I have yet to figure out how to get trailer lights to work. I have four different boat trailers, which I have wired up, and none of them work like any of the others. One works fine when the pickup lights are on, but the turn signals don’t work at all. Another one has the running lights work on one side and the turn signal lights on the other side, but all the time, one or the other doesn’t work. Then another…well you get the picture without me going through it all. I have been wiring up trailer lights for about 50 years and never once got any of them to completely work right. I have, on rare occasions, had the lights working perfectly for three or four days, and then just all of a sudden, they go haywire. I get so jealous of those fishermen who drive down the highway with all their trailer lights working.
On occasion a law enforcement official stops me, and I promise I am going straight home to fix the trailer light problem. I even carry a wire stripper, black electrical tape and extra wires and plug-ins to show one of them on occasion, so I won’t get a ticket. But over the years, some of the older patrolmen have gotten to know me, and it is difficult to talk them into letting me go. But shucks, there’s always a light or two of one type or another that is working, so it isn’t like I’m not trying. I would like to know if there are any trailer wiring specialists out there who could help me. I probably can’t afford to pay you much, but I have a lot of extra wiring and partly broken taillights, which probably have some usable parts.
And if you don’t mind me getting serious for a moment, I am writing this on Veteran’s Day, so I would like to pay tribute and give thanks for those servicemen who made our country strong and free with their sacrifices. Many years back, someone sent me a page from the Springfield newspaper, which is owned by a giant liberal newspaper company from New York City, which showed almost half a page with a color photo, reporting on 15 college kids protesting something by repeatedly chanting a four-letter gutter-type profanity next to a grade school. The organizer said he found the word less offensive than the name of Jesus! Apparently, this was a very important event to that Ozark newspaper. I can only say those 15 college kids are lucky there were no World War II veterans close-by.
Twenty years ago, when my uncle’s book “Ridge-Runner” was published, I organized a big dinner on Veterans Day for World War II paratroopers, since he was a 101st Airborne soldier who fought at Bastogne and in the Ardennes Forest. Much of his book was about the war, and so to publicize it, we brought together all the World War II paratroopers we could find, about 30 in all from five different Midwest states, and bought them dinner in a Springfield restaurant. Because of the book, and their determination not to publicize it, the newspaper and television stations in Springfield refused to cover it. The daylong get-together was a wonderful day for those men in their eighties, all of them gone now, joining comrades who died in the war, making the supreme sacrifice.
My uncle received a special commendation from General David Petraeus, then commander of the 101st Airborne Division in Ft. Campbell, Kentucky. The base sent out a news release about the book which none of the news media to use. They invited my uncle and I to Fort Campbell for a weekend just before Petraeus was sent to Iraq. General Petraeus met with us and took us on a tour of the fort. He thought the book was significant enough to sell there. It has never been reviewed or written about in any Ozarks media in more than 20 years.
But the newspaper did find that protest of great interest for their front page: a gathering of students yelling a vulgar word next to a grade school, and the organizer who preferred the word to the name of Jesus. Today the college protests are going on again. They seem to be mad at the nation described in the Bible as God’s chosen people. I am glad I live deep in the Ozarks, deep in the woods. I went to a big college when I was a kid, and I am glad to live here in the woods, far, far away from it.
If you would like to read a copy of my uncle’s book, “Ridge Runner, from the Big Piney to the Battle of the Bulge,” just call me at 417-777-5227 or email me at lightninridge47@gmail.com. You can see it at www.larrydablemont.com
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