The Last Meeting
Tuesday, January 16th, 2007
The last (meaning both most recent and also final) meeting of The A-Haunting We Will Go Tent of Dayton, Ohio was held on December 2, 2006. At least it was the last with me as Grand Sheik. I had considered giving up my post many months ago after Carolyn and I separated, but then decided to go ahead and finish out the ‘tent year’ with our Summer picnic – and then finally, to finish the actual 2006 calendar year. I have been Grand Sheik for nearly 15 years – and presided over 136 meetings. Read the rest of this entry »
Babes In Toyland is one of the most treasured of Laurel and Hardy films. The timeless comedy of the boys combines with the sights and sounds of a magical land capable of wow-ing any kid seeing L&H for the first time. Ashleigh used to watch this film over and over again – and I mean like four times in one day. The characters in the film are based on nursery rhymes and children’s stories, and among them are the Three Little Pigs. Most of us had always assumed that these guys were actually all midgets – but the truth of the matter is that two were midgets and one was child actor Payne Johnson. 
Continuing with the Sons of the Desert convention in Georgia…After our long, sweaty day in Harlem and our cool, brisk swim, it was time for the next item on the agenda: the Laurel and Hardy trivia contest. Since I have long prided myself on my L&H triva knowledge, I now enter the contest whenever possible. Beginning in 2000, the contest became a team-of-three effort, whereas beforehand it was a solo competition. I assembled my crack team of buffs the first morning of the convention. Amazingly, although I have been in all four of the team trivia challenges, I have never had a single common teammate. 
I spent nearly the entire first half of 2000 blissfully submerged in a resurrection of Dante’s Info. I recall these chilly months working at Xenia Kroger spending every break and then going home and spending nearly every waking minute obsessively reading all of the published works on Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy and toiling over this newsletter. The reason: I had gotten the bright idea to try and put together an informational newsletter for every single monthly tent meeting.
As it was my first time in Harlem, Georgia, I wanted to make sure that I took the time to scout the area and find all the relevent landmarks of the hometown in which Oliver Hardy was born. I was a little disappointed that there was not a formal tour of the area, nor even a map pinpointing the locations, but since the town was so incredibly small, it wasn’t hard to for the locals to point us in the right direction – and even accompany us to the cemetery.