Marshall County Good Life Magazine - Summer 2014

Marshall County

Jim and Carol Meekins call Honeycomb natural bridge home Visit the eight local pipe organs and the musicians who play them SUMMER 2014 COMPLIMENTARY

Students, volunteers talk about serious fun... fishing for your schools

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Welcome

Here’s ‘full disclosure’ and some off-the-wall tidbits O

ld newspaper habits die hard, so I feel compelled to offer you full disclosure regarding one article and one photo in this magazine.

In the first case, I wrote about my wife. Not because she’s my wife, but because she plays the pipe organ, and I wrote a story about the seven pipe organs at churches in Marshall County and the one that’s at a school. (Didn’t know that, did you?)

I confess that since my wife began organ lessons in 2007, my interest in

the “king of instruments” has grown.

I have learned the pipe organ is very different to play than the piano; one difference being that the former is a wind instrument, the latter a percussion.

Pipe organs trace their origins to the third century Greek hydraulis, the world’s first keyboard instrument, which used water to create the air pressure that made the sound.

By the 17th century, the pipe organ, sometimes with thousands of pipes, each producing different timbres, had become the most complex man-made

device in the world. It retained that distinction until the late 1800s and the invention of the telephone exchange.

Well, I’ll be dogged. I learn new stuff every day. It almost balances out all of the things I forget...

Oh, my other disclosure? The photo inside of the how-not-to grow a magnolia, well, that is my tree.

David Moore Publisher/editor

Contributors Besides writing part-time for Good Life Magazine, Steve Maze of New Canaan collects antiques and memorabilia. He now has another part-time job: teaching creative writing for Arab City Schools.

Together they probably add up to a time-and-a-half job.

Annette Haislip hung ferns and potted petunias, begonias and herbs at her house in Arab this spring.

Meanwhile, she’s reading two or three books a week, including “The Signature of all Things” by Elizabeth Gilbert and “Duty” by Robert Gates.

She reviews others for this issue.

Good Life’s advertising and art director, Sheila McAnear, seems nice but has a selfish side to her. She has three boys but likes cutting grass so much she won’t let them do yard work. Within minutes of finishing this issue of the magazine, she had cranked up her mower.

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Patrick Oden is back with another story and photos on one of the good restaurant destinations in Marshall County: Wintzell’s. A photojournalist and design consultant who lives in Claysville, he holds a master’s degree from Ohio University, where they say, “Go Bobcats!”

Eddie Wheeler is a minor league hockey player... No. Wait. Wrong Eddie Wheeler. The Eddie Wheeler was recently promoted to coordinator of the Marshall County Extension Office. He writes this quarter about the “beauty and the beast” of southern landscape trees.

A few months ago, at his wife’s urging, publisher and editor David Moore grew something of a goatee. At his wife’s urging, he has now shaved it off. It probably says something about his ability to grow a beard... and maybe something about his ability to follow instructions.

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Inside 9

Good Fun

Mayfest and Poke Salat are just a start

14 Good People

Gene Turner helps others, feels good

18 Good Reads

“The Goldfinch” and “Sycamore Road”

20 Good ’n’ Green

“Beauty and the Beast”

22 Good Cooking

Brittanee Johnson gives tips for a crowd

26 Good Eats

“Fried, stewed or nude”

30 The natural bridge

Meet Jim and Carol Meekins and the treasure they keep in Honeycomb

38 The day the Indians came

She did not know what would happen when they picked up her baby

42 Marshall County pipe organs

A look at the “king of instruments” and who plays them during worship services

52 Fishing for your school

Student anglers catch fish and benefits on the teams at Arab and Guntersville

58 Out ‘n’ About

Wakes and faces from the Classic

On the cover: The massive blossom of a southern magnolia smells as divine as it looks. Pictured here: Looking up from

the bottom of this sinkhole offers a unusual view of Marshall County’s natural bridge overhead. More on both are in this summer issue of Marshall County Good Life Magazine.

Photos by David Moore

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David F. Moore Publisher/editor 256-293-0888 david.goodlifemagazine@gmail.com Sheila T. McAnear Advertising/art Director 256-640-3973 sheila.goodlifemagazine@gmail.com

Vol. 1 No. 3 Copyright 2014 Published quarterly MoMc Publishing LLC P.O. Box 28, Arab, Al 35016 www.good-life-magazine.net

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Good Fun

An arts stroll, 12 hours of outdoor music, an antique boat show, shopping and dining have joined forces for fun on Saturday, May 17, at the Lake Guntersville Mayfest blast.

The arts stroll, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., will be in the newly formed Arts and Entertainment District of Guntersville in the vicinity of Gunter Avenue in Northtown. Numerous artists will have displays on the sidewalks and in stores. The stroll is sponsored by The Arts Factory, the city of Guntersville, the Lake Guntersville Chamber

of Commerce and the Northtown Merchant’s Association.

Up until May 16, artists can register for available space for a minimal charge of $5-$20; members of The Arts Factory co-op can show for free but need to register. For more information call: Jennie McBride, 256-571-0375 or 256-202-3715.

That morning, acoustic musicians Asher, Denton & Kristen Gillen, Blake & Hanah Brock, Jamie Hudson and Chad Mosely will play on five sidewalk stages in the A&E district. That afternoon

they’ll play on the main stage at Errol Allan Park, followed from 6-10 p.m. by the bands Mockingbird Lane and The Love Apples.

For a change of pace, visit Lake Guntersville Yacht Club between 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday for the Lake Guntersville Antique and Classic Boat Show. An open house day for the club, the public and fly-ins are invited.

The boat show is sponsored by the Lake Guntersville Yacht Club and Dixieland Chapter of the Antique and Classic Boat Society, with members from Alabama, Tennessee, Louisiana and Mississippi.

For more information, call: Chuck Ruddy, 256-744-5858.

Other events joining Mayfest are a Gunter’s Landing yard sale starting at 7 a.m. and a spring festival to benefit “Blessing in a Backpack” from 10 a.m.-4 p.m. at The Church at Lake Guntersville, 4525 Wyeth Drive.

Enjoy art, poke salat and, of course, fireworks

Here is a sampling of “Good Life” fun and events to cap off your spring and brighten your summer...

• Through June 28 – A posthumous show of Guntersville’s first nationally known artist and a “prismatic” painter from Huntsville will be on display at the Mountain Valley Arts Council.

Guntersville native Martha Bradford died in 1993, leaving behind an illustrious career that garnered attention as early as 1935 with award-winning water colors at the Montgomery

Museum of Fine Arts. She also exhibited at Baltimore Museum of Art, Southern States Art League, The High Museum of Art in Atlanta, and Houston Fine Arts Museum. Martha also taught a number of local people who went on to make a name in art for themselves, including Lucile Smith Rains and Giselle Hembree.

Jerry Brown, a retired engineer, has painted a vivid new career, the hallmark of which is vibrant color. He paints in oils with a surprising impressionistinfluenced eye for detail, breaking

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images into pieces reminiscent of stained glass.

The MVAC gallery at 300 Gunter Ave., Guntersville, is open 9 a.m.-4 p.m.

Tuesday-Saturday. For more information, call: 256-571-7199.

• May 16-17 – Poke Salat The 30th Annual Poke Salat Festival in downtown Arab will have vendors of all sorts lined up on the streets starting Friday afternoon and continuing Saturday. Friday night, catch Jeff

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Besides vendors, on Saturday artisans will be downtown demonstrating crafts; local authors will be signing books; plus there will be lots of activities for the kids. A variety of musicians will perform from three stage areas during the day, and that night The Kyle Wilson Band (formerly the Wayne Mills Band) will play. Don’t forget to stop

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• June 7 – Art at the state park Lake Guntersville State Park will hold a fine arts sale 10 a.m.-5 p.m. this Saturday in the lobby of the lodge.

Feel free to come and browse.

The Arts Factory is promoting the sale to benefit local artists. There is no charge to exhibit, but the park receives a 15-percent commission on sales.

Interested artists wanting to reserve limited space should call: Amanda Glover at the park, 256-571-5440.

• June 28 – Get a jump on the Fourth Boaz’s 13th Annual Independence Day Free Concert and Fireworks promises a big street party this Saturday, capped off by fireworks. City officials were still lining up entertainment at press time, but the opening act starts at 7 p.m. followed by a headliner.

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Previous performers include Lee Greenwood and Marty Stuart. The latter, with opener Three on a String, drew some 20,000 folks last year.

The concert will again be on Billy Dyar Boulevard. Bring your own lawn chair. Food vendors and local restaurants will ensure you don’t starve.

The concert will conclude about 9:30 with a dazzling fireworks show.

• July 4 – Fireworks over the lake Guntersville’s decades-old traditional fireworks extravaganza over the lake is, well, just that... an extravaganza.

The 20-minute show – a community-

wide effort on which the city spends $20,000 – draws people from out of the county and state as well. The fireworks shows will be simulcast to music on WTWX 95.5 FM. Fireworks are set off from a small barge in Lake Guntersville starting at dark. Many people will watch the show from boats. On land, the best viewing is between Civitan Park and the Kiwanis Pier. The entire area – including the Ala. 69 causeway – is always packed with vehicles, so best come early.

For more information call: Milla Sachs at Guntersville City Hall: 256-571-7565; or Lake Guntersville Chamber of Commerce: 256-582-3612.

• July 19 – Boaz tractor show Proud of your old tractor? Love old tractors? Like to have fun? Yes to any of those and Boaz’s annual antique tractor show ought to do the trick for you. The free family event will be 8 a.m.-noon at the Boaz Farmers Market at the corner of Ala. 205 and Linn Avenue where some 40-50 tractors, engines and farm equipment will be on display. There will be judging and trophies and a parade at the end. Games will range from the slowest tractor race and blind-folded driving, to the cast iron skillet toss for women. You can buy breakfast, lunch, and, of course, lots of fresh veggies from the farmers market.

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Art added to the concert line-up on Lake Guntersville From calypso to classic rock and blues, the Mountain Valley Arts Council’s spring-summer concert series on the shores of Lake Guntersville has an array of music lined up for May and June. Plus, local artists and crafts people are invited to show their work at the concerts – giving you an opportunity to buy something unique.

All of the free, Tuesday concerts start at 6:30 p.m. at Civitan Park in Guntersville. Put on your summer garb, grab lawn chairs and a picnic for the 90-minute shows.

Off pss O h hoop S S e e h h T T

Here’s the line-up: • May 13 – Marsha Morgan (think Janis Joplin and blues); • May 20 – the venerable R&B/rock group Kozmic Mama; • May 27 – classic rock with American Lane (Classic Rock); • June 3 – locally famous Persons of Interest; • June 10 – Mockingbird Lane with classic rock and blues; • June 17 – Freshwater Creek, Arab popular youth bluegrass band; • June 24 – feel the islands with the

Topical Breeze Steel Band.

Local artists, jewelers and craftspeople are invited to sell their work at every concert, as a project of The Arts Factory, a branch of the MVAC. Vendor space under the pavilion is free for Arts Factory members; non-members pay a minimal charge; no commission is charged.

For vendor or other arts information, contact: Jennie McBride of the Arts Factory, 256-571-0375 or theartsfactorymvac@gmail.com.

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Snapshot: Gene Turner

• Education: After growing up in Paducah, Ky., he earned a degree in mechanical engineering from Purdue University.

• Enter Bonnie: Met Bonnie, an Indiana native, at Purdue, and they married shortly after he graduated in 1953. She finished her degree in the humanities in 1991 at Athens State..

• Family: Son David, formerly of Buck Island, lives in South Carolina; daughters Janet Heath lives in Guntersville and Emily Busby lives in Birmingham; the Turners have five grandchildren, one great-grandchild.

Career: After three years in the Army working mostly with NikeAjax program at White Sands, N.M.; Gene and his family spent 10 years near Denver where he did test planning for the Martin Company’s Titan I and II ICBM programs. He continued for 22 years with Martin Marietta and Lockheed Martin managing aspects of the Skylab, Space Shuttle and tethered satellite programs; working in Hawaii, Vandenberg AFB and Huntsville and retiring in 1992.

Marshall County: Gene and Bonnie moved from Athens to Guntersville in 1998. “We really do love Guntersville,” he says, “and are happy to call it home.”

Gene Turner Volunteering and helping others... and helping himself at the same time Story and photo

by David Moore After retiring from a 35-year engineering career in the missile and space program, Gene Turner simply was not wired to be a couch potato.

Maybe Bonnie wanted him out of the house every once in awhile, but that’s another story.

At any rate, retirement left more time to travel, and in the Turner’s passport book that meant cruises.

Over time they cruised around a large chunk of the planet.

Also, from the beginning of retirement, Gene found a desire to help people, to volunteer. While still living in Athens, he joined a group involved with the Reading Buddies program, helping youngsters improve their reading skills.

Only later did he realize he had joined RSVP – Retired Senior and Volunteer Program.

After he and Bonnie moved to Guntersville 16 years ago, Gene joined Marshall County RSVP to continue as a Reading Buddy.

Sensing Turner’s eagerness to be involved, RSVP wasted no time putting his attitude and myriad skills to work. He started out assembling computer tables and soon graduated to helping wall off classrooms and offices after RSVP moved into the former Mike’s Merchandise warehouse.

Gene also joined the agency’s free income tax preparation program, helping people fill out their annual tax returns. Plus, he became a “lab rat,” teaching various computer classes sponsored

by RSVP as well as the Christian Women’s Job Corps.

“Gene has a passion for helping

and doing,” says RSVP executive director Jean Ann Moon. “He is one of those celebrate-life people.”

At age 82, he’s now dealing with health issues but, rather proudly, continues his lab rat services.

1. How would you describe

your philosophy on life?

I am not a philosopher, but I always wanted to follow my parents’ instructions and guidelines.

I wanted to grow up being honest and pure. I wanted to be productive.

That’s kind of a crazy description, but it’s what I had to build on.

After we got married and started a family, I wanted our children raised in the same way, with good morals and to be good people. I am proud of all of them. And I am proud of my wife.

I have always done things to enjoy life, like getting into radiocontrolled planes as a hobby with my son. My approach to life has always been involvement... planning a cruise, working with people in the office to achieve a goal or complete a project, puttering around on the boat, building onto a house.

Jean Ann Moon might get a little carried away with “celebratinglife” and a “passion” for helping.

After I retired, I missed having companionship, the office environment. But I have found in my volunteer activities something that helps substitute for that.

I feel I have achieved whatever this thing, this “philosophy on life,” is.

2.

Why is it important to you to help people, to be a volunteer?

Good People

5questions Actually, that’s a secondary benefit. I go for the companionship, for my own selfish interest. When I do teach a class or other volunteer work, it always makes me feel good. I am happy that somebody is learning something, that I can share something with them. But I guess why I volunteer is because it makes me feel good to help someone.

That’s not a very esoteric answer but that’s the truth of it.

Outside RSVP, one instance of helping someone that meant a lot to me started when a Big Brother representative visited our church and asked if anyone would like to help them. I said that I should be able to do that.

The first couple boys I was with, we didn’t bond like we should have. Their goals were not the same as I had. I got discouraged.

Then I found a young man I’ll call Dylan. He had been in a home with several disturbances. I stayed with him a long period of time. He was a ward of the state and went to various foster homes throughout school. But I kept track of him. I’d find him and we would do things together. He ended up going to the Presbyterian Home for Children in Talladega, and he’s in college now.

He has done pretty well, but I can’t claim that I did all of it. I just happened to be helping him at several points during his life.

There are other kids that Bonnie and I have helped.

If I have some skills, I like to share them with somebody. If I know something, I like to share it and help somebody do something better.

MAY | JUNE | JULY

15

3. What prompted you and

Bonnie to start sailing around the world, and why are fun and adventure important to you?

I saw how happy someone at work was after coming back from their first cruise, and we decided right away that we’d like to take one. After our first cruise – it was somewhere in the Caribbean – we did it more and more. We took cruises to be with my parents. Then we started to take them just because we wanted to. As Bonnie says, we weren’t getting any younger.

Two weeks after 9/11, we a took a cruise we’d already booked from Vancouver to Alaska to Unalaska in the Aleutian Islands. Then we crossed the Bering Sea to Russia and several ports in Japan, then on to Beijing and other places in China.

That was a great cruise even though people were so nervous after 9/11. But for six days on the Bering sea we didn’t see another ship or a contrail in the sky. I figured we must have been on the safest place on the planet.

Some cruises were adventurous.

We went up the Amazon River as far as you can go. We met some nice cruise-mates from England once and later visited them and enjoyed seeing what England and Ireland are like.

Our last cruise would have taken us around the Indian Ocean and

16

MAY | JUNE | JULY

more or less tied into where we left off in China. But on day four, along the southeast coast of Africa, Bonnie fell and broke her hip. She had to spend 10 days in a hospital on shore.

That ended our big trips, but we have been to 35 countries. We also got to travel the country a lot with my job and have visited 45 states.

We just enjoyed traveling. We did it for the fun of it

4.

Do you make it a conscious point or effort to celebrate life, to seek fun and ways to help people, or does that come naturally?

I don’t know that I am making any conscious effort to do that. I am just enjoying life. I do the things I like to do, and I feel good when I’ve done them.

People call about an errant computer. I don’t say no. I enjoy helping them.

Teaching the classes at RSVP, doing taxes and all of it are very important to me. They fill out my life and give me things to do. When I go off on a cruise, that’s another part of my life I enjoy. Whatever is going on with my family, I enjoy that.

I have other things I do. I suspect that the things I do with RSVP almost make up a quarter of my interests. I am active in my church and love all the people there. I am glad to be a part of that.

5.

You have cancer of the prostate and spine – certainly a physical ordeal. You worry about loss of short-term memory. What’s your approach to dealing with this aspect of your life?

It’s discouraging to know I have these things. I know I am old. But I am thankful for the years I have had.

I will take whatever comes along.

I hope it does not make me too much of a burden on Bonnie. She is my… (pauses to compose himself.)

She is my memory bank. I depend on her an awful lot. She keeps me in line and takes care of me.

I don’t want to be a burden to her. We are a team. We’ve been a team... excuse me, again. We have been a team for 61 years in June.

That’s a long time.

I want to keep enjoying my family.

And, as long as I am able, I want to continue being a lab rat.

I don’t want to stop. I know that I don’t do it as well as I used to. I am moving slower, but I am glad to still be involved in RSVP and have those friends and do something productive.

My short-term memory is slowing me down more than the cancer is. My bones hurt and ache, but I want to keep going as long as I can, and as long as I don’t make a damn fool of myself.

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MAY | JUNE | JULY

17

Good Reads

Tartt’s long-awaited new novel flies off on a convoluted plot

‘Sycamore Road’ offers a new look at an old Grisham town

1654 by an obscure Dutch painter, is the center of the convoluted plot of Donna Tartt’s long-awaited third novel by the same name.

Early on, Tartt drops a bomb on the A great sorrow, and reader that sends the one I can only begin to story and narrator, understand; we don’t 13-year-old Theo Decker, in unexpected get to choose our own directions. And after hearts…. We don’t get to a conversation with a dying man under choose the people we are. extreme circumstances for anyone – much less a young teen – Theo ends up with a gold ring, an address and the painting. The ring will greatly influence Theo’s future, as will his future mentor, the dying man’s “niece” and an enigmatic Ukrainian friend who, like Theo, grows up in a highly unstructured environment.

Theo’s unfolding life is a series of misadventures involving a wealthy, dysfunctional New York family, hedonistic insanity in Las Vegas, a renowned antique shop dealing in fakes and an European crime syndicate.

Through it all, “The Goldfinch” is a source of solace, beauty and guilt in Theo’s spiraling-out-ofcontrol life.

– Annette Haislip

to the small Mississippi town featured in his first bestseller, “A Time to Kill.” Many in his legions of readers will remember Jake Brigance, the engaging small town lawyer, and his brilliant but Jake handed her a copy of alcoholic mentor, Seth’s will. She read it and Lucien Wilbanks.

Grisham again uses began crying. the theme of racial conflict highlighted by a controversial trial.

Seth Hubbard, a wealthy businessman and something of a recluse, is dying of cancer. He commits suicide by hanging himself and leaves behind a handwritten will leaving five percent of his assets to his church, five percent to a long-missing brother and the remainder to his black housemaid, Lettie Lang – deliberately omitting his two children. A contentious battle ensues pitting family members against one another, blacks against whites.

Lettie’s family provides a glimpse into the black culture of the 1980s, and the appearance of a black Memphis lawyer, dressed in fancy clothes who rolls into town in his Rolls Royce to demand justice for the oppressed, will likely ring a bell.

Grisham – as he is so good at doing – builds it all up to the revelation of a long-held shameful secret.

– Annette Haislip

A small painting titled “The Goldfinch,” done in

18 MAY | JUNE | JULY

In “Sycamore Road,” author John Grisham returns

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19

Good ’n’ Green

Southern magnolias ‘Beauty and the Beast‘ W

Story by Eddie Wheeler Photos by David Moore

e automatically think of the southern magnolia when any magnolia tree is mentioned in the South. It’s our ornamental plant symbol.

They come in all shapes and sizes, but the most wellknown magnolia in Alabama is the southern magnolia (Magnolia grandiflora). Also called evergreen magnolia, bull-bay, big-laurel, or large-flower magnolia, it is one of the most outstanding forest trees and a very popular ornamental tree.

The southern native is widely adaptable to a variety of soils and has few pest problems. It is drought tolerant and can thrive in full sun or partial shade.

Few trees can match it for year-round beauty.

In the spring and summer, southern magnolias produce creamy white blossoms that have a lemony smell. The flowers are unusually large – grandiflora means “large flower” – and stand out beautifully against the dark green foliage.

The broad leaves are thick, 5-8 inches long and glossy, with a dark green color so rich that florists use them in arrangements. The trees retain this green foliage yearround, providing welcome relief to the bare branches of deciduous trees.

Southern magnolia blooms are not only beautiful but smell divine, capturing, perhaps, the essence of the South. On the beastly side are shedding leaves for a few months. Unless

maintenance is necessary, it’s recommended that you not

cut back the lower branches. Shade and exposed roots can make growing grass underneath the tree impossible.

T

he southern magnolia does, however, have a “beast” side in its falling leaves and seed pods.

Even though they are evergreen, magnolias drop leaves abundantly in spring and early summer. They also drop old petals when they are in bloom along with seed cones and a few more leaves in late summer and fall, making it messy when planted in a lawn area.

Given this, it’s best to locate these trees away from outdoor living areas, pools and driveways, where litter dropping out of the tree will not be a nuisance. It also needs ample room to accommodate its massive size of up to 80 feet tall and 40 feet wide.

As it matures, the tree casts a dense shade, often preventing grass from growing beneath it. Plus, magnolias produce surface roots, so locate them well away from concrete surfaces such as driveways, sidewalks and curbs.

Left to grow on its own, the magnolia will retain its 20

MAY | JUNE | JULY

lower branches, creating a canopy that starts at ground level. Allowed to grow this way in ample space, this sometimes beast of a tree is an outstanding beauty, but you must have enough room in the landscape for this to be practical.

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21

Good Cooking

Brittanee Johnson and

her husband own Unique

Occasions at the Lumpkin House. Built in 1949 by

George E. Lumpkin Sr., it’s the third house to sit on the quiet,

stream-crossed property located on Carlisle Street just east of U.S. 431 in Albertville.

Hosting a party for a crowd?

You can make it a ‘unique occasion’ Story and photo

by David Moore

Hosting a tea or party this

summer and feeling overwhelmed at the prospect of feeding a crowd?

Fear not. Brittanee Johnson is a pro when it comes to cooking for a crowd and offers some recipes and tips to help make your event a delicious success.

She and Jonathan, her husband, own Unique Occasions at the Lumpkin House in Albertville.

From family reunions and anniversary parties, to weddings, showers and teas, they and their staff cater to crowds of 10 to 1,000 people.

Certainly there is work involved, but, for Brittanee, feeding a crowd is a 22

MAY | JUNE | JULY

labor of love that began simmering as a young child.

She was exposed to the commercial side of cooking through her grandmother, who owns The Sandwich Host on East Main in Albertville. While at Douglas High School, she and Jonathan worked at Albertville Home Bakery on Broad Street.

“I’ve been raised cooking,” Brittanee says.

Drawn to the kitchen, she studied culinary arts for three years at Cullinard in Birmingham.

“After graduating in 2006, Jonathan and I started catering events through my grandmother’s restaurant,” she says. “God blessed us again in 2012 with our own wedding/

event venue.”

Here are four things Brittanee says to remember about cooking for a crowd: • Small plates and cups keep guests from taking too much food; they can go back for seconds.

• Always keep food at the correct temperature. Never assume it will just be OK. • Do not over-purchase or spend.

Finger foods go a long way at an event.

• Finally, enjoy the event and don’t stress over little things. Most people will never realize something wasn’t just the way you planned if you don’t mention it.

Besides, after your guests dig into Brittanee’s recipes, you’ll be a hero...

GRILLED TENDERLOIN SLIDERS One whole tenderloin (4-5 lb.)

Nonstick olive oil spray 3 loaves of French bread 3 5-ounce containers garlic Boursin cheese 4 red or orange bell peppers 1 Tbs. Creole seasoning Slice the beef tenderloin into small medallions 2-3 oz. each. Season each side of the medallions with Creole seasoning. Lightly spray each side of the medallions with olive oil spray. Slice the French bread into ¾ inch thick pieces.

Spread top of bread slices with Boursin cheese.

Roast, peel, seed and cut peppers into small strips. Place beef tenderloin medallions on hot grill and cook to medium rare. Place 2-3 strips of roasted pepper and a cooked tenderloin medallion on each bread slice and serve immediately. Makes about 36 servings.

GOLDEN PECAN GRAPE SALAD 2 oz. red grapes 4 oz. cream cheese 4 oz. sour cream

1/2 cup granulated sugar 1 tsp. vanilla 1/4 cup brown sugar 1/4 cup finely chopped pecans Wash grapes, remove from vine; set aside. Combine brown sugar and pecans; set aside. In mixer combine cream cheese and granulated sugar on low. Add sour cream and vanilla.

Mix on medium speed until well combined.

Pour mixture onto grapes and stir until well combined. Pour into serving dish and top with brown sugar pecan mixture. Makes 25 servings.

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HAWAIIAN CHICKEN SALAD CROISSANTS 50 medium croissants 3 lb. frozen boneless chicken breast (boiled) 1 pound red grapes (sliced in half) 3 red delicious apples (peeled and medium diced) 4 celery stalks (diced small) 20 oz. can crushed pineapple 3 cups of mayonnaise (if dry add more for desired texture) 1/4 cup granulated sugar Salt and pepper Shred chicken into large bowl.

Mix in grapes, apples, celery and crushed pineapple; add sugar, salt and pepper to taste.

Mix mayonnaise until you reach the texture preferred, then stuff croissants with the chicken salad.

MINI CHEESEBALLS 16 oz. cream cheese 1-1/2 cups diced green bell pepper 3/4 cups diced onion 24 oz. crushed pineapple 3 tsp. seasoned salt 6 cups crushed pecans (add more if desired) Ritz crackers

This photo by the chef shows the grapes, apples, celery and pineapple that make her Hawaiian chicken salad a yummy crowd pleaser.

Cut bread into 1/2-in. slices. Using a small round cookie cutter, cut round “loaves” from sliced bread.

Peel cucumbers and cut into 1/4-in. slices. Combine cream cheese and ranch powder and mix well. Spread mixture onto each round loaf, add cucumber, sprinkle tops with a dash of paprika and enjoy. Makes 100 servings.

Mix cream cheese with paddle until smooth. Add all ingredients except pecans. Mix on low speed until well combined. Roll mixture into mini balls (1 in.) and roll in pecans.

Serve balls on top of Ritz crackers.

Makes 50 servings.

SHRIMP SPREAD 8 oz. cream cheese, softened 1/2 cup mayonnaise 1 cup of cooked, cleaned shrimp 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese 2 Tbs. chopped fresh parsley 2 cloves garlic, minced

MINI CUCUMBER SANDWICHES 3 French bread loaves 8 medium cucumbers 32 oz. cream cheese 4 Tbs. Hidden Valley ranch powder Paprika

Beat cream cheese and mayo in

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STRAWBERRY LEMONADE PUNCH 6 2-liter bottles ginger ale 1 29-oz. container Country Time lemonade mix 4 16-oz. containers of frozen strawberries In 5-gallon container combine ginger ale and lemonade mix then freeze.

Set out frozen mixture 8 hours prior to event. Ensure mixture is an even slush; add thawed frozen strawberries. Stir, serve and enjoy. Makes 75 servings.

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medium bowl with mixer until well combined. Add remaining ingredients; mix well. Refrigerate 4 hours. Served chilled with assorted crackers. Makes 16 servings.

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Good Eats

Story and photos by Patrick Oden

Slumped in the corner booth

sound asleep, a half smoked cigar hanging from his lips, the way the now iconic image of J. Oliver Wintzell captured him was simply business as usual at the first Wintzell’s location on Dauphin St. in Mobile, Ala. Born in nearby Bayou La Batre in 1905, Wintzell dropped out of college, as he would later write, “Because they didn’t offer a degree in opening oysters.” To those who frequent Wintzell’s Oyster House, this may have been the best decision J. Oliver ever made.

That first location on Dauphine St. boasted a staggering six-stool oyster bar where 15 cents bought you a dozen on the half-shell (nude).

The year was 1938.

J. Oliver was a man known for 26 MAY | JUNE | JULY

Fried, stewed or nude Awe shucks, we’re just talking about oysters his love of conversation, which often turned to politics. Wintzell ran for office in Mobile County several times throughout his life, however his political ambitions were never realized.

Once again J. Oliver’s failings were a triumph for oyster lovers.

The restaurant was J. Oliver’s life, and it quickly grew into a full seafood house.

Wintzell had another passion, one he was able to indulge from his corner booth, and one that patrons of the now 13 Wintzell’s locations are still enjoying to this day. J. Oliver enjoyed scribbling his often witty thoughts into a notebook.

These pages became larger than life as J. Oliver’s brother began to paint

small signs with each saying, and eventually Wintzell’s wit covered nearly every inch of the restaurant.

Not much has changed since 1938, not where it really matters anyway. Walk into Wintzell’s first franchise location on the shore of Lake Guntersville, and you will understand why J. Oliver was onto something with the signs.

“When we are rushed with a big crowd, the customers have got something to amuse them and don’t realize the service could be better,” wrote J. Oliver before his death in 1980. While humorous and ringing with truth, the quote is a much better representation of J. Oliver’s personality than his business

philosophy. Since day one, customer service has been as important to Wintzell’s as its food.

“Quality food and quality service, that’s what we live by here,” says Andrew Freeman, kitchen manager of the Guntersville restaurant.

A sentiment you would expect from a man in Andrew’s position, but what can’t be escaped is the sincerity with which he speaks.

“When you come here to eat it’s like family,” Andrew says. In fact, he speaks of both his staff and customers as family, and attributes both employee longevity and patron loyalty to this observable dynamic.

Opened by local restaurateur Dana Price in 2008, Wintzell’s on Lake Guntersville combines tradition and innovation in a setting that can be described as no less than picturesque. Not only can you enjoy the view of the lake and a calm afternoon breeze on Wintzell’s patio, you can take your boat to get there.

With more than 3,000 oysters being shucked and served on an average week at the Guntersville location, oysters may be the mainstay at Wintzell’s, but it’s the fresh catch that really gets Andrew excited.

Unique to the Guntersville location, Andrew brings in a variety of fresh fish throughout each week to ensure ongoing dining diversity.

While the popularity of Wintzell’s gumbo and bread pudding has guaranteed their perpetual spot on Wintzell’s menu, features such as swordfish and mako shark offer fish lovers an exotic treat.

Because Lake Guntersville draws so many people from outside of Marshall County, Andrew says their business is predominately tourist based, with only about 25 percent of patrons being local residents.

But he makes no bones about his appreciation for the restaurant’s local and loyal customers, attributing its success not to its

Wintzell’s serves oysters fried, stewed and “nude,” which is, raw. They also serve oyster Rockefeller and other tantalizing variations, at left. Below, low country boil is another favorite. You can’t eat atmosphere, above, but it sure is fun.

location or its influx of tourist, but to his extended family, the locals he has come to know and love a dozen oysters at a time.

Combine a 78-year-heritage, 156,000 oysters annually, 13

beers on tap, eight boat slips, a multitude of friendly faces, a stray cat named Miss Wintzell’s... It all adds up to one dining experience, without equal, on the shores of Lake Guntersville.

MAY | JUNE | JULY

27

30Th Annual Poke Salat Festival Don’t Miss It! Fun For The Whole Family In Historic Downtown Arab

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NEXT TO SIERRA’S MEXICANISIMO

Keepers of the natural bridge Jim and Gloria Meekins believe in sharing one of the ‘Seven Wonders of Marshall County’

30

MAY | JUNE | JULY

S

Story and photos by David Moore

ome landscaped yards you see have been years, decades, even generations in the making.

Jim and Carol Meekins have been landscaping their property in the Honeycomb community for 15 years. But the centerpiece of their yard – unique in all of Marshall County – was eons in the making.

The Meekinses have a natural bridge in their yard.

Testament to its unique status, the site was voted one of the Seven Wonders of Marshall County in 2007.

The natural bridge comes replete with three springs gurgling and gushing in and

out of the backdrop mountainside, several small waterfalls, three known caves and, in front of it all, a 70-foot-deep sinkhole.

A massive tulip poplar juts straight and tall immediately behind the span of the bridge as if to emphasize the landscape with a natural exclamation point.

It’s a stunning place to build a home.

The couple bought the fissure- and caveriddled limestone property in 1996 with one objective: to save it from desecration and ruin by humans.

Jim had worked for the Army Corps of Engineers in Norfolk, Va., then, as a civilian, at the U.S. Army Materiel Command in Alexander, Va., before it moved to Redstone Arsenal in Huntsville.

He knew Carol, a longtime Redstone employee, before he transferred there in

1990. They married that February, and he retired about three years later.

In the fall of 1995 they wanted to visit the Smoky Mountains, but Carol, manager of the then-new Sparkman Center, was too busy to leave town. Having grown up in New Hope, she suggested they tool about the beautiful mountains in North Alabama.

“So we went joy riding looking at the leaves,” Jim says.

They found more than pretty leaves.

They found a calling as keepers of the bridge.

Driving down U.S. 431, alongside

the Honeycomb area of Lake Guntersville, the Meekinses happened to turn onto Cottonville Road. A winding half-mile later brought them to a sharp curve, and there before them at the base of Gunters

The natural bridge, one of 11 recognized in Alabama, was created ages ago, time out of mind, as acidic waters slowly ate away the limestone, eventually collapsing a mountainside cave. Left standing after the fall was a span of rock measuring about 100 feet long at the top, 25 feet long under the arch and 35 feet tall. It was ancient before ever seeing the light of day.

MAY | JUNE | JULY

31

The Meekinses have planted a profusion of rhododendron, azaleas and flowers on the grounds, making them truly parklike. Stone terraces create garden spaces, paths and viewing areas around the bridge.

Some people might be surprised to know that, along with much of the landscaping, Carol did the masterful stonework. Jim, above left, admires her work and that of Mother Nature.

Mountain – commonly called Grant Mountain – yawned an unexpected sight.

“That must be the natural bridge I’ve been hearing about all my life,” Carol had said.

“I just fell in love with it,” Jim says.

“I couldn’t believe it wasn’t already a state park. It was a natural site for one.”

But not all was natural and beautiful with the natural bridge.

“It was a dump,” Jim says. “There was graffiti on the rocks. I think some homeless folks were living there. The place was trashed.”

What’s more, silt had run off a dirt drive leading down to the site and was filling the large sinkhole.

That first visit was on a Saturday.

32

MAY | JUNE | JULY

Monday found Jim at the Marshall County Courthouse researching tax records to identify the owner. A year later they purchased the 15-acre plot.

“It needed to be occupied to keep people who prey on sites like this from messing it up,” Jim says.

They had found a calling.

C

urious to learn more about the unique property, Jim asked an archaeologist friend at The University of Alabama to visit. He said it had surely been an important Indian site because of its beauty, fresh water and sheltering bluffs. Jim has found no artifacts but figures they were hauled off years ago.

Cavers from the The Huntsville

Grotto of the National Speleological Society also visited. The mouth of one cave is too small to enter without tearing it up. The ceiling of a second one caved in. But spelunkers took Jim in to see the third one, Ghost Creek Cave, during a dry spell in 1996.

“There were stalagmites and stalactites, but in order to get into it, you have to go in on your belly,” he says. “Even in the summer it was wet and muddy.”

A geologist Jim invited to the site brought along a geological engineer.

“The geologist said the bridge had basically been like it is hundreds of thousands of years and looked pretty stable,” Jim says. But there were caveats to “stable.”

Young Carter and Hudson Kelley of Arab find a lot of adventure at the natural bridge, above right. “This,” says Jim Meekins, “is some of the oldest dry land on the planet.” Sensitive to their treasure, he and Carol ensured that their

house made a minimal imprint on the environment. Their extensive efforts included installing a septic system 300 feet from the caves and springs, one of which provides drinking water; another feeds the landscape irrigation system.

The geologists noted some damage; specifically two boulders that had peeled off the abutments of the bridge. This, they speculated, occurred back in the day when TVA operated a large cave quarry – later a Civil Defense shelter and now closed off – on adjacent property.

Future seismic activity could further damage the natural bridge, the geologists cautioned – a warning Jim later repeated during efforts to halt plans for a nearby quarry. When they started building their house there in 1998, the Meekinses kept in mind that the intriguing bridge and other geological features had a certain fragility to them.

In May 1999, Carol and Jim

moved into their house.

Not counting the basement garage, the house has 2,500 square feet heated and cooled. The main floor features a great room with a natural walnut mantel and granite fireplace and a wall of windows facing Ghost Creek Falls and the bridge. There’s also a master suite, kitchen and utility room. Upstairs are two guest bedrooms and a bath, and there’s another bedroom with a stone fireplace and bath in the basement.

Almost as stunning as the geologically landscaped yard is the stone terrace work Carol did, which is indicative of the couple’s commitment to preserving this natural wonder.

“We wanted to make it look nice, but it was eroding very badly when we bought the property,” Jim says. “All of the terrace work was to stop erosion.”

They took different preservation steps in 2003-04 when Vulcan Materials sought permits to open a quarry in the Hebron community, about a mile from the natural bridge. Once state permits were granted, there were no avenues open to local government and residents to stop blasting to build the quarry, which the company said would cause no damage in the area.

According to Jim, the quarry was sought in anticipation of building the Memphis-to-Atlanta superhighway.

But the long-sought grandiose project died along with the end of MAY | JUNE | JULY

33

The Meekinses are glad to share their unique property, and curious – and always courteous – people drop by unannounced just about all the time. Sometimes they come in crowds, such as senior 2013 classes from Albertville, Douglas and DAR en route to their proms, shown above in a photo Jim took.

Visitors who come around Christmas catch some of the Meekinses’ holiday spirit, below.

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Not surprisingly, the house offers ample outdoor living space, including a large front porch and, on the side nearest the falls, a main floor deck and a basement level patio. It’s all enjoyed by the entire Meekins family, which includes three grown children, six grandchildren, four great-grandchildren and several generations of Carol’s family still living in the general area.

Named because it vanishes then reappears, Ghost Creek starts at a spring up the mountainside and tumbles

through several cascades. It abruptly disappears into a small opening to Ghost Creek Cave near the top of the

limestone wall before reappearing from another cave hole, above left. From there, the creek falls down the face of the wall to disappear yet again into the entrance to Natural Bridge Cave. A second waterfall comes from a spring in another strata of stone and topples from below the arch at least 60 feet into a sinkhole, above right.

Congressional earmarking in 2012.

Meanwhile, Huntsville’s growth continued to the east and west, not the south. With the quarry’s economic impetus gone, the project slid to a back burner.

The Meekinses are relieved but know the still-permitted quarry could reemerge as a threat to the natural bridge they set out to preserve.

I

t might – or might not – help if Marshall County’s natural bridge were a state park. But with three state parks already located in the county, 36 MAY | JUNE | JULY

and funding what it is, Jim doubts that will ever happen.

“There is no way of protecting the natural bridge by a governing body,” Jim says. “It’s just a part of living here that goes with the property.”

Still, the Meekinses don’t regret what they’ve done.

“This site needs to be occupied to keep it preserved,” Jim says. “If not, people will come at their own pleasure, as experience has shown, and it ends up being mistreated.”

Carol and Jim are not looking to

sell their property, but yard work is physical, and at some point, they’ll have to. The keepers of the natural bridge, however, aren’t likely to sell to just anyone.

“This is not a place for a control freak, someone who would put up a no trespassing sign,” Jim says.

That’s because the Meekinses strongly believe in sharing their unique, geologically landscaped yard. Visitors are welcome to stop by – and they do all of the time – to enjoy one of the Seven Wonders of Marshall County.

Stone mason Tim Baugh o f Grant apparently is a man who enjoys his work. Doing the front and side of the house, Tim had fun with rocks that caught his imagination. Three of the

many examples – which include a model of

the natural bridge – are the buck, who gets to

wear a set of antlers, a welcome pineapple and a rather elaborate butterfly, left, with colorful wings. General contractor for the house was Teddy Taylor of Guntersville.

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The day the Indians came Story by Steve Maze t should have been a routine day for Mrs. Elijah Ridgeway in March of 1830, but it would turn out to be anything but. In the years to come, she would tell and retell the details of that day to her many descendants.

Mrs. Ridgeway had decided to spin some thread on her spinning wheel inside her and her husband’s one-room log cabin since it was very cold and windy outside. Two of their daughters were playing with dolls made of corn shucks while their 9-month-old baby lay in its cradle.

Everything seemed normal until the door suddenly burst open. An Indian woman entered the cabin and was quickly followed by two others from a nearby Cherokee tribe.

Mrs. Ridgeway and her children were terrified by the presence of the uninvited guests. They did not know what the Indians wanted and could not communicate with them since they spoke a different language. Panic stricken, Mrs. Ridgeway had no idea what to do.

Her husband had set out on foot earlier that day to have some corn ground into cornmeal. The Ridgeways’ cabin was located in the Beech Creek community near Browns Valley while the mill was situated on a mountain above the cabin. The chore would take Mr. Ridgeway most of the day, so Mrs. Ridgeway knew he could not help with the Indians.

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The Ridgeway family had emigrated from Ireland only two years earlier and had briefly settled in Charleston, S.C. Plentiful land that was rich with trees and sparkling river waters had lured them to the wilderness of North Alabama. Upon arriving in Brown’s Valley, however, the Ridgeways found very few white settlers in the area.

Now Mrs. Ridgeway glanced over at the three

Among the pieces in the Native American

collection at The Guntersville Museum is a 1986 print by Nicholas A. Rosato depicting Indians in birch bark canoe. Artifacts include a needle

made of undetermined material, wooden beads –

perhaps like those the visiting Cherokees gave Mrs. Ridgeway for her cornmeal – and a mortar with a depression created by continued use of a pestle for crushing maize or corn into meal. Many of

artifacts are from the extensive collection of Percy Tyler Barnard and donated to the museum after his death in 1994. Photos by David Moore Cherokee women and began to wonder if the move to Alabama was going to cost her and her children their lives.

The Cherokee women, all tall, slim and erect, were particularly fascinated with one individual in the cabin – the infant lying in the cradle. They picked up the baby and immediately began undressing it while speaking to each other in their native tongue.

Mrs. Ridgeway did not know whether they intended to harm the baby or were merely curious about the way it was dressed. The women closely examined each item of the infant’s clothing.

Mrs. Ridgeway did not know whether to grab the child and run, or let the curious Indians further examine the baby and its clothing. She reasoned that the women had probably not seen clothes made MAY | JUNE | JULY

39

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of cotton and other fabrics because most Native American children were dressed in clothing made from animal fur and hides.

I

n the end, the anxious Mrs. Ridgeway decided against grabbing her baby from the women since it might be injured in a struggle.

Some settlers later agreed with Mrs. Ridgeway that the women probably undressed her child because they were curious about its clothing. Others offered a simpler reason – they might have just wanted to see if it were a boy or a girl.

The Native American women then began to play with the infant in a friendly manner while continuing to speak to each other in their Cherokee language.

Finally, they redressed the baby and returned it to the cradle.

Mrs. Ridgeway was already feeling less anxious about her visitors when the women then walked over to her and indicated through sign language that they needed some cornmeal. She got what little the family had and gave it to them. In trade for the cornmeal, the Cherokee women offered her beads.

Soon after, Mrs. Ridgeway breathed a sigh of relief as the trio walked to the door with their cornmeal and went silently on their way.

As it turned out, the Cherokee tribe near Brown’s Valley was peaceful. Mr. Ridgeway even became hunting partners with them later on.

In fact, the Cherokees had been allies with Gen. Andrew Jackson years earlier. In 1813, Jackson and 2,500 men – including famous frontiersman Davy Crockett – had marched across Brindley Mountain to Browns Valley where they camped for two days.

Around 200 local Cherokees were recruited to help Jackson successfully defeat the Creek Indians at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in 1814. Andrew Jackson was elected President in 1829, however, and time was about to run out for most Native Americans – even his Indian allies.

From 1835 to1838, around 15,000 Cherokees were forced by the U.S. government to give up their land and relocate to Oklahoma. Many of the Native Americans died of exposure, disease and starvation on the way to their new home. This episode of U.S. history became known as the “Trail of Tears.”

It’s unknown what Mrs. Ridgeway’s feelings were

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But on that day in March of 1830 when they came to visit Mrs. Ridgeway, it’s likely that what she felt when it was over was a maternal kinship with three women adoring her baby and willing to pay for some cornmeal they needed for cooking.

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A tour of the pipe organs in Marshall County Story and photos by David Moore Celestial sounds of a pipe organ pervade the sanctuary, music mighty enough to rattle – and simultaneously buttress – the structure’s foundation and rafters. The great instrument’s ranks of smaller pipes, set to the timbres of violins, trumpets, reeds and flutes, send high notes soaring, seemingly unhindered by a mere cathedral ceiling, to merge as one with the boundless heavens. At the same time the organ’s great, deep sounding bass pipes penetrate the body, plumbing ever deeper, stirring the depths of the soul itself.

“In my eyes and ears,” proclaimed Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, “the organ will forever be the King of Instruments.”

Seven churches in Marshall County use pipe organs in their worship. An eighth is located in the Daughters of the American Revolution chapel on the campus of DAR School in Grant. (A ninth pipe organ, now out of service, remains in the chapel at Snead State Community College in Boaz.)

The following is a look at the county’s eight pipe organs – each a hand-crafted masterpiece – and the musicians who came by various paths to create beautiful music from these kings of instruments.

With apologies to John Wesley for tweaking his hymn: O for a thousand pipes to sing...

Pipes of myriad size and type stand at attention in one of the

pipe chambers at the Episcopal Church of the Epiphany Guntersville.

In a world where it sometimes seems that more and more goods are shoddily built, Jessica Fazio appreciates the

“inspiring” quality of workmanship that goes into creating pipe organs. Beyond their complexity, the instruments sometimes are considered works of great art. Randall Dyar and Associates of Jefferson City, Tenn., built the pipe organ Jessica plays at Albertville First United Methodist. Installed in 1989, it boasts 20 ranks and 1,145 pipes.

Albertville First United Methodist Jessica Fazio remembers a childhood Sunday school lesson on how God loves cheerful, joyous givers.

Her teacher went on to say she wished the organist would sometimes play loud, happy music for the offertories.

“I thought, ‘That’s a good idea,’” Jessica recalls.

So today if you hear her pull out all of the stops while playing the offertory on the big pipe organ at Albertville First United Methodist Church, you understand what’s stirring in her heart.

Jessica was 7 when she started piano lessons and continued the pursuit while at Birmingham-Southern and

Oral Roberts. In college, she studied organ as a second instrument, but she’d been playing the Hammond at Albertville First – with no formal training – since age 12, accompanying congregational singing on Sunday nights and the choir when it practiced.

“In college I learned to do things correctly on the organ that I had been winging before,” she says.

She was married and raising a family when Albertville First United Methodist hired her as organist in 1984. The year before, fundraising had started for a pipe organ. In the ensuing years, Jessica says, they often wished someone would outright pay for the organ and dedicate it to a loved one.

As it works out, having many smaller contributors is nice in its own way.

“I think of our organ,” she says, “as

dedicated to the glory of the all mighty Lord.”

Jessica loves the wide range of sounds at the instrument’s command.

“From prayerful to grand and exciting and everything between, there is a tremendous variety of sounds you can get from an organ,” she says.

While she loves to play loud, joyous offertories, some of her favorite pieces are quiet, meditative. She also enjoys playing different styles of music, from choir accompaniments to liturgical, high-church pieces by Bach. But her great love is playing hymns, which she usually performs without piano.

“I knew the entire Methodist hymnal for piano as a child,” Jessica says. “You can pick up a lot of good theology from hymns that helps in your relationship with the Lord.”

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Christ Episcopal Church, Albertville

Christ Episcopal’s Möller organ was initially built for a

church in Decatur, Ga. After it merged in 1971, its organ sat

disassembled in a dealer’s basement several years until his wife proclaimed that either he or the instrument had to go; and so

Barger & Nix Organs bought it. In the 1970s, Christ Episcopal purchased a small church building in Piedmont and moved it to Albertville. About 1984, it bought the re-worked Barger & Nix organ to “rattle the rafters,” as Debbie Free says. It has four

ranks of 287 pipes and a full set of chimes. The church is hosting a summer organ concert featuring Bill Barger.

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Among the many victims of the tornado that hit Albertville in 2010 was Christ Episcopal Church. It was as if a bomb penetrated the sanctuary’s roof and floor, knocking the building off its foundation.

Debbie Free cried when she saw it and the pipe organ she played there. But perhaps some of her tears were from relief. The instrument’s console had been saved by the 16- and 8-foot pipes that once rang out to the glory of God. “It appeared they were holding up the wall, keeping it from falling on the organ,” she says.

While a new church was being raised, Barger and Nix of Tennessee rebuilt the organ the M.P. Möller company of Maryland created in 1952.

To hear Debbie play it, few would ever suspect she has no formal organ training.

She began piano lessons in the first grade and by the sixth was playing at local churches and gospel singings. While playing saxophone at Albertville High, band director Jack Powell asked her to accompany his choir practices at First Presbyterian. So Debbie taught herself to play more structured music on piano.

A few years later, the organist at the church retired. Debbie inherited her music books and began teaching herself to play the electronic organ there in 1977, the year she graduated from AHS. After playing 15 years at the Presbyterian church she left to raise a family.

In early 2005, Christ Episcopal asked her to fill in while it searched for a full-time organist.

“They’re still looking, I guess, because I’m still here,” she laughs.

From her early gospel years, Debbie’s playing has evolved into high church. She plays with no accompaniment. Even though the “new” organ remains at the rear of the sanctuary, she serves as music director, leading congregational singing, the choir and handbells. “I’m it,” she laughs.

In the course of a service she plays a prelude, postlude and offertory – often classical – the doxology, three congregational hymns and a communion hymn. She enjoys both music and the instrument upon which she gets to play it.

“This is my thing,”Debbie says. ‘It’s fulfilling spiritually. It’s peaceful.” Her “peaceful” comment, however, doesn’t count tornadoes.

Mike McGee has some unorthodox playing techniques. The Schlicker organ he plays is unorthodox, too. Keys are wood-

grained and brown on black instead of black on white. Dedicated in memory of the late Claude Elrod by his wife, Nerine, the organ boasts 1,400 pipes and 23 ranks. While it was being built, the story goes, word got out that the company was

closing up, that the instrument would not be completed. Concerned, Nerine, Glen Maze and other church members, flew

to Buffalo, N.Y. and, unannounced, visited the Schlicker shop, Mike says. “It’s believed if they had not made the trip, the organ would not exist.” As it is, he adds, First Baptist’s organ is either the last or second to the last the company built.

Boaz First Baptist Church Some of the things Mike McGee does and plays on the pipe organ are, in his words, “very unorganistic.”

That’s partly because he’s a jack of all trades with musical instruments and partly because Boaz First Baptist offers blended services, combining elements of traditional and contemporary worship.

Typically, organ pedals are for sustaining notes and chords or walking scales, techniques Mike incorporates in, say, Bach preludes or fugues. On a contemporary piece in the same service he might use the pedals to carry the rhythm as if he were playing bass

guitar with his feet.

“I am aware that’s not orthodox, but I do it anyway,” he says.

Growing up in Killen, Mike’s dad was a minister of music. His mom sang in the choir and, at home, kept a stop watch on Mike to ensure 30 full minutes of daily piano practice.

In high school he played trumpet and graduated from The University of Alabama in 1982 with a degree in music ed.

Mike took a job as band director at Boaz High and joined First Baptist.

When the pianist moved a few months later, the late Glen Maze asked him to fill in until he found a replacement.

The “temporary” job lasted until mid1986 when Mike went to Opelika as assistant band director. In 1989, with an MA from Auburn, he returned

to Boaz to become band director at nearby West End High.

That fall, First Baptist replaced its electric organ with the new pipe organ, and organist Evelyn Camp retired. Again, Mike agreed to fill in and took six months of lessons from Gadsden organist George McSpadden, practicing several hours daily.

From any instrument in a big band to a washtub bass, Mike can play them all. The lover of music, however, can’t pick a favorite instrument anymore than he can pick a favorite song.

“But I really like the available power of the organ and the ability to improvise and rescore the music” he says. “With the registration and voicing, it’s like dealing with an orchestra or a band, and you get to choose who plays what and when.”

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Arab First United Methodist Church

Arab First United Methodist Church formerly used an electronic keyboard for an organ. When it moved in 2000 to a new building

on North Main it got a new instrument built by the Reuter Organ

Company of Kansas. It features 28 ranks of 2,044 pipes, 30 of them facade-mounted in front of the pipe chamber coverings. Among its

many stops, says Diane Moore, the organ has a zimbelstern. That’s a wheel on which small bells are mounted, creating a continuous

tinkling sound when played. Sid and Jane McDonald donated the organ to the glory of God and the memory of his parents.

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Playing the pipe organ wasn’t on Diane Moore’s to-do list when her mother signed her up for piano lessons in Birmingham. Her mom’s insistence had a big influence on the 9-year-old sticking with it.

She came to love it and eventually graduated from Birmingham-Southern College with a degree in music education and a minor in piano.

In the 35-plus years Diane has taught piano, two maxims for her students have always been to practice and to count the rhythm.

She and her family moved to Arab in 1990, and she later played piano for nine years at Arab First United Methodist Church. Needing a break, she sang in the choir, but playing the pipe organ still hadn’t made her to-do list.

That remained true when long-time organist Eleanor Cobb announced her retirement, and Diane was named to the committee to find a replacement. It became apparent that church organists are rare. So, after more than a year of futile searching, in 2007 Diane took a deep breath and made the offer to the committee that if the church funded a year of lessons, she would learn to play the organ and apply for the job – and there it was, playing the pipe organ, suddenly atop her to-do list.

After a year of study under Chuck Bradley of Guntersville, Diane found herself at the church’s Reuter organ. Though the organ is vastly different from the piano, she says her maxims of practice and counting have served her well.

“It’s a fabulous instrument,” Diane says. “I love the range of sounds, from the reeds and strings to the principals.”

She also loves the rapport with music director Brian Quillin and pianist Anthony Wilson.

“I feel we are able to contribute something worthy to the worship service,” she says.

That includes special music, such as Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus” at Easter, and duets with Anthony, including old-time religion music, that the congregation seems to love.

As much as anything, Diane loves playing hymns. “To God be the Glory,” “Praise to the Lord the Almighty,” “Blessed Assurance” and “Oh For a Thousand Tongues to Sing” are among the many on her pipe organ to-do list.

Guntersville First Baptist Church Sandra Martin has been “interim organist” at Guntersville First Baptist Church on and off since about 2005. But don’t let that date fool you.

She – along with her pianist sister – are long-time musical cornerstones of the church.

Sandra was the organist for 30 years, and Kay the pianist for 22 years, until 2000 when their father died. Then they went to part-time status, playing Sunday nights, because caring for their ailing mother was the sisters’ top priority.

“She was the biggest influence in our music,” Sandra says.

Since then, several people have been hired to play the big Milnar organ installed after the sanctuary was rebuilt in 2000. Each time a new organist was sought, Sandra played in the interim.

This current “interim” has lasted several years.

She laughs and says she doesn’t even ask if the church is still looking for an organist.

Other than her college years, Sandra has attended First Baptist since she was 2. She began studying music at about age 6 after her grandfather, completely unannounced, shocked the family by having a piano delivered from Forbes in Birmingham.

By high school Sandra was playing piano at church on occasional nights and filling in Sunday mornings. Then long-time organist Loree Bush showed her the fundamentals on the instrument, bought her some music and asked Sandra to fill in for her on the church’s old Norville Hall organ.

Sandra went on to what’s now Samford University, majoring in piano, minoring in organ.

Back home, she spent 17 years giving piano lessons and teaching fifth grade in Guntersville.

What’s more, soon after her return Loree retired, and Sandra was asked to take over as organist.

The message from the Bible and pulpit are the crux of the worship service, she says, but music is important, and she believes the organ adds much to the singing of hymns. While she no longer accompanies the choir, she does enjoy playing the prelude and finds the congregation appreciative.

“I am committed to this church,” Sandra says.

“Kay and I feel our music is a ministry we can offer. It’s an opportunity to give back. The church has been a great part of our lives. We are thankful the Lord has allowed us to serve here this long.

He’ll let us know when it’s time to leave.”

Milnar Organ Co. was a week from delivering a new three-manual organ console for Guntersville First Baptist Church when the

sanctuary and old pipe organ were destroyed by fire in the fall of 1999. Milnar, located in Eagleville, Tenn., worked with the

architect for the new sanctuary on the location of the console and

the chambers that house 1,266 pipes in 21 ranks. Unlike most local organs, the console directly faces the congregation, which could be

a little intimidating for an organist. Fortunately, laughs Sandra Martin, the huge console essentially hides her from the crowd.

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The organ Katherine Brewer plays at St. Paul United Methodist features 1,003 pipes with 17 ranks and two manuals.

It was built by the Schantz Organ Company of Orrville, Ohio, and installed in 1977 at a cost of $42,000.

That was raised in two years, starting with a church crafts bazaar that brought in more than $7,000.

Emily Porter was the organist for years, followed by a few interim musicians and, in 2001, Katherine.

St. Paul United Methodist, Boaz As a kid, Katherine Brewer taught herself to play the organ so she could show out in front of company and lead sing-alongs. Forty-plus years later, aspects of that scenario remain unchanged. Katherine plays the pipe organ at St. Paul United Methodist Church in Boaz, accompanying, with piano, the congregational singing.

Instead of showing out, she plays a leadership role in worship.

Youngest of five children in a musical family, Katherine calls most of her organ education “self-inflicted.”

As a teen, her oldest sister took lessons and played organ at church. When she left for college, Katherine, 10, 48 MAY | JUNE | JULY

claimed the bench and jumped on the Hammond organ her parents had bought her sister.

“I wanted to show out for Mother and Daddy’s company,” Katherine says. “We always sang, and I wanted to learn to play for them.”

Fascination with the pedals initially self-motivated her. Then her dad introduced her to reading music, and, by age 11, she had played organ on a voluntary basis for evening services at Geraldine First Baptist. By 14 she was on the staff.

She played through Snead State and Berry College in Georgia, but organist was not her target career. In 1980, she earned an education degree.

“I did take a semester of pipe organ in college, attempting to improve how my real life experience had shaped my music,” she says.

During her continuing education career, Katherine played electronic organs at Hewett United Methodist in Albertville then First Presbyterian in Albertville. Asked in 2001 to interview for the job at St. Paul, she was thrilled.

The pipe organ itself was a huge reason she was interested, Katherine says.

Bach, Haydn, Beethoven...

Standard hymns and old standbys newly arranged... Katherine loves them all, loves integrating chimes with melodies, experimenting with the many unique voices. And then there’s the sheer power of the pipe organ. She finds playing it to be very fulfilling.

“I feel a sense of leadership in each service,” Katherine says. “Even though I’m not the director, the organ has much to do with how successful the congregational singing is. I love being a part of that.”

Guntersville Episcopal Church of the Epiphany Music for services at the Church of the Epiphany in Guntersville is unique among local churches. There is no piano. Kay Benefield plays hymns on a pipe organ in tandem with a violinist, Valerie Fleming of Union Grove.

Kay plays the hymns, while the duet accompanies the choir for offertory and plays a prelude. It might be a hymn arrangement of, say, “Precious Lord” or “Shall We Gather at the River,” but usually it’s high church, often Bach.

It’s challenging. Kay constantly learns new music, whether for the choir or something special she and Valerie play. They played some 30 pieces for Holy Week at Easter. They learn even more for Christmas.

“People say, ‘Oh, musicians have so much talent.’ It’s not the talent,” Kay insists. “It’s the work. You have to practice. It takes a lot of concentration. I try to practice every morning except for Tuesday when I do housework.”

That adds up to as much as 10 hours a week.

Wife of long-time Guntersville pharmacist Bill Benefield Sr., Kay grew up in South Sauty and earned a degree in piano performance from The University of Alabama in 1960. She minored in organ with no intention of ever becoming an organist.

Returning to Guntersville, she started a longtime career teaching piano. She also played piano at First Baptist. The late Loree Bush played the pipe organ at the old Episcopal church then walked down the hill and played organ at First Baptist.

Kay quit her church job after 15 years to care for her mother and husband when they became ill.

Meanwhile, she saw to it that her son, Bill Jr., took music growing up, including organ lessons with her former teacher at UA. Bill later played organ at the Episcopal church, and when he left for Auburn to study pharmacy he urged Kay to take over. Kay was not interested in committing herself to the practice and a job that tied her down on Sundays and Wednesday nights, but her son insisted she was direly needed. There was no one else who could play organ.

“So I started playing at the old church, and now I’m in my 30th year. I got roped into it,” she laughs. But that’s not why she’s played all of these years: “I do it to the glory of God.”

Among Kay Benefield’s favorite organ composers are Johann

Sebastian Bach, George Frideric Handel and Dieterich Buxtehude.

The organ console was moved from the old Episcopal church on

DeBow Street and extensively renovated in 1991 by the Milnar Organ Co. of Tennessee. The organ has 625 pipes, most from a

church in Crossville, Tenn., and located in two chambers flanking the altar. Fronting each chamber are 13 facade pipes from

Germany. The renovation included adding stops for trumpet,

mixture and a zimbelstern, and the organ now has nine ranks.

MAY | JUNE | JULY

49

Known as a studio pipe organ, the instrument Liles Burke donated to the DAR has three ranks, 243 pipes and a twomanual console as part of the pipe cabinetry. Built by Wicks in 1979 for a Louisiana nunnery, it was put up for sale after the last nun there who could play it died, and Liles bought it. It’s played sometimes for special concerts and weddings. DAR member Sue Ellen Adams of Huntsville is the designated organist. She’s also associate organist and handbell director at Trinity United Methodist Church in Huntsville.

DAR School Chapel,Grant Liles Burke is not, foremost, an organist. He’s a judge on the Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals. But, along with diesel locomotives, Liles has a fondness for pipe organs. His knowledge and talent are such that he fills in for organists at Arab First United Methodist, Church of the Epiphany and Christ Episcopal.

He’s also unique in that he may be the only person in Marshall County to ever have a pipe organ in his house. He donated it in 2010 to the Kate Duncan Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution, which placed it in the DAR School chapel.

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MAY | JUNE | JULY

Built as a studio instrument, it’s not big by pipe organ standards, but it literally filled his living room in Arab when he was a bachelor. After he married, the organ didn’t actually grow, but with children on the horizon, it nonetheless became too huge.

He moved it for a few years to his farm near Arab. Three years later, when the family moved to Cherokee Ridge and Liles was selling the farm, he decided to donate the organ to a small church. But a chance conversation at a local Republican meeting with Jean Brewer, a member of the DAR, lead to an appreciated new home for the organ.

“It is a perfect match for the chapel,” Liles says. “They use it for concerts and weddings.”

Liles started piano lessons as a youngster with, he says, little talent

and less work ethic. At 15, he took a year of electronic organ lessons in Arab from the late Damaris Ballew.

“I got interested in the organ, I guess from church,” he says.

As an elective at The University of Alabama, he studied organ under the late Warren Hutton, playing a studio instrument similar to the one he later had. Once, though, Hutton allowed Liles to play UA’s massive Holtkamp organ, with 86 ranks and 4,705 pipes.

While he appreciates classical music, Liles’s real love is hymns, “Holy, Holy, Holy” being a favorite.

He played the song recently when, for the first time since donating his old Wicks, he sat down at it and filled the small DAR chapel not with the sound of a train whistle, but with the glorious sounds of a pipe organ.

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Several members of the Arab fishing team had to work the day of the tournament on Lake Guntersville, and only nine

showed up. Short an angler, coach and boat captain Brent Jones asked his daughter, Olivia, a sophomore, if she wanted to fish. To his pleasant surprise, she was eager to pick up a rod for the cause. Early on, she caught a 3.25 pound

bigmouth. “She’s whipping me,” boat-mate Dustin Benefield, above, laughed shortly before landing a 2.125-pounder.

Kenneth Chambers’ adrenalin

churned like the wake behind his Phoenix bass boat as it skimmed across Lake Eufaula at 70 mph. It was 2011 and Hartselle High School’s second tournament as part of the Alabama Student Angler Bass Fishing Association. Kenneth, a boat captain, was intent on getting his two team members to a hotter bass hole. The clock was ticking.

52 MAY | JUNE | JULY

He glanced at the teens beside him.

They were intent on catching fish, too, but for now bass had escaped their minds. They were holding Goldfish crackers out in front of them, letting the blasting wind rip them from their fingers, then trying to catch them in their mouths as they flew past.

Kenneth cracked up. He didn’t stop, but he did freeze the moment – and the flying fish lesson – in his mind.

“It’s their innocence in life,”

Kenneth laughs now. “It’s refreshing to be around them after being in the rat race. They can entertain you and remind you what’s fun in life.”

That’s one reason the Vinemont man, who owns Freedom Marine on U.S. 431 in Albertville, volunteers his time with the Hartselle team and is a sponsor of the ASABFA. The flying Goldfish bring to mind an old photo of him and his dog sitting on Big Rock at Smith Lake. Kenneth

Going fishing for your school Story and photos

by David Moore

With bass fishing’s popularity

growing, Bassmaster and The Bass Federation are trolling high schools nationwide for future tournament talent.

With the formation of the Alabama Student Angler Bass Fishing Association a few years ago, the state became second in the country to develop a grass-roots fishing organization to recruit and promote bass fishing among teens. The Alabama Legislature has proclaimed it the state’s official high school bass fishing group.

Jon Stewart, senior manager of the BASS Nation and head of its high school and youth programs, says Alabama is an ideal spawning bed

has a fishing pole in his hands. The picture captures the innocent fun of fishing he enjoyed as a kid.

Don’t get Kenneth wrong. Sure, the kids involved in the Alabama Student Angler Bass Fishing Association have fun, but, by and large, they are competitors who take fishing seriously.

Their ranks are seriously swelling, too. The second such state-level organization in the country, the ASABFA started in 2010 with 29

from which high school students might enter professional ranks.

“We applaud the work done by the ASABFA in involving high school students in the sport of bass fishing,” Stewart says in story for Bassmaster.

“They’ve done a great job in creating a strong foundation among students in Alabama, and we believe our program is an excellent complement to that...

It’s another chance for them to get outdoors, compete and enjoy fishing.”

In Marshall County, Guntersville and Arab high schools are members of the ASABFA. Both qualified for the state championship tournament held May 9-10 on Neely Henry Lake after this magazine was published.

Here’s what some of these student anglers and team volunteers have to say about “going fishing for your school”...

schools. By 2013, that had jumped to 52 schools, and this year there are 88.

Bass fishing for Guntersville

High School surfaced four years ago at the urging of three students – then senior Spencer Gore, his then freshman brother Thomas, and his classmate Clay Hardin.

Jeff Gibbs, assistant principal at Guntersville Middle School, was named coach, and the group – initially

a fishing club – soon became the 29th team to join the new ASABFA. “It’s grown by leaps and bounds,” Jeff says of the organization, noting that 215 boats from across the state – each with two students and a volunteer adult as captain – participated. And the team with the home-lake advantage finished first.

Several people in Boaz and Albertville have contacted him about starting fishing teams there, and he MAY | JUNE | JULY

53

hopes they do. Jeff told them the Guntersville community at large has been very supportive of the Wildcats, and sponsors are keeping them afloat.

Sometimes it’s an effort to get boat captains, Jeff says, because fathers who would otherwise volunteer their boat and time might have to work on a tournament Saturday, but the only negative he’s heard came from an uninformed Facebook posting a few years ago claiming that Guntersville was laying off teachers but could still afford a fishing team.

“The comment was made out of ignorance,” Jeff says. “We are self-sufficient. We do not use a dime of school money – and don’t plan to.”

A

Guntersville seniors Thomas Gore, in the bow, and Clay Hardin – along with boat captain Gary Gore – fish March 29 in the lousy

weather at the Smith Lake tournament. “That’s the worst weather

we’ve had for one of our tournaments,” Clay says. But neither that nor missing an April tournament on Pickwick Lake because of a

soccer injury, dampens his enthusiasm for four years of ASABFA fishing. “It’s been awesome, he says. “I’d like to see more high

schools involved.” It’s a good mix of fun and serious fishing, Clay

adds. Thomas – who spends most of the money he earns on fishing – agrees. “Golf is frustrating. I can’t handle that,” he laughs.

“Fishing is more relaxing. I love it and want to make a career of it, if I can. Of course college is important,” he adds for Dad, though Dad understands the lure of fishing. “He completely quit golf to go into fishing,” Thomas says.

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mong long-term benefits to students – bound to the no-pass-no-play rule to encourage studying and staying in school – are the $35,000 in scholarships funded through ASABFA sponsors, Jeff says. And more and more colleges have fishing teams.

Many student anglers harbor dreams of turning pro, which could come true, but, he continues, fishing now could lead to other related careers.

“You may decide to get a marketing degree and be a rep for a major tackle company,” Jeff says.

He also points out a very important short-term benefit of fishing for your school.

“Not everyone one is a football player, a basketball player, a baseball player,” Jeff says.

“But when members of the fishing team pull on their Guntersville jersey, they realize they are part of something important, something they can have success at.

“Everybody has something they can do well.

They just have to find it and work at it.”

B

rent Jones cast his efforts with the Arab High School bass team because, like Jeff, he sees benefits in kids fishing for their schools.

He volunteered three years ago when the team started. This year, the school sponsor, Justin Jonus, was so involved with other coaching responsibilities that he asked Brent to “do whatever.”

“Youth today spend a lot of time in front of computers and phones,” observes the ex officio coach. “The first and foremost benefit of the program is kids getting outside, learning to enjoy God’s creation.

“Most of the kids here are not really into much

trouble, but this does occupy some spare time where they might be out doing other things.”

Kids also learn aspects of being on a team, Brent says, achieving common goals through teamwork. Unlike individuals competing in a tournament, high school fishing team members communicate amongst their boats, passing on tips on what bait is working, good locations and the like.

“In order to compete statewide, we have to communicate,” Brent says, “You are not going to win with just one of your boats bringing in five fish.”

Another benefit, plain and simple, is learning to fish.

“We have speakers come in and have had a few knot tying sessions,” Kent says. “We encourage the kids to learn fishing tips. They have to practice, to study, to learn weather patterns and conditions, things of that nature.”

A

nother reason Brent is involved in the ASABFA fishing team – and it’s apparently a common one – is that it’s a chance to be outdoors doing something fun with his kids. He has two on the team, Bronson, a senior at Arab, and Olivia, a sophomore.

Brent is the captain of the boat manned by Olivia and her fishing partner, giving father and daughter at least a day together practicing for a tournament plus the event itself. He’s been taking Bronson fishing for as long as his son remembers.

On one of their first excursions, Bronson caught two fish on a single cast.

“Beginners’ luck,” laughs Bronson, who’s heavily into fishing for the Knights. Four or five years ago, he “played everything” in the way of sports at school, plus he rode dirt bikes.

“Then I started fishing tournaments,” he says, which parked his other extracurriculars except for the dirt bike. “I like to fish, but I like it more with the competition.”

While he likes the individual competition in general tournaments, he’s in the same boat with his teammates when fishing for his school.

“We’re fishing as a team,” Bronson says. “And everyone at school pretty much knows about the team. We wear our jerseys to school the day before a tournament.”

Kenneth Chambers grew up in Cullman

County pond fishing until his dad bought five acres at Big Rock on Smith Lake. After that, they often camped and fished there; later built a rough

High school fishing... fun or serious competition? “Serious fun” decide Guntersville freshman Nate Knight and senior Dustin

Chandler, in the bow and amidships, respectively, with boat captain Leon Knight at the Lake Guntersville tournament March 15.

“Mainly I like to have fun,” Dustin says. “But whenever I need

to be serious, I can be. It is my last year and a shot at getting a

scholarship. I’m going to be serious, but I’ll try to have fun, too.”

While only Nate’s first year on the team, he has several years of tourney experience thanks to fishing events held by the Junior

Bassmasters of North Alabama. “If I have a tournament, I try to be serious,” Nate says. “But if my dad just takes me out for a few hours to fish, I try to have fun, but I still focus.” Friday practices before ASABFA tournaments are usually fun, he adds, partly because they get out of school for it.

MAY | JUNE | JULY

55

cabin. As a teen, he’d invite buddies for fishing weekends.

Next season, Kenneth will begin volunteering for the Vinemont High School team. His son will be on it, and he looks forward to spending time with him and the other kids, imparting his knowledge about catching bass.

“We learned, but they are learning so much younger,” Kenneth says. “It’s amazing to watch.” The kids also are exposed to a growing career field. In Kenneth’s case, fishing throughout his life led him to owning Freedom Marine Center in Albertville.

Some of today’s young anglers may become BASS pros, he says. Or work for ESPN. Or sell bass boats. Fishing with the ASABFA can open doors to such dreams.

But there’s something else here, too, something that hearkens back to his fishing days as a kid.

“I want these kids to have memories of fishing,” Kenneth says. “I look back at that picture of me and my dog on Big Rock fishing. Everybody who went to our old cabin to fish will tell you those were the best times of our lives.”

It was about 1985 when Keith Turney shot this photo of his future

brother-in-law, Kenneth Chambers. Kenneth was 13 and fishing with

his dog, Tiffany, from Big Rock on Smith Lake. He likes to see young

anglers today fish competitively and further their skills, but he says he

also appreciates the innocent fun of fishing and the memories it creates.

Marshall teams

ASABFA: rules they fish by

Arab Team members: John David Henderson, Bronson Jones, Houston Barbee, Cole Cranford, Tristan Wallace, Andy Kelly, Adam Higgins, Olivia Jones, Dustin Benefield.

Boat captains, Jeff Benefield, Wayne Cranford, Randy Barbee, Brent Jones, James Wood.

Coaches: Justin Jonus, school sponsor, Brent Jones, assistant.

Here are the Alabama Student Anglers Bass Fishing Association’s basic rules: • Each high school team can field up to five voluntarily supplied boats, each with two student anglers and a volunteer adult boat captain. There are no classifications by school size.

• The ASABFA sanctions six “spring” tournaments statewide.

Each team fishes three of them in hopes of qualifying for the state championship.

• Each boat can weigh five fish; the average weight of each team’s top three boats determines the team’s standings.

• A tournament’s top seven finishing teams qualify for state. If any of them are already qualified, that many of the next top finishers are bumped up so that seven different teams from each of the

Guntersville Team members: Sam Barwick, Clay Hardin, Dustin Chandler, Taylor Stewart, Brock Clifton, Charlie Conner, Nate Knight, Connor Jones, Hunter Prichett, Max Brandon, Chris Stewart, Thomas Gore, Jonathon Wilburn.

Boat captains: Tim Barwick, Gary Gore, Jerrell Wilburn, Leon Knight, Chris Davis, Josh Carr, Kevin Steward, Marty Pritchett.

Coaches: Jeff Gibbs, head; Richard Smith, assistant.

56

MAY | JUNE | JULY

six tournaments qualify for state.

• The student angler catching the biggest fish at each tournament qualifies his or her team for state. If the team is already qualified, the state slot does not bump down.

• The team of the year is based on the highest overall standings.

Among changes for next season is a district system, and each district will hold three tournaments this fall. A school can enter as many boats as it wants to in those tournaments, and students fishing those tournaments are eligible for three spring tournaments, explains Drew Sanford, VP and marketing director for the ASABFA. You’re still limited to five boats per tournament, but if your school has, say, 15 boats, you can send five different boats to each event.

Four years ago, I made some campaign promises to you. Today, I am proud to say that I have kept them.

Together, we have accomplished much for District 9, including...

• Pushing pro-business legislation that has made Alabama one of the top three states nationally in which to do business

Keeping the Good Life in Marshall County Safer.

Keep Walls Between You and Crime.

• Increasing funding for the Marshall County Economic Development Office to put all of Marshall County in a better position to recruit industry • Strongly supporting career and technical education for motivated students to be trained for the workforce • Passing some of the toughest ethics laws in the nation • Repealing the legislative pay raise of 2006 • Passing one of the toughest illegal immigration laws in the country • Being a strong supporter of ATRIP legislation that’s providing more than $1 billion for desperately needed roadwork • Listening and responding to the concerns you have voiced

Scott

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Paid political advertisement by Friends of Clay Scofield, P.O. Box 1092, Guntersville, Ala., 35976

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57

Out ’n’ About

The 56 top fishermen in America slowly file

from Guntersville City Harbor, left, during the

opening blast off for the Bassmaster Classic Feb. 21. After clearing the harbor, they literally blast

off, leaving white wakes not unlike contrails from jets in the sky. Spectators in other boats give

pursuit to watch their favorite pros work Lake

Guntersville for big bass. Among the throng on shore the second morning of the Classic is Spc. Patrick Hayes, left, with the 152 MP Co. of

Decatur performing honor guard duty. Sarah

Sims, 5, of Guntersville, at right, grins from the shoulder of her mom, Brandy. Below center,

Mao Shimizu, 5, of Japan is off in her own world dancing. Perhaps it was meant as a good-luck

dance for her father, Morizo Schimizu, a pro in the Classic who finished 15th.

Photos by David Moore;

airplane piloted by Bill Greenhaw

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