Happy 23rd, Boone!

 

by Pa Rock

Proud Grandpa

My oldest grandchild, Boone Macy, was born twenty-three years ago today in West Plains, Missouri, the same small Ozark town that produced actor and comedian Dick Van Dyke, country music star Porter Wagoner, and baseball great Preacher Roe.  Boone grew up in the West Plains area, and is now living in southwest Missouri where he is in his final year at Missouri Southern University pursuing a degree in elementary education.

In an effort to combat the rampant spread of censorship and ignorance in the United States, I made a personal vow this year to send each of my grandchildren a banned book on their birthday.  The one I selected for Boone was John Steinbeck's widely banned "The Grapes of Wrath," which offers an unflinching look at the evils that corporate farms and unchecked capitalism were imposing on America during the Great Depression, evils that persist to this very day.

John Steinbeck won the Pulitzer Prize in Literature for "The Grapes of Wrath" on May 6th, 1940, fifty-nine years to the day before Boone was born.   His message about the people who are forced to live on the fringe of the American economy has grown stronger and more urgent over the years.

American radio personality and innovator (and actor) Orson Wells was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, on May 6th, 1915.  Wells was just twenty-three, Boone's current age, when he and his Mercury Theatre troupe unleashed "The War of the Worlds" over the radio and scared the bejeezus out of the country with their play about a Martian attack on Earth. That signature radio event established Wells as a force in American entertainment that spanned decades and lingers on into the present.   (No pressure, Boone!)

Twenty-three has always been my lucky number.  I was born on the 23rd of March, and Boone's Uncle Tim came into the world on the 23rd of September.  When I was twenty-three I was able to quit my post-college job working on the line at the chicken plant in Noel and drive to Virginia where I began military service as a  second lieutenant at the Army's Transportation School at Ft. Eustis.  During that year - when I was twenty-three - I lived in three states - Missouri, Virginia, and Kansas - and also  traveled across the Pacific Ocean to my first overseas duty assignment on the island of Okinawa.  I was also twenty-three when I saw my paternal grandfather, Chock Macy, for the final time.

Boone, it's a beautiful spring here at the farm, and I've never seen things so green!  We would love to have you come for a visit.  (Let me know if you need a map!)

The whole family is rooting for you, Boone!  Have a wonderful birthday - and an epic year!