4-H Club (2)

Going Wild at Texas A & M

Mr. Werst has a club coupe.  There was a bench seat in the front and a very crowded seat behind it.   Six boys and Mr. Werst piled into that car and rode all the way to College Station.   I have no idea where we put the luggage.  I guess we didn’t have much.   

We were not exactly models of deportment.   We were away from home at the A and M campus and we celebrated our independence  Oh, we didn’t get drunk or anything like that.  After all fourteen years old wouldn’t have been allowed to purchase liquor.  Most of the boys wanted to experiment with tobacco, but I held out on that one for the most part.    

We were interested in girls, but had no idea about how to ask for dates and got turned down every time.  Then there was this little happening.   A vendor was selling refreshments under a shade tree on the lawn.  He kept calling, “Ice cream, “Chocolate Milk.”   We stood there awhile and Bob (Hays) started mimicking him.  He would shout out “ice cream, chocolate milks.”  Instead of being upset the guy thanked him for his help.  Up until the time of Bob's recent death he would call me on the phone and before identifying himself, and will say, “ice cream, chocolate milk.”  Of course I’m was the only man in the world who knew what that meant.

In the district contest, our rivals were from Fisher County.  4-H club contests are based on identification with counties rather than town.  We competed with them in several tune up contests as we prepared for the state contest.   We couldn’t stand them, and they couldn’t stand us.   

At A and M, they  were assigned to the same dorm that was assigned to us.   We were on the first floor; they were on the third floor.   When they saw us coming, they would run to their rooms, get bottles of water and pour them on our heads.   One night, we decided, we’d had enough of that, so we loaded up our bottles and went after them.  We got caught.   They fellow who caught us asked us what county we were from.   We told him the truth.  The next day we had a visit from Mr. Werst.  He told us we were on probation and that one more episode would mean that we would be taking an early ride home.   None of us wanted to face our parents with that kind of humiliation, so we behaved ourselves the rest of the time.