The Soap Box Derby
My maternal grandfather, William Adair Cox (“Grandpop”), used to take me and my brothers to various events in and around downtown Dallas. One of them was the running of the Soap Box Derby. For those unfamiliar with the Derby, I...
Class tells—and Rodney Page had it
I came across a lot of interesting stories during the research and writing of my 1998 book Longhorn Hoops / The History of Texas Basketball. Some were curious, some were amusing, and some begged for more attention. In the latter category I...
Unsolicited advice for my fellow scribes
Long ago, even back when I was in high school, I had no qualms about corresponding with other writers. It began with letters to the editor, a section of the newspaper at which veteran journalists scoffed. Maybe they did not care what the...
Satchel Paige
I recently finished a 392-page biography of Leroy “Satchel” Paige, a man whose professional pitching career started in 1926 (during the presidency of Calvin Coolidge) and ended 40 years later (Lyndon B. Johnson). First, about...
Dedicated to Yoon and Park
My 38th marathon was not altogether different from the previous four (one in Daegu, two in Seoul and one in Suwon). I am drastically undertrained, seldom varying from my pattern of two miles each morning. Back when I followed the rules and...
Ah, to be wrapped in the warmth of Rashid’s billions!
At some point in the 1980s, a naming frenzy began at my alma mater, the University of Texas. After the state legislature started cutting back on funding higher education, UT and other schools had little choice but to hit up the alumni even...
My encounter with Leslie
One morning in 2004, I was on my way to work at the McElroy Translation Company. First, however, I pulled into a convenience store at the intersection of 10th Street and Lamar Boulevard with one purpose in mind: to become fabulously wealthy in...
The most important class I ever took
Aleta Fairchild, a colleague at a company where I worked in the 1980s, told me an interesting story. This woman, a native of Idaho, had been determined to avoid becoming a secretary. She thought the best way to prevent that was to not learn...
“Line-up for Yesterday”—baseball version
Popular acclamation for the basketball and football versions of Ogden Nash’s poem “Line-up for Yesterday” has been enormous. OK, my parole officer liked it; and I shoot pool with a guy named Vinny who found my rhymes mildly...
“Line-up for Yesterday”—football version
As I did in the previous entry, I wish to spoof or lampoon Ogden Nash's famous poem about baseball. The more I read it, the more it seems he composed his little ditty in an afternoon while he had something else on his mind, while he was...
“Line-up for Yesterday”—basketball version
In 1949, Ogden Nash penned his famous poem “Line-up for Yesterday” for Sport magazine. In it, he recalled baseball greats of the past in alphabetical order. I find the poem’s enduring cultural value rather puzzling. I am...
Lead Belly at UT, 1949
Just 22 years before my matriculation at the University of Texas, a concert was given on campus that did not draw a lot of attention. It was summertime, June 15, 1949, to be specific, and most of the students were away. Appearing that night...