long and red, it easily carried eight of us through the streets of downtown Detroit.

Not one person noticed us.

Drive down the street today in a 1969 Cadillac Convertible and everyone notices. Do it in downtown Detroit today and you likely won’t make it home.

Cars used to be fun to drive. They had their own identity. And their identity rubbed off ...

The phrase, “We were poor, but didn’t know it,” likely was based on the delicious and inexpensive food most Southerners ate growing up.

My father told me we only ate the finest, center-cut baloney. The reality was, we were so poor, our baloney didn’t have a first name.

There were two camps of baloney cooks: leave the baloney slice whole and let it turn into a bowl shape while frying, or cut slits on the outer rim so it would lay flatter ...

My dad hated holes in the walls. So, when mom wanted something hung up, he complained.

“This is just another way for bugs and critters to get in the house,” he’d say. And he wasn’t wrong. I woke up one morning in my bedroom in the house on Locust Street in Ashdown, Arkansas, and a small garter snake was in the middle of the floor.

That snake got in, but not because of any holes I had caused. But I did put ...

Early in life, I learned that adults had their own language. They spoke English, but it was interspersed with phrases that had been handed down for so long that for the most part, no one really knew their original or real meaning.

My parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and any other old person (over age 20) could say a great deal with a few words.

Sometimes it was advice. Sometimes it was a warning. Occasionally it was a warning disguised as advice, which ...

Scouting was once as common for kids as Cap’n Crunch and Post Toasties. Learning how to tie knots, set up a tent and campsite, and earning merit badges, consumed much of a Southern boy’s or girl’s time.

Often, your mom and dad were the den mother and trip advisor. Which meant you not only had to learn everything put in front of you, you always had to be on your best behavior.

Much like it was summarily announced to me that at ...

Moms used to be more versatile. If you were in the back seat of the Buick, they could discipline you from the driver’s seat and never swerve or knock the ashes off of their Marlboro Red.

My mom never smoked, so it’s possible that without a cigarette dangling from the corner of her mouth, she was even more effective. At barely over five feet tall, she could reach over the front seat of her Electra 225 Limited and get to my ...

In the North, dads have basements. In the South, they have shops. Both accommodate man things, including woodworking, small engine repair, and isolation from the fairer sex.

As a kid in Ashdown, Arkansas, I saw basements on TV shows and wished we had one. My dad said the water table was too high where we lived, so a basement would flood. Instead, he used our garage to do man things. And he included me.

Whether it’s a basement, garage, shed, or shop, ...