I can’t remember not listening to the Indianapolis 500-mile race on the radio.

As young kids and teenagers, we listened to the radio much more than any other form of entertainment. My folks had one of those big radios that sat on the floor. I can remember laying on the floor and listening to my favorite shows  - the Lone Ranger and Superman were high on my list. My parents also had a list of shows that were listened to in the evenings. Jack Benny, Burns and Allen, Our Miss Brooks and many others were listened to in our living room. Lots of the best radio shows later were converted to television.

I remember listening to the race while riding in my dad’s milk truck. Those country pick-up milk routes operated seven days a week. We could listen to a good part of the race before we completed the route before arriving home. I would then switch to a radio in the house to finish race. The program was sent all over the world, and I thought it was so cool that all the announcers were local fellows that we could hear every day.

E.Z. Gwynn, Sid Collins, Jim Shelton, Paul Page, Bob Jenkins and many others entertained us over the years. One local Southside radio personality was a member of the track team. Tom Peden worked with one of the local radio stations and was one of the guys we would hear on the race broadcast. His son, Mark, attended Southport High School and was a member of my high school class. I always thought that if I visited the track a time or two during the month of May, I could fully imagine A.J. Foyt and all the others screaming past the start/finish line as the announcers reported it on the network.

I plan to sit in our backyard and listen to the race on Sunday and hope to have a great time. Stuart will probably hang out with me. I’m sure he will hop on my lap a few times and help me enjoy it.

 I was excited when a NASCAR race started at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway. A few years ago, I offered an article about getting to tour Junior Johnson’s NASCAR racing facilities. For years he drove and owned stock cars. During the tour I noticed a real problem with the use of some fasteners on these cars. I explained to the crew about the problem and offered a solution. They crew members summoned Johnson to the garage, and I was asked to explain it to him. He understood and asked us to travel to all the other NASCAR race shops and explain my thoughts to them.

I pointed out that he and his employees would be seeing all those racers that weekend and they could easily make the explanation in a couple of hours. His response was that the owners and teams lied to each other so much that he wouldn’t be believed.  So, we needed to send sales agents to each facility to help with the corrections.

One other time, I was working with a salesperson in Houston, Texas, who had several clients at large dealerships where our main contact was the parts manager. At one dealership we visited, I was introduced to the parts manager and told him I was from Indianapolis.

The parts manager paused and was eager to introduce me to the fellow who owned the dealership. I was pretty sure that I knew who it was. At this dealership, there were standing orders to contact the boss if anyone from Indianapolis ever showed up.

A.J. Foyt came out and shook my hand and started asking me questions. We had a blast tossing out names to see if we had connections. The one I remember was Joe Langley. Joe was an Indy 500 chief mechanic and later an outside sales representative for an automotive chemical company. Joe’s shop was behind his house on Madison Avenue.

Visiting with A.J. was a wonderful and totally unexpected. He has been a bit under the weather for several years. I saw that he attended the Daytona Races in February. I hope he is here for the 2019 Indianapolis 500.

​Back in the mid-70s, I took an outside sales position with a large national company that sold automotive and industrial maintenance supplies. I was starting a new sales territory and I was really enjoying the challenge. My customers were in the automotive field and consisted of dealerships, trucking companies, school bus fleets and vehicle maintenance facilities.

After a couple of years, I was asked to become a sales trainer. It was a part-time position and I would be able to retain my local Indianapolis sales territory. I would train and assist new sales agents in 17 states. I traveled out of Indiana only one week of each month. I would generally fly to my destination early on a Monday morning, work with a fairly new sales agent for the week and return to Indianapolis late Friday afternoon. It was a nice change of pace from my normal.

One of my trips took me to New Orleans. I had never been to that special city and was looking forward to that week. My early Monday morning flight was uneventful. The new sales agent that I was going to work with met me at the airport. It was about lunchtime when we exited the airport and I suggested lunch. He quickly pulled into a Denny’s.

We had several things to discuss and I needed to get to know this fellow and plan our week. We had a nice conversation and after lunch, we made some sales calls. Around 5 p.m. we called it a day and he drove to my hotel. I checked in and we spent time planning our next day. It was then that I explained to him that this was my first trip to New Orleans. I was hoping to have meals at places that I couldn’t enjoy in Indianapolis – no more Denny’s or any other fast food. He laughed and assured me that he would do his best to see that we wouldn’t visit any more chain restaurants that week.

A couple of days later, we began our day making some planned sales calls. It seemed we were closer to the downtown area. Around 11:30 a.m., we parked the car and walked about three blocks to a small downtown restaurant that was almost empty. A young lady showed us to a table. We were not given menus but were asked about drinks. There were three people sitting at a table near us.

After a short while, food started flowing out of the kitchen. Those folks at the other table and our table for two were inundated with small portions of fabulous dishes. I was both shocked and confused. Why were we receiving such a royal treatment? Later, I found out that the father of the sales agent that I was working with had a rental property that was rented by the chef. The folks eating at the other table were food critics from New York City. They were there to check out the place and sample the food for a future magazine story.

We enjoyed our special lunch for over three hours. About every 15 minutes, another tray of small dishes of fabulous food would arrive to our tables. It was amazing. When we departed the restaurant, we drove directly to my hotel. That was a very memorable week and especially that day at the restaurant. I never did get to see the magazine article.

While I was writing this column, I had the New Orleans Saints-Los Angeles Rams playoff game on my television. I began experiencing a small Saints connection. Then Jimmy Buffett, a big Saints fan, sang the National Anthem. The Jimmy Buffett-New Orleans connection became larger. I met Buffett at a concert several years ago when he gave me a short tour of his motorhome bus. I love it when connections come together like that.

​I’ve been looking back over our just completed holiday season. One thing I noticed as I reviewed the past few weeks was the times that I connected with folks who attended Edgewood Grade School, as I did. A couple of my good friends, Ted Lobdell and Barry Hix, have been so instrumental in putting together several reunions that covered all classes that attended Edgewood Grade School.

There is a very interesting Facebook page called,” Friends of Edgewood Elementary”. This group has over 650 members. Ted and Barry are in charge of the site where members can post some favorite and funny memories. All sorts of comments, questions and pictures are posted on the site. I was looking at a photo of the 1951-52 Marion County basketball champs, the Edgewood Grade School 8th grade boys basketball team. I quickly recognized a player that I felt honored to be a friend of his for many years.

Joe Simpson attended and played basketball at both Edgewood Grade School and Southport High School. Several years later, we reconnected when I discovered he was working with a good friend of ours at a Southside business. The junior high school building had not yet been built in 1952. Perry Township grade schools had eight grades at that time. Edgewood had many students that a smaller building, the James Whitcomb Riley School, was constructed on the Edgewood property.

I was in the very first 2nd-grade class in the new building that only had 1st- and 2ndgrade classes. My high school class is very close. We have a reunion each year and a breakfast and lunch each month. I attended our first lunch of 2019 last week. I sat beside a young lady that I first met in the 2nd grade. Sharon Brinkoetter-Kinder and I were in the same class in the Riley building.

We talked and laughed during the lunch. We remembered the feelings we enjoyed as we walked through the Riley building after it was reopened a few years ago. The James Whitcomb Riley is again a school building for students in Perry Township. I was reminiscing about my feelings as I walked down the hall to the classroom we attended. I could almost feel myself shrinking down to my height as a 7-year-old boy during that walk. Sharon had some of the same feelings when she visited the building.

There were a few postings on Facebook about one of the very special teachers, Georgia Stevens, who taught at Edgewood Grade School. She passed away in December. She taught in Perry Township for 35 years; 20 years at Edgewood and 15 years at Keystone Middle School. I’m lucky that I have two different experiences connected with Edgewood Grade School. First was my six years of learning from some special teachers and school staff.

Paul L. (Pete) Bailey was the Edgewood Principal for many years when I was a student and later when I became a school bus driver and drove students to Edgewood. A few years ago at one of the Edgewood reunions, I felt honored to sit with Edgewood teachers Verne Chandler and Bill Pickard. It was special to see many of their former students come to the table and visit with them. I have reconnected with several former Edgewood students that I drove to school. The latest being Denise Morris-Clarke. She and her brother David Morris rode with me from their home in Rosedale Hills to school and back each day. 

​I first met them as 4th graders. At one of the reunions, I reconnected with David. A few weeks ago, I received a Facebook friend request from Denise that I quickly accepted. I’m hoping that the three of us might get together for lunch soon. I love it that David is a retired school teacher and now is driving a school bus. Happy New Year !! Shonk is a 1960 graduate of Southport High School, a ’63 grad of Indiana Central College (now the University of Indianapolis) and a retired bus driver from Beech Grove Schools.