Does anyone remember the name of Mr. Floyd's business? All I can remember is that we used to go to "Floyd's" almost every day after school. Now that I think about it, maybe it was "Floyd's Sandwich Shop"?

This is from the 1959 Mavahi annual, courteous of my friend, John Franck, who runs the Mavahi.com website. My dear second wife took my copies of the annual with her to Australia and I doubt if I'll ever see them again. But John was kind enough to scan some images out of his sister, Martha's, copy that he found in his basement at Chatmoss and this is a cropped version of me selling Mr. Floyd an ad in the upcoming edition 1959 edition. I was the business manager at the time and they wanted a picture of me selling an ad to somebody that classmates would recognize and I wanted to do it with Mr. Floyd. 

Here's Mr. Shank. This was taken in the MHS band room (I can tell because I recognize the window in the background). Ralph Shank was always my band director. He was there with me in the fourth grade when he suggested I try out for the band playing the trumpet. I had failed rather miserably in Ruth Pace's choir so my dad suggested trying out for the band.

After finding out that over 20 others had decided they also wanted to play the trumpet, I switched over to the baritone, at least for a while. But eventually, Mr. Shank decided he needed me to try out for a reed instrument instead. Almost all the clarinet players were girls, so in the seventh grade, I started playing the alto saxophone.

My dad found me a used Paris Selmer made at the Elkhart Indiana factory and I absolutely loved it! 

I got pretty good at playing sax. Four All-State band medals and a bunch of others from college that, unfortunately, also wound up in Australia when wife #2 moved there with a lot of my stuff from North Carolina. Also, unfortunately, I didn't continue with a career in music when I left college. Getting married, settling down, and working at the radio station in Martinsville (WHEE) became priorities, although I did play a little in my own band for a few years before stopping altogether.

When I left the twins mother and married Martha Jo Wampler (wife #2), I left the sax with the kids and they eventually sold it. I wish they'd let me know they were going to let it go, but it was gone before I knew anything about it. 

I bought another Selmer alto sax off eBay while I was living in Florida, and left it with son, Bill when I retired and moved to Panama. I never liked playing the French version anywhere near as much as the American one that I'd grown up with. For some reason, it just didn't seem to play as well.

And I was absolutely thrilled to learn that son John bought his youngest son, Drew, an alto sax last year! He seems to enjoy playing it from the images and videos I've seen.