After seven short years with us, our Bullmastiff named Chandler passed away May 16, 2014. He was polite, strong and dignified, but worn down by the years and poor health. When he first came to us years ago he was just skin and bones, weighing only 95 pounds. Late in life he was more like 125. Quiet except for the occasional “big dog bark” warning to coyotes and strangers late at night, he kept a watchful eye upon us and the other dogs.
Yesterday I had the great fortune to hear the Right Honorable Henry McLeish speak before a small crowd at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. He gave some prepared remarks on education, mostly dealing with the importance of continuing education for seniors such as that available at the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute and then answered questions from the audience. I was as impressed as I expected to be with his thoughtful and often entertaining answers. I would have liked to have peppered him with queries regarding his hometown of Methil in Scotland and then warmed up into questions on the old Kingdom of Fife regarding politics, coal mining, poverty and the class system. But I didn’t. Instead he answered the predictable questions on Scottish independence (he said it will fail this time around) and a few odds and ends (such as the cost of the new airport tram system in Edinburgh and the shrinking British military.) After I left I realized I should have asked for his autograph but when I returned the small auditorium was locked.
I’ve followed the career of Henry McLeish from afar since probably the middle 1990s, or whenever the internet made it possible for me to do so. What captured my interest, of course, was that he was the Member of Parliament for Central Fife in Scotland and a rising star in British politics. He was a Minister of State for Scotland in the Blair government and key in the devolution process that led to the creation of the Scottish Parliament. Among the many accomplishments on his impressive resume is that he served as the First Minister of Scotland (similar to being the Prime Minister of Scotland.) Now he lectures at various universities besides being a consultant on all things Scottish wherever he goes. He was interviewed by National Public Radio yesterday, for instance, and his opinion is continually sought by the BBC and other media.
I suppose I felt disappointed by the whole thing in a way, though. There were only about thirty in attendance and I don’t think the majority really grasped that they were hearing a First Minister of Scotland. I’m not saying they weren’t appreciative of his enjoyable talk, but he’d been instrumental in devolution, after all. I don’t know what would have been appropriate to the occasion and I generally prefer things to be low key, but standing room only and television crews would have been nice. I felt it to be a real honor to be in the same room. I bet if he toured the various Scottish festivals in the United States and Canada he’d be treated like a rock star.
Morris and Boris by Bernard Wiseman
With Christmas upon us, there is little doubt that the cash registers will be busy at the 11,000 stores owned by Wal-Mart. But what allowed Wal-Mart to rapidly expand into such a global juggernaut? An important facet of that answer is Eureka Springs and our roads.
Sam Walton always said he managed by walking around, keeping an eye on things at as many stores as he could while continually teaching his philosophy and managing the rollout of his plans. In the early days, he was frustrated by the roads in the Ozarks, but as Vance H. Trimble wrote in his biography Sam Walton: The Inside Story of America’s Richest Man, “But one evening as he tooled along the corkscrew curves on U.S. Highway 62 through Eureka Springs he heard the drone of a small airplane.” That gave him an idea that eventually led to a pilot’s license and an airplane. As Vance H. Trimble says in the book, “Without this magic carpet, his Wal-Mart phenomenon never would have seen the light of day.”
When I was a kid, Grandpa Jack McCall and I encountered Sam Walton at the old Berryville Wal-Mart. The mantle had burned out on Grandpa’s Coleman lantern and he needed another one. We were wandering around the store when we bumped into this older guy who obviously worked for Wal-Mart. Grandpa asked where the mantles were. The older man didn’t know but said they’d sure find them. Three Wal-Mart associates who’d been lurking around the corner appeared and took Grandpa by the arm to the mantles. After we left, I asked Grandpa if he knew who the old man was. Grandpa shook his head. I said that it was Sam Walton, owner of Wal-Mart, the richest man in America. Grandpa said that if he owned the store, he should’ve known where the mantles were. He was not impressed.
Sam is gone now, but after skimming the Forbes list of the wealthiest people, it appears the Walton family is still doing okay. Lumping together the reported net worth of the six heirs of brothers Sam and Bud Walton gives a respectable total of $145 billion or so, enough to rank as the richest family in the world.
