35. The Sectional ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

Pine Village had won the sectional basketball contest only five times: 1921, 1922, 1934, 1939, and 1941. Thirty-one years had elapsed since the last win. Calling 1972 the “Year of the Village,” the cheerleaders, the Pep Club, and the Booster Club shared the view of Mrs. Cottingham, a teacher who was serving as guidance counselor: “This is our year.” Coach Bill Barrett said, “We have to be ready mentally to play the game. I feel we’re the best team in the county—the ability is there, and we’re twenty points better than any team in the sectional.”

As editor of The Chrome-Plated Clipboard, the school newspaper, Robert did all he could to support the team.

Pine Village won the first game of the sectional by beating the Fountain Central Mustangs with a score of 83 to 67. Robert distributed a hundred purple Ditto sheets as souvenirs. “Friday night will see the contest where the team and the fans alike must strive with every ounce of strength and spirit to overpower the Seeger Indians.”

Coincidentally, the weights of the team members added up to 1972 pounds; their heights, to seventy-two feet.

In all the years that Robert had attended the school in Pine Village, basketball games were exciting occasions.

The architectural design of the gymnasium lent itself to a feeling of immediacy—with everyone seated so near the court! The elongated-dome ceiling trapped the cheers of the crowd and magnified the sound until the noise could be described as “deafening.”

Cokes and popcorn were available down a flight of stairs and around the corner in the bay area of the shop and agriculture classroom on the north end of the gym, but students carrying wire baskets hawked soft drinks up and down the aisles between the benches. Members of the band in their blue uniforms with silver buttons, white stripes, and white braids gathered for the half-time show.

Basketball games were the principal entertainment of the farming community. Everyone, it seemed, turned out for the contests. The parking lots were full of cars and pickup trucks.

In 1972, farmers talked about the 1954 team from Milan, Indiana, that achieved the Milan Miracle, winning the Indiana High School Boys Basketball Tournament Championship at the Butler Field House in Indianapolis. Could Pine Village be another Milan? One by one, the small schools across Indiana were falling—merging into consolidations. Such small schools had grown accustomed to losing to teams from the big cities of the Hoosier State, but now those local schools that remained also faced tough challenges in overcoming teams from the consolidated school districts. 

Joe had been present for Pine Village’s 1934, 1939, and 1941 sectional championships, and he had listened to the Milan victory on radio. He wondered if the heyday of Pine Village basketball had already occurred in the 1930s and early 1940s, but he hoped the halcyon time lay yet ahead.

In the weeks leading up to the 1972 sectional, townspeople who happened to meet on the sidewalk or at the elevator or post office or who were gathering for church services talked anxiously about the team’s chances.

Years later, Robert would be a clarinetist in the Indiana University Pep Band at two NCAA championship games when IU emerged the victor, and he would remember the Pine Village sectional games as fitting in the same thrilling category.

The sectional final game between Pine Village and Seeger felt unreal. Robert sat next to his cousin Pam in the Pep Club seats. Pam and Robert yelled until they were hoarse. They were continuously leaping to their feet. These players on the court were their friends, and their friends were playing their hearts out to win.

Once, Robert had reflected in print, “For Pine Village to cheer forward its team in this game in this way is truly fine! This brings our small world together!”

Robert glanced across the intensely emotional faces of townspeople and of neighbors such as Mr. Reed, driver of the team bus, and Mr. Brutus, driver of the fan bus. The noise was like that of an agitated ocean crashing on a rocky shore. Robert could see people shouting, but he could not distinguish their words amid the roar. The cheerleaders sustained frenzied cheer after frenzied cheer without pause.

This was glory! Hope and fear wrestled in the countenances and the gestures of all from young to old.

The team raced back and forth in a fast-paced matchup that the strongest defense could not slow. Mr. Barrett cupped his hands like a megaphone and yelled instructions to his team. Mr. Owens, the assistant coach, paced the sideline like a lion in a cage.

With a fierce expression, Bax Brutus guided the total team effort of Pine Village.

Each time the ball flew up, a collective breath was held. When it slid straight through the hoop, the noise from one side surged.

Before Robert could comprehend what had happened, the clock ran out. Pine Village had won with a score of 76 to 72! On the blue side of the court, pandemonium reigned.

It was indeed the Year of the Village.

Even though the team eventually lost to Benton Central in regional play, it had broken the spell and had won the sectional. The team’s victory had proved that hearts and minds—collaborating with confidence and skill—can attain high goals.

19. The Fossil Hunt ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

A favorite family activity was fossil hunting. Joe, Ida, Charles, and Robert once visited the historic railroad cut in Madison, Indiana, and brought back enough horn coral and brachiopods to weight the car down on its springs. From Pine Village to Madison and back in a day meant a long time on the road. Joe never could stay overnight because he had to feed his livestock and would not ask a neighbor to help.

One morning, Ida said, “Let’s go to southeast Indiana to find fossils,” and Joe agreed. A few days later, the family piled into the Pontiac Bonneville and drove and drove. Joe took State Route 52 through Rushville to Brookville, where they ate their picnic lunch before searching for fossils along the Whitewater River to the west of town. Finding little to keep them interested, Joe drove farther south and took State Route 1 along a creek that looked promising. Joe pulled onto a short stretch of country road, then onto what was little more than an abandoned farm lane that crossed a tiny bridge.

“Let’s hurry before it rains,” Ida said. The sky had become cloudy. Gradually, the daylight dimmed beneath the heavy cloud cover. Joe, Ida, Charles, and Robert fanned out along the creek. The trilobites that they had hoped to find remained elusive.

Suddenly, raindrops began pelting the creek.

“I guess we’re going to be rained out,” Ida said, as everyone headed for the car. Robert had to sit in the rear seat—with Ida’s promise that he could switch to the front seat in Brookville.

The mischievous storm quickly developed into a steady downpour.

“Joe, we need to get back to the highway as soon as we can,” Ida said. “When I was growing up along the Ohio River, there were people that got caught in flash floods along creeks like this.”

“I don’t think there’s any need to worry,” Joe said. He put the car in gear and steered it toward the low bridge he had crossed to reach a level place to park along the creek. In just that short a time, a raging channel of yellow clay and water was surging under the bridge and, at both ends of the bridge, had already crossed the driveway.

Joe took his foot off the throttle.

“Oh, Joe! Don’t stop now,” Ida warned, with a note of fear in her voice.

“I don’t think we should drive through water that deep and fast,” Joe said.

“But don’t you see that the water is going to cover everything where we are? We have to get to the other side of that bridge!” Ida said, her panic escalating.

Reluctantly, Joe inched the Pontiac forward into the current at the near end of the little bridge. Robert and Charles peered through the windows at the seething stream surrounding the car.

“Hurry, Joe!” Ida said, tensely. She put her hand on the dashboard as if she were encouraging a horse to remain calm while attempting a dangerous feat.

The car gained the bridge, but as much water was crossing the other end as the Pontiac had already cleared. Leaving the bridge behind, the car nosed back into the turbulent yellow stream.

Ida began patting the dashboard nervously.

Eventually, the Pontiac climbed out of the rushing water and turned onto the country road.

Everyone breathed a sigh of relief.

“I told you there was nothing to worry about,” Joe said.

“Oh, you know you were scared back there!” Ida exclaimed.

“With a car this heavy, we weren’t going to be swept away,” Joe continued.

“Why, I could feel the car rocking from the water!” Ida said, staring at Joe. “We nearly became one of those families that you read about in the newspapers: the ones carried off by a flood.”

“We weren’t close to being ‘carried off by a flood,’” Joe persisted.

“You grew up where everything is flat,” Ida retorted. “Maybe I know a thing or two about hilly country that you don’t know.”

Joe reached over and patted Ida’s wrist. “I’m just teasing,” he said. “I think we were in some danger there. Had we waited a few more minutes, we might not have been able to drive out.”

“That’s right,” Ida said, barely placated.

At Brookville, Joe pulled over, so that Robert could trade places with Ida. Robert was already experiencing motion sickness, but it slowly abated on the way to Rushville.

Throughout the return trip, the rain fell in torrents. The drive to the Whitewater River was the family’s last fossil hunt.

18. The Art Class ... THE FARM EAST OF PINE VILLAGE

It was an exciting day! Ida had just bought a new pocketbook at Sears. It had plenty of room! There was even a place to stick her crossword puzzle books! Best of all, it was bright red!

Ida had purchased the masterpiece of consumer art while she was waiting for Charles and Robert to take their block printing class at the Art Museum in Lafayette. Ida had enrolled the boys in the six-week course that had begun just after school was out.

The boys’ instructor was an expert at woodcuts and was slowly making a cut the size of a small table top that depicted a European cathedral. He taught the class of youngsters to make linoleum cuts. Ida had obtained the necessary supplies at the bookstore near the Purdue campus. There were slender boxes that contained wooden handles into which various knives could be inserted. Some of the knives were straight; others were curved. There were tubes of special ink in black, red, and green. There were brayers to spread the ink on a surface such as a glass pane until the ink became tacky enough to roll onto the linoleum block. Then there was the linoleum.

It had presented a problem initially. The instructor had called for the students to acquire battleship linoleum—so named because it was used on battleships. While many homes had flooring of battleship linoleum, Ida had a difficult time finding any. Ultimately, she purchased a big roll from a flooring store in Lafayette. It was dark green.

The boys looked forward to art class each week. The instructor gave just enough explanation and then let the students work at their own pace without much intervention. Robert was making a horizontal rectangular piece measuring about eight inches by six inches that he called “Four Faces.” He had designed four profiles overlapping in a row, each different from the others. The faces were modern—not all the way to Picasso but getting there. For surfaces of the cheeks, chins, noses, foreheads, and necks, Robert used various knives to form lines, dashes, dots, and circles. The knives removed material from the linoleum, which was backed with a coarse burlap weave. Even though the linoleum was thick, the knives were so sharp that they could cut all the way through to the backing. The trick was to cut away enough linoleum that the ink would become applied to the “hills” and not the “valleys”—without cutting past the linoleum and into the burlap. Sometimes a “valley” was shallow, and the ink would touch ridges in the valley. The resultant print would have lines showing the tops of the ridges.

Making the prints was fun! When a student was ready to print from a finished block, he or she rolled the ink on a large glass surface with a brayer until the ink became so tacky that the brayer would hiss each time it was rolled along. Next, the brayer was rolled onto the linoleum surface to apply ink in a thin but substantial layer. The student then carefully placed a sheet of fine quality paper, cut to a size somewhat larger than the linoleum block, onto the block. The paper could not be moved, once it had touched the ink. The student then rubbed the bowl of a teaspoon around and around on the paper with just enough pressure to transfer the ink from the linoleum to the paper without damaging the paper. Ultimately, the paper was peeled off the linoleum, thereby revealing the art.

Robert was always intrigued at how different the art looked from what he had carved. The picture was backwards from the one he had been cutting with the knives! On the day that he made his first print of “Four Faces,” he laughed to see them looking in the opposite direction.

The instructor came by and said, “Your faces are very good. What do they represent?”

“They are facets of one person,” Robert said. “The first face is the one everyone sees. The next is the one only loved ones see. The third is the one that only the person sees, and the fourth is the one that God sees.”

“Well!” the instructor said, nodding, with the thumb and forefinger of his hand on his chin. “I like your explanation! Good!” The instructor walked on.

Several prints could be made from one application of the ink, but, eventually, the ink would become patchy. More ink had to be applied to continue the print making.

The instructor taught the students to number their prints in pencil with a first number indicating the application of the ink, a slash mark, and a second number representing the print made from that application. So 2/4 would mean the fourth print taken from the second ink application.

Working in the presence of other artists gave Charles and Robert the opportunity to witness the expressions of creative minds. The works of art ranged from masterly to spontaneous.

The boys waited for their mother outside the Art Museum’s new addition that held the classrooms and studios. When Ida drove into the parking lot, Charles and Robert dove into the seats for the ride home. They showed their mother that day’s prints, for which she had only praise.

Once they were home, Robert took a seat at the kitchen table while Ida set her old pocketbook beside her new one and began piling the contents of the old one in a heap in the middle of the table.

“What will you do next week?” Ida asked Robert.

“I need to cut out a few of the areas a little more so the ridges don’t show in the print,” he replied. “Then I get to print again!”

Absent-mindedly, he was looking over the items that were rolling downhill from the mound of materials that could never have fit inside the old pocketbook! A Revlon red lipstick in a brassy gold cylinder almost cleared the edge of the table. Several Bic pens and at least one Sheaffer cartridge pen spun this way and that. There were pencils galore, most of them with no eraser left! A brown and yellow tin of “Genuine” Bayer Aspirin slid down. Three hankies, somewhat crumpled but none the worse for wear, clung to the slope of the heap. A Stratton powder compact with mirror and a rose motif slipped out. A plastic bottle of Jergens hand cream and a jar of Noxzema cold cream came out (both headfirst). A baby blue wallet with a snap clasp fell heavily forward. Two pairs of sunglasses—one hopelessly tangled with a clear plastic rain cap with pink trim—lent their bulk to the pile. A small creamy white bottle with a dark coral cap cascaded to the back of the pile: To a Wild Rose by Avon. A stack of dog-eared crossword puzzle booklets fell topsy-turvy. Creased notes in Ida’s dashed-off handwriting stuck out at crazy angles from the booklets. Shopping lists and checklists caught Robert’s eye. Stacks of folded Kleenex tissues, with sheets of stamps adhering to them, tumbled out. A square squeeze-type coin purse advertising a crane service in Muncie did cartwheels. It by no means held all the coins in the pocketbook because pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, and half dollars rolled every which way. Most of the silver coins were silver all the way through, but some were the new “sandwich” variety with the tell-tale copper edge. There were hairpins by the handful. An opened and somewhat sticky roll of Life Savers joined the accumulation. Somehow, a silver flashlight and a pair of nail clippers were in the mix. A tin of Band-Aid bandages appeared from deep down within the old pocketbook. A spare red vinyl belt uncoiled like a snake. Robert wondered why there should be a belt. Maybe you just never knew when you might need one?

A Valentine’s Day card depicting a rabbit holding a carrot fell forward. “If you carrot all for me, be my Valentine,” the card proclaimed. Before Ida saw what Robert was doing, he turned the card over. In handwriting on the back were these words: “From Mr. Bunny to Mrs. Bunny, Love, Joe.”

Robert stared at the words. He knew that his parents loved one another, but seeing the fact in handwriting was arresting.

Ida glanced over. “Oh,” she said. “I forgot that was in there. I meant to put that in my drawer.”

“Dad gave you a Valentine?” Robert asked.

“Yes, as he does every year,” Ida said in a tone that was not without passion but was not overly expressive either.

Robert smiled slightly. “Mr. and Mrs. Bunny?” he said.

“Our names for each other when we aren’t talking to you,” Ida said, gently taking the card from Robert and setting it to one side.

“Mr. and Mrs. Bunny!” Robert thought, trying to fit the concept within his comprehension of his parents.

“We’ve always thought bunnies are cute,” Ida said. “When he was a boy, your father raised rabbits.”

Seeing that Robert was still musing on the topic, Ida said, “If you ever had the least doubt that your father and mother love each other, you now know better: you know that they do and always will! And we love you and Charles, too. Just don’t let me catch you calling me ‘Mrs. Bunny’ or your father ‘Mr. Bunny.’” Ida burst out laughing. “I would love to see the look on your father’s face if you were to call him ‘Mr. Bunny’—but don’t you ever do that! Those are our names for each other, not your names for us.”

Robert already adored his parents, but, with the revelation of the Valentine’s Day card, he now felt a reverence for them.

Ida began stuffing the new shiny red pocketbook with all her necessities mounded so high on the table—including the card!