Have to agree to a degree thus that's why I'm backing Bill Bradley..
link (source)
billbradley.com
In lower right hand corner, "About Bill Bradley",
hit link "learn more"
Note the picture of BB along Mississippi is
shall we say sort of Huckfinish?
(excerpt)
Bill Bradley was born on July 28, 1943, in Crystal City, Missouri, the only child of Warren and Susan Bradley. The Bradleys lived a comfortable, middle-class life in a small, multiracial, multiethnic town on the banks of the Mississippi River, thirty-six miles south of St. Louis. The Crystal City of Bill's youth was a blue-collar company town with a single stoplight and a population of 3,492. With the support of his family and the close-knit community around him, Bill developed the values that have guided him as a leader, athlete, writer, U.S. Senator, and presidential candidate.
While Bill was growing up, Warren Bradley was a respected small-town banker. He had been forced to quit high school at age sixteen to help support his family, taking a job with the St. Louis-San Francisco Railroad. A few years later, he began what was to become a long and fulfilling career at the local bank, first "shining pennies," and working his way up to become assistant cashier, cashier, and eventually president of the bank. He gave Bill his first job as a janitor at the bank during school breaks. A reserved man, Warren Bradley had a clear sense of ethics and lived by a strict code of conduct. Warren's proudest achievement was that he never foreclosed on a single homeowner throughout the Great Depression, something that earned him the admiration and gratitude of the local community.
Bill's mother was an energetic and strong-willed former schoolteacher. Susie Bradley taught Sunday school classes at the Presbyterian church across the street from the Bradley home, which the family attended every week. She also doted on her only son. Susie kept Bill active and involved as a child, enrolling him in piano, trumpet, French, swimming, basketball, boxing, and French horn. She was the den mother of his Cub Scout group and attended all of his activities and sporting events. Susie stressed the importance of manners and modesty to Bill. He would win a race or game, but she would convince him that he hadn't won, that he just had longer legs than the other boys. Susie also made sure the neighborhood kids felt welcome in their house. The Bradley home became a popular gathering place for Bill and his friends, where they played pinball in the basement, watched "American Bandstand" on TV, and traded baseball cards in the backyard.
The Mississippi River, which bordered Crystal City to the east, provided a sense of stability and security. As a young boy, Bill played with his friends on the limestone bluffs along the river. In high school, he did cross-country training there to get in shape for basketball season. And as an adult, long after he left Crystal City, he and a friend bought Hug Farm, a small, fertile piece of land along the river. "When I bought the farm, I knew I was buying a permanent place in Crystal City," Bill said.
During Bill's childhood, Crystal City was ethnically and racially diverse. Hungarians, Italians, African Americans, and Poles worked alongside one another at the Pittsburg Plate Glass plant, the town's main employer. For the most part, race relations were peaceful in Crystal City. As his father always told him, "The color of your skin doesn't predict whether you'll save money or pay your bills." But Crystal City did not shield Bill from the realities of racial prejudice in the 1940s and 1950s. When his Little League team traveled to Joplin, Missouri, for a playoff game, they had to stay in a run-down hotel because the better hotels wouldn't take the African American players on the team. In high school, his American Legion baseball team was refused service at a New Madrid, Missouri, restaurant, because the catcher and left fielder were black.
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"Bill got his energy and dynamism from his mother. He got his willingness to wait things out from his father. And he got his high standards from both."
-- Hardeman Bond, Bill's aunt
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Time Present, Time Past : A Memoir
by Bill Bradley
amazon.com |
