How Do You Move Grandma's House?

You never know what you might see on a road trip. While passing through Edgewood, a small, rural East Texas town, my road trip partner and I found our road temporarily closed. The police officer whose car had the road blocked told us it would only last a few minutes. Being an early Saturday morning, there was nobody else around and we were the only ones inconvenienced so we decided to just pull over, park, grab a Dr. Pepper from the ice chest in the back seat & see what was going on.

A couple of minutes later we found out why the road was closed as a big old house came rolling into view from a small side street. "Hey," I said to my buddy, "you see that? Is that a house coming down the road?" Then we noticed a couple of guys riding on the top of the house's roof! What the heck?

As they very slowly came to the intersection, we saw why. The peak of the roof was taller than the utility lines slung across the road. No problem for some good-old country boys though.

And this is how you move Grandma's house through small-town U.S.A.

 

 

Well done, guys!

 

The Death of President John F. Kennedy

Dealey Plaza Historical Marker

On November 22, 1963, President John F. Kennedy was assassinated. It happened in Dallas, Texas, a fact that has haunted, saddened, and unfairly shamed Dallas as the media began repeatedly calling it "the city of hate" and "the place where Camelot died."

In the immediate aftermath of that horrible Friday, it was easy to forget that thousands of Dallas residents snuck out from work and skipped school to line the motorcade route to see and cheer the president and the First Lady. One national magazine called it "the most enthusiastic reception accorded President Kennedy in his three years in office." Nearing the end of the route, Nellie, the wife of Texas Governor John Connally who was riding in the front seat of the limo turned to the president and said the last words ever spoken to him, "Mr. President, you certainly can’t say that Dallas doesn’t love you.” Those words still haunt Dallas because all of the southern hospitality, all of the welcome shown on that day, was forever destroyed in the next 3 seconds, the time it took for a disturbed madman to fire 3 shots from his $19.95 rifle.

The view of the end of the motorcade route
where President Kennedy was shot

It's been over 50 years, and many younger Americans don't know Kennedy was shot in Dallas. Many have no idea who Oswald was. It may not be ancient history yet, but it is finally just another historical fact to most. Of course, to those of us who were born and raised in Dallas, to those of us who looked upon President Kennedy as our hero and the leader of our generation, to those of us who were there that day, it's not really history yet. It still saddens us. We haven't forgotten.

Looking back on the route toward the School Book
Depository building where Oswald fired the
fatal shots.

The "X" in the street marks the place where the
limousine was when the president was shot.

View from the "grassy knoll" with the School Book
building in the background on the left

School Book Depository Building. Oswald shot
from the 6th floor, 2nd window from the right.

    

Historical marker on the School
Book Depository Building. A
museum is now on the 6th floor.

The Dealey Plaza overlook parking lot. On the left
behind this fence is where the rumored "
2nd gunman" also fired shots.