Some wag has said, "For God so loved the world that He did not send a committee." Another has dealth with the peculiar construction of the camel and expressed the conviction this was a horse designed by a committee.
The great American game has become service on committees. If we want something lost in the shuffle, buried and forgotten, with only a little backwash, we turn it over to a committee. If we want others to share responsibility in the decision or a criticism, we spread the base by assigning a committee to take the matter under advisement.
Conversely, we can focus the best talent and dedication on a worthy objective by carefully selecting those who will relate to all the angles and come in with the answer.
Don't frighten and frustrate yourself by thinking out the number of hours in each month you spend on committees, sub-committees, and committee related activities. When someone calls or taps you on the shoulder and says, "Will you serve on the committee to...," is the your mouth always set to say YES?
Is you family proud of your committee involvement? Do they ever see you at home? Are they just as glad it is this way? Or, are they constantly upset and nagging because you are never home.
There is always a reason for dealing with a subject. The trigger which fired this shot was a mention of the hours and hours given by individuals serving as committee members in the interest of the League of Federal Recreation Associations, all 62 of the agency members, and the 150,000 individual federal employees who are known as participants.
Committee members are always subject to the judgement of those who do not like the conclusions, wish they had been asked to serve, or who know they could have done a better job. So, who can you please and why do you agree to serve? Probably it's because you care, you have pride, and you know that someone must do or nothing is done.
Oliver Wendell Holmes once said, "A man should share the action and passion of his times at the peril of being judged not to have lived." Each generation has an obligation to make whatever sacrifices are necessary to preserve the great privileges which were given us.
We now know that a Constitution to be followed must first be written, a Prayer to be answered must be given, and to be gained Membership must first be sought.
Now you have the inspiration and you are ready to reach out for your challenge and opportunity. You want to serve on a committee.
Fine, we have just the spot for you. To be successful as a committee member, you must be a man of vision and ambition: a diplomat, after-dinner speaker, after-dinner guzzler and a night-owl.
You must continue to work all day, take phone calls all night, and be on the job next morning early.
Oh yes, you must be able to please all organizations and auxiliaries. You must be both a Democrat and a Republican, be a man's man and a ladies man, a model husband and father, a devoted son-in-law, a good provider, psychiatrist, manager, and magician.
You must attend all meetings, tournaments, union sessions, funerals and visit jails, hospitals and credit unions. In you spare time you will be expected to review the constitution, by-laws and organizations structure of LFRA.
When you have related to your committee assignment, given it the best you have, there will be those whose soft tones will credit you with sincerity of purpose. Your loyalty will be cited and friends will recognize that some pretty ordinary persons have become very substantial leaders because you had the uncanny ability to get teamwork out of the group.
But you are not unique. There have been many committeemen. Historically, each one has been caught up in the ageless pattern of freedom, which is always revolutionary. Freedom is always alive, marching on many fronts... The ferment of freedom never ends.
David L. Brigham
Committeeman Extraordinary
Showing posts with label Executive Etchings. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Executive Etchings. Show all posts
January 13, 2010
January 5, 2010
September 1971
The Water Witch was novel to some who reviewed this spot last month. It caught Jim's eye and he traced the Executive Witch to his den. If you don't believe in coincidence you can hop off right here.
It all began back in Iowa. A young Maryland lad had just gone to the tall corn State to do some broadcasting, some news reporting and some public relations. He wound up with the old AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Administration) and met Jim of the AP (Associated Press). Who could forget the battered felt hat, the crisp verbiage and the urgency of effort fostered by hungry days as a stringer and cub reporter. We related like a magnet and he was soon with USDA and AAA also.
Both boys moved from Iowa at the request of Uncle Sam. One found a home in Missouri and the other in Minnesota. They kept in close touch and crossed paths with some frequency. Then came the big events. Two baby girls arrived within days of each other. Both struggled for life and lost. The two families were drawn even closer together.
The surprise was a little understandable when the two wives compared notes. Yes, indeed they were. So within a few weeks of each other a couple of young men saw the light of day. They were worth waiting for! Within ten days of the even the Missouri Dad was heading for infantry service in World War II. Before leaving he called Jim to tell him of the "Greeting from the President."
You guessed it... Jim had just enlisted in the Seabees. Both wound up in the Pacific until it was over there. And who do you think made it home fro Christmas in 1945? Both did!
Next the Christmas card from Jim to Dave in 1946. Mine's due in April, when's yours? A hurry up reply informed Jim the other arrival had been scheduled for May. And so the two girls began their almost joint journey.
No one would expect you to believe there was a girl apiece the following summer. There were other similarities like the wives being sick at the same time and the work changes which sent both to the Washington area a few days apart. Then, as the years and activities have a way of doing such relationships in, the two families lost contact.
There was a call last week. Jim wanted to speak to Dave. He had read a column in a thing called the Recreation Register. It was about a witch or something. Was this the same Dave? Well... Well, if it is... Well, Jim, how old is your Grandson? Well, how did you know I only had one grandchild and it is a boy? Well, that's easy. I have a grandson myself and my oldest daughter is the Mother... Same with you I'm sure? Exactly the same!
It was country talk about finding water and digging a well that brought us back together. We began our renewed visit with well... And when he asked something about LFRA and my interest in the future of this association of and for federal employees, it was easy to use the same thought collecting delay, well...
I had to begin with the deep well of despair some of us have battled hard to overcome. There was the shortage of interest, the limited funding and the primary responsibility of willing horses to their own agency associations rather than to an overall League.
It made you feel like the frog in the bottom of the well who thought the entire world was the patch of sky he could see when he looked up. We didn't get the full view and begin to realize the potential until we looked over the top edge of the well.
Then, there was a the bucket of cream lowered par way down into the well to keep cool. Two frogs fell in. One pushed the panic button, folded up and sank to the bottom. The other kicked, scrambled and struggled. He churned the cream, created a pat of butter, hopped upon it, gave a great leap from this floating perch and escaped the well.
Is there any word we use more? This is the most convenient and versatile of the four-letter words. How do we begin when the boss says, "Why haven't you...?" Perhaps the wife would like to know what kept you at the office? Or, the preacher why you missed services? What's the reason payment is a little slow this month? Did you get a check-up? There's a problem with your kid and we'd like to know... The first thing to come to mind as we stall for the answer to meet the situation is WELL... Well eh!
There was Jacob's Well..the Well of Bethlehem, Abraham, Issac and the "well of living water." There is the Artesian well form which water flows of its own pressure. Some are purported to go to the well once too often and find only disappointment.
There are tales of those who bought an interest in a dry well. Others invested in prospecting for a productive oil well. Some made it with a well and some lost it. There's been many sunk in or drawn from a well.
Well, how are you feeling? Well, I hope!
There are other "wells" like Fargo and Wellington and wellsweep, wellbeing, well meaning, welldoer, welldisposed, well born, and well head. The last supplies water to a spring or well and the flow begins the circuit.
Why dwell upon the well? Jim started it and I want to tell him why I pursued it. You see, even before we heard of each other, I found the right girl and gave her a ring. She ran through the big farm house to the back porch where her Dad was taking off his boots. The skinny college lad followed...at a most reasonable distance.
"Look Daddy, look!" I guess he saw the little diamond. The response drifted back into the kitchen, "My Lord child, that boy's not dry behind the ears yet!"
Then you know who came on the scene and gulped..."Well...Sir...ah...eh...mmmm...."
And the 230 pound, six foot plus recognition followed:
"WELL...That's a deep subject when you get to the bottom of it."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
It all began back in Iowa. A young Maryland lad had just gone to the tall corn State to do some broadcasting, some news reporting and some public relations. He wound up with the old AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Administration) and met Jim of the AP (Associated Press). Who could forget the battered felt hat, the crisp verbiage and the urgency of effort fostered by hungry days as a stringer and cub reporter. We related like a magnet and he was soon with USDA and AAA also.
Both boys moved from Iowa at the request of Uncle Sam. One found a home in Missouri and the other in Minnesota. They kept in close touch and crossed paths with some frequency. Then came the big events. Two baby girls arrived within days of each other. Both struggled for life and lost. The two families were drawn even closer together.
The surprise was a little understandable when the two wives compared notes. Yes, indeed they were. So within a few weeks of each other a couple of young men saw the light of day. They were worth waiting for! Within ten days of the even the Missouri Dad was heading for infantry service in World War II. Before leaving he called Jim to tell him of the "Greeting from the President."
You guessed it... Jim had just enlisted in the Seabees. Both wound up in the Pacific until it was over there. And who do you think made it home fro Christmas in 1945? Both did!
Next the Christmas card from Jim to Dave in 1946. Mine's due in April, when's yours? A hurry up reply informed Jim the other arrival had been scheduled for May. And so the two girls began their almost joint journey.
No one would expect you to believe there was a girl apiece the following summer. There were other similarities like the wives being sick at the same time and the work changes which sent both to the Washington area a few days apart. Then, as the years and activities have a way of doing such relationships in, the two families lost contact.
There was a call last week. Jim wanted to speak to Dave. He had read a column in a thing called the Recreation Register. It was about a witch or something. Was this the same Dave? Well... Well, if it is... Well, Jim, how old is your Grandson? Well, how did you know I only had one grandchild and it is a boy? Well, that's easy. I have a grandson myself and my oldest daughter is the Mother... Same with you I'm sure? Exactly the same!
It was country talk about finding water and digging a well that brought us back together. We began our renewed visit with well... And when he asked something about LFRA and my interest in the future of this association of and for federal employees, it was easy to use the same thought collecting delay, well...
I had to begin with the deep well of despair some of us have battled hard to overcome. There was the shortage of interest, the limited funding and the primary responsibility of willing horses to their own agency associations rather than to an overall League.
It made you feel like the frog in the bottom of the well who thought the entire world was the patch of sky he could see when he looked up. We didn't get the full view and begin to realize the potential until we looked over the top edge of the well.
Then, there was a the bucket of cream lowered par way down into the well to keep cool. Two frogs fell in. One pushed the panic button, folded up and sank to the bottom. The other kicked, scrambled and struggled. He churned the cream, created a pat of butter, hopped upon it, gave a great leap from this floating perch and escaped the well.
Is there any word we use more? This is the most convenient and versatile of the four-letter words. How do we begin when the boss says, "Why haven't you...?" Perhaps the wife would like to know what kept you at the office? Or, the preacher why you missed services? What's the reason payment is a little slow this month? Did you get a check-up? There's a problem with your kid and we'd like to know... The first thing to come to mind as we stall for the answer to meet the situation is WELL... Well eh!
There was Jacob's Well..the Well of Bethlehem, Abraham, Issac and the "well of living water." There is the Artesian well form which water flows of its own pressure. Some are purported to go to the well once too often and find only disappointment.
There are tales of those who bought an interest in a dry well. Others invested in prospecting for a productive oil well. Some made it with a well and some lost it. There's been many sunk in or drawn from a well.
Well, how are you feeling? Well, I hope!
There are other "wells" like Fargo and Wellington and wellsweep, wellbeing, well meaning, welldoer, welldisposed, well born, and well head. The last supplies water to a spring or well and the flow begins the circuit.
Why dwell upon the well? Jim started it and I want to tell him why I pursued it. You see, even before we heard of each other, I found the right girl and gave her a ring. She ran through the big farm house to the back porch where her Dad was taking off his boots. The skinny college lad followed...at a most reasonable distance.
"Look Daddy, look!" I guess he saw the little diamond. The response drifted back into the kitchen, "My Lord child, that boy's not dry behind the ears yet!"
Then you know who came on the scene and gulped..."Well...Sir...ah...eh...mmmm...."
And the 230 pound, six foot plus recognition followed:
"WELL...That's a deep subject when you get to the bottom of it."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
October 9, 2009
August 1971
They were both big men and the muscles vibrated in the forearms above the clublike hands. One had just called the other a water witch and I backed up to the honeysuckled fence row. A boy didn't belong too close at that moment.
A kid raised in the country learns some words the city kids never hear. A clodhopper or just a plain clod; a briar jumper or a hick; a hawg jaw or an apple knocker; a slew foot or a hay seed. I knew 'em all and could take each one from the bigger kids who had walked a furrow or jumped a black berry patch while chasing a rabbit. It was routine to slop the pigs and easy to use a long stick to shake the apples off the tree.
You don't mind being a hay seed when you have mowed, raked, loaded, forked and worked hay into the mow of the old barracks. Still fresh in memory are the wheat shocks, the pitch forks, the bundles pitched up to the top of the wagon, and the "first and last snake" tossed up with the last bundle. Tass Carter sailed off that topped out load and was running before he hit the ground. He said something about k-k-killin' the next boy who did that trick. But, he was kidding, or was he?
Anyway, this was country talk and farm boys understood. There was always work and time for fun. The oversized, old felt hat was a trademark. The ever present hound could handle the rabbits, quail, squirrels and even a skunk. The collie brought the cows in for milking and there was always a horse to ride or work as the occasion might demand. There was no real need for parks, golf courses, organized recreation, and planned activities by associations and organizations.
Most of us lived in the country and knew what those folks who drove out to see us on Sunday were called. We whispered about city-slickers with fancy suits and tourin' cars. They needed watching a little but they didn't have the real smarts a county kid comes by kinda natural.
We showed 'em the birds and bees and the stock and the chickens. What was the use of talking about things you lived with every day of your life. If they were half-way with us, we steered them around poison ivy, beggars lice, sumac and chuckle burrs.
It was fun to try the young fellow from town our on corn silk, Indian cigars, grape vine and Brown's Mule. Smokin' and chewin' was all the same, they got white, wobbly and then sick to the stomach. That was good clean fun and recreation the old way. We didn't mean no harm by it and they had something to talk about when they got back to the city.
I guess they talked about Dad rollin' his own and the checked dress Mom had made from some feed sack goods. We got in our licks about the patent leather shoes, the striped pants and the starched collars.
But all of us enjoyed the coming and the going. Those city words that identified a nationality and degraded many first generation Americans were lost on our untrained ears. It was better that way. We walked the country roads and they walked the city streets.
Once in a while the youngsters were afraid of the dark and needed some reassurance. But there was always someone to make you feel safe and not much happened to make newspaper headlines. I guess it happened some but when you have a piece of hay in the corner of your mouth and whistle up your dog a fellow feels mighty comfortable and secure.
So I watched the two big men. You don't call a man a Water Witch, even in the country and get by with it. There had to be the inevitable collision.
The one stood sort of sizing up the antagonist and then fondled the forked peach stick. It looked sort of like a sling shot without the leather cup and rubber innertube strips. I thought of David and Goliath. Perhaps history would repeat. Then the startling first words, "It's a gift, sort of like extrasensory perception."
The forked stick is held in both hands with the bottom of the Y pointed upward. It is known as a Divining Rod and when the gifted carrier walks over a good stream of water the stick turns over and points to the water. Next the "witch" takes a limber twig and holds it over the spot selected by the peach stick.
Like a pump handle the twig dips down and then comes back to the starting position. Each circuit indicates 10 feet and if it bows 8 times you must go 80 feet to strike water. At the end of the measurement the twig will shake sideways before staring over again.
Fantastic? Perhaps it is. But, this same man told me where to drill and that I would need to go down 128 feet to strike water. I believed and hit at 126 feet. We have good water in a country well and if you understand the meaning of the title even a Water Witch can be a mighty regular guy.
If some of my city colleagues feel like being a LFRA Witch, we'll let them use a Diving Rod to find discounts, travel opportunity, recreation and more members. Success is fun!
David L. Brigham
Executive Witch
A kid raised in the country learns some words the city kids never hear. A clodhopper or just a plain clod; a briar jumper or a hick; a hawg jaw or an apple knocker; a slew foot or a hay seed. I knew 'em all and could take each one from the bigger kids who had walked a furrow or jumped a black berry patch while chasing a rabbit. It was routine to slop the pigs and easy to use a long stick to shake the apples off the tree.
You don't mind being a hay seed when you have mowed, raked, loaded, forked and worked hay into the mow of the old barracks. Still fresh in memory are the wheat shocks, the pitch forks, the bundles pitched up to the top of the wagon, and the "first and last snake" tossed up with the last bundle. Tass Carter sailed off that topped out load and was running before he hit the ground. He said something about k-k-killin' the next boy who did that trick. But, he was kidding, or was he?
Anyway, this was country talk and farm boys understood. There was always work and time for fun. The oversized, old felt hat was a trademark. The ever present hound could handle the rabbits, quail, squirrels and even a skunk. The collie brought the cows in for milking and there was always a horse to ride or work as the occasion might demand. There was no real need for parks, golf courses, organized recreation, and planned activities by associations and organizations.
Most of us lived in the country and knew what those folks who drove out to see us on Sunday were called. We whispered about city-slickers with fancy suits and tourin' cars. They needed watching a little but they didn't have the real smarts a county kid comes by kinda natural.
We showed 'em the birds and bees and the stock and the chickens. What was the use of talking about things you lived with every day of your life. If they were half-way with us, we steered them around poison ivy, beggars lice, sumac and chuckle burrs.
It was fun to try the young fellow from town our on corn silk, Indian cigars, grape vine and Brown's Mule. Smokin' and chewin' was all the same, they got white, wobbly and then sick to the stomach. That was good clean fun and recreation the old way. We didn't mean no harm by it and they had something to talk about when they got back to the city.
I guess they talked about Dad rollin' his own and the checked dress Mom had made from some feed sack goods. We got in our licks about the patent leather shoes, the striped pants and the starched collars.
But all of us enjoyed the coming and the going. Those city words that identified a nationality and degraded many first generation Americans were lost on our untrained ears. It was better that way. We walked the country roads and they walked the city streets.
Once in a while the youngsters were afraid of the dark and needed some reassurance. But there was always someone to make you feel safe and not much happened to make newspaper headlines. I guess it happened some but when you have a piece of hay in the corner of your mouth and whistle up your dog a fellow feels mighty comfortable and secure.
So I watched the two big men. You don't call a man a Water Witch, even in the country and get by with it. There had to be the inevitable collision.
The one stood sort of sizing up the antagonist and then fondled the forked peach stick. It looked sort of like a sling shot without the leather cup and rubber innertube strips. I thought of David and Goliath. Perhaps history would repeat. Then the startling first words, "It's a gift, sort of like extrasensory perception."
The forked stick is held in both hands with the bottom of the Y pointed upward. It is known as a Divining Rod and when the gifted carrier walks over a good stream of water the stick turns over and points to the water. Next the "witch" takes a limber twig and holds it over the spot selected by the peach stick.
Like a pump handle the twig dips down and then comes back to the starting position. Each circuit indicates 10 feet and if it bows 8 times you must go 80 feet to strike water. At the end of the measurement the twig will shake sideways before staring over again.
Fantastic? Perhaps it is. But, this same man told me where to drill and that I would need to go down 128 feet to strike water. I believed and hit at 126 feet. We have good water in a country well and if you understand the meaning of the title even a Water Witch can be a mighty regular guy.
If some of my city colleagues feel like being a LFRA Witch, we'll let them use a Diving Rod to find discounts, travel opportunity, recreation and more members. Success is fun!
David L. Brigham
Executive Witch
September 26, 2009
July 1971
It was June and a beautiful afternoon as I slipped across the parking lot apparently unseen. Then came the well recognized voice of the Duty Guard. "Watch that cuttin' out early and leaving the rest of us to carry on!"
This meant a little slow-down and a valued minute or two of conversation and rich, homey philosophy. You can't beat it for relaxing frayed nerves, cutting life into focus.
He didn't know I was about to spend some money I didn't really have. Some things are essential even if you are scratching for the change it takes to accomplish the responsibility. That's why I was wishing for the new LFRA Buyers Guide, wondering where I could find the best price for something appropriate, and asking myself why money seemed so hard to come by.
So it's June and we began our "expert" conversation with that fact; after we had covered the weather. June is the month when we spend more money for gifts than any other except December. There are the many graduations and weddings by the dozen. Those bright eyed girls are experts at removing ribbons and seals and colorful wrapping from multi-shaped packages. The guys just look dumbfounded, ill at ease or like the floor should separate and make room for them in the basement.
Then there is Father's Day and more is spent on the old guy than the family release to make Mother's Day perfect for the best. It isn't that we think more of Dad, he just costs more to buy for. Mom likes the blouse, stockings, perfume, some costume jewelry and a pretty card with the right words.
But Dad is something else...a shirt and tie perhaps, something for libation purposes, golf togs or equipment, possibly a rod and reel, or a box of cigars. It costs to keep Dad and it costs more to find a card that will tell the truth about him than it does to shower love on Mom.
I reached down in the pocket which had been worn through by change and car keys. Nothing there! The other side held the reassuring feel of soft leather over three or four dollars. How was that going to guy a graduation present today?
It was easy to drop the question and start with the days when we had even less in our pockets, if we had pockets at all. June was that great month when you kissed school goodbye for a few weeks and headed for the Patuxent River. There were mud slides, tadpoles, dragon flies, snapping turtles, box turtles, frogs, eels, sun perch, catfish, craw dads, black snakes, a raft and rapids, land nettles on bare legs and the buzz of a mosquito.
The home cut poplar pole, an earthworm, hook, sinker, some green line and a cork from the vinegar jug did the trick for the young fisherman. If they didn't bite there was always skinny dippin in the deep hole, until the neighbors came around the bend in a canoe very much unannounced.
How about the heavy rains and the river jumping the banks, coming across the marsh and right up to the mouth of the pup tent placed on the knoll just off the woods road. We answered that one by jumping in the main current at Mink Hollow and flying downstream to Snells Bridge. Over and over this thrill was repeated and nobody was lost in the flood or snagged by an under the water tree limb. The blankets got wet and moldy, dry wood was hard to come by, and the oil off the top of a jar of peanut butter served as lubricant for the pancake griddle.
This was the same river, still a little muddy, and it was June 1971. The Guard had wanted me to tell him about our neighborhood minister and the river.
There had been a confirmation class for 10 teen age youngsters. They learned about baptism and were given a choice. The unanimous decision for kids whose parent had been sprinkled some years before was immersion. Now the choice was where it would be done. The prompt verdict was the Patuxent River behind Dave Brigham's place. Shades of the Jordan and a man named John.
It had rained and the banks were muddy, right where the old slide used to be. The minister walked out in his good shoes and suit, waist deep in the center stream. Parents and friends sang "Shall We Gather At The River" and one by one the white robed ten made their sometimes shaky way to a memorable experience and a new hope. Once safely back on shore, a fellow who had not been as unsure as the rest peeled off his robe to reveal a T-shirt bearing the inscription "Aqua Club - Expert Swimmer."
So, it is June and I am in the parking lot going to buy a graduation present. The Guard waned to know if it was high school or college. He was coming out next year from high school. I told him this was a college graduate in nursing, the third to finish the University. My three were all out of the nest and going along. That's why I was ducking out early to get a present for the last one. It was June I told him.
"My, my," he replied, "You must feel like the man that has gone and swum the river!"
Funny how a guy can put it so you just can't help but understand it. There is so much uphill in life and we struggle along. All of a sudden it is over, done, accomplished and completed. The old river that you fought so hard to swim has been conquered. Now you are on the other side. What's the next move?
Turn around and start back. You must cross again. Life is always a struggle and both Home and Success are on the other side.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
This meant a little slow-down and a valued minute or two of conversation and rich, homey philosophy. You can't beat it for relaxing frayed nerves, cutting life into focus.
He didn't know I was about to spend some money I didn't really have. Some things are essential even if you are scratching for the change it takes to accomplish the responsibility. That's why I was wishing for the new LFRA Buyers Guide, wondering where I could find the best price for something appropriate, and asking myself why money seemed so hard to come by.
So it's June and we began our "expert" conversation with that fact; after we had covered the weather. June is the month when we spend more money for gifts than any other except December. There are the many graduations and weddings by the dozen. Those bright eyed girls are experts at removing ribbons and seals and colorful wrapping from multi-shaped packages. The guys just look dumbfounded, ill at ease or like the floor should separate and make room for them in the basement.
Then there is Father's Day and more is spent on the old guy than the family release to make Mother's Day perfect for the best. It isn't that we think more of Dad, he just costs more to buy for. Mom likes the blouse, stockings, perfume, some costume jewelry and a pretty card with the right words.
But Dad is something else...a shirt and tie perhaps, something for libation purposes, golf togs or equipment, possibly a rod and reel, or a box of cigars. It costs to keep Dad and it costs more to find a card that will tell the truth about him than it does to shower love on Mom.
I reached down in the pocket which had been worn through by change and car keys. Nothing there! The other side held the reassuring feel of soft leather over three or four dollars. How was that going to guy a graduation present today?
It was easy to drop the question and start with the days when we had even less in our pockets, if we had pockets at all. June was that great month when you kissed school goodbye for a few weeks and headed for the Patuxent River. There were mud slides, tadpoles, dragon flies, snapping turtles, box turtles, frogs, eels, sun perch, catfish, craw dads, black snakes, a raft and rapids, land nettles on bare legs and the buzz of a mosquito.
The home cut poplar pole, an earthworm, hook, sinker, some green line and a cork from the vinegar jug did the trick for the young fisherman. If they didn't bite there was always skinny dippin in the deep hole, until the neighbors came around the bend in a canoe very much unannounced.
How about the heavy rains and the river jumping the banks, coming across the marsh and right up to the mouth of the pup tent placed on the knoll just off the woods road. We answered that one by jumping in the main current at Mink Hollow and flying downstream to Snells Bridge. Over and over this thrill was repeated and nobody was lost in the flood or snagged by an under the water tree limb. The blankets got wet and moldy, dry wood was hard to come by, and the oil off the top of a jar of peanut butter served as lubricant for the pancake griddle.
This was the same river, still a little muddy, and it was June 1971. The Guard had wanted me to tell him about our neighborhood minister and the river.
There had been a confirmation class for 10 teen age youngsters. They learned about baptism and were given a choice. The unanimous decision for kids whose parent had been sprinkled some years before was immersion. Now the choice was where it would be done. The prompt verdict was the Patuxent River behind Dave Brigham's place. Shades of the Jordan and a man named John.
It had rained and the banks were muddy, right where the old slide used to be. The minister walked out in his good shoes and suit, waist deep in the center stream. Parents and friends sang "Shall We Gather At The River" and one by one the white robed ten made their sometimes shaky way to a memorable experience and a new hope. Once safely back on shore, a fellow who had not been as unsure as the rest peeled off his robe to reveal a T-shirt bearing the inscription "Aqua Club - Expert Swimmer."
So, it is June and I am in the parking lot going to buy a graduation present. The Guard waned to know if it was high school or college. He was coming out next year from high school. I told him this was a college graduate in nursing, the third to finish the University. My three were all out of the nest and going along. That's why I was ducking out early to get a present for the last one. It was June I told him.
"My, my," he replied, "You must feel like the man that has gone and swum the river!"
Funny how a guy can put it so you just can't help but understand it. There is so much uphill in life and we struggle along. All of a sudden it is over, done, accomplished and completed. The old river that you fought so hard to swim has been conquered. Now you are on the other side. What's the next move?
Turn around and start back. You must cross again. Life is always a struggle and both Home and Success are on the other side.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
September 22, 2009
June 1971
It was just a short article in a promotion booklet. I took time to see it had been written in, for and about conditions in another country. Nevertheless, I could hum the opening lines:
"Everybody's talkin' at me
Don't hear a word they're sayin',
Only the echoes of my mind."
The message kept ringing as I walked alone on the streets of the Capital City of the greatest nation on earth.
These words were from the them song of the film Midnight Cowboy telling of a lonely young man in a big city. The small town boy had lost his ability to communicate and thereby the essential ingredient to keeping one spiritually alive. To me they asked what happened? Why do we experience such uncertainty? What is there for us to hold to? What gives life direction? Who sets the pace? Who leads? Why make the effort? Who botched up what? Why am I urged to straighten out some of the mess?
Several of my friends had a vital discussion over a simple lunch. Can't you hear the reaction? What's the use of writing a column, or even a letter? People don't take time to read anymore. A glance through the newspaper and never a good book!
We are in a great rush to nowhere and we have the means to pay for things to be done for us. Why fight it?
These thoughts don't help when you are looking for the right way to communicate something you want to say or that you hope folks will want to hear and relate to.
Then came the bold. YOU ARE PART AND PARCEL OF THE PILL GENERATION. It all began with that aspirin your mother gave you years ago. Certainly your kids have known nothing else. Every shape and color; in fancy containers and plain; but always handy.
True, it all began with mom. She tranquilized by reading stories children liked to hear, reciting poetry by the hour and re-telling those "hand-me-downs" from previous generations. All were designed to relate to the peace of mind and the education of the upcoming generation.
We were supposed to be a little poor, maybe a little hungry, clothes a little worn and torn, hands grubby on occasion, and discouragement part of a regular diet.
If treatment was needed, there was a home remedy--like lemon, sugar and kerosene for coughing spells; iodine that stung for cuts and scratches; mustard plaster for congestion; argerol and ipicac [ipecac] (can't spell 'em but sure can taste 'em); and then the spring "line up kids and we'll clean out the winter"--each in turn gulped a tablespoon of castor oil.
What happened to the Sunday visits? The picnic trips with the whole family? Are there still places to go and things to do--as a family? Do we need a pill to escape or to relax? Do we need another to sharpen the intellect, to reassure, to give courage? Whey do I need to be confused to boost my morale and pull me out of a depression? My old Sunday School teacher used to say, "Don't count sheep; talk to the Shepherd." Sometimes that worked.
So many are worried. Things are already distorted and we either don't know how to face our times or we don't want to. It's so easy to pick up the many-sided safety valve "The devil made me do it." There's a pill for everything and we are the generation of pills.
It's tough to relate when the terms are over your head and the kids see you and your limited exposure as the root of the problem. To you a trip is travel, a pot belongs under a bed, and hooked is something mom did to make a rug.
The youngsters can't relate to the hydraulic ram, the wooden water tank, a stopped overflow and water from the attic to the basement with plaster falling behind. Coal oil lamps and candles, chunk stoves and feather ticks, soap stones and crocks, three point two and Goose Goslin, all need explaining.
So they come back with kicks and distortions, pot and love-in, beautiful and Hotline, grass and hard rock music, Mary Jane and free love.
Maybe we need to find the time to study our vocabulary. We who are older have made the journey and we know. Those who are younger will soon be the ones who can recount the experience and just hope the even younger generation will not go quite as far and fast as they did. But they know they will!
Somehow, I don't mind telling you about a 19 year old boy and his dad. They related and understood, although the language was a shade different. The young fellow came down to breakfast on Sunday morning. He was greeted with "Son, you turned in mighty late last night." There was a ready explanation for the 2:00 a.m. arrival. "Don't you see, Dad, the ole Model-A froze up and she boiled over. I took the radiator cap off to see what happened and it blew off in the big snow drift over on the middle pike. I looked and looked but never did find it again."
The response was unexpected. "Yes, Son. Well some years ago your Mother and I were courting. We had old Nancy to the buggy and came around past Highland and over Mink Hollow Road. On the way the lap robe bounced out of the back of the buggy, and it took up tow hours to locate that darn thing."
Sometimes there are older people who have a story to tell. I remember the same 19 year old boy who managed to get pifilated on 3.2 beer when he was two years below the legal age limit for purchase and consumption.
I have seen parents who must cap a difficult and frustrating week with "just a few" to put the memories away for a spell. Then they wonder what makes a kid seek escape from a hard and frustrating week at school with a slightly different approach.
There is a role for recreation in our society. Simple things like walks in the woods, picnics and croquet. Maybe we can read a little to relax. When did you learn you last poem or listen to the birds sing early in the morning.
There is a free society and we do have a free life. There is even freedom to self-destruct if we don't find the way to relate and communicate and love in the broadest sense.
Don't look for answers in terms of economic or social levels. Race and religion are both involved and concerned, nor have they found all the answers in the image of man or the hope of faith. When I was a youth I asked for guidance. My college professor said, "You are often guilty by association." From my mother came, "A man is known by the company he keeps." Dad got right to the point, "If you lie down with dogs, you will get up with fleas."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
"Everybody's talkin' at me
Don't hear a word they're sayin',
Only the echoes of my mind."
The message kept ringing as I walked alone on the streets of the Capital City of the greatest nation on earth.
These words were from the them song of the film Midnight Cowboy telling of a lonely young man in a big city. The small town boy had lost his ability to communicate and thereby the essential ingredient to keeping one spiritually alive. To me they asked what happened? Why do we experience such uncertainty? What is there for us to hold to? What gives life direction? Who sets the pace? Who leads? Why make the effort? Who botched up what? Why am I urged to straighten out some of the mess?
Several of my friends had a vital discussion over a simple lunch. Can't you hear the reaction? What's the use of writing a column, or even a letter? People don't take time to read anymore. A glance through the newspaper and never a good book!
We are in a great rush to nowhere and we have the means to pay for things to be done for us. Why fight it?
These thoughts don't help when you are looking for the right way to communicate something you want to say or that you hope folks will want to hear and relate to.
Then came the bold. YOU ARE PART AND PARCEL OF THE PILL GENERATION. It all began with that aspirin your mother gave you years ago. Certainly your kids have known nothing else. Every shape and color; in fancy containers and plain; but always handy.
True, it all began with mom. She tranquilized by reading stories children liked to hear, reciting poetry by the hour and re-telling those "hand-me-downs" from previous generations. All were designed to relate to the peace of mind and the education of the upcoming generation.
We were supposed to be a little poor, maybe a little hungry, clothes a little worn and torn, hands grubby on occasion, and discouragement part of a regular diet.
If treatment was needed, there was a home remedy--like lemon, sugar and kerosene for coughing spells; iodine that stung for cuts and scratches; mustard plaster for congestion; argerol and ipicac [ipecac] (can't spell 'em but sure can taste 'em); and then the spring "line up kids and we'll clean out the winter"--each in turn gulped a tablespoon of castor oil.
What happened to the Sunday visits? The picnic trips with the whole family? Are there still places to go and things to do--as a family? Do we need a pill to escape or to relax? Do we need another to sharpen the intellect, to reassure, to give courage? Whey do I need to be confused to boost my morale and pull me out of a depression? My old Sunday School teacher used to say, "Don't count sheep; talk to the Shepherd." Sometimes that worked.
So many are worried. Things are already distorted and we either don't know how to face our times or we don't want to. It's so easy to pick up the many-sided safety valve "The devil made me do it." There's a pill for everything and we are the generation of pills.
It's tough to relate when the terms are over your head and the kids see you and your limited exposure as the root of the problem. To you a trip is travel, a pot belongs under a bed, and hooked is something mom did to make a rug.
The youngsters can't relate to the hydraulic ram, the wooden water tank, a stopped overflow and water from the attic to the basement with plaster falling behind. Coal oil lamps and candles, chunk stoves and feather ticks, soap stones and crocks, three point two and Goose Goslin, all need explaining.
So they come back with kicks and distortions, pot and love-in, beautiful and Hotline, grass and hard rock music, Mary Jane and free love.
Maybe we need to find the time to study our vocabulary. We who are older have made the journey and we know. Those who are younger will soon be the ones who can recount the experience and just hope the even younger generation will not go quite as far and fast as they did. But they know they will!
Somehow, I don't mind telling you about a 19 year old boy and his dad. They related and understood, although the language was a shade different. The young fellow came down to breakfast on Sunday morning. He was greeted with "Son, you turned in mighty late last night." There was a ready explanation for the 2:00 a.m. arrival. "Don't you see, Dad, the ole Model-A froze up and she boiled over. I took the radiator cap off to see what happened and it blew off in the big snow drift over on the middle pike. I looked and looked but never did find it again."
The response was unexpected. "Yes, Son. Well some years ago your Mother and I were courting. We had old Nancy to the buggy and came around past Highland and over Mink Hollow Road. On the way the lap robe bounced out of the back of the buggy, and it took up tow hours to locate that darn thing."
Sometimes there are older people who have a story to tell. I remember the same 19 year old boy who managed to get pifilated on 3.2 beer when he was two years below the legal age limit for purchase and consumption.
I have seen parents who must cap a difficult and frustrating week with "just a few" to put the memories away for a spell. Then they wonder what makes a kid seek escape from a hard and frustrating week at school with a slightly different approach.
There is a role for recreation in our society. Simple things like walks in the woods, picnics and croquet. Maybe we can read a little to relax. When did you learn you last poem or listen to the birds sing early in the morning.
There is a free society and we do have a free life. There is even freedom to self-destruct if we don't find the way to relate and communicate and love in the broadest sense.
Don't look for answers in terms of economic or social levels. Race and religion are both involved and concerned, nor have they found all the answers in the image of man or the hope of faith. When I was a youth I asked for guidance. My college professor said, "You are often guilty by association." From my mother came, "A man is known by the company he keeps." Dad got right to the point, "If you lie down with dogs, you will get up with fleas."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
September 15, 2009
May 1971
It was a conference of sorts...In fact, it was a big meeting under the auspices of the President's Committee for the Employment of the Handicapped. People came from all over the world, for disability and rehabilitation cannot be walled in for only a few to endure or enjoy.
Recreation entered in as wheelchair athletes demonstrated the fruits of competition and the therapy of physical activity. Fertile minds exposed ingenious devices and a grim determination to achieve in spite of...The strength, desire and grit of the real man was never better demonstrated. You can do so much with so little. We who have so much with which to meet life may indeed feel shame.
Somehow you are convinced recreation is something you must earn. And what was happening on the streets outside? Not all of the handicaps and disabilities were in the hotel. Not all of the mental capacity of the city was assembled on the concourse level. Much was on the streets of our Capitol. Vets against the War, controversy about sleeping in a national park, women talking about liberation for the ladies, youngsters saying that the establishment failed to recognize the grey area where truth really lies, and the obvious contrasts...
There are the beards, the mutton chops, the blue jeans, sandals, bare feet, thongs, micro-mini skirts and maxi coats on the same frame, and an unmistakable gleam in a number of old eyes. Who is right and who is wrong? Who's old fashioned and who just plain nuts?
They are sleeping in the park tonight. The supreme judicial body of our greatest country on the globe says they cannot. But, they are and they did and I guess they will. Some are physically handicapped. They left a part of themselves overseas. They were in the battle. They have a right to speak. I'm talking about the Vets. There are times when I'm proud to be identified as one of them; and then there are times when I want to join the kids who ask some of the authorities to justify all of it. My response about a different war and purpose has a hollow ring. I want a real answer for it all.
These amputees and the paraplegics who zip about and do things. These guys who complain so little and smile so much. I carry a big torch for those who find one of the greatest challenges in life is working with the handicapped.
The flag must have been flying from my pole as I went to lunch with three friends - all handicapped. One had to take the elevator because crutches don't work on escalators. Another has a victory over cancer and calls himself one of those successful colostomies. The third had just received the golden word and his handicap was unemployment.
Our placemat was "The Story of Our Flag." In the center was the Star Spangled Banner of Fort McHenry fame. On the flanks were such colorful reminders of our heritage as the Viking Flag, Cross of St. George, Royal Standard of Spain, French Fleur-de-Leis, British Union, Bunker Hill, Rattlesnake, Alamo, Confederate, Betsy Ross Flag, and more...
In bold letters the caption spoke - "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
I kept my thoughts to myself, but I thought! Yes, we are a long way from home sometimes. And we are a long way from base, and truth, and right, and giving, and dedication, and devotion, and faith, and trust, and charity, and love. We must be worthy of our keep and earn what we enjoy. Maybe recreation means re-Creation.
Congressman Jack Marsh of Virginia shared a situation report with me some months ago. I drew on this as I ate with my friends who have suffered, with men who had known war, and with the symbol of our great America adding nourishment. Why are we there? Why here? Who has a right to question? Was it earned? Will it be?
The emerging nation in question has a population of about two and one-half million spread along a coastline of about twelve hundred miles. Forests are perilous due to hostility of indigenous natives.
Loyalty to the home government is unquestioned but for the past few years, civilian unrest has been growing due to economic exploitation of local products and markets.
Continued petitions by the populace for a revision of policy have been rebuffed. This has led to outbreaks of armed conflict against the regular troops throughout the territory. The dominant nation is a foremost world power. Their army, although below wartime strength, nevertheless, is substantial in size.
There is no political cohesion or political stability. Privately, many influential supporters of the insurgency are pessimistic of success and some blandly forecast defeat, at best hoping for some compromise which more radical leaders are fast making impossible.
Knowledgeable foreign observers predict a quick, crushing military defeat, with severe penalties to Rebel leaders as an example to others harboring aspirations of Independence.
THE TIME -- 1775. THE PLACE -- America.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Recreation entered in as wheelchair athletes demonstrated the fruits of competition and the therapy of physical activity. Fertile minds exposed ingenious devices and a grim determination to achieve in spite of...The strength, desire and grit of the real man was never better demonstrated. You can do so much with so little. We who have so much with which to meet life may indeed feel shame.
Somehow you are convinced recreation is something you must earn. And what was happening on the streets outside? Not all of the handicaps and disabilities were in the hotel. Not all of the mental capacity of the city was assembled on the concourse level. Much was on the streets of our Capitol. Vets against the War, controversy about sleeping in a national park, women talking about liberation for the ladies, youngsters saying that the establishment failed to recognize the grey area where truth really lies, and the obvious contrasts...
There are the beards, the mutton chops, the blue jeans, sandals, bare feet, thongs, micro-mini skirts and maxi coats on the same frame, and an unmistakable gleam in a number of old eyes. Who is right and who is wrong? Who's old fashioned and who just plain nuts?
They are sleeping in the park tonight. The supreme judicial body of our greatest country on the globe says they cannot. But, they are and they did and I guess they will. Some are physically handicapped. They left a part of themselves overseas. They were in the battle. They have a right to speak. I'm talking about the Vets. There are times when I'm proud to be identified as one of them; and then there are times when I want to join the kids who ask some of the authorities to justify all of it. My response about a different war and purpose has a hollow ring. I want a real answer for it all.
These amputees and the paraplegics who zip about and do things. These guys who complain so little and smile so much. I carry a big torch for those who find one of the greatest challenges in life is working with the handicapped.
The flag must have been flying from my pole as I went to lunch with three friends - all handicapped. One had to take the elevator because crutches don't work on escalators. Another has a victory over cancer and calls himself one of those successful colostomies. The third had just received the golden word and his handicap was unemployment.
Our placemat was "The Story of Our Flag." In the center was the Star Spangled Banner of Fort McHenry fame. On the flanks were such colorful reminders of our heritage as the Viking Flag, Cross of St. George, Royal Standard of Spain, French Fleur-de-Leis, British Union, Bunker Hill, Rattlesnake, Alamo, Confederate, Betsy Ross Flag, and more...
In bold letters the caption spoke - "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all."
I kept my thoughts to myself, but I thought! Yes, we are a long way from home sometimes. And we are a long way from base, and truth, and right, and giving, and dedication, and devotion, and faith, and trust, and charity, and love. We must be worthy of our keep and earn what we enjoy. Maybe recreation means re-Creation.
Congressman Jack Marsh of Virginia shared a situation report with me some months ago. I drew on this as I ate with my friends who have suffered, with men who had known war, and with the symbol of our great America adding nourishment. Why are we there? Why here? Who has a right to question? Was it earned? Will it be?
The emerging nation in question has a population of about two and one-half million spread along a coastline of about twelve hundred miles. Forests are perilous due to hostility of indigenous natives.
Loyalty to the home government is unquestioned but for the past few years, civilian unrest has been growing due to economic exploitation of local products and markets.
Continued petitions by the populace for a revision of policy have been rebuffed. This has led to outbreaks of armed conflict against the regular troops throughout the territory. The dominant nation is a foremost world power. Their army, although below wartime strength, nevertheless, is substantial in size.
There is no political cohesion or political stability. Privately, many influential supporters of the insurgency are pessimistic of success and some blandly forecast defeat, at best hoping for some compromise which more radical leaders are fast making impossible.
Knowledgeable foreign observers predict a quick, crushing military defeat, with severe penalties to Rebel leaders as an example to others harboring aspirations of Independence.
THE TIME -- 1775. THE PLACE -- America.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
September 8, 2009
April 1971
Life is what we work for, talk about, and hold tight to. Often the thread is thin and sometimes there is a regeneration. Spring does follow the dead of winter. We breathe deeply of the fresh breezes and express pleasure in being alive. We look for the first swelling buds and the initial spikes of green forcing their way between the frosty layers of earth. Yes, it is spring and life leaves that dormant state and flows fully again.
The old walnut was dead. At least is was very far gone, and there was no hope of recovery. It stood at one corner of the church. As if showing that even a tree cared about such things, it leaned toward the sanctuary. The trustees who know about such things felt the seventy-five year vigil had been sufficient. The patriarch must come down.
Then came the bulldozer to push out the stump and do the grading. Some sleeping grubs and a few sluggish fishing worms were turned up. They worked their way back into the earth, to shelter, protection, and survival. Even the stump of the tree fought to hang on, preferring to rot rather than be rudely dislodged.
My week had been like this. The economy was tight both from a personal and business standpoint. I had listened to someone say austerity a dozen times. He wanted me to know the sky was falling, and I had best shore up the dike if a part of my existence was to continue. I thought of this as I cut that walnut.
For a couple years my heart and effort has gone into a federation of associations know as the League. Many have tried to breathe life and strength into LFRA. They have pleaded with the larger members who do not need the strength of numbers to reap benefits to lend a hand for the lift they can give the smaller organizations. To the lesser agency associations, they have said the banding together gives strength and purchasing power. Use the Buyer's Guide for discount buying and as you save for yourself you will strengthen the League.
If you are planning a trip, make your travel arrangements through an LFRA contact. This will save you money and help the League do more for its members. Read the Recreation Register and see that others in your association receive a copy. They are still free.
My mind had wandered, and I returned to my tree. The stump and one of the larger sections of trunk were side by side. I knelt to view the ants searching for retreat. There it was!
At the edge of the more than 75 rings...the wood, each denoting a year of life, there was a half inch of new and green growth. The tree was as dead as dead could be. No doubt about it.
But to the trained eye, that tree fought to the bitter end. When it was 98 percent destroyed there was still the will to struggle and fight on. One of the basics is survival, and life is what life is all about.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
The old walnut was dead. At least is was very far gone, and there was no hope of recovery. It stood at one corner of the church. As if showing that even a tree cared about such things, it leaned toward the sanctuary. The trustees who know about such things felt the seventy-five year vigil had been sufficient. The patriarch must come down.
Then came the bulldozer to push out the stump and do the grading. Some sleeping grubs and a few sluggish fishing worms were turned up. They worked their way back into the earth, to shelter, protection, and survival. Even the stump of the tree fought to hang on, preferring to rot rather than be rudely dislodged.
My week had been like this. The economy was tight both from a personal and business standpoint. I had listened to someone say austerity a dozen times. He wanted me to know the sky was falling, and I had best shore up the dike if a part of my existence was to continue. I thought of this as I cut that walnut.
For a couple years my heart and effort has gone into a federation of associations know as the League. Many have tried to breathe life and strength into LFRA. They have pleaded with the larger members who do not need the strength of numbers to reap benefits to lend a hand for the lift they can give the smaller organizations. To the lesser agency associations, they have said the banding together gives strength and purchasing power. Use the Buyer's Guide for discount buying and as you save for yourself you will strengthen the League.
If you are planning a trip, make your travel arrangements through an LFRA contact. This will save you money and help the League do more for its members. Read the Recreation Register and see that others in your association receive a copy. They are still free.
My mind had wandered, and I returned to my tree. The stump and one of the larger sections of trunk were side by side. I knelt to view the ants searching for retreat. There it was!
At the edge of the more than 75 rings...the wood, each denoting a year of life, there was a half inch of new and green growth. The tree was as dead as dead could be. No doubt about it.
But to the trained eye, that tree fought to the bitter end. When it was 98 percent destroyed there was still the will to struggle and fight on. One of the basics is survival, and life is what life is all about.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
September 3, 2009
March 1971
One of the young folks reads this column. I know, for it was he who placed me squarely behind the eight ball with, "Dad, it was interesting, but what did it have to do with the League?"
This was a time to talk about life, the uncertainty of each undertaking, the personalities involved in most organizations, the goals and dreams of officers and committees, and the relationship of time, talent and efforts of individuals. The League is a great example. So many have worked so hard and done so much, yet the struggle always lies ahead.
The problems are compounded with growth. There is more and more to absorb, understand, and solve. The first bruises, cuts, and frustrations pile on. Suddenly, you find that not everything objectionable is dissipated by someone patting you on the head or kissing where it hurts. Now that you are somebody, you have problems and at least you must share in their solution.
Most are aware of the urgent inner call to push forward to the next plateau. Never are we quite satisfied or secure.
So it has been for this association of some 150,000 federal employees, many of whom do not know a thing about the League or its function. They only hear indirectly that it might lend a big hand if you are planning a trip or wanting to buy something at a discount. Who really relates to the other 54 agencies and their employees? We have our own niche and that's enough for anyone to chew.
Like the young man with all the dreams and ambitions, the League has grown and stumbled. It has plunged forward, made great strides, fallen and gotten up to try again. The potential is always the incentive. That many people and that many agencies and a central interest and dedication--Think of the possibilities if that many spoke with one voice. Yes, mountains could be moved. Hope springs with some real justification.
The League is not at that point yet, but our little pattern of a life example must take a man into those years he calls the prime of life. He has learned that the late teenager who was ready to save the world at 18, is now 30 and can't save fifty cents.
The mortgage payments and the rent are always due; the grocery costs mount; the car needs unexpected repairs; there must be insurance in case something happens to the head of the household...
We want the best for each one and can't always convince each component that we are doing the best we can, have stretched the resources and income to the best advantage, and next year we will have the time and the money to take that long anticipated trip with the entire family. Yes, the pot is at the end of the rainbow.
If the struggle of life for an individual never ends as long as there is life, what of an organization that is in effect a loose federation with many of the components more interested in the immediate backyard of the own R&W?
Such thoughts took me back to boyhood. Old Charlie Scott sat on an oak stump. He had been laying a flagstone walk around our house, and he was both hot and tired. A young chap sat at his feet to show him the toad frog which had hopped out from under the porch.
Gently he lifted the toad into the cup of a powerful, calloused hand. Then he explained the superstition that warts would come off the toad and onto the hand of the little boy who picked him up. No, not on a big, tough, black hand. After all, warts are white. That's what he said anyway.
I didn't believe Charlie, and I told him so... But I did watch my hands for a couple of weeks. And I do go out the same door I came in when I'm visiting someone, and don't want to break a friendship. Charlie said I should do that.
Maybe some of you will understand that I do not believe any of this stuff about being born under a certain sign that makes me jovial, and bright and capable and understanding and happy and willing and... I just glance at the Farmer's Almanac to find out when the bad storms are coming. I don't set any store by what it says.
I don't think there is anything to Friday the 13th, but I was in a banzai attack in World War II on April 13th, a Friday. I had an accident on such a day and was in the middle of a severe wind storm on another...and in the center of a violent confrontation between two strong arm groups of men on a Friday the 13th. I don't believe in such things.
On my desk is a round, black object. It has a white circle with a black eight in the circle. They call it an eight ball. If you shake it soundly and ask a question it give an answer. I don't really believe the things it indicates... Or do I?...
I asked about the prospects for the League of Federal Recreation Associations in 1971 and turned up the window in the bottom of the eight ball. There seemed to be an eye looking back at me. Then, an eyelid opened and closed a couple of times (I saw the eyelashes). Then suddenly it was there. The answer which I must believe flashed forth...OUTLOOK GOOD.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
This was a time to talk about life, the uncertainty of each undertaking, the personalities involved in most organizations, the goals and dreams of officers and committees, and the relationship of time, talent and efforts of individuals. The League is a great example. So many have worked so hard and done so much, yet the struggle always lies ahead.
The problems are compounded with growth. There is more and more to absorb, understand, and solve. The first bruises, cuts, and frustrations pile on. Suddenly, you find that not everything objectionable is dissipated by someone patting you on the head or kissing where it hurts. Now that you are somebody, you have problems and at least you must share in their solution.
Most are aware of the urgent inner call to push forward to the next plateau. Never are we quite satisfied or secure.
So it has been for this association of some 150,000 federal employees, many of whom do not know a thing about the League or its function. They only hear indirectly that it might lend a big hand if you are planning a trip or wanting to buy something at a discount. Who really relates to the other 54 agencies and their employees? We have our own niche and that's enough for anyone to chew.
Like the young man with all the dreams and ambitions, the League has grown and stumbled. It has plunged forward, made great strides, fallen and gotten up to try again. The potential is always the incentive. That many people and that many agencies and a central interest and dedication--Think of the possibilities if that many spoke with one voice. Yes, mountains could be moved. Hope springs with some real justification.
The League is not at that point yet, but our little pattern of a life example must take a man into those years he calls the prime of life. He has learned that the late teenager who was ready to save the world at 18, is now 30 and can't save fifty cents.
The mortgage payments and the rent are always due; the grocery costs mount; the car needs unexpected repairs; there must be insurance in case something happens to the head of the household...
We want the best for each one and can't always convince each component that we are doing the best we can, have stretched the resources and income to the best advantage, and next year we will have the time and the money to take that long anticipated trip with the entire family. Yes, the pot is at the end of the rainbow.
If the struggle of life for an individual never ends as long as there is life, what of an organization that is in effect a loose federation with many of the components more interested in the immediate backyard of the own R&W?
Such thoughts took me back to boyhood. Old Charlie Scott sat on an oak stump. He had been laying a flagstone walk around our house, and he was both hot and tired. A young chap sat at his feet to show him the toad frog which had hopped out from under the porch.
Gently he lifted the toad into the cup of a powerful, calloused hand. Then he explained the superstition that warts would come off the toad and onto the hand of the little boy who picked him up. No, not on a big, tough, black hand. After all, warts are white. That's what he said anyway.
I didn't believe Charlie, and I told him so... But I did watch my hands for a couple of weeks. And I do go out the same door I came in when I'm visiting someone, and don't want to break a friendship. Charlie said I should do that.
Maybe some of you will understand that I do not believe any of this stuff about being born under a certain sign that makes me jovial, and bright and capable and understanding and happy and willing and... I just glance at the Farmer's Almanac to find out when the bad storms are coming. I don't set any store by what it says.
I don't think there is anything to Friday the 13th, but I was in a banzai attack in World War II on April 13th, a Friday. I had an accident on such a day and was in the middle of a severe wind storm on another...and in the center of a violent confrontation between two strong arm groups of men on a Friday the 13th. I don't believe in such things.
On my desk is a round, black object. It has a white circle with a black eight in the circle. They call it an eight ball. If you shake it soundly and ask a question it give an answer. I don't really believe the things it indicates... Or do I?...
I asked about the prospects for the League of Federal Recreation Associations in 1971 and turned up the window in the bottom of the eight ball. There seemed to be an eye looking back at me. Then, an eyelid opened and closed a couple of times (I saw the eyelashes). Then suddenly it was there. The answer which I must believe flashed forth...OUTLOOK GOOD.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
August 28, 2009
January/February 1971
There is always a gate. Sometimes it is swinging in, and at other times, swinging out. For every gate there is an experience. There are people to relate to the gate whether it be of wood, metal, or stone.
Some gates are ornate, and others brightly painted. Some are rusty, creaking, and only half on an abandoned post. Always the gate is engaged in a struggle against the elements created by both nature and man.
At the gate there are always hopes, memories, ambitions, and experiences. Of all the creations, these vital ingredients have been reserved for man alone. Both the generosity and the responsibility of these gifts are overwhelming. Thankfully, there is a balance which causes the gate to swing in one direction with pressure, and in another with pull.
As we reach into the tomorrow of yet another year, we must close our gate on some great events which are now history. All of us have our own reflection as we see an old year out and anticipate the new. I trust that you will have your own parade of thoughts as I relate my own gate experiences.
In the past year a gate was opened for a member of our family. This was a farewell gate for one who had seen nearly 82 years as a treasured component of our inner circle. She was the one who had laughed with such understanding when a small boy on a very black night was encouraged to set a new record for the 100 yard dash. The route was from the barn to the back porch and was initiated by the groan of a rusty hinge supporting a sagging gate.
She it was who often summed up the ambition of this youth with the impossible goal, "He's all too often reaching for the moon." She lived long enough to hear her little granddaughter say, "I used to think Daddy was so tall he could walk up on a stepladder and touch the sky." In the time of that grandmother, other young Americans opened the impossible gate--reached the moon and walked upon it. It couldn't be done and yet is was...in 1970.
Hardly had that departing latch dropped before another was being lifted to accommodate someone coming in our gate. For those who are interested, there is a grandson. We have our miracle and he picked my birthday to enter the gate.
Undoubtedly, gates are important, and for some 17 years I sat on a great campus where I could watch the arrival of young men and women as they walked between the great brick posts and under the identifying ironwork. For many this was a giant step which would be appreciated and assimilated.
The bricks and mortar were there, the knowledge of generations waited in the library, and many fertile minds were ready to share the largest word in research and discovery. Like the structure of bricks and the mortar, knowledge is built on fact and finding, a step at a time.
Each generation adds a segment to the great mosaic of life. All too often there are those who exit through the gate after a short struggle, for the campus hills offer a challenge. Others see the green grass which borders the pathway lading to the great outside and depart. For some, it will remain green, but for most, it will lose its vigor as the distance from the gate increases.
Fortunately, there are many who have the means, the stamina, and the desire to complete the experience and enjoy not only the climax parade before family and friends, but also the fruits of effort.
It is difficult for us to look at the interesting experience we call life without realizing that each generation and each year goes beyond that which preceded it. Somehow the combination of the certainty of yesterday gives the hope that is required for tomorrow.
Indeed the story is an old one, but deeply significant...So many have not heard it yet...The young man left home and walked through the gate to seek his fortune in his own way. For a time those who had contributed most to his preparation were forgotten and ignored.
The years passed and an aging mother and father received a letter. Briefly it stated, "I will be on the train next Wednesday. If I am welcome at home, after the years of heartache and neglect I have caused, please hang a white cloth on the cherry tree at the edge of town. If there is no cloth, I will know I am not welcome."
When the train reached the town limits, a passenger viewed an old tree completely covered with bed sheets.
It has been good to re-live old days, but it means even more to be a part of the preparation for an unexplored tomorrow. I think I'll spend a few moments with the thoughts of the English school teacher in India.
She faced an uncertain road, and her answer may well have a message for the League, for the leadership, for 150,000 members representing 58 federal agencies and for you and for me...
"And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year: 'Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.' And he replied, 'Go out into the darkness and put thy hand in the hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light and safer than a known way.'"
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Some gates are ornate, and others brightly painted. Some are rusty, creaking, and only half on an abandoned post. Always the gate is engaged in a struggle against the elements created by both nature and man.
At the gate there are always hopes, memories, ambitions, and experiences. Of all the creations, these vital ingredients have been reserved for man alone. Both the generosity and the responsibility of these gifts are overwhelming. Thankfully, there is a balance which causes the gate to swing in one direction with pressure, and in another with pull.
As we reach into the tomorrow of yet another year, we must close our gate on some great events which are now history. All of us have our own reflection as we see an old year out and anticipate the new. I trust that you will have your own parade of thoughts as I relate my own gate experiences.
In the past year a gate was opened for a member of our family. This was a farewell gate for one who had seen nearly 82 years as a treasured component of our inner circle. She was the one who had laughed with such understanding when a small boy on a very black night was encouraged to set a new record for the 100 yard dash. The route was from the barn to the back porch and was initiated by the groan of a rusty hinge supporting a sagging gate.
She it was who often summed up the ambition of this youth with the impossible goal, "He's all too often reaching for the moon." She lived long enough to hear her little granddaughter say, "I used to think Daddy was so tall he could walk up on a stepladder and touch the sky." In the time of that grandmother, other young Americans opened the impossible gate--reached the moon and walked upon it. It couldn't be done and yet is was...in 1970.
Hardly had that departing latch dropped before another was being lifted to accommodate someone coming in our gate. For those who are interested, there is a grandson. We have our miracle and he picked my birthday to enter the gate.
Undoubtedly, gates are important, and for some 17 years I sat on a great campus where I could watch the arrival of young men and women as they walked between the great brick posts and under the identifying ironwork. For many this was a giant step which would be appreciated and assimilated.
The bricks and mortar were there, the knowledge of generations waited in the library, and many fertile minds were ready to share the largest word in research and discovery. Like the structure of bricks and the mortar, knowledge is built on fact and finding, a step at a time.
Each generation adds a segment to the great mosaic of life. All too often there are those who exit through the gate after a short struggle, for the campus hills offer a challenge. Others see the green grass which borders the pathway lading to the great outside and depart. For some, it will remain green, but for most, it will lose its vigor as the distance from the gate increases.
Fortunately, there are many who have the means, the stamina, and the desire to complete the experience and enjoy not only the climax parade before family and friends, but also the fruits of effort.
It is difficult for us to look at the interesting experience we call life without realizing that each generation and each year goes beyond that which preceded it. Somehow the combination of the certainty of yesterday gives the hope that is required for tomorrow.
Indeed the story is an old one, but deeply significant...So many have not heard it yet...The young man left home and walked through the gate to seek his fortune in his own way. For a time those who had contributed most to his preparation were forgotten and ignored.
The years passed and an aging mother and father received a letter. Briefly it stated, "I will be on the train next Wednesday. If I am welcome at home, after the years of heartache and neglect I have caused, please hang a white cloth on the cherry tree at the edge of town. If there is no cloth, I will know I am not welcome."
When the train reached the town limits, a passenger viewed an old tree completely covered with bed sheets.
It has been good to re-live old days, but it means even more to be a part of the preparation for an unexplored tomorrow. I think I'll spend a few moments with the thoughts of the English school teacher in India.
She faced an uncertain road, and her answer may well have a message for the League, for the leadership, for 150,000 members representing 58 federal agencies and for you and for me...
"And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year: 'Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown.' And he replied, 'Go out into the darkness and put thy hand in the hand of God. That shall be to you better than a light and safer than a known way.'"
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
August 24, 2009
November 1970
There is a nail at the top of the basement steps. It's just like the old one in the house across the field. This is where my newer "handy cap" hangs.
Early morning in an interesting time. In the mad scramble of jumbled thoughts as one attempts to find that pin point of focus for the activities of the day, there come memories, ambitions, frustrations and concerns. There is family, work, Thanksgiving, welfare, recreation, income vs. out-go, health, memory and hats.
How can you separate one from the other and make your day and your reason for being make sense. Like the Alice of Wonderland you are in a maze of mirrors, trying to find the looking glass to walk through, and knowing that unlike the Mad Hatter you will not be able to balance all of the shapes and styles upon your whirling mind at once.
So, to the nail and the cap. The dogs knew the signal of a bolt sliding in the lock and woke up the neighbors in anticipation of a run in the woods.
The collies led the way in a joyful dash. They had been to the sassafras stump before and were content to lie quietly for the moments the fellow wearing the handy cap seemed to relish as he sat. This morning there was a dew covered spider web and the owner worked back and forth to leave a perfect lacework pattern. The handiwork was perfection and much like others I had seen before. How do they know to follow a path similar to those who have deposited their thread in like fashion over so many years? Nature has such a way of balancing things out...maybe we'd better try to straighten out our own disorganized thinking.
There are bonnets and caps and hats. Some fit and are attractive while others are better relegated to the foot of the basement steps or the corner of the attic.
For years the urge to try on hats has overwhelmed me. There is always a laugh in a hat when it is deposited upon the wrong head.
For a period the LFRA hat was my vocation. It is still one of my strong interests and hopes. The first birthday of the Recreation Register is a happy occasion for me and I join the 75,000 readers of our 140,000 membership in a salute. The long struggle is not over but the vital communication link is alive and rendering great service. For this we can all be thankful.
And on to another hat... This one is the Committee for the Handicapped, People-to-People... This is a mighty comfortable fit. Those who have such a variety of problems make life so worthwhile for all of us. This was the fleeting thought on that sassafras stump and I almost left it there to complete my walk.
Then the colorful leaves and pine needles sifting down told me it was fall...November...the month of Thanksgiving... We gather the family together then...all of us...past and present...the well and strong, the sick and lame, the blind and deaf, the young and the old, the paralyzed and the voiceless... All of us... And we each have a pad and pencil to go with a ten minute time limit. We write down those things for which we are thankful.
This Thanksgiving we are thankful for those who care about the Recreation and Welfare of others. That there is a League and a union of the employee associations. Then we are thankful for those around us who give so much inspiration and make out problems seem so small. I am thankful for the hat of service to the disabled that so many wear, even for just the moment of helping someone up the stairs or across the street.
Before me is the note from the paraplegic who says, "Each person is an individual and we do not sit in our wheelchairs like so many blobs, smiling incessantly...I am not always patient and cheerful...I criticize, I knock, I get mad and swear, I seldom have time to smile..."
I'm wondering how many of us would trade our lives for the life of any other individual we know. Remember, you would be trading all of the life, not part of yours for part of his. Not every lid that fits another man's kettle will go on yours.
All of a sudden the sun is getting brighter; there is no insect in the web and the spider is resting. This is a good time to be saying thanks to --
The God that gave me eyes that I might see,
And ears that I might hear,
A voice that I might tell to all
His story far and near.
To me He gave a heart too full
To pass my brother by,
Two legs, two feet, two arms and hands
To use to serve my fellow man.
A mind, a looking back, a soul set free
Thank God! He gave these gifts to me.
So I my duties must not shirk
For God made man to do His holy work.
The young, the lame, the old and gray,
The boys and girls who cannot play
Extend to us their searching hands.
To know the touch of one who truly understands.
Empathy, compassion we ask of Thee,
To help us do and see
The tasks which Thou hast given
That we might know the taste of Heaven.
I guess I better put my cap back on and go now. It's funny...after a few minutes on the Thanksgiving stump the "handy cap" really feels good when you are relating life to handicapped. I am thankful for my love of hats!
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Early morning in an interesting time. In the mad scramble of jumbled thoughts as one attempts to find that pin point of focus for the activities of the day, there come memories, ambitions, frustrations and concerns. There is family, work, Thanksgiving, welfare, recreation, income vs. out-go, health, memory and hats.
How can you separate one from the other and make your day and your reason for being make sense. Like the Alice of Wonderland you are in a maze of mirrors, trying to find the looking glass to walk through, and knowing that unlike the Mad Hatter you will not be able to balance all of the shapes and styles upon your whirling mind at once.
So, to the nail and the cap. The dogs knew the signal of a bolt sliding in the lock and woke up the neighbors in anticipation of a run in the woods.
The collies led the way in a joyful dash. They had been to the sassafras stump before and were content to lie quietly for the moments the fellow wearing the handy cap seemed to relish as he sat. This morning there was a dew covered spider web and the owner worked back and forth to leave a perfect lacework pattern. The handiwork was perfection and much like others I had seen before. How do they know to follow a path similar to those who have deposited their thread in like fashion over so many years? Nature has such a way of balancing things out...maybe we'd better try to straighten out our own disorganized thinking.
There are bonnets and caps and hats. Some fit and are attractive while others are better relegated to the foot of the basement steps or the corner of the attic.
For years the urge to try on hats has overwhelmed me. There is always a laugh in a hat when it is deposited upon the wrong head.
For a period the LFRA hat was my vocation. It is still one of my strong interests and hopes. The first birthday of the Recreation Register is a happy occasion for me and I join the 75,000 readers of our 140,000 membership in a salute. The long struggle is not over but the vital communication link is alive and rendering great service. For this we can all be thankful.
And on to another hat... This one is the Committee for the Handicapped, People-to-People... This is a mighty comfortable fit. Those who have such a variety of problems make life so worthwhile for all of us. This was the fleeting thought on that sassafras stump and I almost left it there to complete my walk.
Then the colorful leaves and pine needles sifting down told me it was fall...November...the month of Thanksgiving... We gather the family together then...all of us...past and present...the well and strong, the sick and lame, the blind and deaf, the young and the old, the paralyzed and the voiceless... All of us... And we each have a pad and pencil to go with a ten minute time limit. We write down those things for which we are thankful.
This Thanksgiving we are thankful for those who care about the Recreation and Welfare of others. That there is a League and a union of the employee associations. Then we are thankful for those around us who give so much inspiration and make out problems seem so small. I am thankful for the hat of service to the disabled that so many wear, even for just the moment of helping someone up the stairs or across the street.
Before me is the note from the paraplegic who says, "Each person is an individual and we do not sit in our wheelchairs like so many blobs, smiling incessantly...I am not always patient and cheerful...I criticize, I knock, I get mad and swear, I seldom have time to smile..."
I'm wondering how many of us would trade our lives for the life of any other individual we know. Remember, you would be trading all of the life, not part of yours for part of his. Not every lid that fits another man's kettle will go on yours.
All of a sudden the sun is getting brighter; there is no insect in the web and the spider is resting. This is a good time to be saying thanks to --
The God that gave me eyes that I might see,
And ears that I might hear,
A voice that I might tell to all
His story far and near.
To me He gave a heart too full
To pass my brother by,
Two legs, two feet, two arms and hands
To use to serve my fellow man.
A mind, a looking back, a soul set free
Thank God! He gave these gifts to me.
So I my duties must not shirk
For God made man to do His holy work.
The young, the lame, the old and gray,
The boys and girls who cannot play
Extend to us their searching hands.
To know the touch of one who truly understands.
Empathy, compassion we ask of Thee,
To help us do and see
The tasks which Thou hast given
That we might know the taste of Heaven.
I guess I better put my cap back on and go now. It's funny...after a few minutes on the Thanksgiving stump the "handy cap" really feels good when you are relating life to handicapped. I am thankful for my love of hats!
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
August 18, 2009
October 1970
It was a massive desk with a thick glass over the entire surface. This was fitting since Dad was a big man in my life, in his work with the government and in physical appearance. Under the glass were three items of interest to a young lad who loved to visit "the office" on a Saturday morning when school was out and federal employees only worked a half day.
After some paperclips, a wide rubber band, and a pencil you could screw the point in and out of had been secured in the deep recesses of corduroy knickers and the ladies of the office had their "making over the boss's kid," I could study that desk top. Prominent was the quotation, "The wheel that does the squeaking is the one that gets the grease." A baby held a bottle over the caption "Milk Makes Men."
There was the young mother in blue and white gingham at the clothes line hanging the beautifully fluffed and I am sure already dry clothes. Those words still drift back: "The clothes line is a rosary of household love and care. Each little saint the mother loves is represented there." That must have included me!
Then, there was the picture of Mr. Lewis. I remember that one the best. In typical executive style, I stretched out in the swivel chair, placed my spindle legs on the glass desk top and leaned back. I was a wheel for a few moments but hadn't counted on some other wheels having to do with the stability of the chair.
As my foot left the desk in somewhat of a hurry, the heel dragged across the glass and much of the black rubber remained to distort the picture of Mr. Lewis. I don't recall that Dad was upset at his son, but I do recollect he was six-six and weighed two-sixty. Somehow the little fellow on the floor always remembered the words of that moment, "Mr. Lewis made his mark, and I reckon the boy wanted to make his."
So much is said, partly in jest and to make conversation, but in the routine and unexciting maze of government service. Perhaps this makes a little story very much in order. My Mother made the long journey just a few weeks ago. She left so much with us, as every mother should. She understood the strength of love and how you gave direction to life with it. So, quite obviously, she would say tell the story about the big man and the little Welsh coal miner from Cumberland.
Dad was bright and finished college in three years. I didn't know until many years after I finished that when you had a high school diploma in his day it meant you started in the sophomore year at college. Anyway, he started farming and became active in the Farm Grange. This farm organization gave support to Dad's contention that shipping costs for farm folks were out of all reason. There was no competition for private rail shipment by one very large company.
With a directing resolution from the Grange the young farmer approached the members of the Congress from Maryland. The only response came from David J. Lewis, a mite of a man stunted by labors in the coal mines of Allegany County. This self-made lawyer with less than a fourth grade education, began nearly a year of research, writing, and developing the case for parcel post legislation. At his side and request there worked a young farmer who was later to become the nation's Assistant Director of the Agricultural Extension Service.
In the midst of the legislative preparation the farmer had his first child. He took time out to give him a name. It was David Lewis, in honor of the little man with whom he walked down Pennsylvania Avenue each Wednesday for some thirty years. After a weekly luncheon the tall man and the almost dwarf relaxed by letting the public gawk as they walked.
The first parcel post bill was enacted into law by the Congress. Mr. Lewis, who later was honored as the Father of Social Security, was first recognized as the Daddy of Parcel Post. There is now among my prized inheritance a copy of that bill with the inscription, "To Reuben Brigham - to whom this legislation owes its life - David J. Lewis."
I went to see Mr. Lewis in Cumberland some years ago. He was in his mid-eighties working in the basement of a law building, and his clothes were wrinkled and spotty. The lawyers upstairs did not want me to go down into the basement retreat. He had failed so. I told them I was his namesake and knew him well. This was my pass key.
He was involved with blocks of wood and a jigsaw. After the warm greeting that was to be our last, he said, "David, they think I'm a little off." Then he explained, "I always wanted to know something about higher math and the books all assume you have had the basics. The only way I can work out the mathematical equations and physics is to cut blocks the way I think and then fit them together to prove the formula."
This was not too important until he added, "David, when you stop appreciating other people and when you stop desiring to improve you own knowledge, the world no longer needs you."
I am glad there is work ahead for all of us, that there is yet knowledge for us to acquire, and that there are people to relate to. Oddly enough the quot next to the Mr. Lewis picture read, "Life is a series of little packages from which the strings are always coming untied." If you can't handle it you might send it Parcel Post.
David Lewis Brigham
Executive Director
After some paperclips, a wide rubber band, and a pencil you could screw the point in and out of had been secured in the deep recesses of corduroy knickers and the ladies of the office had their "making over the boss's kid," I could study that desk top. Prominent was the quotation, "The wheel that does the squeaking is the one that gets the grease." A baby held a bottle over the caption "Milk Makes Men."
There was the young mother in blue and white gingham at the clothes line hanging the beautifully fluffed and I am sure already dry clothes. Those words still drift back: "The clothes line is a rosary of household love and care. Each little saint the mother loves is represented there." That must have included me!
Then, there was the picture of Mr. Lewis. I remember that one the best. In typical executive style, I stretched out in the swivel chair, placed my spindle legs on the glass desk top and leaned back. I was a wheel for a few moments but hadn't counted on some other wheels having to do with the stability of the chair.
As my foot left the desk in somewhat of a hurry, the heel dragged across the glass and much of the black rubber remained to distort the picture of Mr. Lewis. I don't recall that Dad was upset at his son, but I do recollect he was six-six and weighed two-sixty. Somehow the little fellow on the floor always remembered the words of that moment, "Mr. Lewis made his mark, and I reckon the boy wanted to make his."
So much is said, partly in jest and to make conversation, but in the routine and unexciting maze of government service. Perhaps this makes a little story very much in order. My Mother made the long journey just a few weeks ago. She left so much with us, as every mother should. She understood the strength of love and how you gave direction to life with it. So, quite obviously, she would say tell the story about the big man and the little Welsh coal miner from Cumberland.
Dad was bright and finished college in three years. I didn't know until many years after I finished that when you had a high school diploma in his day it meant you started in the sophomore year at college. Anyway, he started farming and became active in the Farm Grange. This farm organization gave support to Dad's contention that shipping costs for farm folks were out of all reason. There was no competition for private rail shipment by one very large company.
With a directing resolution from the Grange the young farmer approached the members of the Congress from Maryland. The only response came from David J. Lewis, a mite of a man stunted by labors in the coal mines of Allegany County. This self-made lawyer with less than a fourth grade education, began nearly a year of research, writing, and developing the case for parcel post legislation. At his side and request there worked a young farmer who was later to become the nation's Assistant Director of the Agricultural Extension Service.
In the midst of the legislative preparation the farmer had his first child. He took time out to give him a name. It was David Lewis, in honor of the little man with whom he walked down Pennsylvania Avenue each Wednesday for some thirty years. After a weekly luncheon the tall man and the almost dwarf relaxed by letting the public gawk as they walked.
The first parcel post bill was enacted into law by the Congress. Mr. Lewis, who later was honored as the Father of Social Security, was first recognized as the Daddy of Parcel Post. There is now among my prized inheritance a copy of that bill with the inscription, "To Reuben Brigham - to whom this legislation owes its life - David J. Lewis."
I went to see Mr. Lewis in Cumberland some years ago. He was in his mid-eighties working in the basement of a law building, and his clothes were wrinkled and spotty. The lawyers upstairs did not want me to go down into the basement retreat. He had failed so. I told them I was his namesake and knew him well. This was my pass key.
He was involved with blocks of wood and a jigsaw. After the warm greeting that was to be our last, he said, "David, they think I'm a little off." Then he explained, "I always wanted to know something about higher math and the books all assume you have had the basics. The only way I can work out the mathematical equations and physics is to cut blocks the way I think and then fit them together to prove the formula."
This was not too important until he added, "David, when you stop appreciating other people and when you stop desiring to improve you own knowledge, the world no longer needs you."
I am glad there is work ahead for all of us, that there is yet knowledge for us to acquire, and that there are people to relate to. Oddly enough the quot next to the Mr. Lewis picture read, "Life is a series of little packages from which the strings are always coming untied." If you can't handle it you might send it Parcel Post.
David Lewis Brigham
Executive Director
August 6, 2009
September 1970
Vacations are mighty important. A good case can be built for the short ones and the long ones. The in-between are also much to be desired. It is a matter for debate when one says the anticipation is often worth more than the actual leave time. Another will stress the real pleasure is in reliving the away moments through pictures and the telling to the poor stay-at-homes.
Well let me say a word for right in the middle of a vacation. Someone must want to know how much I enjoyed catching that big fish. The game warden landed on the lake by our boat and taxied over in his plane to be sure we had a license and that the boat was properly registered. Then, he asked the question I was waiting for... "Mind showing me your catch?" That stringer came out of the water mighty easy and the warden seemed impressed. I was sure he would have more to say about my big fish because it was the largest caught off Owl Island this summer.
Next, he paddled over to the boat where the younger generation was having a go at the bass and perch. The kids were within the length limit on their string, but just barely. It was good to bask in the light of success when the professional eye was on the scene. The old man had put it on 'em once again. Surely the warden wanted to see my fish again but he took off without further notice of that big guy who took my bait.
Many others have taken vacations and are now safely back. Not many came back with a badly sprained ankle from slipping on a rock and falling into the lake. Not many limped around in an off-white tennis shoe and had a boss full of sympathy and understanding who drew a parallel to the hippie in the same one shoe situation. The businessman who saw the one bare foot and the sneaker on the other admonished, "Hey fellar, you lost one of your shoes!" Came the snappy reply from the long haired youth, "Naw, I just found one!"
So we had a great time and we did relax, got a new grip on our problems and began to plan for another year. It's funny how easy it is to be your real congenial, wholesome self when you are a little distance from the problems of the office and the trials of keeping the home fires burning.
As we looked ahead to another day before this one was over, we did the logical thing. As League members the obvious move is to inquire about the LFRA Travel Program.
You can write for suggestions or ask for prices on trips you think you would like to try. If the League does not have what you want there is no problem about looking to other travel avenues. Our thinking is that we want to start where the discount is available. That means LFRA and the travel numbers.
So why do we spend time on vacation plans when we are just back from this ten day spree? That's easy! We had so much fun planning for this year that we want to get the kick to be realized from anticipating once again. Then we want the joy of another relaxing time and the best of all lift of telling friends like you about it.
We are thinking about a cruise or a flight to Europe. Maybe we'll settle for a See America tour by bus. Several short jaunts to Williamsburg, Hershey, and New England wouldn't be bad. I'd sure like to see Yellowstone again. then there's Hawaii and the far east. How about Tokyo?
There was lunch last week with a friend who had just returned from Tokyo. One of those combined business and fun trips. The highlight was a visit to a department store where he was greeted by a lovely English speaking, kimono clad Japanese hostess. In perfect English she welcomed, advised and hoped the visit would be flawless.
The elevator door by which the American stood quietly opened and the operator who appeared to be a duplicate of the greeter gave her welcome. The visitor was not to be outdone and after thanking the two girls he posed a question: "Do you take turns?" From the elevator operator, "No. So sorry. Just up and down."
Travel can be fun even when you are misunderstood. You can always tell someone about something, and they will laugh with you. Maybe that is the reason I had such a great time this year. You must go to Maine and hear the spice of a real "down easterner" before your travels are over.
Yes, I did almost forget about that fish. He was a big one and the game warden had noted my luck. So we went down the lake to Meddybemps with the six houses, church and general store. Had my picture taken with my fish and then went into store to see the old cracker barrel sitters who had told me the fishing was best "on the rain line." You watch for spots where the rain stops on the lake and the big ones are there.
The word was ahead of me. They knew about the big fish and told me so. I felt good and showed it. Then one of them, the deaf guy in the corner by the chewin' tobacco said, "Son, that was a mighty fine male fish you got." I agreed.
Then I began turning wheels...how does he know it is a male? I made the wrong move and asked... He couldn't hear the question but another old native did. Came the answer...
"Of course it's a male, son. It's a small mouth bass ain't it?"
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Well let me say a word for right in the middle of a vacation. Someone must want to know how much I enjoyed catching that big fish. The game warden landed on the lake by our boat and taxied over in his plane to be sure we had a license and that the boat was properly registered. Then, he asked the question I was waiting for... "Mind showing me your catch?" That stringer came out of the water mighty easy and the warden seemed impressed. I was sure he would have more to say about my big fish because it was the largest caught off Owl Island this summer.
Next, he paddled over to the boat where the younger generation was having a go at the bass and perch. The kids were within the length limit on their string, but just barely. It was good to bask in the light of success when the professional eye was on the scene. The old man had put it on 'em once again. Surely the warden wanted to see my fish again but he took off without further notice of that big guy who took my bait.
Many others have taken vacations and are now safely back. Not many came back with a badly sprained ankle from slipping on a rock and falling into the lake. Not many limped around in an off-white tennis shoe and had a boss full of sympathy and understanding who drew a parallel to the hippie in the same one shoe situation. The businessman who saw the one bare foot and the sneaker on the other admonished, "Hey fellar, you lost one of your shoes!" Came the snappy reply from the long haired youth, "Naw, I just found one!"
So we had a great time and we did relax, got a new grip on our problems and began to plan for another year. It's funny how easy it is to be your real congenial, wholesome self when you are a little distance from the problems of the office and the trials of keeping the home fires burning.
As we looked ahead to another day before this one was over, we did the logical thing. As League members the obvious move is to inquire about the LFRA Travel Program.
You can write for suggestions or ask for prices on trips you think you would like to try. If the League does not have what you want there is no problem about looking to other travel avenues. Our thinking is that we want to start where the discount is available. That means LFRA and the travel numbers.
So why do we spend time on vacation plans when we are just back from this ten day spree? That's easy! We had so much fun planning for this year that we want to get the kick to be realized from anticipating once again. Then we want the joy of another relaxing time and the best of all lift of telling friends like you about it.
We are thinking about a cruise or a flight to Europe. Maybe we'll settle for a See America tour by bus. Several short jaunts to Williamsburg, Hershey, and New England wouldn't be bad. I'd sure like to see Yellowstone again. then there's Hawaii and the far east. How about Tokyo?
There was lunch last week with a friend who had just returned from Tokyo. One of those combined business and fun trips. The highlight was a visit to a department store where he was greeted by a lovely English speaking, kimono clad Japanese hostess. In perfect English she welcomed, advised and hoped the visit would be flawless.
The elevator door by which the American stood quietly opened and the operator who appeared to be a duplicate of the greeter gave her welcome. The visitor was not to be outdone and after thanking the two girls he posed a question: "Do you take turns?" From the elevator operator, "No. So sorry. Just up and down."
Travel can be fun even when you are misunderstood. You can always tell someone about something, and they will laugh with you. Maybe that is the reason I had such a great time this year. You must go to Maine and hear the spice of a real "down easterner" before your travels are over.
Yes, I did almost forget about that fish. He was a big one and the game warden had noted my luck. So we went down the lake to Meddybemps with the six houses, church and general store. Had my picture taken with my fish and then went into store to see the old cracker barrel sitters who had told me the fishing was best "on the rain line." You watch for spots where the rain stops on the lake and the big ones are there.
The word was ahead of me. They knew about the big fish and told me so. I felt good and showed it. Then one of them, the deaf guy in the corner by the chewin' tobacco said, "Son, that was a mighty fine male fish you got." I agreed.
Then I began turning wheels...how does he know it is a male? I made the wrong move and asked... He couldn't hear the question but another old native did. Came the answer...
"Of course it's a male, son. It's a small mouth bass ain't it?"
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
January 10, 2009
July/August 1970
Mike is only four. You might say he is typical with a baseball cap and closely cropped hair. Sometimes he comes on too strong for the establishment. Kids have a way of saying it like it is...no camouflage or veneer.
This young man is one of the sizable entourage of youngsters who are in the niece and nephew category for Uncle Dave. Some call him Uncle Brigham since he is the oldest of the circle of the older generation curiosities. Daddy is a federal employee and mighty important. Mother is alright also. She does a little work on the side and cooks a pretty good meal.
But Daddy is the one. He may be a number on the government payroll or just one of 400,000 folks in the Washington arena. Then again, he is something special and Mike will tell you so if you ask him...or if you don't.
A recent copy of the Recreation Register came into the family circle. This was natural since the head of the house, in addition to running the agency to which he reports each morning, also belongs to a "recreation sumpin." I know because Mike told me.
So, the paper was passed around and scanned. There was talk of what the League is all about. Not very many seem to have the full picture and it was natural to turn to Uncle Dave as one who had lived with the situation for a couple of years. Of course he didn't know as much as Daddy but he might be able to tell us something. Four years old and bugging the dickens out of me! Oh boy!
In unity there is strength. I seemed to remember that from somewhere. This was a good place to begin and it could confuse and quiet a four-year old.
Wouldn't it be fine if all public servants were like Daddy and belonged to their own agency Recreation and Welfare Association, and these in turn all joined the League of Federal Recreation Associations? Now we would have 400,000 all working for the same thing and doing something about the many benefits which are waiting in the wings for such a group. Look at the purchasing power, the influence, the ability to bargain and the meaning such a unified voice could express. There is no limit if someone can just strike the right chord.
As if this were not enough to overwhelm bright-eyed Mike, there came urging to get down to cases, sort of a "what can this thing do for Daddy right now" type of explanation. As this one turned around to avoid being charred by the heat of the child's frankness, the nuts and bolts seemed to be dropping all around.
Yes, this has been a bad year for travel and the many who were expected to take advantage of good opportunities and discounts through the League have not been knocking down the doors. Money is tight and budgets are pinched. If the trip is over $300, it is just too much and there is not that kind of money running around loose.
The Buyer's Guides are out and there is another good reason to have Daddy in this thing called R&W. This is what we meant about the buying power of large numbers. And there were some tulip bulbs from Holland that Daddy could buy for a good price because he had his membership card.
There is no way to tell a four-year old about ways in which groups of Uncle Sam's people work with and find advantages in making or saving money through parking lots, cleaning facilities, barber shops, stationary and book stores, snack bars and cafeterias. He painting a guy into the corner with more questions about the time it takes to be a member of something. He thought he knew why some interest and dedicated service by a few hardy workers had breathed life into organizations that struggled to succeed and at time survive.
This matter of wanting to do for others and of feeling a responsibility caught the fancy of a young man. You don't have to be more than four to relate to that. So, the League does have responsibility and potential and we are going to hear more about it from Daddy. Right?...Right. came the answer.
Now it was time for a parent to respond and there was a picture at the top of the page for Mike to see. It should be obvious after this long talk about mice and men and recreation and things. The question came from a Mother who related well to the guy who has something to do with this League.
"Alright Mike, these are Executive Etchings and there is a man in the picture at the top of the page. Who is that man in the picture?" Mike loves Uncle Dave!
The answer was just what we all expected... "Don't worry, Mother, I know who that is alright... He's got problems! That's President Nixon."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
This young man is one of the sizable entourage of youngsters who are in the niece and nephew category for Uncle Dave. Some call him Uncle Brigham since he is the oldest of the circle of the older generation curiosities. Daddy is a federal employee and mighty important. Mother is alright also. She does a little work on the side and cooks a pretty good meal.
But Daddy is the one. He may be a number on the government payroll or just one of 400,000 folks in the Washington arena. Then again, he is something special and Mike will tell you so if you ask him...or if you don't.
A recent copy of the Recreation Register came into the family circle. This was natural since the head of the house, in addition to running the agency to which he reports each morning, also belongs to a "recreation sumpin." I know because Mike told me.
So, the paper was passed around and scanned. There was talk of what the League is all about. Not very many seem to have the full picture and it was natural to turn to Uncle Dave as one who had lived with the situation for a couple of years. Of course he didn't know as much as Daddy but he might be able to tell us something. Four years old and bugging the dickens out of me! Oh boy!
In unity there is strength. I seemed to remember that from somewhere. This was a good place to begin and it could confuse and quiet a four-year old.
Wouldn't it be fine if all public servants were like Daddy and belonged to their own agency Recreation and Welfare Association, and these in turn all joined the League of Federal Recreation Associations? Now we would have 400,000 all working for the same thing and doing something about the many benefits which are waiting in the wings for such a group. Look at the purchasing power, the influence, the ability to bargain and the meaning such a unified voice could express. There is no limit if someone can just strike the right chord.
As if this were not enough to overwhelm bright-eyed Mike, there came urging to get down to cases, sort of a "what can this thing do for Daddy right now" type of explanation. As this one turned around to avoid being charred by the heat of the child's frankness, the nuts and bolts seemed to be dropping all around.
Yes, this has been a bad year for travel and the many who were expected to take advantage of good opportunities and discounts through the League have not been knocking down the doors. Money is tight and budgets are pinched. If the trip is over $300, it is just too much and there is not that kind of money running around loose.
The Buyer's Guides are out and there is another good reason to have Daddy in this thing called R&W. This is what we meant about the buying power of large numbers. And there were some tulip bulbs from Holland that Daddy could buy for a good price because he had his membership card.
There is no way to tell a four-year old about ways in which groups of Uncle Sam's people work with and find advantages in making or saving money through parking lots, cleaning facilities, barber shops, stationary and book stores, snack bars and cafeterias. He painting a guy into the corner with more questions about the time it takes to be a member of something. He thought he knew why some interest and dedicated service by a few hardy workers had breathed life into organizations that struggled to succeed and at time survive.
This matter of wanting to do for others and of feeling a responsibility caught the fancy of a young man. You don't have to be more than four to relate to that. So, the League does have responsibility and potential and we are going to hear more about it from Daddy. Right?...Right. came the answer.
Now it was time for a parent to respond and there was a picture at the top of the page for Mike to see. It should be obvious after this long talk about mice and men and recreation and things. The question came from a Mother who related well to the guy who has something to do with this League.
"Alright Mike, these are Executive Etchings and there is a man in the picture at the top of the page. Who is that man in the picture?" Mike loves Uncle Dave!
The answer was just what we all expected... "Don't worry, Mother, I know who that is alright... He's got problems! That's President Nixon."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
January 6, 2009
June 1970
Crisfield is about as far as you can go without running out of land on Maryland's Eastern Shore. The purpose of the trip was to address some of the finest young Americans from the local high school classes who were being honored by Rotary Clubs. The riding partner wanted to talk about the League of Federal Recreation Associations in terms of both investment and insurance opportunities. He knew many had worked for the betterment of LFRA and had become somewhat discouraged and to a degree disillusioned.
My friend stopped at an antique shed to pick up some"depression glass." I saw a Martin House and thought it might look well and serve a purpose in my country vegetable garden. These birds live and work together in goodly numbers and close interdependence. They are not destructive and consume great quantities of insects, mosquitoes and bugs.
So, the Martin House found its new home at 2:00 A.M. and rested quietly in the yard. It had no inhabitants, no mobility and no reason for thinking it might in any remote way relate to this League business the two men had been talking about.
Then there came a fifteen foot hickory pole, a two by four and plywood platform, much lifting and a few nails. Now the house was up, overlooking the countryside and ready for tenants. It was early afternoon and there were two very much unresolved questions: Would the house stay on the pole if the wind blew? Would the Martins come?
By 4:00 P.M. there were two Martin scouts checking each of the 20 entrances and compartments. They heard the Bob White call in the pines below. The Robin sat peacefully on her nest with confidence each of the four blue eggs would be productive. A Cardinal sang from his bush where his mate was busy with her brood.
The Wren had hauled thousands of twigs into the winter feeder and could flutter wings and whistler like a flute with the pride of the mission accomplished.
The test was not to be long in coming. As the inspection of the Martin house continued and old sticks from another flock and generation were hauled away, there were flashes of lightening and the unmistakable rumble of the thunderstorm which had been predicted.
The duel of the jagged flashed was not an unfamiliar sight. Nor were the dark clouds. The Martins left the house and one wondered if they felt the insecurity and the uncertainty of quarters perched upon a pole.
The wind whispered through the pines. It spoke louder. Then came the rain, more wind and pellets of hail. The white pine grove rocked, the hail stones increased to the size of marbles and continued to beat down for twenty-five minutes. A large pine was twisted off some fifteen feet up. Another was broken in two and took a spruce with it.
The cherry in the garden was torn up. Gullies of water rushed by the house and the basement was filled to three and a half feet. The water couldn't run into the drain or under the door as fast as it was rolling down the steps form the backyard.
There were two more heavy cloudbursts and the garden was only a stripped down sea of mud where the strong and promising young plants had been. In the desolation and discouragement of it all there walked a man who had helped get it all planted, nourished, financed and on its way.
At this low point a Bob White called form the white pines. It was then I thought of the birds. The Martin House was still riding high, but would the Martins come back?
At the front of the picture window which the hail stones had pounded, the little feeder was standing the Wrens were safe. The singing told me so.
The news was not so good with the Cardinal. There was no longer a nest in the bush. The young were lost and the female was a distance away. The redbird sat on his limb and gave his throaty message of strength and assurance.
What about the Robin's nest in the pine. It was still intact after the coaster dip experience. But the eggs were gone and so were the parents. They must have given up! Then the first big surprise... One of the Robins flew up to her nest. She took the sting from her beak and began to weave it into the nest. There will be eggs next and then the brood. She still believes.
Back to the garden and the Martin house. It looks more black and white in the distance. Funny...only the roof was painted black. The rest was white...
The house is moving...or is it? There are no longer two Martins. There are now forty Martins! The Martins came back.
Nature has something to say to those who have worked so hard, attempted to accomplish in the face of real obstacles and given of themselves in the service for all federal workers. A little twister can provide a lot of inspiration. The Martin House is up and the Martins are building.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
My friend stopped at an antique shed to pick up some"depression glass." I saw a Martin House and thought it might look well and serve a purpose in my country vegetable garden. These birds live and work together in goodly numbers and close interdependence. They are not destructive and consume great quantities of insects, mosquitoes and bugs.
So, the Martin House found its new home at 2:00 A.M. and rested quietly in the yard. It had no inhabitants, no mobility and no reason for thinking it might in any remote way relate to this League business the two men had been talking about.
Then there came a fifteen foot hickory pole, a two by four and plywood platform, much lifting and a few nails. Now the house was up, overlooking the countryside and ready for tenants. It was early afternoon and there were two very much unresolved questions: Would the house stay on the pole if the wind blew? Would the Martins come?
By 4:00 P.M. there were two Martin scouts checking each of the 20 entrances and compartments. They heard the Bob White call in the pines below. The Robin sat peacefully on her nest with confidence each of the four blue eggs would be productive. A Cardinal sang from his bush where his mate was busy with her brood.
The Wren had hauled thousands of twigs into the winter feeder and could flutter wings and whistler like a flute with the pride of the mission accomplished.
The test was not to be long in coming. As the inspection of the Martin house continued and old sticks from another flock and generation were hauled away, there were flashes of lightening and the unmistakable rumble of the thunderstorm which had been predicted.
The duel of the jagged flashed was not an unfamiliar sight. Nor were the dark clouds. The Martins left the house and one wondered if they felt the insecurity and the uncertainty of quarters perched upon a pole.
The wind whispered through the pines. It spoke louder. Then came the rain, more wind and pellets of hail. The white pine grove rocked, the hail stones increased to the size of marbles and continued to beat down for twenty-five minutes. A large pine was twisted off some fifteen feet up. Another was broken in two and took a spruce with it.
The cherry in the garden was torn up. Gullies of water rushed by the house and the basement was filled to three and a half feet. The water couldn't run into the drain or under the door as fast as it was rolling down the steps form the backyard.
There were two more heavy cloudbursts and the garden was only a stripped down sea of mud where the strong and promising young plants had been. In the desolation and discouragement of it all there walked a man who had helped get it all planted, nourished, financed and on its way.
At this low point a Bob White called form the white pines. It was then I thought of the birds. The Martin House was still riding high, but would the Martins come back?
At the front of the picture window which the hail stones had pounded, the little feeder was standing the Wrens were safe. The singing told me so.
The news was not so good with the Cardinal. There was no longer a nest in the bush. The young were lost and the female was a distance away. The redbird sat on his limb and gave his throaty message of strength and assurance.
What about the Robin's nest in the pine. It was still intact after the coaster dip experience. But the eggs were gone and so were the parents. They must have given up! Then the first big surprise... One of the Robins flew up to her nest. She took the sting from her beak and began to weave it into the nest. There will be eggs next and then the brood. She still believes.
Back to the garden and the Martin house. It looks more black and white in the distance. Funny...only the roof was painted black. The rest was white...
The house is moving...or is it? There are no longer two Martins. There are now forty Martins! The Martins came back.
Nature has something to say to those who have worked so hard, attempted to accomplish in the face of real obstacles and given of themselves in the service for all federal workers. A little twister can provide a lot of inspiration. The Martin House is up and the Martins are building.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
December 31, 2008
May 1970
It's a long way down. At least that was the thought as I watched several workmen in the chill drizzle of a late winter morning. They were in the park eleven stories below and the things they were planting looked very dead and the labor hopeless.
Now a month has passed and the leaves are starting out on the trees. The red of the azaleas, the red, yellow and white of the tulips, and the blues of the border plants are saying something.
There is something to be said for starting with nothing, or almost nothing. You can add some faith and hope, a portion of TLC, the warmth of the sun, a well prepared seedbed, and the overwhelming spark of LIFE. The result can be anticipated is you are willing to wait the appointed time. It's not nearly as far down when there are colors in such perfect patterns to relate back to you.
How satisfied are you? Does the title "Federal Servant" bug a little? This is one thing the League of Federal Recreation Associations is all about. We want the world to know something about these folks who make up the great heartbeat that is the United States of America. True, we cannot all be identified, singled out and honored in the niche in which our talents are utilized. But...
But, aren't we part of the structure which placed men on the moon and brought three safely back from almost certain disaster? Is you position one calling for support of these proud young Americans on the line for their Country in Viet Nam? Or, are you in the services area making sure the mail goes through on time, that there are jobs for those who need them, that the production in this nation is in line with the needs, and the natural gifts of our environment are protected as we relate more and more to air and water conditions.
Perhaps you are involved in transportation and the moving of men and materials over, under and around. Roads, rails, airways and waterways tell us something about America and your role in her progress. Or, is it communications for defense or peace, business and pleasure? Could be you are in the midst of telling where we have been and projecting where we are going through a census survey, in interstate commerce, or by a relationship to our Interior?
As the stock market rocks around seeking level, you suddenly become fully appreciative of your position in the essential financial structure of the most blessed of the globe. Without the "me" in government what happens to budget, treasury, general accounting, federal deposits, home loans, small business, and securities to be held or exchanged?
You are a vital part of making things better for people everywhere. The health, the education, and the welfare of all are in your hands. Housing and the improvement of our cities occupy your time and ability. You are helping someone else through an immigration or naturalization maze just like someone in your own family experienced. You are part of the philosophy making certain there is equal justice under the law for all. Yes, even our friends in Internal Revenue give us that assurance.
My cup of tea is also in the heritage of our land and I reach out to those who want to hear about us, read about us, and see us in action yesterday and today. That's why I am enthused when I identify with the Library of Congress, the Archives, the Gallery of Art, Bureau of Standards, Patent Office, and the great and grand Smithsonian Institution.
A goodly number hit us where we live...We want to live longer, have less pain, and be able to enjoy what all these other government friends have done for us. That's why we direct a nod of pride to those who man the hospitals, research all areas of health and science, give us rehabilitation opportunities, and then economic security through gainful service to others.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Now a month has passed and the leaves are starting out on the trees. The red of the azaleas, the red, yellow and white of the tulips, and the blues of the border plants are saying something.
There is something to be said for starting with nothing, or almost nothing. You can add some faith and hope, a portion of TLC, the warmth of the sun, a well prepared seedbed, and the overwhelming spark of LIFE. The result can be anticipated is you are willing to wait the appointed time. It's not nearly as far down when there are colors in such perfect patterns to relate back to you.
How satisfied are you? Does the title "Federal Servant" bug a little? This is one thing the League of Federal Recreation Associations is all about. We want the world to know something about these folks who make up the great heartbeat that is the United States of America. True, we cannot all be identified, singled out and honored in the niche in which our talents are utilized. But...
But, aren't we part of the structure which placed men on the moon and brought three safely back from almost certain disaster? Is you position one calling for support of these proud young Americans on the line for their Country in Viet Nam? Or, are you in the services area making sure the mail goes through on time, that there are jobs for those who need them, that the production in this nation is in line with the needs, and the natural gifts of our environment are protected as we relate more and more to air and water conditions.
Perhaps you are involved in transportation and the moving of men and materials over, under and around. Roads, rails, airways and waterways tell us something about America and your role in her progress. Or, is it communications for defense or peace, business and pleasure? Could be you are in the midst of telling where we have been and projecting where we are going through a census survey, in interstate commerce, or by a relationship to our Interior?
As the stock market rocks around seeking level, you suddenly become fully appreciative of your position in the essential financial structure of the most blessed of the globe. Without the "me" in government what happens to budget, treasury, general accounting, federal deposits, home loans, small business, and securities to be held or exchanged?
You are a vital part of making things better for people everywhere. The health, the education, and the welfare of all are in your hands. Housing and the improvement of our cities occupy your time and ability. You are helping someone else through an immigration or naturalization maze just like someone in your own family experienced. You are part of the philosophy making certain there is equal justice under the law for all. Yes, even our friends in Internal Revenue give us that assurance.
My cup of tea is also in the heritage of our land and I reach out to those who want to hear about us, read about us, and see us in action yesterday and today. That's why I am enthused when I identify with the Library of Congress, the Archives, the Gallery of Art, Bureau of Standards, Patent Office, and the great and grand Smithsonian Institution.
A goodly number hit us where we live...We want to live longer, have less pain, and be able to enjoy what all these other government friends have done for us. That's why we direct a nod of pride to those who man the hospitals, research all areas of health and science, give us rehabilitation opportunities, and then economic security through gainful service to others.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
December 21, 2008
December 1970
The bumper sticker below the license plate of an Alabama auto caught my eye. It said, "Wise Men Still Seek Him."
Christmas is upon us again. The tired, but fairly good natured crowd clogs up the streets and freedom of movement is lost in the stores. Clerks are worn out and still they smile. Sales must be made and jobs need to be maintained. The joy of the season is almost buried under the crush for things. But is this what it's all about?
The temptation is to recall the orange in the toe of a stocking, wax candles on the pine tree you cut yourself, a "Flying Arrow" sled, the yule log you helped haul to the big fireplace, and the fire on the plum pudding. The woodbox in the corner by the kitchen range was a favorite spot also. Here you could drowse and absorb the first aroma of turkey and duck.
There is a definite generation gap... How many can recall stale hard candy, nuts in the shell, apples and a pair of shoe laces as the heart of the stocking loot? Or, the icy vigil at the head of the stairs while the pipeless furnace was being fired up with soft coal and the wood you had brought in?
Then we gathered in the parlor to open presents... You never heard about a parlor, or a mantle, or a kerosene lamp, or an outhouse, of sloppin' the hogs, or crows foot and standin' cedar... How about ground pine and laurel, holly and spruce, bayberry and Santa Claus?
It's no wonder we have trouble looking back some 2000 years when we can't even tell about our Christmas Past without a world of definition. Somehow this is the time of year to relate to the past, present, and future. We read about Scrooge and Tiny Tim with great feeling. We squelch our doubts by once again reading aloud, "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Clause!" At the same time we enjoy the superior smile of a boy who thinks he has found out there is no Santa and his Sister hasn't.
Tinsel and holly, Santa Claus, and children. Noise and confusion and the ring of cash registers; the tearing of credit slips (for Santa enters through a hole in the chimney and leaves through a hole in the pocket); above all these sounds are the notes of cornets and trombones playing "Holy Night" or "Little Town of Bethlehem." Wistful, little children look hungrily at shop displays; a child is made happy by a ten cent gadget (this is the season when we get the children something for Father to play with); Angels, wise men, and a special family; City lights and the light of a star. Luxury and a stable. Men of today and a manger of yesterday. Civilization and a Child.
To some the contrast seems a mockery and hypocrisy. Others there are to say romance and reality. I like the crowds and the three kings of the Orient. I like the city stores and the shepherds and the angels. Even in a world of confusion wise men see a star. Surely they say to young and old alike, "Help build a better tomorrow rather than to destroy an imperfect today."
The Wise Men following a Star, offering their gifts... This is a symbol of Christmas. If this ever be forgotten, the world will be the poorer. These Wise Men saw a Star. A radiance shone around them. Their hearts were not without wonder. These star-gazers related he brightness of the skies to the events of the earth. Even as the tides combine the waters of the earth with the pull of other planets, so these men responded to the unity and harmony of the larger universe.
These Wise Men saw a child. While it is possible to sentimentalize about childhood--or to fly off on another tangent in talk of little animals; nevertheless, most of us parents are saved by our children. The fires of our devotion are kindled around the manger of Bethlehem; or a tiny crib of a little child in any of our homes.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Christmas is upon us again. The tired, but fairly good natured crowd clogs up the streets and freedom of movement is lost in the stores. Clerks are worn out and still they smile. Sales must be made and jobs need to be maintained. The joy of the season is almost buried under the crush for things. But is this what it's all about?
The temptation is to recall the orange in the toe of a stocking, wax candles on the pine tree you cut yourself, a "Flying Arrow" sled, the yule log you helped haul to the big fireplace, and the fire on the plum pudding. The woodbox in the corner by the kitchen range was a favorite spot also. Here you could drowse and absorb the first aroma of turkey and duck.
There is a definite generation gap... How many can recall stale hard candy, nuts in the shell, apples and a pair of shoe laces as the heart of the stocking loot? Or, the icy vigil at the head of the stairs while the pipeless furnace was being fired up with soft coal and the wood you had brought in?
Then we gathered in the parlor to open presents... You never heard about a parlor, or a mantle, or a kerosene lamp, or an outhouse, of sloppin' the hogs, or crows foot and standin' cedar... How about ground pine and laurel, holly and spruce, bayberry and Santa Claus?
It's no wonder we have trouble looking back some 2000 years when we can't even tell about our Christmas Past without a world of definition. Somehow this is the time of year to relate to the past, present, and future. We read about Scrooge and Tiny Tim with great feeling. We squelch our doubts by once again reading aloud, "Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Clause!" At the same time we enjoy the superior smile of a boy who thinks he has found out there is no Santa and his Sister hasn't.
Tinsel and holly, Santa Claus, and children. Noise and confusion and the ring of cash registers; the tearing of credit slips (for Santa enters through a hole in the chimney and leaves through a hole in the pocket); above all these sounds are the notes of cornets and trombones playing "Holy Night" or "Little Town of Bethlehem." Wistful, little children look hungrily at shop displays; a child is made happy by a ten cent gadget (this is the season when we get the children something for Father to play with); Angels, wise men, and a special family; City lights and the light of a star. Luxury and a stable. Men of today and a manger of yesterday. Civilization and a Child.
To some the contrast seems a mockery and hypocrisy. Others there are to say romance and reality. I like the crowds and the three kings of the Orient. I like the city stores and the shepherds and the angels. Even in a world of confusion wise men see a star. Surely they say to young and old alike, "Help build a better tomorrow rather than to destroy an imperfect today."
The Wise Men following a Star, offering their gifts... This is a symbol of Christmas. If this ever be forgotten, the world will be the poorer. These Wise Men saw a Star. A radiance shone around them. Their hearts were not without wonder. These star-gazers related he brightness of the skies to the events of the earth. Even as the tides combine the waters of the earth with the pull of other planets, so these men responded to the unity and harmony of the larger universe.
These Wise Men saw a child. While it is possible to sentimentalize about childhood--or to fly off on another tangent in talk of little animals; nevertheless, most of us parents are saved by our children. The fires of our devotion are kindled around the manger of Bethlehem; or a tiny crib of a little child in any of our homes.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
December 12, 2008
April 1970
So you are doing everything you can with what you have to work with... You don't need an association of employees... You can make it on your own without a crutch... What's the matter now... What do you mean I could do more if I didn't have a handicap?
The last thing I need is a sermon to tell me a League of Federal Recreation Associations is important. After all, I have worked with and for the League and I believe. Perhaps we are too self centered and interested only in our own corner.
Maybe we don't possess the time, interest and stamina needed to do the extra of being involved in another association. I can just be a member and drift along. Let the suckers and those who can't do the other things plod along with organizations that do for others: I've got enough just to keep me snowed under!
Yes, I did hear the great Helen Hayes say it. "We are all handicapped: some physically, some mentally, some emotionally, some financially, and some spiritually." This can explain away the struggle of the League to be a forceful, dynamic and vital representative of 140,000 individual members.
All of us are handicapped when it comes to putting something of ourselves into something of a general nature. We didn't sit unmoved in the Commerce Auditorium on 144th Street as representatives of the Civil Service Commission presented the Second Annual Award Ceremony and the Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employee of the Year.
If you are wondering what you can do with what you have to do with, there are some folks close by who can tell you. Let's meet a few together...
The Marine Corps Band played "This is My Country," and we were all invited to join in singing the Star Spangled Banner as the Color Guard of the combined services advanced the Colors. So that sounds routine...
Then look on the stage... In the spotlight were braces, artificial limbs, a crutch, wheelchairs and personalities. Their owners were the 10 Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employees of the Year.
Many like you were nominated and from the search came those who were deemed to have done the most with what they had. Let's call the roll...
The Department of the Air Force sent Jimmy Adams (polio-meningitis), a research chemist with a Master's degree and an Outstanding Performance Rating; Dr. Thomas Austin (polio quadriplegic), Director of the National Oceanographic Data Center of the U.S. Navy and "Honorary Citizen" of Dade County by the Mayors Council for service as Chairman of the Greater Miami Area Equal Employment Opportunity Committee; USDA nominee Dr. Jay Basch (born deaf), an outstanding chemist and author; and Mrs. Francis Garcia (polio) deaf, mute, total blindness in one eye, and a presser with the Sandia Base Laundry in New Mexico who represented the Defense Atomic Support Agency.
Also in the footlights, Ralph Harwood (spinal meningitis) drew the nod from the Defense Supply Agency where he is a public representative and chemist although completely deaf; Mrs. Dorothy Hickey (polio) confined to a wheelchair for the past 24 years, refused to dwell on her infirmities, became an effective counselor to others severely handicapped and performs with accuracy, efficiency and cheer for the U.S.I.A.; Earl Miller (cerebral palsy) conquered a wheelchair, crutches, braces and a cane to learn to walk alone and to be named the outstanding representative from the Civil Service Commission itself.
Next, Philip Pepper (polio) who was President of his class at U.C.L.A. with a Master's degree in social welfare and presently the distinguished Chief of the Office of Program Planning and Evaluation, Indian Health Service, for H.E.W.; Miss Magdalene Phillips (blind) a dictating machine transcriber at Letterman Army Hospital takes the dictation of six medical officers and in her spare time counsels newly blinded patients.
As if this were not enough to make you proud and inspired the last of the 10 nominees was called forward for his citation. He walked across the stage. So, what's so great about walking across the stage?
Bob Smith, a combat rifleman in Korea in the winter of 1950 was presented by the Veterans Administration by Administrator Don Johnson. Bob was shot, taken prisoner, and held for ten days without food or medical attention. His wounds, aggravated by frost bite and infection, necessitate a quadruple amputation. Since 1955 he has been with the VA from tabulating machine operator to computer programmer.
Bob refused to be handicapped. With pride and determination he walked across the stage to meet Harold Russell, Chairman of the President's Committee on Employment of the Handicapped, himself a double amputee.
Someone in the audience quipped, "The Iron Men are at work," as four artificial arms and functional hooks grasped the plaque. Who could better carry the title Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employee of the Year?
Bob Smith opened his own door to opportunity and as the program said, "He's making sure the door stays open for others now traveling that hard road back."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
The last thing I need is a sermon to tell me a League of Federal Recreation Associations is important. After all, I have worked with and for the League and I believe. Perhaps we are too self centered and interested only in our own corner.
Maybe we don't possess the time, interest and stamina needed to do the extra of being involved in another association. I can just be a member and drift along. Let the suckers and those who can't do the other things plod along with organizations that do for others: I've got enough just to keep me snowed under!
Yes, I did hear the great Helen Hayes say it. "We are all handicapped: some physically, some mentally, some emotionally, some financially, and some spiritually." This can explain away the struggle of the League to be a forceful, dynamic and vital representative of 140,000 individual members.
All of us are handicapped when it comes to putting something of ourselves into something of a general nature. We didn't sit unmoved in the Commerce Auditorium on 144th Street as representatives of the Civil Service Commission presented the Second Annual Award Ceremony and the Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employee of the Year.
If you are wondering what you can do with what you have to do with, there are some folks close by who can tell you. Let's meet a few together...
The Marine Corps Band played "This is My Country," and we were all invited to join in singing the Star Spangled Banner as the Color Guard of the combined services advanced the Colors. So that sounds routine...
Then look on the stage... In the spotlight were braces, artificial limbs, a crutch, wheelchairs and personalities. Their owners were the 10 Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employees of the Year.
Many like you were nominated and from the search came those who were deemed to have done the most with what they had. Let's call the roll...
The Department of the Air Force sent Jimmy Adams (polio-meningitis), a research chemist with a Master's degree and an Outstanding Performance Rating; Dr. Thomas Austin (polio quadriplegic), Director of the National Oceanographic Data Center of the U.S. Navy and "Honorary Citizen" of Dade County by the Mayors Council for service as Chairman of the Greater Miami Area Equal Employment Opportunity Committee; USDA nominee Dr. Jay Basch (born deaf), an outstanding chemist and author; and Mrs. Francis Garcia (polio) deaf, mute, total blindness in one eye, and a presser with the Sandia Base Laundry in New Mexico who represented the Defense Atomic Support Agency.
Also in the footlights, Ralph Harwood (spinal meningitis) drew the nod from the Defense Supply Agency where he is a public representative and chemist although completely deaf; Mrs. Dorothy Hickey (polio) confined to a wheelchair for the past 24 years, refused to dwell on her infirmities, became an effective counselor to others severely handicapped and performs with accuracy, efficiency and cheer for the U.S.I.A.; Earl Miller (cerebral palsy) conquered a wheelchair, crutches, braces and a cane to learn to walk alone and to be named the outstanding representative from the Civil Service Commission itself.
Next, Philip Pepper (polio) who was President of his class at U.C.L.A. with a Master's degree in social welfare and presently the distinguished Chief of the Office of Program Planning and Evaluation, Indian Health Service, for H.E.W.; Miss Magdalene Phillips (blind) a dictating machine transcriber at Letterman Army Hospital takes the dictation of six medical officers and in her spare time counsels newly blinded patients.
As if this were not enough to make you proud and inspired the last of the 10 nominees was called forward for his citation. He walked across the stage. So, what's so great about walking across the stage?
Bob Smith, a combat rifleman in Korea in the winter of 1950 was presented by the Veterans Administration by Administrator Don Johnson. Bob was shot, taken prisoner, and held for ten days without food or medical attention. His wounds, aggravated by frost bite and infection, necessitate a quadruple amputation. Since 1955 he has been with the VA from tabulating machine operator to computer programmer.
Bob refused to be handicapped. With pride and determination he walked across the stage to meet Harold Russell, Chairman of the President's Committee on Employment of the Handicapped, himself a double amputee.
Someone in the audience quipped, "The Iron Men are at work," as four artificial arms and functional hooks grasped the plaque. Who could better carry the title Outstanding Handicapped Federal Employee of the Year?
Bob Smith opened his own door to opportunity and as the program said, "He's making sure the door stays open for others now traveling that hard road back."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
December 3, 2008
March 1970
So what's your Thing?... I guess the young fellow was a Mod and wanted to know what I do to keep active. Did he think the League was the Establishment or was I?
My Thing was a Trip and I'd like to arrange his travel in a plane or a ship. Perhaps a bus or a train. Had he read the schedule in the Register or called the numbers for Trips he could take? Man we can give you a Fix on most any place in a hurry. Before you know it you'll Be-In, Switched-On, and finding everything Groovy. If you want something Neat why not leave your Pad and look for Grass that is really green.
You can save Bread and not rob the mint through LFRA Travel Discounts. The Roll you won't need like from the bank and a Rock is outdated to be perfectly frank. So you can be a Swinger and not Hang-Up the phone. You don't want to be a Pill, worry about being a little Hippie and going to Pot. You need to get Hooked on our Travel Program and head for the Cool breezes of the Southern Seas. Fly with the Birds of a feather and leave the Fuzz to the Chickens.
Just to let you know the League Travel Program is up-to-date and we are Psychedelirious about it... It is not a matter of sending you on some Freak Scene journey. We have something to talk about and we want to say it in language all can understand.
If we lost you somewhere along the line, join the crowd. We are really Square and don't quite know how to tell you the full story in a few column inches. Try our phones and tell us what is wanted. If we don't have the trip in a package, we can soon tie one up to suit your taste.
In addition to such down to earth things as travel discounts and discount buying, the League needs to know there are those members who want the services it can provide. It must also know there are those willing to give some time to advance the broad base upon which it is established.
All who work with the League are "part-time." Each of us has another primary responsibility and what we do for the League and its membership comes from the heart and the pocketbook.
Those who give of themselves are the planners, the organizers, the workers and the Voice. Theirs is not a voice of protest; they want no act of disrespect or defiance of the law; these are part of America, a most vital part in the role of Public Servant.
Perhaps the League is the Establishment but it represents the best that America can boast. These are folks who make our country tick and who recognize that freedom demands a price -- It Is Not Free.
We of the League roll with the times in appreciation of a goodly heritage and in recognition of a the need to be current. We are working to make things just a little better for all who serve in the government related domain.
Perhaps there is an opportunity for you to participate a little beyond yourself and your present status in serving your own Recreation and Welfare Association.
There is room for you to help lift the League. We need news, participation, people going places on our Trips and above all the understanding Name of Big League for our 140,000 members and 56 Associations. "In the soul of a seed is the hope of the sod. In the heart of a child is the Kingdom of God." To Grow we Go Right On Working!
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
My Thing was a Trip and I'd like to arrange his travel in a plane or a ship. Perhaps a bus or a train. Had he read the schedule in the Register or called the numbers for Trips he could take? Man we can give you a Fix on most any place in a hurry. Before you know it you'll Be-In, Switched-On, and finding everything Groovy. If you want something Neat why not leave your Pad and look for Grass that is really green.
You can save Bread and not rob the mint through LFRA Travel Discounts. The Roll you won't need like from the bank and a Rock is outdated to be perfectly frank. So you can be a Swinger and not Hang-Up the phone. You don't want to be a Pill, worry about being a little Hippie and going to Pot. You need to get Hooked on our Travel Program and head for the Cool breezes of the Southern Seas. Fly with the Birds of a feather and leave the Fuzz to the Chickens.
Just to let you know the League Travel Program is up-to-date and we are Psychedelirious about it... It is not a matter of sending you on some Freak Scene journey. We have something to talk about and we want to say it in language all can understand.
If we lost you somewhere along the line, join the crowd. We are really Square and don't quite know how to tell you the full story in a few column inches. Try our phones and tell us what is wanted. If we don't have the trip in a package, we can soon tie one up to suit your taste.
In addition to such down to earth things as travel discounts and discount buying, the League needs to know there are those members who want the services it can provide. It must also know there are those willing to give some time to advance the broad base upon which it is established.
All who work with the League are "part-time." Each of us has another primary responsibility and what we do for the League and its membership comes from the heart and the pocketbook.
Those who give of themselves are the planners, the organizers, the workers and the Voice. Theirs is not a voice of protest; they want no act of disrespect or defiance of the law; these are part of America, a most vital part in the role of Public Servant.
Perhaps the League is the Establishment but it represents the best that America can boast. These are folks who make our country tick and who recognize that freedom demands a price -- It Is Not Free.
We of the League roll with the times in appreciation of a goodly heritage and in recognition of a the need to be current. We are working to make things just a little better for all who serve in the government related domain.
Perhaps there is an opportunity for you to participate a little beyond yourself and your present status in serving your own Recreation and Welfare Association.
There is room for you to help lift the League. We need news, participation, people going places on our Trips and above all the understanding Name of Big League for our 140,000 members and 56 Associations. "In the soul of a seed is the hope of the sod. In the heart of a child is the Kingdom of God." To Grow we Go Right On Working!
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
November 28, 2008
February 1970
He looked me square in the eye and said, "Now tell me what the League is in a position to do for us." The Association President who said that to a new Executive Director had just treated him and the LFRA President to a fine luncheon in the fine dining area of a large agency.
Time had been spent viewing the many activities and opportunities provided R&W members of his association. There was a garage, barber shop, health room, dry cleaning outlet, discount store and a travel department. I was impressed! Then came the bomb..."What can the League do...?"
I have not forgotten the question or the President. He accepted my most inadequate answer and hopefully will note this attempt to face the same question a year and a half later for the benefit of all of the 140,000 who have at least indirect interest in what the League can do for them.
Although he is from one of the larger agency members of the LFRA, this President and his officers have continued to lend much support to the efforts of the 56 member League. They don't really need the League but they recognize a potential in the unification of all the associations with a common purpose.
The larger members can give assistance and do. The smaller ones seek direction and support. They also give some help in establishing buying power, objectives and services. All pay nominal dues which make the memberships in the respective agency associations entitle each individual member to LFRA membership also.
What Can The Leagues Do? There may be an impossible dream, an unreachable star, a new dawn for this cumbersome, overgrown and awkward youngster called the League of Federal Recreation Associations.
What the doubting Thomases don't seem to know or understand is the dedication of the hardy souls who have given thousands of hours to their volunteer time to make the League tick. They see the potential and are willing to sacrifice and struggle just to see things jell. Don't sell them short!
What makes one who has been in the depths more than once so sure of the big image and the anticipated realization of the potential of federation? The answer is people: Guys and gals who want something for the career employee in the way of credit for service, recognition for dedication, and the opportunity to enjoy social events and discount buying.
There appear to be five major divisions which make the future League worthy of your participation and backing. First there is this newspaper. Here is a means of communication which can and will tell the story as it is and to all the people. It is growing and needs help in securing more advertising, more news and pictures, and the assurance there will be someone from each agency willing to pick up the copies each month and see that they are circulated to the membership.
Second, the need is apparent for a well organized and aggressive travel program. This is being developed on an extensive scale and will mean funds with which to operate the League and to better serve the members.
Other divisions to be anticipated and now well into the planning and implementation stages are Discount Buying, Mutual Funds and Investments, and Insurance. As these last three unfold the true potential of the League will begin to be revealed. The volunteer efforts of many to whom so much is owed will be recognized.
Legislation to provide more benefits and highter morale can be sought with some degree of confidence. More agency associations will find a reason for belonging. There will indeed be a better mousetrap and businessmen with insight will indeed beat a pathway to the League door.
I am sure enough of the tomorrow of LFRA to be willing to give it some more volunteer hours. Others feel the same way. There is room for you, your interest, your suggestions and your involvement.
I want to thank the man who asked what the League can do for his membership. He started the wheels turning and one of these days I'd like to take him to dinner in The League Building.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
Time had been spent viewing the many activities and opportunities provided R&W members of his association. There was a garage, barber shop, health room, dry cleaning outlet, discount store and a travel department. I was impressed! Then came the bomb..."What can the League do...?"
I have not forgotten the question or the President. He accepted my most inadequate answer and hopefully will note this attempt to face the same question a year and a half later for the benefit of all of the 140,000 who have at least indirect interest in what the League can do for them.
Although he is from one of the larger agency members of the LFRA, this President and his officers have continued to lend much support to the efforts of the 56 member League. They don't really need the League but they recognize a potential in the unification of all the associations with a common purpose.
The larger members can give assistance and do. The smaller ones seek direction and support. They also give some help in establishing buying power, objectives and services. All pay nominal dues which make the memberships in the respective agency associations entitle each individual member to LFRA membership also.
What Can The Leagues Do? There may be an impossible dream, an unreachable star, a new dawn for this cumbersome, overgrown and awkward youngster called the League of Federal Recreation Associations.
What the doubting Thomases don't seem to know or understand is the dedication of the hardy souls who have given thousands of hours to their volunteer time to make the League tick. They see the potential and are willing to sacrifice and struggle just to see things jell. Don't sell them short!
What makes one who has been in the depths more than once so sure of the big image and the anticipated realization of the potential of federation? The answer is people: Guys and gals who want something for the career employee in the way of credit for service, recognition for dedication, and the opportunity to enjoy social events and discount buying.
There appear to be five major divisions which make the future League worthy of your participation and backing. First there is this newspaper. Here is a means of communication which can and will tell the story as it is and to all the people. It is growing and needs help in securing more advertising, more news and pictures, and the assurance there will be someone from each agency willing to pick up the copies each month and see that they are circulated to the membership.
Second, the need is apparent for a well organized and aggressive travel program. This is being developed on an extensive scale and will mean funds with which to operate the League and to better serve the members.
Other divisions to be anticipated and now well into the planning and implementation stages are Discount Buying, Mutual Funds and Investments, and Insurance. As these last three unfold the true potential of the League will begin to be revealed. The volunteer efforts of many to whom so much is owed will be recognized.
Legislation to provide more benefits and highter morale can be sought with some degree of confidence. More agency associations will find a reason for belonging. There will indeed be a better mousetrap and businessmen with insight will indeed beat a pathway to the League door.
I am sure enough of the tomorrow of LFRA to be willing to give it some more volunteer hours. Others feel the same way. There is room for you, your interest, your suggestions and your involvement.
I want to thank the man who asked what the League can do for his membership. He started the wheels turning and one of these days I'd like to take him to dinner in The League Building.
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
November 23, 2008
December 1969
Years ago a little lady stood on the steps of the Library of Congress beside two small boys. She gazed across a street and square to the dome of the Capitol of the United States.
The boys were too young to know the meaning of a tear and the strange awe on her face. This was her first trip to a city which represented all that was great and free in her life. She was now 80 and could recall that she had been born a slave.
While there was much I did not understand at that moment, I do recall that I was one of those two small boys. Also, still fresh in my mind are the words of explanation for the display of emotion.
Turning to my mother, old Christie said, "Miss Marg, I been standing here thanking the Good Lord for letting me live in such an up-to-date century."
She did not live to see beyond the Model-T and the crystal radio set. She did not use electricity or even hear of TV. She had no social security or retirement. She was proud of her folks and her work and she had time for her church. Perhaps this was a basic life but it was a rich one.
There has been another moon landing and a precise, safe return. The perfection of these two exploits is almost beyond comprehension for we earthlings. The accomplishments we have lived to view are fantastic. What lies ahead defies all of our Buck Rogers visions.
As a symbol of our time there is a tip of the hat to the men who dared and who conquered the uncertainty of space. At the very base of the launch, the journey and the return lies a team. In some way each of us had a part.
There was the combination of science and courage, of service and faith, of government and private enterprise, and of talent and taxes.
It has been said we in the United States can accomplish anything we set our minds and attention to. Those who report these things are aware of our capability in large wars and of our utter frustration in the smaller ones.
Somehow, we find ourselves on the big teams and full of pride concerning what we have done as a nation. Then someone indicates in a rather uncomplimentary way that we are "just another government worker." Or, "you are one of those who stays at the trough because you couldn't make it out in the rough and tumble anyway."
And we freeze and grumble and absorb the needles because we have only a small voice and we are poorly organized.
Have we forgotten the role we played in the moon landing? How far would science have progressed without people like us? What about the rights of our citizens to stand as equals? Are there benefits in terms of hospital care and pensions, social services and heal standards? What about the drug regulations and investment protection?
You can be proud you are in government and a vital part of something big. You are doing and the public should hear about it.
The League is not something brand new. Nor is the objective. In a voluntary way there is a strong effort to bring the employees of all government agencies under one tent, in a federation of organization. The purpose: to give strength to the Federal servant as someone of importance whose voice needs to be heard in unison.
For too long the members of each agency have been satisfied to enjoy the rivalry of inter-agency exchanges and a little discrediting. Now the time has come through this new medium to shout from the housetops.
Great things are being done in and by government. People are responsible for all that our nation achieves. Surely there is something or someone in your agency worth talking about.
Our problem is that we do well with the big things and the small frustrate us. Let's turn things around and with your help have more news and stories than we can possibly use for the January issue.
We need these stories from any who will take a few moments to write or send a clipping to Recreation Register, 1500 Lawrence St, N.E., Wash., D.C., 20017. Someone close to you has helped make this a time to remember.
As we grow in unity and purpose we could do worse than say from our generation and our Capitol, "I'm just standing here thanking the Good Lord for letting me live in such an up-to-date century."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
The boys were too young to know the meaning of a tear and the strange awe on her face. This was her first trip to a city which represented all that was great and free in her life. She was now 80 and could recall that she had been born a slave.
While there was much I did not understand at that moment, I do recall that I was one of those two small boys. Also, still fresh in my mind are the words of explanation for the display of emotion.
Turning to my mother, old Christie said, "Miss Marg, I been standing here thanking the Good Lord for letting me live in such an up-to-date century."
She did not live to see beyond the Model-T and the crystal radio set. She did not use electricity or even hear of TV. She had no social security or retirement. She was proud of her folks and her work and she had time for her church. Perhaps this was a basic life but it was a rich one.
There has been another moon landing and a precise, safe return. The perfection of these two exploits is almost beyond comprehension for we earthlings. The accomplishments we have lived to view are fantastic. What lies ahead defies all of our Buck Rogers visions.
As a symbol of our time there is a tip of the hat to the men who dared and who conquered the uncertainty of space. At the very base of the launch, the journey and the return lies a team. In some way each of us had a part.
There was the combination of science and courage, of service and faith, of government and private enterprise, and of talent and taxes.
It has been said we in the United States can accomplish anything we set our minds and attention to. Those who report these things are aware of our capability in large wars and of our utter frustration in the smaller ones.
Somehow, we find ourselves on the big teams and full of pride concerning what we have done as a nation. Then someone indicates in a rather uncomplimentary way that we are "just another government worker." Or, "you are one of those who stays at the trough because you couldn't make it out in the rough and tumble anyway."
And we freeze and grumble and absorb the needles because we have only a small voice and we are poorly organized.
Have we forgotten the role we played in the moon landing? How far would science have progressed without people like us? What about the rights of our citizens to stand as equals? Are there benefits in terms of hospital care and pensions, social services and heal standards? What about the drug regulations and investment protection?
You can be proud you are in government and a vital part of something big. You are doing and the public should hear about it.
The League is not something brand new. Nor is the objective. In a voluntary way there is a strong effort to bring the employees of all government agencies under one tent, in a federation of organization. The purpose: to give strength to the Federal servant as someone of importance whose voice needs to be heard in unison.
For too long the members of each agency have been satisfied to enjoy the rivalry of inter-agency exchanges and a little discrediting. Now the time has come through this new medium to shout from the housetops.
Great things are being done in and by government. People are responsible for all that our nation achieves. Surely there is something or someone in your agency worth talking about.
Our problem is that we do well with the big things and the small frustrate us. Let's turn things around and with your help have more news and stories than we can possibly use for the January issue.
We need these stories from any who will take a few moments to write or send a clipping to Recreation Register, 1500 Lawrence St, N.E., Wash., D.C., 20017. Someone close to you has helped make this a time to remember.
As we grow in unity and purpose we could do worse than say from our generation and our Capitol, "I'm just standing here thanking the Good Lord for letting me live in such an up-to-date century."
David L. Brigham
Executive Director
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