Those of you that read this regular series know that I am from Hackett, Arkansas, just a mile or so from the Oklahoma border, and just about 10 miles south of the Arkansas River. It was a rural sort of place that did not particularly appreciate education, and just zoom onto my previous posts to understand a bit about it.
Today, my father would have been 93 years old. He lived to be 85, which is not bad. His dad lived to be 91 (passing away in 1968 or 1969), so I have some pretty good genes in my paternal line. My maternal grandfather died at about 55 from heart disease, but my maternal grandmum lived to 101 and a half, lucid until the almost the end.
Roy Willard Smith, my father, was born on this date in 1919. That year is also know for the first year that Ford offered an electric starter as an option for the Model “T”.