Don’t like this weather? Just stick around. We’re supposed to warm back up to the 50s by Sunday!
JA BIZTOWN. The 6th grade had the coolest field trip on Tuesday. They went to JA BizTown. I think the best way to describe JA BizTown is to lift the description straight off their website (http://www.janash.com/ja-biztown/).
JA BizTown is a community unlike any other; one where kids take charge by running businesses, earning paychecks, voting in elections and donating to philanthropy. This unique program designed for 4th-6th grades, engages students in the roles of workers and consumers in a series of classroom lessons that culminates in a visit to our fully-interactive simulated town. Students learn entrepreneurial and personal finance skills while they work and shop in their own vibrant community. Through this experiential learning process, students develop a strong understanding of the relationship between what they learn in school and their successful participation in our global economy.Nate got to participate in JA BizTown as the CEO of Nova Copies. Vicki had signed up the chaperone the trip and it just so happened that she was assigned to help out at Nova Copies as well. Nate had to speak to the town council as well as run his business. Not everything went as planned. At the end of the day he got to the bank with his last deposit of the day just after the bank closed. In spite of this he had a great time and came home saying it was a lot of fun.
RACING TIME. It’s racing time again here in Robertson County and I’ve been busy. On Saturday we took the church’s track to White House so the Cub Scout pack there could run their Pinewood Derby. We set the track up at church and hosted the Cross Plains pack’s Derby Monday evening. We were to run the race for the kids at church last night but canceled all activities with the ice and sleet moving in. We get to do that next week. This coming Saturday we will be set up in Springfield for the Associational RA race if weather permits. What’s odd for me this time is that this is the first year neither Ben nor Nate has a car in any of our races.
Jeff Garst and I have been doing this for a number of years now. Jeff got into this with a three lane track before I joined him. We built a four lane track back in 2010 and were able to equip it with an electronic timer and software to track each car’s time. The software is accurate to one millisecond and we’ve even had placing within a competition be as close as that tiny slice of time. This is a lot better than trying to decide a winner in a tight race by placing a Styrofoam cup on the track to see which way the cup flies when the cars cross the finish line.
And just when I think I’ve seen everything something new happens. One of the cars that ran Saturday was so tail heavy it did a wheelie all the way down the track, even derailing the cars in the neighboring lanes. It was entered by one of the Scout leaders and ran in the open division race. We jokingly dubbed her car “The Destroyer.” It ran better in reverse than forward.
BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION. I never got the chance to meet Aunt Scrap, but I sure heard a lot about her as I was growing up. Her given name was John Arianna Hancock. She was Aunt Mar’s aunt. Her husband, Lyn Work, was a business partner with Aunt Mar’s father in the country store located between their two homes.
Aunt Scrap’s birthday was yesterday. If she were still alive she would be 140 years old. I bring this up because someone gave me a newspaper clipping from the March 23, 1955, edition of the Springfield Herald. This clipping from the Women’s Page features the following article titled “Mrs. Work Honored at Surprise Party.”
On Friday night, March 4, at 7:30 o’clock at her home on the Cross Plains highway, Mrs. Scrap Hancock Work was honored with a surprise birthday party. Mrs. Work was observing her 80th birthday.Now I’m not one to normally give the society column too much of my time, but this I found interesting. Aside from the glimpse of what some of my family were doing back in 1955 what really caught my attention here was the fifty year old dress that had remained “in good style” with only a slight modification. My, how things have changed!
The table was centered with a large birthday cake topped by eight lighted candles and encircled by jonquils.
Mrs. Work was seated at a table where the [daintily] wrapped gifts and greeting cards were assembled.
Ice cream and cake were served later in the evening.
The honoree was attired in a dress which was made fifty years ago. She bought the material in Mayfield, Kentucky, in 1904 before she and her late husband, Len Work, were married.
The dress remaining in good style was originally trimmed in white at the neck, but in past years she replaced the trimming with tatting which her mother, Mrs. John Hancock, had made thirty five years ago.
Those attending the party were Mrs. Lula Hancock, Mrs. Linda Denning Cotter, and Mr. and Mrs. George Swann of Springfield; Mrs. Lester Cook and Mrs. Nola Simmons of the Mt. Carmel community.
TEN DIGIT DIALING. Speaking of change, ten digit dialing has arrived in Robertson County. When I was little Tennessee only had two area codes. Middle and East Tennessee were all 615 while West Tennessee had 901. Over the years four more area codes have been added, each one splitting off territory from the original two and the 615 area code has shrunk to Nashville and the surrounding counties. As of now Tennessee has a new area code, 629, and for the first time here this one was overlaid with 615. This hasn’t changed our phone numbers, but it forces the ten digit dialing. And whenever we get cell phones for the boys they could get the new area code.
I know many areas of the country already have ten digit dialing, but this is a first for us. It’s also frustrating because I’m not used to having to dial in the area code for local calls, even on my cell phone when in my home area.
Times are changing. It used to be that I knew where you lived in Robertson County based on your exchange (the first three digits of the seven digit phone number). Now as people are dropping their land lines this is not the case.
Phone calls have changes a lot from when Mom was a girl. At that time she were to call her grandparents she says that you rang the operator Andy Griffith Show style and asked for 82J, and she thinks that the phone number for Dad’s parents was 3902. These phone lines were party lines, one line shared by several homes with each customer having a distinctive ring pattern (imagine the eavesdropping!). For Mom the telephone was such a marvel that she recalls being very excited to see one.
Funny how comic strip character Dick Tracey’s wristwatch with two-way radio (which made it’s first appearance in 1946) doesn’t seem all that far fetched nowadays.
REFLECTION ON AUNT SCRAP. Having just reread this edition of the Swann Family News I wonder what Aunt Scrap would have said if I one of us could have traveled through time to visit the other for her 80th birthday. Just try to imagine understanding half the stuff I have written about just now from her life’s perspective. How would you explain the iPhone with it’s access to the Internet that fits in my pocket? What would she think about watching a Pinewood Derby with race results to split-second accuracy projected on the wall immediately after each heat? Could she even imagine taking a busload of kids on a field trip to the south side of Nashville and having them back to school in time for dismissal?
More importantly, would the One in whose presence Aunt Scrap now stands be pleased with the way we live our lives today?
Joe
