To know so much and yet know so little about him.
John Landry Morrison was born on a plantation, his father was a sugar planter and his mother a homemaker. He was not the oldest but he was the oldest to reach maturity, his older brother died of diptheria. He had a sister and two younger brothers.
as the olderst, he was the first to leave home. He went to Morganza High School but when he finished it only went to the 11th grade. But he was done. So he looked about for a college to go to. He applied at Northwestern in Natchodoches but was rejected. He also applied at the flag ship university of Louisiana, LSU and was simarly rejected. He even applied at Tulane in New Orleans and they too said no. The reason was that he did not finish the 12th grade!
He along with is cousin, Harris, applied at Mississippi State College and were accepted on probation. To get to College Station, Mississippi was an ordeal. He had to catch the train on the back of the plantation to take him to Addis, a small town on the west bank of the Mississippi River across from Baton Rouge. He spent the night in Addis waiting for the train ferry to cross the river. There he caught the Mississippi and Yazoo Valley Rail Road train to Vicksburg, MS. That was an all day ride and again he spent the night in Vicksburg.
Next he took the train out of Vicksburg for Jackson, MS - not to far this time. There in Jackson he switched to a local going to College Station. So it took him three complete days to get to school. Naturally, he did not come home until the beginning of the next summer.
Harris did not make it. He could not keep up or really did not care to. Does not matter, Harris did not graduate from Mississippi State. Daddy did finish. He graduated in May, 1925 in Civil Engineering. The oddity is that his birthday was June 1905 thus he finished college before his 20th birthday. That is an unheard of feat today. Harris who did not finish ended up being the richest of Morrison's for awhile, so don't feel sorry for him.
After graduation hDaddy went to work for the State of Louisiana, I believe in the Highway Department as a draftsman in Baton Rouge. I am sure that is where he met my mother who was from Monroe, LA and was attending Louisiana State University at that time.
A story was told that one day, a Friday just before the weekend, he was cleaning up his draftsman's desk, sharpening his pencils, sweep off the erasure dust, etc. He boss came up to him and asked him what he was doing.
"Cleaning up," he said, "He was finished with his project."
His boss said, "You are not finished with the project until a Civil Engineer has signed off the drawing."
My father replied, "He was finished and he had signed off the drawing." He continued, "I am a Civil Engineer!"
I understand later on he was a project engineer on the building of the road from Monroe, LA to Vicksburg. Today there is an Interstate Highway that parallels that route. He was laid off by the state, they had run out of money to construct the highway. So he packed up and went home to New Roads.
He later worked for the state in the Department of Public Works. That is when he ran afoul of Huey Long, etal. Huey wanted all state employees to pay 10% of their salary into his war chest. Daddy refused to do so and was fired.
I suppose he returned to New Roads again. Must have been a hard thing to do. Any rate not long after that he got a job laying banana plantations in Latin America. He went to work for the United Fruit Company out of New Orleans. I have an old passport of his that he obtained in Nicaragua. His photo shows a grand handle bar moustache. He worked in Columbia too. That is where he developed his taste for Scotch Whiskey.
It was prohibition in the states and the ships came in from Europe with plenty of booze on board. He told me that they would buy four cases of Johnny Walker Red Scotch and one case of Johnny Walker Black Scotch. If you don't know, Johnny Walker Red is not aged as long as Johnny Walker Black and thus cost less. He said it was like three dollars a case for the Red and six dollars a case for the Black. You must remember $3.00 was a lot of money in those days. And there was not tax on the stuff either.
He later returned to the states, Huey Long was dead by then. He went to work for Atlas Construction Company, the fore runner of T. L. James of Ruston, LA. They built levees all over the state. I recall stories of Franklin, LA (where my sister Herrise was born) and Cotton Port, LA where he and Mama lived their early married days. When those days were done, he got a job with the US Army Corps of Engineers in New Orleans.
Another story told about him was during the early days of the WW-II, the Mississippi River was on the rise, bad times for Louisiana. At that time he was assigned to Galveston District in Texas but was stationed in New Orleans. In those days, he was working the A. Hayes Towns laying out airports among them are the Harding Field (Baton Rouge Airport) and Moinsant (today known as Louis Armstrong International Airport) Kenner, LA.
At any rate, the river was on the rise, the Corps was very concerned. The US Army Colonel in charge of the New Orleans District was in dire need of an levee expert. His assistant said, "The foremost authority on the levee system is right down the hall but he works in the Galveston District. You have to get them to approve your use of him." So my father was summarily transferred back to the New Orleans District and put in charge of making sure there was no flood. Apparently by the grace of God and lady luck, he was successful.
At the end of WW-II he took a leave of absence from the US Corps of Engineers and went into his own business. That is another story unto itself. But the Corps was not finished with him. I think about 1954 or so, he was doing drainage work for Horace Wilkerson not very far from the foot of the Mississippi River bridge at Baton Rouge. They were on the west side of the river. If you cross that bridge going west, and look off to the north, you will see the river is flowing east and makes a turn south, a fairly sharp bend in the river.
Well his drag line operator woke up one morning, staying in a small motel cabin, fixed his coffee and got ready to go to work. It was still dark. Without much consideration, he opened the door to his cabin and stepped off into two feet of water. The levee had broken at that sharp bend in the river. The Corps commandeered the Morrison Engineering and Contracting Company's equipment and directed by father to begin reconstruction of the levee. The drag line was the only thing sticking out of the rush of water.
The rebuilding process is to make a small ring levee some distance away from the river to contain the flood waters. Then one starts "walking the levee" back to its original position, each time raising the height to contain the waters. The Corp empowered him to use any tractor, grader, drag line that was available in Baton Rouge and surrounding area. The Corps later paid for rental of that equipment but the owner's could not refuse the Corps use of the equipment.
Daddy stopped that flood and built that levee back. There is no evidence the levee break today. The little cabins used by the employee are long gone. The whole area is built up with businesses. It is an industrial complex now days. And old man river keeps on flowing.
He was called back to the Corps one more time, he was charged with "raising the levees" along the fore bay in the Morganza Spillway. They raised the levees some three or so feet, that is several miles - maybe 8 or 9 miles of work. Again, the local equipment owners provided the equipment and were later paid for its usage. Daddy was once again the engineer in charge of the operation.
When Daddy reached 65 or so years, he wrote a letter to the Corps saying he thought it was time to retire. They wrote back that they had retroactively retired him some years before that and sent him a check. He started drawing about $75 or so dollars per month. By the time he died, his retirement was up to some $300.00 per month. He lived on that and his social security until he died. He also had other income from the family plantation, some of it substantial. So he died a man of money, not a pauper.
Next, how he became known as "Honest John" by his construction industry peers. How he also was named Pap Paw by his great grandchildren.
Until then. . . .
Saturday, June 21, 2008
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Old Man River . . .
Old Man River - the mighty Mississippi River of course. I learned all I know about the river from my father, a civil engineer and a levee builder par excellence. My father, affectionately known in his retirement years as Paw Paw constantly watched the river. No, he did not go to the levee and look out on the river, he kept up with the river gauge readings at the key locations.
The key locations as far as he was concerned were at Cario, IL; Memphis, TN, Vicksburg, MS; Natchez, MS; Old River Landing in Pointe Coupee Parish, LA; Baton Rouge, LA and New Orleans, LA. Why are those key, well Cairo is where the Ohio meets or joins the Mississippi. It is the beginning of the lower Mississippi valley.
Memphis is the first point below Cairo where the river is constrained. All along the Mississippi are bulges, are wide spots that flood when the river rises. These spots act as sponges soaking up the ever increasing amounts of water flowing south down the river. They are "accumulators" and take the pressure off the levee system. But there is no wide spot at Memphis, all the water passes through a narrow gap with Memphis on a bluff on one side and Arkansas protected by a levee on the other side. So the gauge at Memphis indicates how bad things can get.
The next spot on the river is Vicksburg. It too is on a bluff and the other side is protected by a levee in Louisiana. Once again all the waters of the mighty Mississippi must flow through that gap. The US Army Corps of Engineers has been given the authority to deal with the river and its levees by US Congress. The Corps as it is widely known, divides the upper and lower Mississippi at Vicksburg.
The river is also constrained at Natchez. Again all the water has to pass through that gap on its way to the Gulf of Mexico.
Old River Landing is a spot on the lower Mississippi River Valley where Old Man River was trying to divert itself to the Atchafalaya River. At that point, as the river flows, it is well over 200 miles to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River and a little less than a 100 miles on the Atchafalaya River. That means the Atchafalaya is a mean swift river that flows down the west side of the Great Atchafalaya swamp past towns like Simmsport, Kortz Springs, Morgan City and so on. All the towns along the Atchafalaya boast of a "ring levee" built after the great 1927 flood. All of those towns have out grown their ring levees and all of those towns fear the great Atchafalaya River.
The Corps has spent billions of dollars at Old River designing and constructing flood control structures to allow some flow off the Mississippi River into the Atchafalaya River. In fact, there is even a hydro electric facility that generates electricity with the drop of some 8 or 10 feet head pressure from the Mississippi River to the Atchafalaya River. There is also a lock to allow barge traffic to go between the rivers and provisions to allow extreme high water from the Mississippi into the Atchafalaya at flood time. This opening would only occur if the Morganza and Bonne Carrie Spillways could not handle the river excesses.
Baton Rouge and south. Baton Rouge is the last bluff on the Mississippi River. The river has never been further east in all geological time, it has been further west often. But the bluff runs out at Baton Rouge, really north Baton Rouge and the old city area. South Baton Rouge, now Louisiana's largest city/parish - 800,000 plus souls, is in the flood plain. Louisiana State University is about where the bluff ends and even part of that is in the flood plain.
New Orleans. Well everybody knows about New Orleans since Katrina. But the gauge watched at New Orleans is the Carrolton Street gauge. The danger points is 18 feet. That's 18 feet above sea level! Yes, New Orleans is protected by levees along the river but they are more or less fixed. When the gauge nears 17 feet or so, the Bonnie Carrie Spillway above New Orleans is opened and water flows in to Lake Pontchartrain and out to the Gulf of Mexico. Lake Pontchartrain is the sixth largest lake in the US and since it is connected to the Gulf of Mexico it is salty. The fishermen and environmentalists have complained for years about the diversion of dirty fresh water out to the Mississippi into the salt lake. Well, it occurs quite often and there has not been any serious damage to the ecology. In fact, geologically, Lake Pontchartrain was created that very way by the Mississippi over times past.
Morganza Spillway starts at Morganza, LA in Poinnte Coupee Parish and flows through the Great Atchafalaya Swamp to the Gulf of Mexico. The spillway parallels the Atchafalaya River to the gulf. It was built in the early 1950s and has guide levees on both sides down into the great swamp area. In its existence it has had two gates opened only a couple of times. I think it has as many 60 or 80 gates. The structure is set back from the river several miles. That area is known as the "forebay" and often fills as the river rises. When the forebay has water in it the Mississippi River at that point is probably six or eight miles wide! That is one of those great accumulators along the river.
The river rises twice a year. It rises in April when the thaw of the Ohio Valley reaches the lower Mississippi River. This year it was a pretty good rise. The Bonnie Carrie Spillway opened when the river reached 17.5 feet on the Carrolton Street gauge. The Morganza Spillway did not open. The forebay did in fact fill up and a couple of high risk farmers lost their soy bean crops.
The second rise is in June. That's when the waters of the Missouri River reach the lower Mississippi Valley. Neither the waters of the Missouri or Ohio by themselves are a threat to the lower Mississippi Valley. That's why a couple of years back St Louis and environs flooded from the Missouri and parts of the upper Mississippi but it was a ho hum thing in the south. That's why today's floods on the upper Mississippi River in Iowa and Missouri and Illinois are going to be ho hum in the south again.
The danger comes when the Ohio thaw is late (and the April rise is late well into May) and the Missouri thaw is early (early like May), them whamo - the lower Mississippi River has too much water in it from end to end.
There are no navigation locks below St. Louis on the Mississippi River and none below probably Louisville, KY on the Ohio (I am not sure about lock locations on the Ohio but there are many). The tow boats require a draft of 9 feet. And even in the years of drought, there is still enough water for most tows to ascend and descend the Mississippi River to St Louis.
The head waters of the Atchafalaya is the Red River flowing out of Texas and Colorado. In recent years, the Corps has made the Red River navigable by installing locks along it in Louisiana. Barge traffic can get to Oklahoma and Texas today at all times. So the Red River is tamed too. Only the Mississippi River is controlled, not tamed through the south. Most of its tributaries along the way are tamed.
It is the lower Mississippi Valley that things can get out of control. The river constantly seeks to change and the levees must be carefully watched at both high and low water. During low water is when repair has to be made. Levees are moved but not in recent times. In my grandfather's day the levee was moved back from its initial location. Our farm faces the river, and we know that some of our land now resides on the bottom of the river. But because we have detailed surveys, we can claim that land for mineral rights - it is still ours.
The levee is granted a right of way. The levee board has absolute control of the levee. But we own the land under it, and on both sides of it. This is why we can graze cattle on the levee. While anybody can drive along the top of the levee, they do not have the right to tresspass on the sides and the bottom areas.
If one looks back at the history of floods one will see that the major problems occurred in Pointe Coupee Parish. It started there and spread all over the place. And that is why my father, a civil engineer, became one of the foremost levee builders along the mighty Mississippi. He grew up there and was a young man that lived through it all. And, yes, he did retire from the US Army Corps of Engineers.
But that is another story at another time. . .
The key locations as far as he was concerned were at Cario, IL; Memphis, TN, Vicksburg, MS; Natchez, MS; Old River Landing in Pointe Coupee Parish, LA; Baton Rouge, LA and New Orleans, LA. Why are those key, well Cairo is where the Ohio meets or joins the Mississippi. It is the beginning of the lower Mississippi valley.
Memphis is the first point below Cairo where the river is constrained. All along the Mississippi are bulges, are wide spots that flood when the river rises. These spots act as sponges soaking up the ever increasing amounts of water flowing south down the river. They are "accumulators" and take the pressure off the levee system. But there is no wide spot at Memphis, all the water passes through a narrow gap with Memphis on a bluff on one side and Arkansas protected by a levee on the other side. So the gauge at Memphis indicates how bad things can get.
The next spot on the river is Vicksburg. It too is on a bluff and the other side is protected by a levee in Louisiana. Once again all the waters of the mighty Mississippi must flow through that gap. The US Army Corps of Engineers has been given the authority to deal with the river and its levees by US Congress. The Corps as it is widely known, divides the upper and lower Mississippi at Vicksburg.
The river is also constrained at Natchez. Again all the water has to pass through that gap on its way to the Gulf of Mexico.
Old River Landing is a spot on the lower Mississippi River Valley where Old Man River was trying to divert itself to the Atchafalaya River. At that point, as the river flows, it is well over 200 miles to the Gulf of Mexico via the Mississippi River and a little less than a 100 miles on the Atchafalaya River. That means the Atchafalaya is a mean swift river that flows down the west side of the Great Atchafalaya swamp past towns like Simmsport, Kortz Springs, Morgan City and so on. All the towns along the Atchafalaya boast of a "ring levee" built after the great 1927 flood. All of those towns have out grown their ring levees and all of those towns fear the great Atchafalaya River.
The Corps has spent billions of dollars at Old River designing and constructing flood control structures to allow some flow off the Mississippi River into the Atchafalaya River. In fact, there is even a hydro electric facility that generates electricity with the drop of some 8 or 10 feet head pressure from the Mississippi River to the Atchafalaya River. There is also a lock to allow barge traffic to go between the rivers and provisions to allow extreme high water from the Mississippi into the Atchafalaya at flood time. This opening would only occur if the Morganza and Bonne Carrie Spillways could not handle the river excesses.
Baton Rouge and south. Baton Rouge is the last bluff on the Mississippi River. The river has never been further east in all geological time, it has been further west often. But the bluff runs out at Baton Rouge, really north Baton Rouge and the old city area. South Baton Rouge, now Louisiana's largest city/parish - 800,000 plus souls, is in the flood plain. Louisiana State University is about where the bluff ends and even part of that is in the flood plain.
New Orleans. Well everybody knows about New Orleans since Katrina. But the gauge watched at New Orleans is the Carrolton Street gauge. The danger points is 18 feet. That's 18 feet above sea level! Yes, New Orleans is protected by levees along the river but they are more or less fixed. When the gauge nears 17 feet or so, the Bonnie Carrie Spillway above New Orleans is opened and water flows in to Lake Pontchartrain and out to the Gulf of Mexico. Lake Pontchartrain is the sixth largest lake in the US and since it is connected to the Gulf of Mexico it is salty. The fishermen and environmentalists have complained for years about the diversion of dirty fresh water out to the Mississippi into the salt lake. Well, it occurs quite often and there has not been any serious damage to the ecology. In fact, geologically, Lake Pontchartrain was created that very way by the Mississippi over times past.
Morganza Spillway starts at Morganza, LA in Poinnte Coupee Parish and flows through the Great Atchafalaya Swamp to the Gulf of Mexico. The spillway parallels the Atchafalaya River to the gulf. It was built in the early 1950s and has guide levees on both sides down into the great swamp area. In its existence it has had two gates opened only a couple of times. I think it has as many 60 or 80 gates. The structure is set back from the river several miles. That area is known as the "forebay" and often fills as the river rises. When the forebay has water in it the Mississippi River at that point is probably six or eight miles wide! That is one of those great accumulators along the river.
The river rises twice a year. It rises in April when the thaw of the Ohio Valley reaches the lower Mississippi River. This year it was a pretty good rise. The Bonnie Carrie Spillway opened when the river reached 17.5 feet on the Carrolton Street gauge. The Morganza Spillway did not open. The forebay did in fact fill up and a couple of high risk farmers lost their soy bean crops.
The second rise is in June. That's when the waters of the Missouri River reach the lower Mississippi Valley. Neither the waters of the Missouri or Ohio by themselves are a threat to the lower Mississippi Valley. That's why a couple of years back St Louis and environs flooded from the Missouri and parts of the upper Mississippi but it was a ho hum thing in the south. That's why today's floods on the upper Mississippi River in Iowa and Missouri and Illinois are going to be ho hum in the south again.
The danger comes when the Ohio thaw is late (and the April rise is late well into May) and the Missouri thaw is early (early like May), them whamo - the lower Mississippi River has too much water in it from end to end.
There are no navigation locks below St. Louis on the Mississippi River and none below probably Louisville, KY on the Ohio (I am not sure about lock locations on the Ohio but there are many). The tow boats require a draft of 9 feet. And even in the years of drought, there is still enough water for most tows to ascend and descend the Mississippi River to St Louis.
The head waters of the Atchafalaya is the Red River flowing out of Texas and Colorado. In recent years, the Corps has made the Red River navigable by installing locks along it in Louisiana. Barge traffic can get to Oklahoma and Texas today at all times. So the Red River is tamed too. Only the Mississippi River is controlled, not tamed through the south. Most of its tributaries along the way are tamed.
It is the lower Mississippi Valley that things can get out of control. The river constantly seeks to change and the levees must be carefully watched at both high and low water. During low water is when repair has to be made. Levees are moved but not in recent times. In my grandfather's day the levee was moved back from its initial location. Our farm faces the river, and we know that some of our land now resides on the bottom of the river. But because we have detailed surveys, we can claim that land for mineral rights - it is still ours.
The levee is granted a right of way. The levee board has absolute control of the levee. But we own the land under it, and on both sides of it. This is why we can graze cattle on the levee. While anybody can drive along the top of the levee, they do not have the right to tresspass on the sides and the bottom areas.
If one looks back at the history of floods one will see that the major problems occurred in Pointe Coupee Parish. It started there and spread all over the place. And that is why my father, a civil engineer, became one of the foremost levee builders along the mighty Mississippi. He grew up there and was a young man that lived through it all. And, yes, he did retire from the US Army Corps of Engineers.
But that is another story at another time. . .
Thursday, June 5, 2008
The Walker's and Their Dogs . . .
The Walker's and their dogs - the count is up to four now since we have lived here. The Walkers are our neighbors, Scott and Christie, a young couple with three children, a girl, a boy and a girl.
Since we have lived here they have gone through two cats and four dogs. The first dog was Penny. Penny was a snappish dog that got along with nobody, at least no of us. She would as soon bite you as look at you and remained in the back yard under control.
I guess to calm Penny down, they added Elvis, a Basset Hound with one blue eye and one brown eye - very disconcerting to look at. As lively as Penny was, is as slow as Elvis is. Big deep voice and Penny would start barking and get Elvis going, and go he did. He barked and barked and barked.
Well one day, Penny took a snap at one of the children and Christie decided she had to go. We breathed a sigh of relief, as with Penny gone Elvis did not bark. He was to stupid to figure it out how to himself and he moped around the back yard.
About then, they decided their two cats had to go. The were spraying up the garage something fierce - I guess the house too. At any rate the cats were no longer with us one day. Now we could enjoy our flower beds with out cat deposits in them again.
Then one day a little fur ball of a dog showed up, a cute little Shitz Zu pup - named Patches. Patches did not want to be in the back yard with the big old Basset hound and found many holes in and under the fence to escape. And escape he did.
We befriended Patches. After a few weeks of capturing him and taking him home we fed him. He had his own water bowl and many bags of treats. He even had a mat to sleep on. Patches would come over and stay until the kids got home from school and he would go home an play. When they let him out in the backyard at night, he came over and scratched on the back door for attention. Naturally, he got the attention and a snack and he would climb up in a chair and go to sleep until he got called in.
Patches roamed the nearby houses. One house was under construction and Patches would go over there and get chicken bones and the like to chew on. So he was always looking for something and had no fear of the workmen.
That was Patches' undoing. At the next new house, he must have stolen a lunch or something like that. He was a nuisance in that regard. Or maybe one of the workmen just did not like dogs. But Patches got kicked in the ribs. Scott took him to Vet and the Vet said he had seven ribs broken and they had punctured his lungs. So Patches got put down. We miss Patches and the other neighbor dog, Roofie, missed him too. Roofie was skitish too now and I figured she had been kicked also. Roofie finally trusted us but then her owner's got her electronic collar working, and she visits no more.
Poor old Elvis mourned Patches and we fed him all of Patches treats through the fence. After a while he got over it. You could tell he was lonely.
Now a new dog has appeared, Priscilla, a young Boxer mix. She has huge feet. Priscilla gets out much like Patches did but since she is growing bigger by the day, her free time is nearing an end. She does not accept that, pounds the fence, has learned to get on her side and skinny under the fences.
Priscilla, is a little skitish of us but tolerates us. We have an old bird bath bowl sitting on the ground out back. She will walk up to the bowl, step in, do a few turns around and lie down in it. We figure she must have some Labrador Retriever in her blood lines. But she is short haired like a Boxer.
Priscilla has the run of the neighborhood. She seeks out other dogs to play with. Our neighbors to the West, the Enrights, have a dog named Bradley. Bradley is a big dog and stays penned in the back yard all day long. Priscilla goes over to play with him and has, in general, befriended the Enrights. So she is tolerated over there.
The routine is for Priscilla to escape out of the back yard back fence, come though our yard and go over to see Bradley. Any dog on the street, being walked or otherwise, is greeted by Priscilla who wants to play. She's been brought back home by any number of neighbors. It is only a matter of time before the dog catcher gets her.
Oh, yes, the cat. Well they got another cat. It was a house cat until Priscilla came along. Now the cat has the garage, and the garage door is kept open for it to have a place of refuge amongst the area of dogs. I chased the cat out our garage the other day. I hope the cat survives the Coyotes and other feral animals that roam the area.
The kids are growing, two in school and the youngest is pushing three now. A very nice family that can not say no to pets. Sometimes we think the pets overwhelm them. Children first them pets and it seems the children are as far as control gets.
Since we have lived here they have gone through two cats and four dogs. The first dog was Penny. Penny was a snappish dog that got along with nobody, at least no of us. She would as soon bite you as look at you and remained in the back yard under control.
I guess to calm Penny down, they added Elvis, a Basset Hound with one blue eye and one brown eye - very disconcerting to look at. As lively as Penny was, is as slow as Elvis is. Big deep voice and Penny would start barking and get Elvis going, and go he did. He barked and barked and barked.
Well one day, Penny took a snap at one of the children and Christie decided she had to go. We breathed a sigh of relief, as with Penny gone Elvis did not bark. He was to stupid to figure it out how to himself and he moped around the back yard.
About then, they decided their two cats had to go. The were spraying up the garage something fierce - I guess the house too. At any rate the cats were no longer with us one day. Now we could enjoy our flower beds with out cat deposits in them again.
Then one day a little fur ball of a dog showed up, a cute little Shitz Zu pup - named Patches. Patches did not want to be in the back yard with the big old Basset hound and found many holes in and under the fence to escape. And escape he did.
We befriended Patches. After a few weeks of capturing him and taking him home we fed him. He had his own water bowl and many bags of treats. He even had a mat to sleep on. Patches would come over and stay until the kids got home from school and he would go home an play. When they let him out in the backyard at night, he came over and scratched on the back door for attention. Naturally, he got the attention and a snack and he would climb up in a chair and go to sleep until he got called in.
Patches roamed the nearby houses. One house was under construction and Patches would go over there and get chicken bones and the like to chew on. So he was always looking for something and had no fear of the workmen.
That was Patches' undoing. At the next new house, he must have stolen a lunch or something like that. He was a nuisance in that regard. Or maybe one of the workmen just did not like dogs. But Patches got kicked in the ribs. Scott took him to Vet and the Vet said he had seven ribs broken and they had punctured his lungs. So Patches got put down. We miss Patches and the other neighbor dog, Roofie, missed him too. Roofie was skitish too now and I figured she had been kicked also. Roofie finally trusted us but then her owner's got her electronic collar working, and she visits no more.
Poor old Elvis mourned Patches and we fed him all of Patches treats through the fence. After a while he got over it. You could tell he was lonely.
Now a new dog has appeared, Priscilla, a young Boxer mix. She has huge feet. Priscilla gets out much like Patches did but since she is growing bigger by the day, her free time is nearing an end. She does not accept that, pounds the fence, has learned to get on her side and skinny under the fences.
Priscilla, is a little skitish of us but tolerates us. We have an old bird bath bowl sitting on the ground out back. She will walk up to the bowl, step in, do a few turns around and lie down in it. We figure she must have some Labrador Retriever in her blood lines. But she is short haired like a Boxer.
Priscilla has the run of the neighborhood. She seeks out other dogs to play with. Our neighbors to the West, the Enrights, have a dog named Bradley. Bradley is a big dog and stays penned in the back yard all day long. Priscilla goes over to play with him and has, in general, befriended the Enrights. So she is tolerated over there.
The routine is for Priscilla to escape out of the back yard back fence, come though our yard and go over to see Bradley. Any dog on the street, being walked or otherwise, is greeted by Priscilla who wants to play. She's been brought back home by any number of neighbors. It is only a matter of time before the dog catcher gets her.
Oh, yes, the cat. Well they got another cat. It was a house cat until Priscilla came along. Now the cat has the garage, and the garage door is kept open for it to have a place of refuge amongst the area of dogs. I chased the cat out our garage the other day. I hope the cat survives the Coyotes and other feral animals that roam the area.
The kids are growing, two in school and the youngest is pushing three now. A very nice family that can not say no to pets. Sometimes we think the pets overwhelm them. Children first them pets and it seems the children are as far as control gets.
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