GUEST BLOG

My thanks to my cousin, Dick Williams, for permission to use this story which he wrote on February 26, 2003, after learning of the death of one of our classmates, J.K.

Dick’s Memories:

In high school days, J. had been the class clown. I was sad to learn of his death. My first thought in reading of his death was a picture which came to mind of his doing a “cannon ball” off the high board at the city swimming pool in Breckenridge during our high school days. Given the way he landed, I was surprised to read that he was survived by any children as his obituary stated. The splash he created when he hit the water in the pool almost emptied the pool.

J. was one of the fortunate few who had wheels in high school. His were a sturdy WW11 Army surplus 4-wheel drive Jeep. One winter evening four or five of us got in J.’s jeep to drive around town, a common form of recreation in a small town like Breckenridge in those days. Someone suggested, and we all decided, it would be fun to chase rabbits in the mud in a new section of the city cemetery on the east side of town. Today, even years later, I still remember that evening well. A city policeman got us. He blocked the only exit from the cemetery with his patrol car and waited for us to surrender. One of our group bailed out of the jeep and made a dash through the gravestones to safety. He got away. The rest of us just surrendered. The policeman allowed as how we were ruining the grass (“tearing he hell out of it” was the way he put it), and we were in real trouble with the law. He was right clear about that. He would take us in. He told us to follow him to the police station in the city hall, where God knows what would happen to us. By God’s mercy, the Jeep ran out of gas on the way there. The police officer came back to find out why we stopped. He checked the Jeep and then believed we were in fact out of gas. He must have decided we were not worth a lot of trouble. He took our names and let us go. When I gave him my name, he asked me if I was Dalton Williams’s son. I had never seen that man before. How could he know my dad or to ask if I was Dalton’s son? It was a mystery and terrifying. For weeks, I lived in terror, thinking he would report my misconduct to my father when he got around to it. I learned that night that a teenage boy is never safe in a small town – at least not in those days. If you get out of line, there are people who will turn you in to your parents. (The policeman never did turn me in to my father. He did all he needed to do by taking my name, and he knew it, even if I didn’t.) Remembering this episode was the the first thing to come to mind when I learned of J.’s death.

Years later, when I stood by my father’s grave as the preacher was leading in prayer, I remembered this was that same part of the cemetery where we “tore the hell out of” the newly planted grass. Our tracks were no longer to be seen.

That evening came close to causing me and some others real trouble with the law and our parents. I never told my parents of this event.