David Triguiero's Idaho

Schoolyard Casino

            When I was in grade school, marbles was a springtime passion. That it was not an altogether respectable activity for upstanding young boys made it even more alluring. Some schools considered marbles a form of gambling, which technically it was, and banned matches on the grounds.

            Pioneer School in Weiser had a progressive principal who allowed games as long as they weren’t played for keeps. Since keeping marbles shot out of the pot – a large ring drawn in the dirt – was the whole attraction of the game, the rule was universally ignored and soon passed into oblivion. The opposition converted its energies setting up an alternative circuit of tournaments with Schwinn bicycles as prizes, but to little effect. We played for keeps and played for bicycles too.

            In fact, the keeps circuit was squeaky clean. There were good players who ended up with most of the marbles, but clear rules were observed by all and hardly anyone was reduced to nothing.

            Only once did a real marble hustler appear. He arrived one day just before spring planting began. Not much older than us in years, but eons ahead of us in experience, his cool, confident presence dominated the playground. His name was Umberto. Like Brazilian soccer stars, he had only one name.

            He carried his marbles in a soft leather bag. An amazing number were agates and he sometimes used them for “dates” – marbles placed in the pot to be shot at. We were lucky to have one agate shooter and instead always dated glass cat’s eyes available at the local five and dime. I got one of my best shooters in a tense match with Umberto.

            At the time Louis Antensio was the accepted schoolyard champ. Dennis Lolly was the best shooter and dominated school tournaments but nearly always wilted under Louis’s pervasive self-confidence in a high stakes game. Louis said tournaments were for sissies.

            Apart from tournaments, Dennis built his reputation and his marble collection – carried in a much envied purple velvet Crown Royal bag – from lower grades and stiffs like me.

            Umberto smelled out Dennis as an easy mark right away. He blew Dennis away in a seven-up (each player put in seven dates) mano-a-mano taking the agate shooter his grandfather had brought home from the Grand Canyon. Umberto shamed him into dating it without uttering a word. He dated five agates himself then stared casually at the gorgeous blue and green rippled shooter until Dennis tossed it into the pot with uncharacteristic bravado. Umberto drilled it on his first shot.

            While all this was going on, I was gradually improving my status from stiff to worthwhile opponent at a heavy cost in cat’s eyes. I didn’t much want to play Umberto because the whole school always gathered to watch him clean some poor sucker. I didn’t need the humiliation when I was trying to challenge the top of the ladder and establish myself as a contender.

            The rules didn’t allow you to turn down a challenge, however, and one day I found myself face to face with Umberto and a little cabal of lower-grade groupies that he never acknowledged. There was no way out. I decided to feign self-confidence and dated two lesser agates into a five-up pot in order to avoid the same trap that snared Dennis. To my surprise Umberto offhandedly toss in the wondrous shooter he had won from Dennis.

            What a prize, if I could win that beautiful agate I could lose all my dates and still come out ahead. It landed tantalizingly close to the edge almost like he wanted my to hit it. I didn’t question his motives and shot it out of the pot on my first shot. Dennis pestered my for months to trade for his Grand Canyon shooter saying Umberto had cheated him. If any one was a cheater, though, it was Dennis. You had to watch him constantly to make sure he wasn’t fudging over the line and he always wrangled selfishly over close calls.

            Umberto was an impeccable gentleman around the pot always giving opponents the benefit of the doubt with a shrug and a smile. He left school soon after the planting season began in earnest and was never seen again. I never gave Dennis a chance to win back the Grand Canyon shooter and still have it to this day. I figured that was the way Umberto had planned it.

           

Fellow Traveling With John Birch

            The Tea Party movement has endorsed Idaho’s own and only Democratic Representative Walt Minnick, apparently in an attempt to assert its nonpartisan credentials to a skeptical public. It also endorsed his front-running Republican opponent Vaughn Ward, a former Senate aide currently supported by his wife, who works for Fannie Mae, currently supported by a taxpayer bailout opposed by her huysband.

            DINO (Democrat in name only) Walt opposed the bailout, too along with health care reform and he is opposed in the Democratic primary this month. So it’s possible Idaho voters may have a real choice on the November ballot. If they do, the Republican candidate will certainly win, ending the Idaho Democratic Party’s brief stint in Washington.

            It won’t be the first time the Democrats have tanked in the state where some suspected Sen. Joseph McCarthy of being a Communist fellow traveler. In 1950, the Democrats nominated an eighth-grade educated pretend cowboy for the vacant U.S. Senate seat handing the victory to Republican Herman Welker, once a lawyer for the John Birch Society.

            Welker grew up in the upper country north of Weiser, which would later produce Sen. Larry Craig, and practiced law there until Wallace Beery wooed him to Hollywood to be a lawyer for himself and other stars. After the war, he returned to live in Payette, Idaho’s most conservative town, just 10 miles south of Weiser.

            The John Birch Society was not considered an aberrant movement in those days. Like the Tea Party today, it was the refuge of people terrified of change, especially change initiated by socialists infiltrating the federal government. They were called communists in those days, of course.

            Lloyd McGrath was in charge of the John Birch Society’s unofficial youth league at Weiser High School.  He may have been the only member for all I know, but he was in demand as a speaker at the Kiwanis and Lions clubs and other community organizations. He also lectured high school classes.

            Lloyd hardly ever mentioned the Soviet Union or Red China. The real Communist menace, we were told, came from within. Communists were secretly infiltrating every facet of American life. Sen. Joe McCarthy was a plant charged with undermining The  House Unamerican Activities Committee.

            We learned to our horror that most of the Russian war machine was being financed by foreign aid supplied by none other than President Dwight D. Eisenhower himself. In the hushed tones of a camp counselor telling ghost stories, Lloyd told how a Communist teacher could spread subversion.

            “He would take the flag and say something like, ‘This is such an important symbol it should be shared by everyone equally.’ Then he’d cut it up and give every student a little piece. Our flag would be desecrated. (Pause for effect) And no one would know.”

            My best friend Barry Wright, who read fellow traveler Walter Lipman each week in godless Newsweek, said, “So, what difference does it make if no one knows.” I am the only one who laughed. We were put in our place by icy stares from Lloyd that made it clear our patriotism was in question.

 Barry, who had once provocatively stenciled CCCP one of his sweatshirts, snorted another derisive laugh and rolled his eyes. I wasn’t so sure. We read god fearing Time magazine at our house and Barry and I argued continually about politics. Still, silly was silly regardless of the politics. I couldn't help myself; I laughed along with Barry and became a fellow traveler.

 

Big Town, Little History

 

 

 

            Boise is a big town, almost three times bigger than it was when my family went there shopping for school clothes every fall in the late 1950s. Only my sisters got clothes; everything I needed was readily available in Weiser at Everybody’s Department Store. Actually, my sisters didn’t get more than one dress, shoes and maybe a coat. The selection was bigger in Boise, but the prices higher.

The reason for the trip was to get out of Weiser.

 My father, who never needed clothes, went to the music stores where he tested out the new home size electric organs, which he hated but could not resist doodling on, bought sheet music and chatted with the sales people, who in those days knew a lot about music

 My mother enjoyed shopping at The Mode, Falk’s ID and other downtown stores we in the hinterlands considered classy. Sometimes a great bargain fell into her lap; like the year she found a White Stag car coat that fit my older sister perfectly for $9, marked down from $16. Nine bucks was a lot for a car coat – Everybody’s had them for $6, but they weren’t White Stag and didn’t have the running deer logo on the collar.

The highlight of the trip was C.C. Anderson’s Department Store. It had escalators that glided you up and down from the ground floor to the mezzanine. If I promised to be good, my mother let me go and ride the escalators while she and my sisters tried on stuff. Often I would run into another aficionado about my age and we would race each other up the down escalator, ride sitting on the moving handrail and otherwise not be good.

We always ate lunch at C.C. Anderson’s in the restaurant on the mezzanine.  Sometimes C.C. Anderson himself would appear in the restaurant. Old, small, round and bald like Winston Churchill in a three-piece blue serge suit, he would chuckle and toss the kids small packets of Chiclets gum. I always got my school shoes at C.C. Andersons and later would get my high school graduation suit there.

Last month C.C. Andersons closed for good. It had been Macy’s for about 20 years and, before that, it was The Bon Marche for almost 30 years. The family had sold the store after C.C.’s death sometime in the early 60s. You can imagine my surprise when The Idaho Statesman ran a story purportedly about the store’s history that didn’t mention C.C. Anderson. So soon they forget, or, more likely, never knew. The Statesman is owned by McClatchy Newspapers, a California based chain that only knows or cares how much money Boise puts in its coffers.

You can still go to Macy’s at The Boise Town Square Mall, which has lots and lots of escalators, but no kids playing on them. The uniformed security guards wouldn’t put up with it, I am sure.  It has a big food court selling everything from cinnamon buns to Mexican food all of it tasting pretty much the same.

You can sit there all day and no chuckling old man will toss you a packet of Chiclets.