Remembering Dick Roberts...

The book that started it all...

About a year ago, I was involved in interviewing a young man for a position that my employer had available.  One of my co-workers was interviewing him at the same time.  Near the end of the interview, my colleague made a couple of recommendations to the young fellow whom we were interviewing (and ultimately hired).  One of these suggestions was that the fellow read How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie.  That suggestions brought a flood of memories to me about my very personal experience with the Dale Carnegie program in the mid-1960s.

I was sent to Norman, Oklahoma, in August of 1965 to teach in the Naval ROTC program.  One day in the following February, I saw an ad in the Norman Transcript for a free demonstration of the Dale Carnegie course in Effective Communications and Human Relations.  I decided to attend, as I was interested in doing anything I could to help me become a better instructor for the Navy.  I called the number in the ad and signed up for the free meeting which was to be held on a Sunday afternoon at the local Holiday Inn.

I arrived a few minutes early and was greeted by a most gregarious individual, short, heavy-set, and an absolute bundle of enthusiasm.  "Hi, I'm Dick Roberts. I'm going to predict that today's presentation will change your life!"  He also exuded self-confidence without being the slightest bit arrogant.  This was my introduction to Joseph Richard "Dick" Roberts, whom I would eventually learn owned the Dale Carnegie franchise for all 58 counties of the state of Oklahoma.  He also was to become my friend.  Dick asked a few questions about my background and how I came to be interested in the class and then pointed out some refreshments that had been provided.

Gradually, the room filled up until there were perhaps 75 people present.  After we were seated, Dick introduced himself and then stunned us by going around the room and introducing everyone by name and sharing a fact or two about each of us.  "This is Bob Mead, currently a Lieutenant in the Navy.  He's recently been sent here to teach naval engineering in the NROTC unit.  And Bob is originally from Schenectady, New York."  Wow!  We realized that as Dick was introducing himself to each of us and asking about our interest in the class, he was also memorizing our names and the facts we had shared with him.  And he remembered these things and associated them with our faces!  I think everyone there was impressed.

Dick went on to describe the course, its contents and format.  He spoke of the benefits and long term life-changing potential of the classes.  And I signed up to take the next class, which was to begin in mid-March.

I arrived on the night of the first session, in which we were asked to introduce ouselves and briefly explain why we had decided to take the class.  There was a Catholic nun who had been selected to head up her convent.  There was a football coach who had coached under Bear Bryant and had recently been hired by Oklahoma Head Coach Gomer Jones.  A local veterinarian had signed up based on the recommendation of his brother.  The class was diverse to say the least, and each of us had our own unique reasons for signing up.

Over the next several weeks, we told stories, explained processes, or made impromptu speeches, a new assignment every week.  But we also learned memory techniques and other useful skills, following many of the writings of Dale Carnegie.  As we neared the end of our course, disaster struck for me -- I received orders to report to UCLA for a summer teaching assignment.  I was heartbroken.  I had come to love my classmates and the course itself, and our teacher, Dick Roberts.  I wanted to finish with my class.  I called Dick and told him the bad news.

Dick didn't even hesitate.  "When you get back, we'll put you in a different class.  And if you want to start back at the beginning, that's just fine.  Nobody should miss out on the whole experience."  And there was never the remotest suggestion that this would cost anything.  I had paid my tuition, and that was that.

I went to California, and when I returned at the end of Summer, I did enroll in session 1 of a new class.  I completed that one with my fellow class members.  Dick asked me if I'd be willing to be a "Graduate Assistant" to assist in other classes.  I eagerly accepted and assisted with three or four classes in the Oklahoma City area.  Even though I eventually had to give that role up due to time constraints, Dick Roberts and I stayed in touch for several years.

As I got to know Dick personally, I recognized that he was a very special individual.  He was a devoted family man.  He and his wife, Mary, had ten children and 2 foster children.  They had adopted two special needs kids who suffered from cerebral palsy.  He used to joke that his house had so many bedrooms, it fel like a dormitory.  He would sometimes introduce himself as "Dick Roberts, the father of twelve beautiful kids.  You know I'm either a conscientious Catholic or a careless Protestant!"

The Dale Carnegie course had a profound impact on my life.  I still, some fifty years later, employ many of the principles I learned.  I sometimes reflect on my classmates and wonder what ever became of them.  I hear the echo of Dick Roberts in his cheerleader role, "Act enthusiastic and you'll be enthusiastic!"

Dick passed away in 2007.  A portion of his obituary notice speaks volumes about this caring, loving, wonderful man: "He is survived by his wife, 10 children and 2 foster children: Paul and Rosa Roberts, Martha and Ken Vass, Rick and Cathy Roberts, Anna Marie Forbes, Teresa and Bill Holt, Rob and Linda Roberts, Russ Roberts, Michael Roberts, Chuck Roberts, Greg and LaDeana Roberts, Curtis Faust (foster son), Corinne and Bill Blankenship (foster daughter and spouse) and Mary Leal Roberts. He cherished his 22 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.

Memorial contributions can be made to United Cerebral Palsy of Oklahoma, 10400 Greenbriar Place., Suite 101, Oklahoma City, OK 73159"

Rest in Peace, my friend.

A Musical Adventure...

USS Northampton (CLC-1) Home of my first midshipman cruise

In the summer of 1959, I went on my first midshipman cruise.  I had just been awarded a NROTC scholarship and received orders to the USS Northampton (CLC-1), home ported in Norfolk, Virginia.  It was to be an 8-week cruise that was designed to introduce first-year midshipmen from both the Naval Academy and the 52 NROTC units to the ways of the Navy.  We would reside on dozens of ships on both coasts (and even in the Great Lakes, as some vessels participated in the formal opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway).  We would rotate through each of the departments on the ship -- engineering, operations, gunnery, supply -- and be introduced to the ways in which a ship operates.  We would stand watches alongside the enlisted crew, chip paint, clean bilges, perform scullery duty, and stay very, very busy.

But all was not work.  The Northampton participated in New York City's Hendryck Hudson festival, a public celebration of the 350th anniversary of Hudson's discovery of his namesake river.  Around the 8th of June, we proceeded from Norfolk along the east coast to Manhattan Harbor, anchored in the Hudson River around 60th street, and spent nearly a week participating in parades and festivities and hosting VIPs on the ship.  And of course there were opportunities for shore leave when I didn't have a duty assignment aboard ship.

On my first day off, I and a couple of my shipmates took the shuttle boat ashore and decided we would check out Greenwich Village.  None of us had ever been there, and we had heard it was a great place to find entertainment and good food.  We took a subway to the general area of Washington Square Park and emerged on the surface with absolutely no agenda except to explore.  As we wandered through the narrow streets and alleyways of the Village, we heard some jazz coming from some open windows of an old, very run-down hotel, the name and location of which are long lost to me.  Curious to see where it was coming from, we investigated.  We entered the empty lobby of the decrepit building, found an elevator, and ascended creakily to the top floor, where we exited into what had once been an elegant ballroom.  In one end, sitting informally on folding chairs, were about 6 or 7 musicians improvising and obviously working on an arrangement.  We listened, standing near the elevator in our white "sailor suits" and dixie cup hats.

The young Sidney Bechet
1920's

Finally, during a break in the music, the apparent leader came over to us and asked if we needed help.  We explained that we had been exploring, heard the music from the street level, and had come up to find the source.  He explained that they were practicing for a concert in Carnegie Hall the next day in honor of Sidney Bechet, a great New Orleans musician who had died in France a couple of months before.  He then asked if we would like some free tickets!  He instructed us to come to a specific stage door in the back of Carnegie Hall on the day of the concert at a certain time.

The next day, none of us had "the duty," so we went ashore and proceeded straight to Carnegie Hall.  At exactly the appointed time, the door opened and there was our musician friend.  He handed us three tickets to seats in a loge overlooking the right side of the stage.  What a fabulous vantage point!  We entered at the front of the theater, found our seats, and were seated well before the tribute concert began.  Needless to say, we were awed by the size and beauty of the auditorium.

John Chilton's biography, Sidney Bechet: The Wizard of Jazz, describes that event: "A month later, on 14 June, 1959, at New York's Carnegie Hall, Sidney's old friends Sammy Price and Noble Sissle organized a tribute concert to Bechet's memory, the proceeds from the event being donated to cancer research.  The turn-out of musicians included Henry "Red" Allen. Vic Dickenson, Omer Simeon, Eugene Sedric, Edmond Hall, Teddy Wilson, Noble Sissle, Wilbur De Paris, and Sidney De Paris.  The guest of honour was Coleman Hawkins, who had been a friend of Bechet's ever since their legendary battle of music had taken place in the early 1920's."

The concert was incredible -- an endless tribute played with passion by extremely talented musicians.  Other than Coleman Hawkins, I was unfamiliar with the individual artists.  I had never been a close follower of the jazz scene.  But it was evident that we were in the midst of some very well-known and highly regarded talent.  And we three midshipman fell into it because of a little curiosity.

The woodwind master late in life

There's a New Sheriff in Town...

7-month old Raylan Hendrix is introduced to his new, all-maple rocking horse.  He's not 100% sure about his new mount, but I reckon he'll grow into it.  Gotta get those legs long enough to reach the stirrups.  Mary Ann did the bow with gen-u-wine cowboy boots on the ribbon.  We hope the sheriff wears this pony out!

One Down, Two to Go...

Back in October, I started to build three rocking horses patterned after an antique in the Old Sturbridge Village Museum.  This weekend, I finished the first of the three.  This one is made of cherry boards that I purchased at Hobby Hardwood Alabama, a real gem of a sawmill that specializes in custom, high-grade hardwoods.  Here is the result:

The other two will be made of oak and maple.  You'll see those when they are completed.  The original was made of pine sometime around 1850.  Based on the wear and tear, you can imagine the countless hours of joy that it brought to generations of kids...

Date Night...

As some of you may know, Mary Ann and I are fans of the Tedeschi Trucks Band.  Derek Trucks and Susan Tedeschi are the husband-wife duo who head up this remarkable 1-piece ensemble.  It would be impossible for us to pick a favorite among the very talented musicians.  And not long ago, we learned that the band was going to appear in Chattanooga on Friday, 23 January.  We went to the band's Website and got great tickets, near the center of the 8th row.

I took Friday afternoon off and we drove over to Chattanooga, about two hours from the house.  I had gone on-line to check out the restaurant scene.  I finally settled on Terramae Appalachian Bistro -- fairly close to the Tivoli Theater and highly rated in both Urban Spoon and Trip Advisor.  We were not disappointed.  We had a liesurely and beautifully-served meal in the delightful surroundings of an old hotel building.

Terramae Interior

After a short drive to the theater and a brief search for parking, we were treated to a terrific concert in the elegant surroundings of the Tivoli, a 1920's music and movie palace.  The crowd was a bit rowdy, but the music prevailed.  Because of the difference in time zones, we were home at midnight.

I count that as a date.

I'm So Glad I Moved to the South...

Harold R. Mead and "The War to End All Wars"......

Last month, I was reminded once more that our Memorial Day used to be celebrated as "Armistice Day" and was the annual celebration of the end of World War I.  Most people are surprised when I tell them that my father, Dr. Harold R. Mead, was a member of the U.S. Army and served in that war.  A lot of my contemporaries have fathers who served in World War II.  There's a simple explanation.  My dad was born in 1894, didn't marry until he was in his forties, and I was the third of four children.  He was nearly forty-six years old when I was born.

As kids, my sister and brother and I would play with the old "doughboy" helmet that was in the garage.  I doubt if we made any connection with the Great War.  It was simply a toy that we used when we staged our own backyard conflicts.  I rarely heard my father talk about his war experience, and when he did, I was too naive to recognize its significance.  I should have been taking notes.

As I eventually gained an interest in my family's history, I certainly wanted to include a detailed understanding of my father's military experience.  So, in the mid-1980's, I corresponded with the U.S. Army and the Veteran's Administration to get any documentation that might be available.  My father had died in 1971.  I was shocked to learn that none of his war records existed.  In July of 1973, a disastrous fire had destroyed much of the National Personnel Records Center outside of St. Louis.  Over 80 million folders of official military records were destroyed.  There were no backups or duplicates.  My father's military history had gone up in smoke.  I resigned myself to the notion that I would never know the details of his service -- when and where did he serve, what units was he associated with, what battles had he witnessed?  I would never know.  I recall the enormous disappointment when I received the news from the Government that the records no longer existed.



The dental infirmary of First Lieutenant Ralph F Krueger, dental surgeon, 302nd Engineers, 77th Division, near Abri du Crochet, Argonne Forest, France. October 29, 1918. Remarkably, I found this image on the Internet.  Dr. Ralph Krueger attended Dental School with my father, was one of his closest friends, and they both ended up practicing dentistry in Schenectady, NY.  When I saw the image, I did a double take.  I thought, "I know that man!" 
Photograph: Courtesy of US Army Military History Institute. SC 42751.

But then came the Internet and the World Wide Web.  And along came better and better search engines.  And perhaps even more important, people and companies scanned and digitized huge quantities of documents that had been residing in libraries and private collections for decades.  More and better information was becoming accessible and searchable on the Internet.  That combination of developments has made much of my father's war record available in spite of the devastating fire that had destroyed so many documents.

The first breakthrough occurred a few weeks ago when I discovered an article in a little-known journal entitled "The Journal of the Association of Military Dental Surgeons of the United States."  In the July, 1919, issue of that journal is an article entitled, "Dental History of the Second Division, A.E.F." by Lt.Col. George D. Graham.  Early in the article, Colonel Graham mentions that he took command of the dental unit described in March, 1918, and lists the officers then in the dental unit.  My father was one of those mentioned.  Thanks to the library at the Northwestern University School of Dentistry and to Google's efforts to scan and digitize academic journal collections, I now know which organization my father served in during the war.

One of my father's units was the 9th
Infantry Regiment of the 2nd
Army Division of the A.E.F.

This article goes on to describe the history of the unit and its operations from March to November of 1918.  Within those few months, they saw action at Chateau Thierry, Soissons, St. Mihiel, the Champagne Front, and the Argonne.  My dad was definitely in the thick of the battles that were taking place.  The article also describes how the Dental Corps personnel were engaged, often acting as anesthetists for the medical corps during surgery.  Dr. Graham states, "Dental officers were installed in towns, in which troops were temporarily billeted, in dugouts, in tents and occasionally by the roadside, wherever their organizations happened to be, often under shell fire."  He also describes how, under these field conditions, these oral surgeons were developing better, lighter, and smaller instrument packages and equipment packages to make it easier to relocate and set up their "offices."  I also learned from Dr. Graham's article that in October, 1918, my father was "evacuated, sick" along with two other dentists.  No further detail is provided on either the nature of the sickness nor the destination of the evacuation.

Not too long after I located Dr. Graham's article, I found another offbeat publication, "Dental Cosmos, A Monthly Record of Dental Science."  This gem had been scanned by Google from within the Health Sciences Library at the University of California, Davis.  Again, I extend my thanks.  Volume 59, dated November 1917, informs us that during the week of September 22, 1917, a certain Army reservist named Harold R. Mead was assigned "To Camp Mills, Garden City, Long Island."  So now, I knew where my father completed his training prior to going to Europe.  The pieces of the puzzle were appearing slowly but surely.

On the U.S. Army Medical Corps site, I discovered a sizeable document called "A History of Dentistry in the U.S. Army to World War II."  In Chapter 15 of that work I read the following, which bears tribute to the service of men like my dad:
"The dental service that Robert Oliver and his colleagues built in France experienced its most difficult test with the combat divisions of the American Expeditionary Forces (AEF). Never before in the history of the Army or its medical department had dental officers gone directly into battle as part of a combat unit. Thanks to Oliver’s efforts and those of many others in the Dental Corps, the AEF had dental officers and assistants attached to all of its front line divisions, including infantry and engineer battalions in the trenches and field artillery batteries. Without the experience of any army in history to guide it, the AEF integrated the dentists into the fabric of the division in a variety of ways. While they were sometimes assigned collateral duties with little regard for their professional backgrounds, they were more often employed as auxiliary medical officers to assist the battalion and regimental surgeons and medical detachments on the battlefield. Regardless of their assignments, the dental officers and their assistants served their fellow soldiers in times of trial, a number of them winning awards for gallantry on the battlefield and others sacrificing their lives. Their performance ultimately won the soldiers’ respect and the honored place in the Army Medical Department that dentists had so long sought."

A search of newspapers of the period when my father likely would have returned revealed another gem.  On August 5, 1919, the following article appeared in the Schenectady Gazette:

"DR. MEAD, FIRST LOCAL DENTIST IN FRANCE, IS HOME
Local Practitioner Saw Months Overseas as First Lieutenant

Dr. Harold R. Mead of 6 Eagle Street, the first Schenectady dentist to reach France, has returned, almost the last local practitioner to leave that country. Dr. Mead enlisted in July, 1917, and was commissioned first lieutenant in the same month. He spent five weeks in Camp Mills and was then sent overseas, where he remained for 21 months. 

He was assigned to the second division and spent most of his time with the 9th and 23d Infantry, composed of both Infantry and marines. Part of his experience was behind the lines with the medical detachment, and part of the time was spent at the front In first aid work. After the signing of the armistice he resumed the work of dentistry.
Among the engagements in which Doctor Mead took part were that of Chateau Thierry, St. Mihiel, and the Meuse-Argonne. His division was the American unit which aided the stopping of the German drive on Paris. At the time of one German raid on his regiment, in which one of the doctors and seven Red Cross men were taken prisoners and another doctor-captain wounded, he, together with three others, was all that was left of the medical detachment. These four were forced to do the work of 12 or 13 men in giving first aid to the wounded and sending them behind the lines. He was commended for this work. Dr. Mead tells an amusing incident which came to his notice while in service. One of his fellow practitioners, while working on a patient in his office chair, had the front of his office blown away by a shell. The patient "got up and ran" and was never heard of since.

The doctor was one of about seven who left this city to practice dentistry in the service. He has a brother-in-law, Captain Gilbert L Van Auken, who spent about the same time as the doctor in the field artillery. He has always lived in this city and expects to resume his practice in a week or two at his old location in Crane Street."

So there is a gap from October, 1918, when he was "evacuated, sick" from his unit in France, until July or August of 1919, when it was published that he had returned home.  I have no idea what transpired nor what his ailment was.  But I know a whole lot more about my father's units and movements than I ever would have thought possible even a few years ago.

He spent 21 months overseas.  It's remarkable to me that he rarely spoke of these times.  One of the few stories I recall him telling was of going into Paris once on leave with another officer.  Meat was in short supply, so a restaurant would usually offer a single choice of meat each day.  On this particular day and at the restaurant in which my father found himself, the meat of the day was tripe.  My dad said that they told the waiter to give their meat to a nearby French couple.  He had tasted tripe and said it was the worst thing he ever put in his mouth.  The French couple was overtaken with emotion that the Americans had "sacrificed" their meat to the benefit of the French.  Little did they know...