Home Town Hero - stories for my grandchildren

I have mentioned before that my sister, in the process of selling her house, has been busy divesting herself of the ephemera of the years, sharing much of it with me - receptive pack-rat that I am. Last week she sent some clippings from the home-town newspaper, including this photo that recognizes my outstanding abilities to wheedle newspaper subscriptions from friends, neighbors and relatives so that I might take fabulous, expense-paid trips to the big city.

I was trying to establish the date of this clipping, and since the Breckenridge American has been digitized as part of "The Portal to Texas History" project, I was able to search the paper for instances of my name. It was easier than it might seem; I was the only "Bobby Anderson" in town during that era, and I turned up a couple of dozen articles that mentioned me in regards to one activity or another.

Now you have to remember that a small town newspaper puts your name in the paper when you attend story hour at the library - July 15, 1949 - Story Hour Has Largest Attendance, 65 Children Hear Stories of Circus. Or when you take swimming classes at the YMCA - September 3, 1950 - Final Promotions Made Local Swimmers Advanced From 'Y.' So it was not surprising to see all those references. Plus, I was a busy boy, with a lot of irons in the fire during my formative years.

Several of the references were for performances of the Breckenridge Boy's Choir. I was a member of that group in the formative years of the choir, and sang my little heart out at numerous concerts - until my voice changed. Mrs Dean had a strict rule - one squawk and you were out; only angelic, pre-pubescent voices could be in her choir.

And there were a number of references to my career as a newspaper carrier. Sometimes I was named carrier of the year. But you have to remember that there were only a half-dozen of us back then and you could be named carrier of the year simply by being in the building when they were trying to fill a 3-inch hole in the day's layout.

 Several times I received awards for outstanding feats, such as "Able to put the paper in a mud-puddle from 50 feet" and "Record for consecutive tosses behind the hedge." Here, I am described as one of the "Outstanding Carrier Salesmen for 1954. See the earlier paragraph referring to "wheedling newspaper subscriptions from friends, neighbors and relatives."

And there were School activities and Band performances; delegate to Boy's State; clowning around at the Junior Rodeo. and appearing as an entr'acte at a minstrel show (which just proves that it may not always be a good thing to dig too deeply into one's past).

Oh, and the date of the photo that triggered all this reminiscing? March 24, 1954 - 62 years, 10 months and 15 days ago.