Russellville Lives. MB

                                                        Second Lives

Those of us who have elected to live in this community of the no longer young share one common characteristic: we all lived former lives that involved coping with the seemingly endless challenges that adventure posed.  As we adjust to the new challenges of our second life, it might be interesting to learn of those first lives of our current neighbors.  However those first lives went, the excitement of the game touched us all.  We will check with some neighbors here.  

                                                    Marty Boettcher

 Marty's engagement with life is way, way beyond normal.  Maybe it's because in her 90-year slog through this vale of tears she has confronted each medical insult, each family tragedy, each cruel assault on her mental faculties with a courageous grace that can only be accounted for by an extraordinary spiritual will.  Through it all she has made the Biblical Job look like little Johnny Sunshine.

Born in Dayton, Oregon in 1931, the family moved to Portland after her father's death in 1940.  She attended high school at the Catholic Immaculate Academy. In 1948 Marty spent a day in the sun with friends and came home with what she thought was a sunburn on her back.  It wasn't a sunburn, it was encephalitis, a rare virus that is spread by ticks or infected insects or, in some cases, by the body's own immune system. She almost died.  It started a lifelong ordeal of recurring seizures that sometimes brought her to death's door.

But she survived and dedicated herself to a life of service.  The detailed accounts of her missions would fill volumes but here's a CliffsNotes (remember those college days? Who needs to actually read the books assigned when there are CliffsNotes?) summation of Marty Boettcher's cavalry charge to where there is a need for social adjustment:

After high school and classes at Clackamas Community College and Portland Secretarial School, Marty served on the Clackamas Election Board, eventually becoming chairman.

After the tragic drowning death of her son in Johnson Creek she worked with other volunteers to improve the entire watershed. And it was in that watershed in 1907 that the Bell Rose rail tracks were laid and trains ran on it until the 1990s. The tracks were removed and it became the 36-mile Springwater Trail, all the way from southeast Portland to Boring, Oregon.  Marty worked with the organizations that made it all happen.

Perhaps her most dramatic contribution to the national political culture was her role in bringing to life  the seminal Oregon vote by mail system.   For years Marty worked with other volunteers in low-turnout elections where all day long there would be maybe one or two voters show up.  The precinct volunteers'  constant complaints to the election board resulted in the creation of what became the Oregon vote by mail system. The fraud-free innovation gave citizens an easy way to choose their political representatives. 

From her earliest childhood the Catholic church has been an important influence in her daily life and she takes an active role as a member of the Altar Society at Christ the King Catholic Church in Milwaukie.  That is in addition to a dozen more charitable organizations where she is actively involved. 

Many residents in this stack of hallways we call home have led remarkable lives, but the harsh truth is, we are not all created equal.  In this dangerous jungle where we spend our lives, some seem to have a mysterious inner fire,  a resilient core that carries them through the bitter times of adversity as they continue accomplishing grand deeds.

Marty Boettcher is one of those.

Meet Ray Niehaus

    If you want to know anything about Russellville Park,  just ask Ray Niehaus because after living here for 16 years, if he doesn't have the answer for you then you don't need to know the answer.  For instance, ask Ray: Did the Overton dining room used to have a big circular coffee table in front of the  fireplace that featured an album containing pictures of the residents?  Ask him: Was there once a dance floor in one corner where the more agile residents would trip the light fantastic?

 Ray: "Yes."

Hey, Clyde, guess the age of that guy over there reading The Oregonian in front of the elevator.        Clyde: "I don't know, probably late 70s, early 80s."  Sorry, Clyde, no cigar. Ray Niehaus was born in Quincy, Illinois in 1928.  Do the math.  After 13 years and starting his education in a Catholic elementary school, Ray's family moved to Portland, Oregon, where Ray entered Central Catholic High School. 

 As the heaviest running back on the football team (152 lbs.) he was given the role of fullback in the T formation where he struck terror in the minds of the linebackers of the opposing teams..  He also pitched for the Rams' baseball team. America was still fighting World War II in June of 1945 when Ray graduated six months before his 18th birthday.  He had always wanted to learn to swim so instead of going to a local pool he joined the Coast Guard where the only water he ever experienced came from his daily shower.

After leaving the Coast Guard at the end of the war, Ray entered a seminary.  After five and a half years he decided the cloistered life was not for him and he left. Some time later he called his brother and asked if he and his wife knew of any young ladies in the parish with whom he might become acquainted. They gave him two names: Mary and Prudy. Mary, an Italian beauty who might have been a clone of Gina Lollobrigida, also owned a car.  Cry your eyes out, Prudy. Ray knew he had chosen well and soon the wedding bells were ringing.  Years later, Mary accused Ray of pursuing her because of her car and Ray had to admit it didn't hurt. Their lives were brightened when Tori, Matt, and Mike came along.  After retiring from teaching, Mary and Ray found their way to Russellville Park in 2005 where they had a happy 13 years together. Tori is a retired nurse and Ray says he could not have made it without her help.

His time in the seminary gave Ray a solid education in Latin and in his lifetime of teaching it became one of his subjects along with English and counseling.  At Madison High School where he spent most of the teaching years he also coached Junior Varsity baseball One day a couple of boys were scuffling in the hall and Ray stepped in to break it up by putting his arms around their shoulders which resulted in all three of them tangled up on the floor.  "Okay," Ray told himself, "That's it for me. Stopping fights is not in my pay grade." 

Ray never had doubts about his choosing the classroom as his life's work and it gave him deep satisfaction to see his efforts light fires in young minds.  Even when one of his Latin students raised his hand with a question after Ray had delivered a long explanation of a complicated grammatical construction. The student wanted to know how the Romans built roads.  Ray couldn't speak for a minute or two wondering how the hell that kid got into a Latin class?  The next week the kid was gone, still wondering about those roads.  Once during a counseling session with a young lady who was transferring to Madison from Grant High School, she told Ray, "I want to come to Madison so I can get my shit together."  Again, Ray says to himself, "Okaaaaaaaaaaaaa." 

If you see Ray reading The Oregonian in front of the elevator and are curious about Roman chariot road construction, ask him.  He'll enlighten you in Latin and tell you how wide to make the lanes.  If you're just trying to get your stuff together, keep going.

Meet Rodney Phillips

 

                                                          

Back when I was young, I read a book about reincarnation and was captivated by the concept. I immediately decided to come back as Errol Flynn because he had certain proclivities that seemed interesting at the time. But later maturity kicked in and now I've changed my mind.  I want to come back as Rodney Phillips.  I'll tell you why in a minute.

In 1946 Rodney was born in North Dakota but quickly joined his parents on the Oregon Trail as they followed the Columbia River down to the Pacific Ocean at Astoria, Oregon.  He grew up there gaining a lifelong aversion to oysters and salmon, which his parents' friends and neighbors over-supplied the Phillip's kitchen. Rodney went from Astoria High School to the University of Oregon, where he graduated in 1969.

Now here's why I want his life:  after the U. of O. he did not start selling used Buicks with suspect transmissions.  He did not start harassing relatives, friends, and people on the street to buy life insurance policies from his potential new employer, Mutual of Omaha.  What he did do was pursue a degree in library science that led him to employment with the New York Public Library where, over the years, he moved from section to section of that massive archival warehouse of 20 million collected books, manuscripts, and other documents.  Rodney Phillips went to that iconic building guarded by two enormous lions where every day of his working life he was immersed in the accumulated knowledge of all the human beings who have ever populated this planet. From the rendering of some knuckle-dragger's cave art to the latest in scientific and artistic endeavors,  how do you find a more compelling venue in which to devote your life to curating the wisdom of the ages?

Rodney has written and published elegant volumes of beautifully designed books.  Some contain his own poetry.  One has an eye-catching title he pulled from William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream:  Exit Moonshine Enter Wall. Others include The Hand of the Poet and A Secret Location of the Lower Eastside.  

I didn't mention that he has a commanding "radio" voice of deep timbre that is pleasing to the ear.  He could start a second career recording audio books from his penthouse apartment on the fifth floor.  I have a proposal:  On the 4th of July, 2022, the residents of Russellville Park must gather around and listen to Rodney read Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. I know the Civil War has nothing to do with the founding of our nation but none of the founding fathers wrote with the profound passion of Father Abraham.  And for patriotic discourse, nothing tops his speech at Gettysburg.  Rodney's voice is already in my ears.  Listen to him: ...Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure.  Cue the fife and drums corps.

Second Lives/Former Lives

                                                                Second Lives

Those of us who have elected to live in this community of the no longer young share one common characteristic: we all lived former lives that involved coping with the seemingly endless challenges that adventure posed.  As we adjust to the new challenges of our second life, it might be interesting to learn of those first lives of our current neighbors.  However those first lives went, the excitement of the game touched us all.  We will check with some neighbors here.  

                                                           Lewis Wilson Barrett

Lou and his wife, Mary, have lived in Russellville Park since 2016, moving here from California to be near their two sons. In his former life,  Lou worked as a highway traffic officer for the state of California until his law enforcement career abruptly ended when he was only 45 years old.  He was standing behind the open door of his patrol car, writing a ticket for a speeder he had stopped when he suddenly pitched forward into the front seat.  He remembers thinking, "What the...?" But then he recovered and delivered the citation to the speeder.  It was a few days later when he was with his patrol partner that the real one hit. Now he knew he was in trouble and he told his partner, "You better get me to a hospital." The heart attack put an end to the job he loved, a traffic officer cruising California highways.  Those heart-pounding 110 miles per hour car chases,  the spin outs, the crashes and most of all, the camaraderie with his fellow road warriors.

Lou and his partner saw a car parked on the shoulder of the road with the driver slumped over the steering wheel. Lou approached the driver's side and rapped  on the window with no response so opening the door he shook the driver awake. "Do you know you were going over 85 miles an hour, weaving in and out of traffic when we pulled you over?" Lou said to him.  "And who was that guy who jumped out of the car and ran across the field?" Lou's partner asked him.  Trying to get himself together the driver stammered, "Oh, that was probably my brother but you'll never catch him 'cuz he's really fast." Lou gave him points for being smart enough to pull over and stop driving so wrote him up for public drunkenness instead of the more serious charge of driving under the influence. 

Lou's mother, Marjorie Barrett, brought her six and a half pound son into this vale of tears having provided him with all the essential attachments and a loud voice to acknowledge his new circumstance.  He was given the name of his great, great paternal grandfather on the 28th day of January, 1942.  It is worth noting that both his father and Superman were born in the same small town of Metropolis, Illinois and became good friends although his father thought the cape thing and the big "S" on his chest was a bit ostentatious.  While there was no report of any celestial event marking Lou's birth,  America was still in shock over the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor 52 days prior to his arrival.

In his growing up years Lou's family, which included a younger sister, Suzzanne, moved often from one small town to another following his father's job changes as a barber.  His father's alcoholism contributed to the troubled environment of the family but it only strengthened Lou's inner resolve to deal with it.  In 12 years of schooling he attended 13 different schools so that making new friends became a valuable personal skill that served him all his life.  As a young man in his early 20s Lou had his own experience with alcohol, waking up one morning in 1971 after a night of drinking and feeling awful he said to himself, I don't ever want to feel this way again. And he never did. For the rest of his life he would have a beer from time to time with friends but that was it: a beer, rarely two.  End of the alcohol story.

In Lou's senior year of high school his family made a major move from Illinois to California. It was goodbye old friends and hello La La Land.  After high school all those World War II babies became fodder for a military misadventure in the jungles of Vietnam.  Being drafted into the army was at the top of Lou's list of things he did not want to do so he enlisted in the United States Navy. After two years he was mustered out with no battle scars and no tattoos. Hopping from one job to another he made a move he had thought about ever since he was a little kid: he applied to and was accepted into the California Highway Patrol (wearing thick soled shoes to qualify for the the 5'10" height requirement).   

The 16 weeks training academy was intense and separated the contenders from the pretenders. Up every morning at 5:00 AM for physical training, a hearty breakfast, then power classes with tests at the end of every week.  Two failed tests and you were gone.  Graduation from the academy sent you to riding with a training officer after which you were assigned to an area as a California Highway Patrolman.  Look out motorized miscreants. 

His new partner, Ezra Chaeffer, was a big guy, 6' 6" and 265 pounds, a couple of  years older than Lou, making Ezra a commanding presence in any confrontation.  Once chasing down a young speeder, they had him pulled over and were talking to him at the rear of his vehicle which he had left partially blocking the road.  When Lou asked the kid to move the car off to the shoulder the kid replied, "You want it moved, move it yourself."  Ezra, who was standing behind Lou, reached around him and snatched the kid by the front of his shirt, lifting him off the ground and almost knocking Lou in his head with the kid's knees as he brought him around and said something in his ear.  Then Ezra returned the kid to where he had been standing before. Ezra said to Lou, "Ask him again."  The car was quickly moved.  Lou never asked his partner what he said to the kid.

"I've got a girl I want you to meet," Ezra told Lou one day. "She is special." Married people believe all single people should be married.  Lou laughed him off but Ezra didn't let it go until Lou said, "Okay, how do I meet her?"  Ezra made the call.

Mary Mapes was two years younger than Lou's 28 and had recently completed a four year tour in the US Air Force. Mary was a looker.  Bright and funny.  Her father was a Sergeant in the San Luis Obispo's Sheriff Department. Matchmaker Ezra had scored a direct hit and 17 days after the blind match up, the two veterans were speeding over the Donner Pass in a snowstorm, destination Reno, Nevada. 

                                  Go'in to the chapel 'un wer  Go'in to get married 

Who needs long engagements?   

The sweet mystery of life is how reality's flow from the time of Lou's birth, moment by moment through all the years of good times and bad; the constant moving, the family drama, his membership in his church, all the events combined to create the moral core of the man.  He became the cop you want flashing those blue and red lights in your rearview mirror.  Lou's prime directive was the Golden Rule: treat people the way you want to be treated.  Of course, some people just don't want to be treated nicely.

At any given time during the years of his second life you might find Lou Barrett pushing a cart through the halls of Russellville Park, picking up donation of items from the residents that will go to places such as shelters for abused women and children.  Or promoting the donations from Russellville residents  to the staff member's annual Christmas fund. That's what he does now.  That's who he is.

                                                 

A Knight To Remember

 I met Phil Knight (you know, the shoe guy) in 1975 after my adventures in working with the World Football League's Portland Storm which got called for permanent delay of game.  Knowing I was out of a job, my good friend Bill Bowerman arranged a lunch date for me with his partner Phil Knight in the startup shoe company, Nike.  Phil told me of the company's plan to make a major move upward by signing top athletes in professional football and basketball as Nike endorsers.  He offered me the job of recruiting the athletes. I had agreed to go to work for another company two days before our lunch and I thanked Phil for the offer but didn't accept it.  I should have.

We remained friends over the years and when I suggested to Bowerman that a book should be written about his amazing life, Phil underwrote my expenses for the research (I accrued 24 hours of taped interviews with Bowerman) on the biography that onetime track star and Sports Illustrated journalist Kenny Moore wrote: BOWERMAN AND THE MEN OF OREGON.

The last few days I've been viewing the NCAA Track & Field Championships and the US Olympic Trials in the magnificent stadium Knight had constructed on Oregon's Hayward Field and it occured to me that a case could be made for citizen Knight being recognized as the state of Oregon's Most Valuable Player (MVP).  Phil, by the way, is a skilled writer and I attended a breakfast on the University of Oregon campus where he was being honored for his book, Shoe Dog.  I told him that morning it was unfortunate he got distracted making sneakers when he could have been celebrated as a famous author.

As a history major at Oregon I did a lot of reading related to our state and Phil would rank with just a few other men and women for that MVP award.  From selling shoes out of the trunk of his car to building the most powerful sports marketing Goliath in the world is in itself an incredible story. But even more than that achievement and the charities he and his wife, Penny, have funded in both academic and medical gifts, it is the projection world wide of the Oregon mystique that is worthy of celebration.  Phil Knight absorbed that spiritual essence that Bowerman taught as coming from the pioneers who blazed the Oregon Trail.  The cowards stayed home, Bowerman said, the weak ones died on the trail and the survivors became the men of Oregon (and, of course, the pioneer women of Oregon).

I'm proud of our friendship.

Save A City

Portland , Oregon was more than a pleasant city to visit or to call your home.  It was a cultural attitude, layers of unwritten beliefs laid down by generations of citizens who reflected a sort of spiritual understanding of how civilized people should treat each other. Tolerance of human strangeness. Compassion for those in need.  Respect for courageous strivers like those brave pioneers who blazed the Oregon trail.  

As a native Oregonian I find the destruction of that place of civic mystique a terrible loss that cannot be allowed to continue.  I have an idea that might work to heal this open wound.  First, identify the elements that have created the problem:  (1) Thuggish behavior of people who have infiltrated legitimate groups of protestors and vandalized buildings.  (2) Encampments of people who have been labeled "homeless" and have trashed the city with their irresponsible squatting.

 Citizens Protesting:The Constitution protects the rights of citizen to protest in the streets.  It does not protect a right to vandalize and loot.  Using legitimate protests as cover for vandalizing and looting must be made a federal crime with severe penalties.  Hard time in federal prisons.  In the event of protests public officials must give heavy publicity to the severe penalties for those offenses.  Because of its connection to protected protesting, new federal legislation must be drafted to make this happen.

Public encampments:  Squatters must be registered with civic authorities and classified as to their reason for not complying with municipal regulations.  Welfare class citizens must be provided with public assisted shelter in an organized location.  People with mental disabilities must be referred to appropriate authorities.  Who pays for this?  Portland Fund Me on line.  Focus on Portland citizens as well as citizens all across America who will be told Portland's need, like Phoenix, to arise from the ashes of its predecessor.

Take down the freaking plywood.  Rout the squatters.  Let Stumptown live again.

Living The Dream

 My friend Jim Grelle lived one segment of his life as an international celebrity who could run one mile faster than all but three or four other young men on planet Earth.  At one time he held the world record for breaking four minutes in the mile more times than any other runner.  He was not only swift of foot but swift with spotting what was funny in this field of dreams we all share.

While in college he often raced in shoes his coach Bill Bowerman had constructed, searching for a perfect blend of lightness and durability. Bowerman's experimental creations would never win a blue ribbon for sleek beauty and in fact some of them were laughingly ugly with odd ends of material sticking out and glue smears leaving strange birthmarks.  Once in a race the runner next to Jim at the starting line looked down at jim's shoes and said to him, "What the (expletive) are those things?"  "Those things," Jim replied, "are what will get me back here before you do."

Jim's racing years were the adventures we lesser mortals fantasize about. Performing before thousands in cities around the world.  He and his Oregon teammate Bill Dellinger were entered in a meet in Rio de Janeiro and the day after their events they went to the beach before their evening flight home.  As will happen on a sunny beach in Rio the two athletes encountered the girls from Ipanema who invited them to chat and in the course of the afternoon one of the girls asked the boys which of them was fastest.  Both claimed that honor and so the girls said there must be a race to determine the truth.  One of them drew a line in the sand and said they should race to the water where the first runner in would be declared champion.

One of the girls had a scarf with which she started the race and off they went.  Now these two Olympians raced all over the world for fan approval (and some discreet folding currency), but this was for the approval of the girls from Ipanema.  As they neared the water Dellinger saw Grelle was a step ahead and he made a mighty leap for the water.  Don't look.  His speed propelled him skidding stomach-first on the wet, hard packed sand, well short of the water, and it removed skin.

End of the sand castle with the girls from Ipanema.  All the way home on the airplane, Dellinger rode with both hands pulling his shirt away from his body. Grelle's compassionate commiseration didn't help the second placer.