Newspaper Page Text
DEDICATED TO THE PROGRESS
OF CUMMING AND FORSYTH COUNTY
CUMMING, GEORGIA
hbb^^^hbh^^^h^^h^hb
m
Jfßßi * .
® W B#k* '
vUlr,' * \
Byß w *# lA** v
WKk t •-*»/' '
. Bl X*k ■
. BBrC> ~ '^r
HA , 'wSS§||^vQ|^H^RHßH^..
■r y mi
TELEVISION’S TUBBY AND LESTER IN THEIR HEYDAY
Pair Grabbed Morning TV’s Kiddie Market
xP># J|
1 Ju *ni' ■ M|M
j__ 1 ' *•
■pg^ppp.
m\. t ' n,' imV*gf r - J :%**!m"
( i fWi^~ >y ’:il'-' : W» •» •*' : -v-'x., . „ j * _, •
■nHHHHMHi f nnHH IHIIIIHmmH9HMHHHHHHi
LESTER (RICH BINGHAM) A YEAR AFTER PROGRAM FOLDED
He Owns And Operates A General Store Northwest Of Cumming
Lester Moves
To Our County
By PAUL BEEMAN
Editor
Rich Bingham, owner-operator of the
Sawnee Mountain General Store, has a
face you almost recognize.
Stick a derby hat on his head and he
almost becomes probably as Bingham
spent four years doing more than 1,000
shows as Lester on Atlanta television’s
Tubby and Lester Show.
Bingham, who’s retired from show biz
except for occasional commercials, left
the bustle of Atlanta several months ago
and bought the general store, located on
Dr. Bramblett Road near Matt, from then
owner Lynn Bottoms.
Though the boy has left the cameras the
ham remains as evidenced by the way
Bingham slips in and out of the many
characterizations he developed over years
as a comedy player.
Bingham grew up in Birmingham and
moved to Gadsden, Ala., at the age of 12.
“That’s where it all started,” he says. “I
was in the seventh grade and they had a
talent show. I learned a routine by Johnny
Stanley, who was kind of a forerunner
Andy Griffith. They disqualified you if you
ran over three minutes. I ran over and was
disqualified and I guess I’ve been trying
to get back at those people ever since.”
Bingham played a trumpet and was a
band major in high school at Northside
High after his family moved to Atlanta.
In his junior year he introduced the first
of the characters he would develop—Zeke
the Hayseed. By his senior year he wrote a
one act horror act for a variety show.
There were three parts in it but he could
only get one other guy to work with him
and they had to switch parts.
“The rest of them all thought I was
crazy,” he remembers.
The play was called “Dr. Creator’s
Death Collar and featured a guillotine and
a hunchback as well as the mad scientists
trying to piece together the perfect body.
“I built a 14-foot guillotine that actually
worked. Edith Hills Coogler wrote a half
page story on it in the Atlanta Journal.
Bingham went to the University of
Georgia and majored in drama. His
classmates included Monte Markham,
IVl||fl FORSYTH MflMfg
i nil county nEi w 3
LXVI
who is the new television Perry Mason.
“I always had to be out in front for some
reason. If there was a class clown, I was
either with him or I was the clown.”
While still in high school, he developed
“Sad Sam Smif,” an Emmett Kelly styled
circus clown. “I decided at that time that
I’d continue with Sad Sam as a vehicle to
get wherever it was I was going to go.”
He played Sad Sam while in the U.S.
Marine Corps for 4% years, painting on his
clown face for charity functions and
continued his clown act professionally
after leaving the service.
He says he averaged about 200 or 300
birthday parties a year as Sad Sam on
Atlanta’s Northside. Meanwhile he was
making a little money with commercial
art work and acting with several theatre
companies in Atlanta.
“In August 1968 I auditioned for
something at Channel 11 but I didn’t know
what I was auditioning for. Me and Sad
Sam did a world’s worst magician act for
the producers. Forty something people
auditioned for a producer from Boston and
director Bob Corley, who is an old movie
man.”
Bingham says the audition ended with
the usual “we’ll call you” and he didn’t
expect to hear anything out of it. A few
days later the producer called and asked
Continued on Page 17
Plush House Is Destroyed
A new home, insured for some $85,000,
was destroyed by fire last week in the
Sundown sub-development off Pilgrim
Mill Road.
Volunteer Fire Department Chief John
C. Moore said firemen were not notified of
the blaze until the house was burned to its
foundation.
The house was nearly completed and
was owned by Herb Rother who was about
to put it on the market.
Rother, who lives off Pilgrim Mill Road,
near Deer Creek Shores, built most of the
house himself. He had fitted it with rough
Wife Claims Cops
Wounded Husband
Teacher Of Year
Big Creek’s
Miss Kay
Gets Award
The one time in her life Fannie Mae Kay
got a promotion, she didn’t like it.
It was during World War II and Miss
Kay, who’d already taught more than a
dozen years, was told she’d have to take
over principal’s duties at the now defunct
Sharon School.
“Men teachers were scarce then and
they kept insisting I’d have to do it,” she
recalled. For two years she had to teach
the eighth and ninth grades and serve as
principal.
But when the war ended she was back to
doing what she likes best-teaching the
youngest students in the first and second
grades.
Doing what she likes best for nearly half
a century earned her the title of Forsyth
County Teacher of the Year for this year.
Miss Kay was bom in Dawson County
and lived for a time at Stone Mountain but
at age 15 her parents moved to Forsyth
County in the Sharon Community. They
moved into the house about half mile from
Sharon Church where Miss Kay lives to
this day.
When Miss Kay started teaching in 1928
she was fresh out of high school. In those
days teachers could start teaching with a
high school diploma and earn their
teaching degrees through summer study
and extension courses.
Her first assignment was the third
through fifth grades in the four-room
Sharon school house. Several years later
she was moved to where she wanted with
the first and second graders.
“I guess I just like the younger children.
I like to take them when they don’t know
anything and work with them and watch
them grow,” she said.
She continued her own education right
along including graduate study at Emory
University and the University of Georgia.
Rev. Bob Bowling
Records An Album
Bob Bowling guesses he may be the first
person to ever cut a record who didn’t own
a record player.
But he owns one now and it’s hard to
guess what’s number one on his playlist.
Bowling is Rev. Robert C. Bowling to the
members of the Cumming United
Methodist Church and president Bob
Bowling to the members of the Cumming
Kiwanis Club.
And now he’s record star Bob Bowling
with the release several days ago of an
album “Bridges to Joy.”
Why did he cut a record?
“People requested it,” he kidded. “You
have your mother who says ‘Bob, you
ought to cut an album. Seriously, I saw it
as a means to extend my ministry into the
homes of people I don’t even know.”
In an unusual turnabout, Bowling had
the cover of his album and title before the
selections were made.
His brother-in-law, Gregg Woodward,
was visiting Cumming. Woodward is a
hewn cypress brought in from Florida and
much other hand worked wood.
Additionally, the three story lakeside
dwelling had lush shag carpeting lain
throughout it.
Chief Moore said Rother was in Florida
when the blaze broke out early Wed
nesday. The chief said there were no
neighbors and firemen learned of the
blaze through a sheriff’s deputy.
The chief said the deputy spotted the fire
from a point in Cumming and estimated it
to be in the general area of Lanier Beach
South.
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 17, 1973
jrvV
W ■ ifeh'
in*?*,.' THHjf™ ■ 4
“I probably have enough (hours in
graduate course) to make up for a
master’s degree,” she said.
After the war she taught for a couple
years at Bethelview, another of the now
defunct small schoolhouses in Forsyth
County.
She then went back to Sharon School and
taught there until it was phased out in 1967
with the opening of Big Creek School.
During her years in the same community
she has even taught three generations of
the same families.
She has several requests every year
from former students who are now
parents and want her to teach their
children.
Miss Kay tried to retire two years ago,
but Robert Otwell, now school superin-
professional photographer and was taking
pictures of local beauty spots and Bowling
asked him to holler if he saw something
suitable for an album cover.
Suitable was the covered bridge in Dr.
Jim Mashburn’s backyard.
“We took the cover and fit the music to
it,” Bowling explained.
Rev. Bowling explains his solo-record
debut on the album jacket:
“The songs selected for this album have
been among those most often requested
during the ‘joy of singing’ services I have
participated in around our southland.
I am realizing now more than ever
before that there must be Joy in our daily
lives in order to be complete and loving
persons.
It is God who blesses us by bringing real
joy to our lives. He alone can touch our
lives and give fullness to our daily living
through the Bridge of song. God speaks of
His forgiveness and concern for each of us
and we can experience true Joy.
From a point off Buford Dam Road, the
fire was reguessed to be near Mary Alice
Park. Firemen headed for Mary Alice
Park Road before being redirected to the
first site near the lake end of Pilgrim Mill
Road.
The Chief said firemen may have been
able to save part of the structure had they
been notified earlier but by the time the
department found out the house had
already burned to its foundation.
The cause of the blaze has not been
determined.
FANNIE MAE KAY IS FORSYTH SCHOOL SYSTEMS TEACHER OF THE YEAR
She Is Seen Here With Some Of Her Pupils At Big Creek School
tendant but then principal of Big Creek,
persuaded her to stay one more year. “It
wasn’t too hard,” she said.
When Otwell was elected superin
tendant and Kelley Summers replaced
him at Big Creek, she told Summers it was
her last year. “He talked me into one more
year. I feel like some younger person
ought to take my place but I do love the
Continued on Page 17
l 4
• ' l&f WM ‘ ||j§ l«ll||P®ss "A* I&m| 11 a | '"’V* H slililli
REV. 808 BOWLING WITH HIS ALBUM ‘BRIDGES TO JOY’
He Cut Record Then Had To Buy Stereo To Hear It
It is my earnest hope that these songs,
which have meant so much to so many of
us, can be a very important part of your
life too. I am learning to “Pass It On” in
order to continue a personal growth with
Joy. Thus, Chrisitans have the unique
privilege to become Bridges that God can
use in bringing Joy to others.
Bowling rounded up some local
musicians and cut the album in two
sessions at the Protestant Radio and
Television Center in Atlanta.
Dr. Mashburn’s daughter, Susan,
provided the piano accompaniment.
Phyllis Martin, daughter of Mr. and Mrs.
Charles Buck Martin, played organ.
“Phyllis had never played a pipe organ
until two days before recorded,” ac
cording to Bowling.
Kathleen Sheridan, daughter of Mr. and
Mrs. Phil Sheridan, played the flute on the
record and Jeffrey McGinnis, son of Mr.
and Mrs. John McGinnis, played bass
Continued on Page 17
ISSUE 42
The young wife of a former Cumming
man who was in fair condition Tuesday
afternoon in Hall County Hospital charged
that her husband was shot by law officers
following an incident Sunday.
“They (law officers) aren’t talking.
They did something wrong,” claimed
Hattie Cox, wife of Charles Cox, formerly
of Cumming.
Her husband had a kidney removed
after a bullet ripped through his torso, she
said. Cox was taken to the hospital by
ambulance Sunday, Mrs. Cox said.
The Forsyth County News tried with
more than two dozen telephone calls to
various law enforcement officials but was
unable to get an official report Tuesday
concerning the Sunday shooting.
Department of Investigation Agent
Charles Stone, who investigated the case
for the state, was in a training school in
Atlanta and was unavailable for com
ment, DOI officials said.
Capt. R.C. McCracken, his supervisor,
was attending a seminar in Savannah and
could not be located by deadline, ac
cording to a DOI statement.
William Beardsley, DOI director, was
unavailable Tuesday before deadline, as
was Sheriff Roy Helton of Dawson County.
According to Mrs. Cox, she was driving
toward her mother’s place in Dawson
County when she was stopped by local law
enforcement officers. She said the officer
approached the car, and told her husband
to get out.
She described her husband as a man
“scared of police” who for some reason
ran. “Three shots were fired and
somebody yelled ‘Halt! Halt!’ af
terwards. He was in a ditch hurt by then,”
Continued on Page 17
Boosters’ Picks
The Forsyth County Athletic Booster’s
Club named Jon Trammel outstanding
back of the week for his performance in
the game last week against Buford.
It is the third time this year Trammel
has been honored by the Boosters.
Outstanding lineman of the week honors
went to David Garner for the Buford
game.
4 Arrested
In Burglary
Four young Forsyth Countains have
been charged with burglary in connection
with the Oct. 4 break-in at John S.
Crawford’s home on Route 5, Cumming.
Forsyth County Sheriff Donald Pirkle
said the four are charged with the crime in
which a color television, radio, electric
can opener and miscellaneous items were
removed.
The sheriff said Capt. P.C. Peacock
made the arrests following an in
vestigation.
The sheriff said all four suspects are in
their early 20s. He identified them as
Tommy Smith of Kelly Mill Road; Danny
Darby of Phillips Trailer Park, Marcus
Key of Route 3, Cumming; and Bill Hulsey
of Cumming.
15 CENTS
PER COPY
TELEPHONE 887 3127