Recent articles by Dr. Lucas G. "Luke" Boyd.http://www.trcb.com/en-Us60Sat, 26 May 2012 08:13:14 ESTCopyright 2012 Dr. Lucas G. "Luke" Boyd, TRCB.com All Right Reservedhttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-ii/day-the-hogs-got-loose-1195.htmI's a-tellin' you whut's the gospel truth, I ain't never gonna git myself involved ever again with Press-tone Murphy and nonna his projects. Why, that man could screw up a one-car funeral and everbody knows it.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 13:06:44 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-ii/day-the-hogs-got-loose-1195.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume IIhttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-ii/the-whuppin-1196.htmRebecca Bingham sat at her desk and cried quietly. She wanted to break down and sob loud enough to be heard over in Hancock County, but she restrained herself.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 13:06:36 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-ii/the-whuppin-1196.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume IIhttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/raymond-1589.htmHe was the first dog I ever knew. The first memories I have of anything or anybody--the house, the yard, my parents--include him. He was as much a part of my family and my early existence as were my parents and younger brother and I loved him greatly.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:23:29 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/raymond-1589.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/daddys-stories-1590.htmMy father loved to tell stories and tall tales. Some were true. Others had some elements of truth in them--maybe just enough to make the listener think they could be true, at least until toward the end of the tale. He had a way of making an observation or turning a phrase that would catch your attention and make it easy to remember. I recall one such phase at one of our Fourth of July fish fries.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:22:45 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/daddys-stories-1590.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/after-bedtime-stories-1591.htmMy father was a great talker and storyteller. I suppose he acquired a good bit of this skill during the time he was a traveling salesman. He had several tall tales that he told on a regular basis, but what I liked best were the stories that were swapped when my uncles came to visit.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:21:26 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/after-bedtime-stories-1591.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-aviator-cap-1592.htmI turned fifty in 1982. For my birthday, my daughter gave me a copy of Eudora Welty's One Time, One Place. The book is a collection of photographs taken by Miss Welty during the early 1930s when she traveled over the state of Mississippi for the WPA. I grew up in Mississippi. Kimberly had recently moved there and begun a new job in Jackson. She was in the process of discovering a Mississippi that she never knew existed.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:20:11 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-aviator-cap-1592.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/drummed-out-of-the-club-1593.htmBack in the mid-fifties, Morton worked for a large company which had offices in several foreign countries. His job took him to England every month or so and he loved these "business" trips. Through his business connections, Morton became acquainted with several people who ranked fairly high on Britain's social ladder.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:18:40 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/drummed-out-of-the-club-1593.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-sanitary-toilet-1594.htmNow-a-days it is a joke to refer to a house as having "four rooms and a path." However, it was no joke in the 1930s in Mississippi. Most houses had a "path." This often-traveled thoroughfare usually led out behind the garden or smokehouse around a screen of elderberry bushes to the outdoor toilet. Some of the more cultured referred to it as the "privy" or "outhouse," but my family used the more earthy term "toilet."Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:16:15 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-sanitary-toilet-1594.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-jesus-doctor-1595.htmIn some ways he was just another country doctor. Of course, it was hard to find any other kind in the Mississippi Delta in the 1920s and '30s. With there being hospitals only in the larger towns like Vicksburg and Greenville, the country doctor was always the first, and in most cases the last, medical person anyone would see when illness or injury struck. It would be hard to overrate their importance.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:14:46 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-jesus-doctor-1595.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/a-letter-to-kimberly-1596.htmThere is documentary evidence from as far back as the ancient Egyptians and Sumerians of letters written by fathers giving advice and counsel to their children in all manner of life's situations. A few years ago, such an opportunity presented itself to me.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:11:45 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/a-letter-to-kimberly-1596.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/manday-1597.htmRobert taught fifth grade at a small elementary school located in a rural section of the county. Most of his students seldom traveled very far from home. Many had never been to Nashville even though it was only thirty miles away. For that reason he had planned a field trip to that city for them to see the Parthenon, the State Capitol, and several other interesting and educational things.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:10:22 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/manday-1597.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/miss-amy-1598.htmThe land was flat. And to a girl who had lived her whole life in the mountains of north Georgia, almost scary flat like it had somehow gotten out of its assigned place somewhere in Kansas or Nebraska and wandered off, and not being able to find its way home, established itself in the northwestern part of Mississippi. Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:09:08 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/miss-amy-1598.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/alsey-1599.htmAlsey was many things, but, first and foremost, he was a teacher of English. He was as comfortable with basic grammar as he was with the Romantic Poets or with modern prose. He loved the beauty and structure of the language as well as the great works written in it. And he had a knack of transmitting this love to youngsters who, at times, did not share his feelings.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:05:47 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/alsey-1599.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/christmas-stories-1600.htmIt was the Sunday just before Christmas Day and my Sunday School lesson dealt with gifts and gift giving--an appropriate as well as a timely focus. As an introductory exercise, I had asked each member to think of a Christmas when they were children and when they had received a very special gift. Next, I asked each of the men to share with the class things they remembered about this gift. What it was, why it was so memorable, and so on.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:04:14 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/christmas-stories-1600.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-last-time-i-did-magic-1601.htmWhen I was a boy I was an avid reader of most anything I could get my hands on, especially detective stories and comic books. One thing about comic books was the back cover which contained advertisements of products that every boy needed. I dont recall any directed toward girls.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:02:52 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-last-time-i-did-magic-1601.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/johns-first-trial-1602.htm"Is that where you wear them?" asked the alteration lady out of one side of her mouth. The other side was filled with several long straight pins. John wondered if she had ever swallowed any. Her disposition was such that he suspected she had one or two stuck in her craw at the moment.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 09:01:22 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/johns-first-trial-1602.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/p-g-1603.htmI was proud to count myself among P.G.'s friends. He had a lot of them. This was evident by the room full of flowers and the hundreds of people who came to mourn his passing. It hardly seems possible that he's been gone a little over a year now. I still miss him. He was one of those real people that the world has too few of. I think there ought to be some cosmic law that prohibits death from claiming people like P.G. until the world is provided with a similar replacement.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:59:30 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/p-g-1603.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-judgment-1604.htmHis death was not a recent event. But last Saturday's auction had brought back the memory of his passing. On that day beginning at ten o'clock, Sam's house and all his worldly possessions were sold to the highest and sometimes only bidders.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:57:45 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-judgment-1604.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/some-never-give-up-1605.htmIt was Thursday afternoon and head nurse Edwina Craul was in her cubbyhole office catching up on some of her records when she was interrupted by a series of loud thumps accompanied by an equally loud string of oaths. She rushed out to find Dub and Sam, two of the custodians, trying to move a large piece of furniture down to Wing-B. Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:55:38 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/some-never-give-up-1605.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/doc-kennon-1606.htmWhile an undergraduate at Ole Miss in the early 1950s, I found myself in need of a science course to complete that requirement. Some of my friends on the football team advised me to sign up for a beginning astronomy course. Since they prided themselves on being able to locate the easiest courses in any department, I listened to them.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:54:14 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/doc-kennon-1606.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-preparation-1607.htmBack in the '50s I bowled on a team which was sponsored by a local dry cleaners. Tom was one of the team members and was a good bowler. Carried about a 190 average. Tom was young and had been married less than a year when his wife became pregnant.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:52:32 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-preparation-1607.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/low-gas-level-1608.htmI didn't know what to expect. Although I knew the father, I'd never had a conference with him. He'd left the education of his children up to his wife.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:50:07 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/low-gas-level-1608.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/dr-green-1609.htmI had done reasonably well in Freshman composition. Supposedly, it was the most feared course at Ole Miss, but I had bested it easily. Of course, I had gone into the course with a good working knowledge of grammar and, somewhere along the line, I had learned how to put words together pretty well. Even the second semester, which involved a research paper, was not a major challenge.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:48:29 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/dr-green-1609.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-wedding-1610.htmTruman did not like weddings. In fact, he despised them. In his view the only weddings a man should be required to attend would be his own and those of his natural children.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:47:15 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-wedding-1610.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume Ihttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-hokey-pokey-1611.htmSpring 1997. The junior-senior prom. For those educators at the secondary level, this annual rite of spring is all too familiar. Black seemed to be the color of choice this year for a majority of the young ladies.Sun, 28 Sep 2008 08:45:51 ESThttp://www.trcb.com/onlinebooks/coon-dogs-and-outhouses-volume-i/the-hokey-pokey-1611.htmTRCB.comBooks / Coon Dogs and Outhouses Volume I