Quote of the day:

Free speech is my right to say what you don’t want to hear.
—George Orwell

When our family moved to Richland in June 1957, I already knew some of the kids there because we had been frequent visitors to my grandparents’ house, and their youngest son Reed, only three years older than I was, had introduced me to some of the boys in his neighborhood. Like Bobby Weinhold, who lived about three doors up South Race Street from him. As it turned out, Bobby was my age, so he and I were in the same class when I went to Richland School and later Elco High School.

Rob Weinhold (as he now likes to be called, though I’ll always think of him as Bobby, just as he’ll probably always think of me as Jimmy) self-published a book back in 2012:

That Amazon listing is wrong; it should be “American Exceptionalism”; it seems that once you get an Amazon listing, it’s difficult if not impossible to change or correct it. Anyway, it’s a conservative screed, as it proclaims right there in the title, so I didn’t read it. Should you be interested, you can purchase the hardcover edition from Amazon for $41.20 (as of this writing) or the Kindle edition for only $3.99. 

Rob was about to self-publish a second book about a year or two ago and he offered to send me a copy, although he warned me that it

is very politically conservative and pro Right Wing, so it may not be to your liking, and I don’t want to ruin our lifelong friendship! Just let me know.

So I took a pass on it, not wanting to, as Rob put it, ruin a lifelong friendship.

Anyway back to his first book, and you’ll notice that I provided the Amazon link for those who might be interested.

Although I didn’t read the whole thing, I did read the beginning, and there were a couple things there that I took exception to. Don’t worry, they are not political.

First of all, he refers to Richland as a “sleepy little town”. 

What’s so “sleepy” about it? I mean we had those carnivals on Saturday nights throughout July every summer with fireworks around the Fourth of July. Ain’t nuthin’ sleepy ’bout that!

Then there was that huge conflagration in April 1960 that burned down Rich Maid Kitchens and Skippy’s luncheonette. Nuthin’ sleepy ’bout that neither, even if my sister and I did sleep through all those wailing fire engines that came roaring past our house.

But that’s not the main item I want to talk about. It’s that thing about Richland being unusual in that an active railroad crossing intersects the town square. It’s what I call Richland’s Urban Legend.

I’ll have more to say about that in my next post.

 

Note: When you purchase something after clicking Amazon links in my posts, I may earn a small commission. As of this date, I have yet to earn anything. 😎