A Train For Under The Christmas Tree
Copyright - 2016 by Chas Johnson
This is a book of fiction although some of the events in the book are real. The Kennedy assassination was a monumental event in the history of our great country. We do not wish it to be considered that the FBI or its director had anything to do with the death of the President, only that some people considered it a real possibility at the time.
The Sheppard’s and the Myers’ did (do) exist and comments concerning them are for illustration purposes only to convey the attitudes of this town at that time in history.
Jimmy is my brother and the part of the story about him is based on the truth. And I dedicate this book to my brother.
Other Books by Chas Johnson:
The Hunt For Gettysburg Gold –
Chapter 1
Friday the 28th of November in 1963 was what is now annually referred to as Black Friday. It is now called Black Friday since the Friday after Thanksgiving Day witness daunting crowds shopping for Christmas at the malls. In 1963 people still shopped downtown, the malls were new-fangled idea that was just starting to gain popularity. But that Friday, that day after that Thanksgiving, was indeed a black day as the country was mourning the loss of a beloved President. Thanksgiving Day was different from a normal Thanksgiving Day as well. People still had their turkey dinners and watched football and the parades on television, but the churches were filled with mourners, and the commentators on television were sobering and stoical instead of lighthearted and frivolous.
That Friday was a day off of school as well and young Jimmy Johnson, a pudgy twelve year old with dirty blond crew cut hair and corn cob teeth, intended to take full advantage of that fact. Rising early, he packed four turkey sandwiches from the left-overs of yesterday’s meal, two for himself and two for his friend Tommy Mack. Tommy, who was already thirteen, was a tall and lanky youth with somewhat Italian looking features despite the fact that his ancestors that he knew of, grandparents and a few great-grandparents, all claimed to have come from either Germany or Northern Ireland. Normally he would not hang out with Jimmy, but he occasionally made an exception because of the money. They were off to Jimmy’s dad’s soda bottling plant to get a few hours of work in at $2.05 per hour. That was a gold mine for two young boys. Arriving at the plant they discovered that the delivery drivers had already left for the day, so the building stood empty. Jimmy and Tommy worked through the returns, sorting the bottles into the various sizes and purposes, checking each for foreign objects and breaks or chips that would render them useless. Every time Jimmy did this job he recalled the time when he found a man’s thumb stuffed into one of the return bottles, he related the story to Tommy. Tommy said he hoped he’d find something like that in a bottle, maybe a finger with a diamond ring on it.
As they worked they had free access to all the soda that they wanted and each of them had sucked down two Big Top Cola’s and a chocolate soda so far and it wasn’t even lunch time yet. After the returns were sorted, the feeder conveyor belt needed to be loaded to match the needed items for Saturdays bottling run. Jimmy had a list from his father: thirty six cases of twelve ounce bottles; forty cases of sixteen ounce Diet Cott Soda bottles; thirty six cases chocolate soda bottles; twenty cases of Big Top bottles; a dozen cases Lovie bottles; and the big run of the day was the white grape twelve ounce bottles. There was no room on the conveyor for the last group so Jimmy staged as many cases as he could at the end of the line without blocking the aisle of course.
They broke for lunch, eating their turkey sandwiches, both boys had eaten so much turkey the previous day that they had sworn they would not touch a single bite of turkey again until at least Christmas, yet both boys made both sandwiches disappear in a blink, washed down with a Black Cherry soda for Tommy and a White Grape for Jimmy.
General cleaning was next on the list, it was always good to give the truck bays a good cleaning while the trucks were out on the road, so they swept them and took a hose to the floor and then they went to the office and swept the floor and dumped the trash into the outside dumpster. The bottling room was next, not only did they need to sweep the floor but they also had to bring in the high pressure hoses and wash everything down with a cleaning mixture that Jimmy’s dad had prepared containing bleach and ammonia and a few other products that Jimmy was instructed were to be used sparingly and to be immediately rinsed away so as to not hurt their lungs. Tommy did not care for this part of the job but for $2.05 an hour he’d of taken a bath in the junk. Are you kidding me $2.05 an hour, he’ll be rich.
It was 3 PM when Jimmy’s uncle, Jimmy’s dad’s partner in the bottling works, arrived as scheduled. He grimaced when he saw Tommy Mack at the facility. He knew that Tommy was bad news, always just this side of serious trouble, yet it was always those around him the got hurt while Tommy Mack just seemed to slip on through without a scratch. Jimmy’s uncle inspected the work, and was pleased. He made a quick journal entry and then broke open the cash box from the office safe and paid the boys.
The money, fourteen dollars and thirty five cents rattled in each of the boy’s pockets as they made their way to downtown Hanover Pennsylvania. Stopping at an Ice Cream Parlor, the MauDra, a teenage hangout, they purchased banana splits. Tommy got his with extra pineapple, for a dime more. Afterwards they checked with a few of their friends as to what might be going on that could be fun, only to discover that the few things that might typically be available for kids to do were canceled because of the Kennedy assassination. They checked the Evening Sun and discovered that To Kill a Mockingbird was playing at the Hanover Theater and Lilies of the Fields was at the Park Theater. Both boys turned their noses up and their thumbs down to that selection. Besides Friday night was date night at the movies, and they didn’t want anyone thinking that they were dating. ‘That would be just awful, I’d have to break a lot of noses if people started talking like that,’ thought Tommy. Finally it was agreed that they’d go to the hotel and shoot some eight ball, Tommy was certain he would win some of Jimmy’s money.
Chapter 2
The Huffman’s Hanover Hotel sat on Center Square in Hanover Pennsylvania. Built in 1851, the building has undergone many changes in its nature over the years. Early on, its ballroom saw the likes of James Buchanan, dancing with his cousin at the wedding reception of a close friend, Nathanial Hawthorn spent a night while traveling home to Massachusetts after a visit to Baltimore, and Abraham Lincoln had reserved a room in 1863, as a back up to stay while on his way to Gettysburg to deliver a speech dedicating the Cemetery there, but at the last minute he simply delivered a preview of his speech, which the people of Hanover considered insufficient for the occasion, and Lincoln travelled on to Gettysburg to spend the night.
But the years were not kind to the old structure and now the grand hotel was a flea bag boarding house, and the ballroom was a pool hall.
Since beer was served in the sandwich shop next to the pool hall, the Pennsylvania Liqueur Control Board mandated that only those twenty one years of age or older were allowed to occupy the pool hall. This was okay with the Hoffman brothers, Reggie and Alex, as they really didn’t want a bunch of teenagers running around in their pool hall, teenagers would not respect the property nor would they spend very much money, and they would tend to keep serious pool shooters away. Tommy Mack was exempt from that rule, not by the LCB but by the brothers as he was their nephew, so he and his guest were allowed to shoot pool, and every now and then have a beer as well.
The pool hall at the Huffman’s Hotel was not just any pool hall. It had thirteen tables, all of them solid oak and of the finest quality, with solid slate - one inch thick, quarried slate - tops co
vered in the best felt available and they were maintained to the very best possible condition. The walls of the old ballroom were splattered with photos of famous pool shooters: Billy "Cornbread Red" Burge; Willie Mosconi; Cowboy Jimmy Moore; Alvin Clarence ‘Titanic Thompson’ Thomas; W.C. Fields, Rudolf Walter ‘Minnesota Fats’ Wanderone, and many others too numerous to mention, and all of the photos were taken within the very walls upon which they were mounted. Reggie Huffman was in fact a former Nine Ball World Champion, winning the title in 1959 and then again in 1961, after which he retired. Yeah, right, a Nine Ball Champ that retires.
Tables cost a dollar to rent for a session and twenty five cents per rack regardless of the game played, although most played either Eight Ball or Straight Pool. Minnesota Fats had faced Mosconi for the 1955 World Championship in Straight Pool at the Huffman’s Hanover Hotel, but the match was played to a rare drawl, and both were eliminated from the championship, after which no serious competitor would come to play at their hall in a championship game as it was now considered to be bad luck – pool shooters are a very superstitious bunch. There were several other places in the Hanover area where a young person might go to shoot pool, but these places were far inferior in many respects. So it was off to Huffman’s Hanover Hotel for our two young lads with their money starting to feel like lava flowing in their pockets.
Chapter 3
It was a short walk from the ice cream parlor to the pool hall, but the late November sun had already set and the temperatures were dropping rapidly. The pint and a half of Ice Cream that each of the boys had just eaten as their supper was now causing both boys to shiver more than they cared to admit. Each boy tugged at their lapel of their coat to get a bit more protection from the cold, Jimmy pulled his Newsboy cap down as tight as he could get it, wishing he had the one with ear flaps. They made the turn at the end of Baltimore Street on to the Center Square, the hotel stood directly in front of them and they hurried their steps to get into the warmth of the pool hall. Jimmy spotted a fellow sitting in a pale green with white trim Ford Edsel parked by the edge of the Square and the man had just leaned out of the passenger door and had vomited into the gutter. “Looks like he had too much to drink already,” laughed Jimmy. Tommy shook his head at the plight of the poor man as he slammed the car door and the car sped off heading east out Broadway. Then suddenly, Jimmy stopped short and said, “Lookie there!”
He was pointing at a sign in the window of Myers Pharmacy advertising a raffle that was giving away a Lionel train set, and just below the sign was the actual train set that could be won. Jimmy was mesmerized, this was the most beautiful train set he had ever seen, and he could not believe that someone would be giving it away. It was the Lionel Chesapeake and Ohio Cannonball Express, a nine car set that included a coal fired steam engine, a coal car, two sleepers, a caboose, four box cars, one a US treasury transport car complete with Secret Service Agents, twenty eight feet of track including two over passes, and three buildings, plus sundry people, signs, street lights and a transformer designed to operate the whole thing. The sign stated that entries required no purchase and that the drawling would be held on December 20th at 5 PM. Jimmy saw that as an omen as that was his birthday, he was certain that he was going to win that train set.
On the bottom right corner of the sign was a statement that the set could be purchased for $89.95 plus state sales tax, a number that Jimmy considered to be a fortune but if he had that kind of money he’d be sure to buy this beautiful set. Of course he didn’t have that kind of money, and saving that much between now and Christmas was unlikely even with the money he could make at his dad’s plant. Winter was not big soda time, sales did go up a little right before Christmas but it was nothing like they were in the summer months.
Tommy Mack turned to Jimmy and said, “Well, let’s go on in a fill out an entry.”
Just then a gust of frigid wind skirted along the building facade causing both boys to duck their heads to protect their eyes and face from the frosty slap they were about to receive. As they turned their heads, Jimmy spotted a lump lying on the ground just below a park bench positioned in front of the drug store, near the curb. Curiosity was Jimmy’s middle name, well actually it was Patrick, but Jimmy was curious to the point that he would get into trouble by noising around stuff that he had no business noising around, so no matter how much he needed to go into that store and complete that entry form , he needed to see what that lump was first.
Without a word, Jimmy turned, walked over to the bench, bent down and grabbed the lump, which to his surprise it was a wallet, a fat wallet in fact. A second later Tommy appeared over Jimmy’s shoulder asking, “What you got there?”
Jimmy looked about at the shoppers who were briskly walking about the Center Square to be certain that nobody was paying any attention to them , which it appeared that they weren’t, and he said, “It’s someone’s wallet.”
A spirited Tommy yelled with glee, “What’s in it?”
Pressing his hand downward to indicate that Tommy should keep his voice down, Jimmy replied in a hush, “Don’t know!”
Tommy got the message and whispered, “Well damn, let’s find out!”
So Jimmy flipped the wallet open, took a second glance around, just making sure that they weren’t being watched. He thought, ‘Shit, what if we’re on Candid Camera.’ And without another thought he pealed back the money compartment and revealed a very large wad of cash, which he pulled from the wallet. Counting it took a few seconds and it was three hundred and eighteen dollars in all. “Man, its three hundred and eighteen bucks,” he told Tommy.
“Well, let’s go spend it! What are you waiting for? We can buy a train for each of us, and still have a bunch of money left over. ”
He was not exactly sure why, but Jimmy thought that spending the money would be a sin. Sticking the money back into the wallet and the wallet into his coat pocket, Jimmy turned and said, “Let’s just see if we can give this back, maybe we’ll get a reward, I’ll split it with ya, okay! Now let’s go and enter to win that train, and then go shoot some pool.”
Tommy was not as big as Jimmy, but he was a star athlete, captain of the basketball team, quarterback for the football team, and homerun hitting leader for the towns little league. He could and had many times before for much less reward, taken the pudgy, out of shape Jimmy down, but he chose not to, sensing that somehow Jimmy was right. It was agreed, unspoken, but still agreed that the money would be returned, Jimmy patted the wallet in his jacket pocket and said, “My Dad will know what to do!”
Chapter 4
Saturday morning Jimmy showed his dad the wallet and told him about the three hundred and eighteen dollars, and asked him what he should do. Taking the wallet, Jimmy’s dad opened it and examined the contents. Indeed, the money grabbed your attention, but Jimmy’s dad dug a little farther, finding some identification documents: a Kentucky driver’s license and a library card for the University of Kentucky, both in the name of Jamison Tate. “Well, looks like this Tate guy is the person who owns all this money. All we got to do is find him. Not likely he’s from around here with a Kentucky driver’s license. Can’t say I ever heard of that name here in town, but I’ll check around and let you know what I find.”
Later that day Jimmy’s dad headed for the Republican Club, where Jimmy’s father met up with Max Strawbaugh. Max was the loan officer at the Farmer’s Bank of Hanover. Max, in Jimmy’s father’s mind, knew everybody in Hanover, and everybody who did business in Hanover. It was his job to know that kind of stuff and he was good at it, but he didn’t know anybody named Jamison Tate. “I’d just drop a line to the address on the driver’s license. That should do it,” said Max, and as far as Jimmy’s father was concerned the investigation was done. On Monday morning at his regular job, Jimmy’s father dictated a short letter instructing Jamison Tate on how to get his wallet back and had his secretary mail it to the address on the driver’s license.
Jimmy’s dad told Jimmy about the
letter he wrote, to which Jimmy had but one question. “What if?” The answer was simple, “It’s all yours after thirty days! That’s what I told the guy in my letter.”
Jimmy did the calculation in his head, six days after Christmas.
Chapter 5
At night, Jimmy would visit the wallet, stowed away in the night stand by his bed, and he’d dream of spending that money in a thousand different ways. But in the end, he’d come back to one item, the train set in old man Myers’ window. He’d counted up his money that he had saved, also kept in a small box in his night stand table, and he knew how much pay that he’d be getting from his dad. No matter how he did it, he’d always come up about fifteen bucks short the price of the train set. His only hope was that the guy would turn up soon and give him thirty dollars or more as a reward – he can’t believe he promised half to Tommy, Tommy ain’t doing nothing - that should put him over the top and he could buy the train in time to put it under the tree on Christmas Day.
Once Jimmy slid forty dollars out of the wallet and took it with him along with the money he had saved to Myers Pharmacy. He was going to buy the train and then just tell the guy when he showed up that the smaller amount of money was all that was in the wallet when he found it. But by the time he got to Myers’ he got cold feet and simply filled out another entry blank and left. Returning the money to the wallet and hid it back in the drawer of his night stand. And then he belittled himself for not having the courage to get what he wanted.
One side of Jimmy really believed that it was fate that he was to get that train, yet there was another side that told him that the only way he’d get it was to buy it cause that box up at Myers was a good two foot by two foot by two foot cube and that was big enough for a ton of entry blanks, so what were his chances, maybe a million to one, at best a thousand to one. He’d never win