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Parker Benton Smith
No full textParker Benton Smith oral history interview as conducted by W.T. Olds.
Mr. Smith would change agencies four times within the four years before joining the Fish and Wildlife Service in 1941. He took a brief leave from the Service in 1946, and returned in 1958 working out of the Regional Office in Law Enforcement.
Organization: FWS
Name: Parker Benton Smith
Years: 1941-1946, 1958-1973
Program: Law Enforcement, Refuges
Keywords: History, Biography, Employee, Law enforcement, Aviation, Refuges, Wildlife ranger, Game management, WPA, Banding, Migratory Bird Treaty Act, Airboat, Wildlife technician1
Oral History Cover Sheet
Name: Parker Benton Smith
Date of Interview: June 14, 1995
Location of Interview: Decatur, Georgia
Interviewer: W.T. Olds
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife Service:
20 years (1941-1946, 1958-1973)
Offices and Field Stations Worked, Positions Held: Game Management Agent at Piedmont National Wildlife Refuge, Georgia
Colleagues and Mentors: Hayden A. (Tony) Carter, Bill Fisher (Forest Service), Charlie Elliot, Bill Davis, Raymond Fleetwood, Jay Kelsey, Oren Steele, Billy Birch, Agent Whitehead, John Boswell, Jim Silver, Roy Moore, Bill Davis, Warren Upton, Jake Wolfley, Rudy Oswald, Johnny Lynch, Wesley Perkins, Noah Long, Jack McLanahan, Jim Elliott, Walker Harrod, Boots Hammond, Yoke Row, Dave Barnes, Walt Price, Charlie Young, Walt Gresh, Donald Hankra, Harvey Nelson, Paul Quick, Bob Smith, Mort Smith, Walt Crissey, Don Smith, Tommy Lines, Art Holkin, Art Bradley, Willie Parker, Cotton Soaper, Manny Carr, Dr. Ted Creaser, Bill Lee, Herman Zeigler, Jim Schuler, Houston Gascon, Van Carlton, Phil Peru
Most Important Issues: Law enforcement, banding
Brief Summary of Interview: Mr. Smith gives a brief history of his early life, becoming a wildlife technician in Cornelia, Georgia and changing agencies four times within the four years there, working for the Forest Service, and then becoming a wildlife ranger for Georgia’s Game and Fish Commission before joining the Fish and Wildlife Service in 1941. He took a brief leave from the Service in 1946, working for the Tennessee Conservation Department and then returning to Fish and Wildlife in 1958 working out of the Regional Office in the Law Enforcement section. Mr. Parker tells many stories of his time with the Service and talks about some of the other agents he worked with. Most of the stories occur in what is now Region 4.
Keywords: history, biography, employee, law enforcement, aviation, refuges, wildlife ranger, game management, WPA, banding, Migratory Bird Treaty Act, airboat, wildlife technician.
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W.T. OLDS: This is W. T. Olds, and I’m with the Southeast Region of the Fish & Wildlife Service (FWS) in Atlanta, GA, and I’m visiting today with Parker B. Smith, a law enforcement officer with the FWS for many years, and we’re at his home in Decatur, GA. And, of course, it’s Wednesday, June 14th, at about five after ten in the morning. So, Parker, I appreciate the opportunity to come by and chat with you, and if you can, just tell me a little bit about your life and your career with the Service.
PARKER: Well, if you can ___, we can go back a long, long way. Like that. And I guess I’m going to say for the introduction, I was born in Elberton, GA, in 1911, and grew up there. And I was twenty-two years old when I left Elberton. I worked in the granite shed there and during the depression, I was right in the middle of that, and then anything that came along in the way of work; I recall working in the silk mills shortly after I married, and was making $13.10 a week.
W.T. OLDS: Was that at Elberton?
PARKER: That was at Elberton, and that was the basis of getting married, have a good, steady job. Three months later they laid me off, along with others, and then I had to find something else to do. And I ended up working for an ice company, driving a wagon for a while and selling ice on the streets, and then driving a truck and selling ice in stores throughout the rural parts of two or three counties around. The whole time, from the time I was five years old, I knew that I wanted to be in the wildlife business of some sort. In trying to make that work out, I watched the news and the names of people who wrote books on wildlife, and every time I got a new name, I would write them and apply for a job. And, eventually, I hit the right man, and his name was Tony Carter, Hayden A. Carter. He was working for the Resettlement Administration as a wildlife biologist, he was the regional supervisor for the whole southeastern part of the country.
W.T. OLDS: And this was regional resettlement?
PARKER: Yeah. So I hitchhiked to Decatur, GA from Elberton, and talked to Tony at his home. And he decided that I was going to do for the job, so he put me on at Cornelia, GA, as a wildlife technician, and that was in 1936, and that was the beginning of my wildlife career. Before that, in trying to get work, I wrote to people like Aldo Leopold. I have a copy of a letter from him right there in the folder. And I wrote to Herbert Stoddard down at Thomasville, GA, and got a visit with him, on his plantation south of Thomasville. And he was looking for a mammalogist to work on the plantation with him, so I didn’t work out for that, but at least I had the privilege of knowing Herbert Stoddard and he was one of the finest guys I ever met in my life. But anyway, all that ended up with me working as a wildlife technician at Cornelia, GA, for the Resettlement Administration, and for four years, I guess, approximately four years, I was stationed in Cornelia, doing the same type of work, but I was transferred to four different government organizations; they were trying to get rid of the land that had been bought, there were forty-four thousand acres of land, lying between Cornelia, ___, and Tallulah Falls. And we bought it all up, and, my working in woods, I knew where everything was that was to be known about that place, including all the whiskey stills. I’d run into these guys on the creeks, and, that’s beside the point, but anyway, they kept me on because of my knowledge of the land lines, the corners, the people that lived in there, and I stayed there until finally they came to me and told me that that work was going to run out. And, I’m thinking back now. I worked for the Resettlement Administration, the Farm Security Administration, the Soil Conservation Service, and the Bureau of Agriculture 3
Economics, all in Cornelia, and then they transferred me to Gainesville, and I went to work for the Forest Service. And I worked just a short time with them and the emergency funds that they were using then were running out, and the director, Bill Fisher, who was the supervisor for the Chattahoochee Forest, came to me and told me that I’d better try to find something else if I was going to stay in the wildlife work because they were not going to be able to maintain the salary for me.
W.T. OLDS: This was what, at about 1940?
PARKER: 1940. And then I went to work for the Game & Fish Commission, Charlie Elliott, and I never will forget, Charlie called me in to his office and he said, “Now, you’re going to be a wildlife ranger and that means you’re going to have to catch the people that are violating the law, and I want you to strap that gun around your gut and leave your conscience on the mantelpiece and get out there and get them.” And that was just the lecture that I got, I still remember it and I got a big bang out of it. But I wasn’t with the, I worked at Blue Ridge, GA, for a short time, and then from Blue Ridge, they transferred me to Thomaston, GA, and then gave me a job as the supervisor of that section down there. And just shortly after that, Gene Talmadge was elected as Governor of the State of Georgia, and he fired us all, from the director down to the janitor, and then I went to work for the FWS at Piedmont Refuge, and Jim Silver, who was the regional director at the time, worked up a job that I could hold on to until I could get an appointment as a game management agent. In 1941, I went to work as a game management agent in ___, GA, and stayed with the law enforcement until, I’m looking at a note now, 1949. Let me see, that’s not exactly right. In 1941, game management agent, through 1946. I wasn’t particularly hot on law enforcement, I was always interested in the biological end of the game, and I had an opportunity, with the help of Bill Davis, my supervisor, to go to work in Tennessee, for the Tennessee Conservation Department. And I went up there and I was their waterfowl habitat development project leader, and I stayed there twelve years and then realized that I wasn’t accumulating anything for my old age, which I’m at now. So, I reapplied with the FWS and, wonder of wonders, they took me back, and I came back to the Regional Office in the law enforcement section. But I was handling mainly the biological projects like banding birds and doing surveys and things of that kind.
W.T. OLDS: When did come back with the Service?
PARKER: Yeah, and I stayed with them until I retired, and I retired in 1993. That pretty well covers a long, long road.
W.T. OLDS: It does. When did you come back with the Service from Tennessee, you say you spent about twelve years in Tennessee?
PARKER: 1946, no I came back in 1958. I’m not sure about that. Let me get my eyes on here and see what happens. No, Tennessee again in 1958, I came back to the FWS and stayed until 73, in the law enforcement section. I get confused with dates.
W.T. OLDS: But it was in 73 that you retired?
PARKER: Yeah, it’s been a while back.
W.T. OLDS: It has been a while.
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PARKER: I keep forgetting when I talk to people how many years have gone by, I’ll see somebody from Tennessee and, you remember so and so; never heard of him. Well, that guy’s up, gone and died since I knew him, and I forget about how many years have passed. But, I will say one thing: the people in the wildlife business that I’ve dealt with and worked with are the best that I ever saw. I don’t think I saw five people in my life that were engaged in wildlife work that weren’t good folks, and I really liked them. And you don’t find that, I think it’s because they like what they do and they’re in a business that they’re interested in, and as a result, they’re just good folks. You ought to know, you’ve been in it a long time, too.
W.T. OLDS: Yeah, I’ve been in it for a little while. Well, when you were first with the FWS, you say you spent some time down at Piedmont until Jim Silver could get a job in management and enforcement. What were some of the things that you were doing when you came to the Service in the management and enforcement group?
PARKER: Well, down at Piedmont, there was, as I said, it was a, something to give me employment until I got to be a game management agent, and I was supervising a crew of WPA workers that were rebuilding and patching up highways on the refuge that had been purchased. That didn’t last long, thank goodness, because I didn’t like it down there. And that makes a story pop up in my mind, I have to tell you. There was an old man that worked on the WPA project, and every morning at daylight, he would come driving in on an old, old Packard, with three or four guys that he’d picked up, and he never drove over twenty miles an hour, and he drove in there one morning right at daylight, and there were three chickens, still dead asleep right on the bumper of his Packard.
W.T. OLDS: A long way from home.
PARKER: Yeah, and that’s what you call a sedate speed, that he was using. I remember that very clearly. A guy named Raymond Fleetwood was the Refuge Manager, and he was bugs on banding birds, he just, he banded several thousand chimney sweeps, down at Macon, and the following year, as I recall, a mining engineer for the Anaconda Copper Company was walking along a trail in Peru, doing some surveys, looking for copper, I suppose. He had an Indian guide and they met a naked Indian coming down the trial with a blowgun, and he had this necklace made out of bird bands. And the guy told him to, made motion he wanted some of the bands and the story goes, the Indian backed off and got his blowgun up and was going to protect himself. And the guide finally got it over to him that he could, wanted to trade for some of them. And they ended up trading him a hunting knife, and getting several bands, as I recall, seven bands, and five of them were from Fleetwood bandings in Macon, GA.
W.T. OLDS: My goodness.
PARKER: And although they knew the chimney sweeps went to South America, they didn’t know where, and the Indian told them that he killed the birds that he got the bands off in a cave, five thousand foot elevation I believe, in the Andes Mountains. So we had an authenticated ___ of where they go.
W.T. OLDS: Right, well that’s sure an example of where bird banding pays off.
PARKER: Oh, yeah, I’ve always been interested in that, it’s been one of my long suits. I banded a couple of thousand doves around Decatur, along with the help of some of the agents that would take the time to go with me on it. And we’ve got a lot of good information from 5
banding them. Since doing that, I have had a tendency to think that the emphasis of law enforcement, and the emphasis on saving them from the hunters, might be misdirected some, because they have a mortality rate that shows up in the banding, that shows a very minor loss as far as guns are concerned. And even including crippling loss, it seems to be, you know, not too bad.
W.T. OLDS: There are a lot more factors out there that impact on their life than just the hunting season. Well, who were some of the agents that you worked with in the early part of your career?
PARKER: I worked with a few who were hired when they merged during the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, in the past. Guys like Jay Kelsey and Oran Steele, Billy Birch, a lot of them the names I’ve forgotten, but they were old-timers and I was the junior agent when I went to work at first, and not too long before I went, the only agent I ever heard of being killed on the job was killed in Georgia, a guy named Whitehead. And he was followed by John Boswell, and, I don’t know, I don’t recall who followed John, maybe not anyone. But anyway, I did have the dubious privilege of dealing with that bunch of wild men. They were good ones. They were good agents, that’s for sure.
W.T. OLDS: What was the circumstance on Whitehead’s death, do you remember?
PARKER: Yeah, he was taking his wife down to Brunswick from Savannah, to a party, and he was driving down the road at King’s Ferry, ___ River, and he saw this black guy run across the road with a sack and a shotgun, and he knew him, and he stopped the car and called his name, and said wait a minute, he wanted to talk to him, and he started walking toward him. And that guy was hidden behind a tree and he just shot him down, right there, his wife looking at him. There was a, but like I say, that’s the only one. I’ve known of one or two others that have been shot, but that’s the only one I know of being killed on the job.
W.T. OLDS: Who was in charge of the agents at that time, in the region under Jim Silver?
PARKER: Ummm, Roy Moore.
W.T. OLDS: Roy Moore.
PARKER: Yeah, Roy was ___ sort of a job as an assistant regional director, and Bill Davis came in as supervisor soon after this. When I first went to work they sent me, incidentally it was my first commercial airplane ride, I got on an old DC-3 of Delta here and flew to Jackson, MS, and met Bill, and my job was to pick up a car that he was going to turn loose and that would be my car in Georgia. But we went on patrol, and, while we were on patrol he got word that somebody was shooting doves on the ___ of Mississippi Prison Farm. So we went up to check it out and sure enough there was a prison truck riding along and we could stop ahead of us and a rifle stick out the door and shoot the dove would fall off the wire. So, we drove up behind them, and Bill ran around to the right hand side where the rifle was last seen, and opened the door, and he said, “Federal agent, get out!” and the prisoner just sat there and looked at him, both of them. In the meantime, I was running around to the other side of the truck, and he said, “I told you I’m a Federal agent, get out!” and the guy said, “You and who’s going to make me?” And that’s all it took. Bill grabbed him and snatched him out on the road and they were down in the dirt scrambling around and when they did that, the one that had the rifle, by that time, was under the steering wheel and he was trying to 6
get the rifle on Bill, and I reached in and grabbed hold of the rifle and said, “Nope, you’re not going to do that.” And he spun around at me and I said, “Get out of the car!” and he tried to pull back, and I dragged him out through the window, and got him down in a ditch and wrestled the rifle away from him and then they both gave up. They had eight or ten doves, as I recall, and it turned out that they were killing them for the doctors there at the prison farm. Some of them had given them rifles and told them, they were trustees and they were going around giving shots to the prisoners. We were sitting around that night, and Bill said, “You notice that ___, those guys can’t pay a fine, they’re not making any money, we can’t put them in jail, they’re already in jail,” he said, “I know the governor, I know what I’m going to do.” And he picked up the phone and called the governor, and told him who he was and he said, “Governor, these guys can’t pay a fine, and they’re already in jail. I just want to recommend you have them hung.” And we all got a big laugh out of that. But that was my first case, involved in, as a Federal agent.
W.T. OLDS: And this was what, with Bill Davis?
PARKER: Yeah, W. T. Davis, you knew him. He was from Jackson, MS, and Jackson, TN, and, no, no, I’m wrong, he was from Brownsville, TN. That was his dad, the Sheriff, in Brownsville. But there’s lots and lots and lots of stories that go along with all of that time, and those fellas that we worked with, and we got into it. Another group of guys that were agents that, you probably knew some of them, Warren Upton was in North Carolina, Jake Wolfley was in Florida, and I named the whole bunch, I’ve got pictures of them yet to look at, too. But Jake was one that was a story builder, he could come up with the darndest things, he loved airboats, and he was always wanting to run an airboat and chase down those boats. And every day the supervisor let him have, I believe, three. I know the first one he got, he was riding down the road and had it on a trailer, and looked out the side of the car and there was the trailer going along right by him, it had jumped off the trailer and was sliding along the road, and tore it up pretty good. Well, they got it patched up, and then he got down in the flooded river bottoms on the St. John’s, I believe, and was going at full speed, headed ___ , another agent sitting down in the bottom of the boat, and Jake was sitting up in the high chair running it wide open, which was fifty to sixty miles an hour, and Noah told me this story, he said they, all of a sudden they hit a stump. There wasn’t supposed to be any stumps out there, and he said it split that boat from the bow to the stern, and there was a sheet of water coming up and spreading out and behind the propeller a rainbow ended, as he told it. And Jake hollered at him and said, “If I stop we’re going sink,” said, “I’m going to run in close to the boat, to the trailer, and you jump out and back the trailer far down in the water and I’ll run it up on the trailer.” Well, he said he ran close to the boat, to the bank, and he jumped out and said he skidded across that water like a flat rock for a ways. Finally got out and backed the trailer down into the water, and Jake got out and lined up and here he came, wide open, and some way or another, he failed to cut it off at the proper time, and he hit that trailer still wide open, and Noah said he went over the trailer, over the car, over him, he was hid behind the car, and hit nose-first in the swamp on the other side. Tore up the airboat, didn’t hurt Jake. That was number one that he really tore up, the next one, he was cruising around at high speed by himself, and he hit a barbed-wire fence right under the surface of the water. No, the fence was sticking out of the water and he didn’t see it, he said it was even with his knees when he was sitting in the high chair. So he threw his feet up, and hit the wire, and said the wire bent, the boat went in and then bounced back, and Jake went straight out with his feet up in the air. Hit on his rear end in the mud out there, praying there wasn’t a stump in there, skidded a hundred yards, and that was all there was to it except there was another airboat gone. And so it went. 7
W.T. OLDS: He was rough on airboats.
PARKER: One other story. He was working with a state officer down near Lake Okeechobee, and, they say the officer was driving an old car, pulling the airboat, and they ran out of gas, and it was on a narrow road somewhere down around Okeechobee, and they didn’t have any extra gas. And Jake thought about it and he said, “I’ll get up and crank up the airboat, and I’ll push you down to a service station,” and the guy said, “Well, all right, but don’t go too fast.” And Jake was a, he had a long white mustache and white hair, and he was a wild one. He got cranked up and things were going so good, he just kept on going a little faster, a little faster, and the guy was up in front, hanging onto the wheel, the guy in that car, and a state patrolman got up behind them. And he couldn’t get them to hear him because of the noise that thing made and finally he got his lights flashing and found a wide place, and
Correspondence to W.T. Smith
No full textThis document is a handwritten letter from W.M. Ogle to W.T. Smith, composed on letterhead from Ogle's office in Primero, Colorado. Ogle responds to Smith's recent correspondence in the letter, providing the names and addresses requested. Ogle lists the names and respective locations of Josephine A. Vreeland and Lucy H. Moore in Philadelphia, Annie C. Ogle in Lancaster, George C. Bennett and Sadie B. Bennett in Lancaster, and himself, along with his wife Margaret Ogle in Primero, Las Animas County, Colorado. Additionally, Ogle recounts a past transaction involving the sale of the blacksmith shop lot to J.E. Simpson, during which some family members were in Philadelphia and others in Harrisburg. The deed was signed with a notary present in Harrisburg, while those in Philadelphia signed it at Mr. Lore's office in Wilmington. Ogle suggests a similar arrangement for the current matter, where family members in Lancaster and Philadelphia can go to Wilmington, and the documents can be sent to him in Primero by registered mail for notarization. Ogle concludes by indicating his intention to inform his sisters to proceed accordingly upon notification from Smith or Mr. Curtis
Correspondence to W.T. Smith
No full textThis document is a handwritten letter from W.M. Ogle to W.T. Smith, composed on letterhead from Ogle's office in Primero, Colorado. Ogle responds to Smith's recent correspondence in the letter, providing the names and addresses requested. Ogle lists the names and respective locations of Josephine A. Vreeland and Lucy H. Moore in Philadelphia, Annie C. Ogle in Lancaster, George C. Bennett and Sadie B. Bennett in Lancaster, and himself, along with his wife Margaret Ogle in Primero, Las Animas County, Colorado. Additionally, Ogle recounts a past transaction involving the sale of the blacksmith shop lot to J.E. Simpson, during which some family members were in Philadelphia and others in Harrisburg. The deed was signed with a notary present in Harrisburg, while those in Philadelphia signed it at Mr. Lore's office in Wilmington. Ogle suggests a similar arrangement for the current matter, where family members in Lancaster and Philadelphia can go to Wilmington, and the documents can be sent to him in Primero by registered mail for notarization. Ogle concludes by indicating his intention to inform his sisters to proceed accordingly upon notification from Smith or Mr. Curtis
Crayton James Lankford
No full textCrayton James Lankford oral history as conducted by W.T. Olds.
Mr. Lankford talks about his early years, graduating from college, being in the military, and how he came to work for the Fish and Wildlife Service. He also talks about the various positions and offices he worked, and issues such as flood control, public use, budgeting, and mammals and non-migratory birds.
Organization: FWS
Name: James Crayton Lankford
Years:1963-1985
Program: Refuges; Administration
Keywords: employee, fishes, birds, public access, resource management, work of the Service, military, supervisory Soil Conservationist Southeast Region, Atlanta, Georgia (1963-1968); Assistant Regional Refuge Supervisor, Portland, Oregon (1968-1972); Departmental Management Development Training, Washington D.C. (1970, 1971); Chief Resource Management (1972-1974); Program Manager for Mammals and Non-Migratory Birds, Washington D.C. (1974-1676); Assistant Regional Director for Refuges, Region 4, Atlanta, Georgia (1976-1985) mammals, non-migratory birds, budgets, supervisor1
Oral History Cover Sheet
Name: Crayton James Lankford
Date of Interview: May 17, 1995
Location of Interview: Stone Mountain, GA
Interviewer: W.T. Olds
Approximate years worked for Fish and Wildlife Service: 1963-1985
Offices and Field Stations Worked, Positions Held: Supervisory Soil Conservationist Southeast Region, Atlanta, Georgia (1963-1968); Assistant Regional Refuge Supervisor, Portland, Oregon (1968-1972); Departmental Management Development Training, Washington D.C. (1970, 1971); Chief Resource Management (1972-1974); Program Manager for Mammals and Non-Migratory Birds, Washington D.C. (1974-1676); Assistant Regional Director for Refuges, Region 4, Atlanta, Georgia (1976-1985)
Most Important Projects: Soils Moisture Program, Southeast refuges
Colleagues and Mentors: John Finely, Lynn Greenwalt, Gene Hester, Phil Morgan, Bill Wood, Barry Freeman, Bob Webb, Roy Rozell, Larry Givens, Dick Smith, Bill Myer, Ken Black, Jim Pulliam, Kahler Martinson, Howard Larson, Harvey Nelson Mel Huish, Ray Vaughn, Forrest Carpenter
Most Important Issues: Mammal and Non-Migratory Bird, encouraging public use of refuges
Brief Summary of Interview: Mr. Lankford talks about his early years, graduating from college, being in the military, and how he came to work for the Fish and Wildlife Service. He also talks about the various positions and offices he worked, and issues such as flood control, public use, budgeting, and mammals and non-migratory birds.
Keywords: employee, fishes, birds, public access, resource management, work of the Service, military, mammals, non-migratory birds, budgets, supervisor
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This is W. T. Olds with the Southeast Region of the Fish and Wildlife Service here in Atlanta, Georgia, and I am meeting today with Crayton J. Lankford at his home here in Stone Mountain, Georgia. You spell your name C-r-a-y-t-o-n (correct) and the middle name is James (correct) and it’s Lankford, L-a-n-k-f-o-r-d (right on) right on, ok.
W.T. OLDS: Well, Jim where were you born and if you don’t mind saying when.
MR. LANKFORD: No, not at all. I was born in Charlotte, North Carolina July 15, 1928. But I moved to Athens at an early age. My father passed away right after I was born. I moved back to Athens and lived with my maternal grandmother. All the way through high school and the first two years of college I lived in Athens. So, I’m primarily a Georgia product.
W.T. OLDS: You went to high school there in Athens?
MR. LANKFORD: I went to high school in Athens at Athens High School. I graduated in 1945 and just had a 50th high school reunion this year as a matter of fact. It’s changed quite a bit.
W.T. Olds: Did they call it Athens High School at that time?
MR. LANKFORD: Athens High School is what they called it. Now that’s been changed. They have two high schools there now. Clark Central, I think is one and the other is Cedar ------- High School. I have a grand-daughter that’s now going to Clark Central. I always wanted to live in Athens but it seemed like it was very difficult. You either had to own your own business or you had to be a college professor, one or the other, and I wasn’t either one of those so I couldn’t very well make a living in Athens. It was kind of strange because my youngest son wanted to go Georgia and study horticulture, and he did and he has been there ever since then. He has figured out a way to make a living and stay over there, but I never could. Athens always has a real warm spot as well as the Georgia Bull Dogs, you probably heard that.
W.T. OLDS: Yes, I have heard that on more than one occasion. So you graduated high school in 45. (In 45) And then did you attend University of Georgia there.
MR. LANKFORD: Yes, as I said I grew up primarily in Athens, and back in those days people thought if you were big enough to walk you were big enough to find something constructive to do. So, I had a number of different types of jobs in Athens as I was growing up. When I was in high school I worked and I saved some money and then when it came time to go to school and I went on to Georgia. The first two years that I went to school there I was living at home so all I had to do was pretty much make enough money for tuition and books and stuff like that. But then my mother remarried and moved to California. I went ahead and finished my sophomore year and went out there and worked for a year with the Bank of America. I was a teller at the bank for a year and saved as much as I could. Then I got out from Lake Charles, Louisiana and I hitch hiked back from California to Athens. I got a job running a drive in restaurant in Athens, which I did the last two years I went to school. It was Buffy’s Drive In, right off the ------- Road. I don’t know if you have heard of any of these places or not. Anyway, all that’s gone now. Everything is 3
replaced by shopping centers and all that kind of stuff. But, as I said, I ran a drive in restaurant the last two years I went to school. I got through school, finally, got to five years of trying to get through school, I had a draft card in my pocket and they were right ready to pick me up for that Korean conflict, I guess, as they call it. So, during the interim from the time I finished school until I was actually drafted a friend of mine had just bought a beer company in Athens so I drove a beer truck for about two or three months till I got drafted . So I’ve been involved in a lot of things.
W.T. OLDS: When did you finish in Georgia. 1950? (Right) And what was your major?
MR. LANKFORD: I majored in agriculture with a major in animal husbandtry, with a minor in Agronomy and dairy husbantry. 1950 ------.
W.T. OLDS: Well, I finished at the University of Florida not to long after that and also went through agriculture. (Yeah) So, you finished and got your bachelor of science in 1950 and then you drove a beer truck there for a while? (You bet, about two or three months. Had a lot of fun doing that.)
MR. LANKFORD: One part that I did want to mention. I said I grew up in Athens. My father’s parents lived over in Hart County, Georgia, and had a small farm over there just this side of Hartwell, between Hartwell and ---- and I spent all my summers over there when I was growing up and that’s where I got interested in agriculture. I just kind of liked being outside, I guess, I always felt like that would be the greatest thing in the world would be to be able to make a decent living and be able to be outside all the time without having to be inside some office, some place where everybody eventually winds up I guess.
W.T. OLDS: When did you get drafted?
MR. LANKFORD: 1950. I was drafted in November of 1950. Originally contracted for eighteen months and they extended it to twenty four months. I got out in November 1952. When you got out you had an option then of being in the active reserve for three years or in the in-active reserves for five years. I told them when I got out I would be just as in-active as a man could possibly be.
W.T. OLDS: So you thought you were going for eighteen months and you ended up for twenty four months. Where did you spend your time for that two year period?
MR. LANKFORD: I took basic training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina and then transferred in to Fort Lee, Virginia just as they were pretty much re-establishing the training center there with the quarter master crew. I went through instructors training and guidance school, I guess they called it. I stayed there as an instructor for the rest of the time I was in the service. I had a pretty cushy job. A lot of wasted time, seemed like. A lot of training going on. (And this was where? Fort Lee?) Fort Lee in Petersburg, Virginia. (Petersburg, Virginia) A long time ago. (Well it was good you got to spend your time in the states) Yes, it was. I did alright. It wasn’t to much of a problem for me. I considered it, rightly or wrongly, I kind of wasted a couple of years because I 4
did get some good experience in being able to deal with people, some assistance in public speaking through the instructors training and that kind of thing.
W.T. OLDS: You got discharged from your active duty in November of 52. (November 1952 that’s right) Did you come back to Athens from there?
MR. LANKFORD: I came back to Athens and right after that went to work for the Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commission. It was a temporary assignment and I was stationed in Leesburg. I went down there as a fisheries technician. Seemed like it was two hundred dollars a month or maybe that’s what I got raised to, I had got a raise under ----- ------. Interesting part of that was I worked for Mel Huish. You knew Mel didn’t you? (Yes, I sure did) I worked for Mel Huish and Bill Wood was there. He wound up being the chief of Fisheries for the State of Florida. I was trying to think of the guy’s name that was, Barry Freeman, was our project leader. He wound up going back to Mississippi. I worked at Leesburg primarily on Lake Harris and Lake Eustis. I did age and growth and food habit studies on Bluegill ------. Our primary mission at the time was to supervise controlled saining crews. Basically what they were doing, this was a program that was pretty much developed by Jack -------- who was a chief fishers biologist at the time. Essentially, what it amounted to was having commercial fishing come in and sain the lakes and as they would sain them they would put all the bass back. They’d take out all the gar fish, the gizzard shed, the groan, trashities, so to speak, take them to the hill and have a bulldozer dig a big trench and they would put them all in there and then they would bury them. The brim of the Shellcracker, the Croppy and the Bluegill and the Catfish they would take out and they would take those and they would put tags in the gills and sell them. And in doing so, and basically what they were doing, they were getting enough revenue from the sell of those fish to pay for the whole program and at the same time they were reducing the rough fish population in all the Florida Lakes and in effect giving the bass populations a much better shot at getting big and fat so to speak. Great program, great program killed by politics. Mentioning that somebody saw somebody kill a bass or something. It died in the net or something like that. It got real emotional. They killed the program, fired Jack -------. All that kind of stuff taught me a little about working for the state. It really did. (You started with Florida Game and Freshwater Fish Commission late in 52?) Yes, in late 52 and I was there through December 53. I was there towards the last, after Jack ---- got fired. He established a business in Leesburg, Southern Fish Cultures, I think was his business. He talked me into quitting my job and going to work for him, essentially seven months peddling bait --------- around through there. We weren’t doing a whole lot of business and anyway I wound up coming back to Athens about December 53, I guess it was. I got back to Athens with no job. I took a job with Universal CIT Credit Corporation as a field representative. Essentially that is someone who goes around and reposes peoples cars if they don’t make their car payment. That’s the toughest thing I have ever had to do, I think. I did that for about a year strictly for survival purposes. Then I got a job with the Soil Conservation Services. I started with the Soil Conservation Service in November 54. My first station was Cedartown, Georgia in November, 1954. I was there for about a year to eighteen months and then I was transferred to Cumming, Georgia, ----- ------- ------ right over here. I was a farm planner in one of the numerous watershed projects of the Soil Conservation Service at that time. I was over there for about a year to eighteen months and then went to Towns County, Georgia. Hiawassee, Georgia as a ------- 5
conservationist. I was there for about five years. I, in effect, installed the first public law 566 Small Watershed program in the state of Georgia. That is where I got to know Don Pfitzer. He came up to review the program. God, that’s been a long time, a long time ago, sure has.
W.T. OLDS: Well did that project consist mostly of small ---------- for flood control?
MR. LANKFORD: Yes, that was land treatment that goes with it. When I was working in Cumming, Georgia, it was a different Watershed Project that they had over there, I don’t remember the number to it, but, they had already constructed a number of ------- ------ towards the reservoirs. When they built them they put duck -----. When I went over there, I was always kind of interested in hunting and fishing so I made it a project of mine to utilize those duck ------. I was planting chicken corn and chewpers and ------ ------- and different things like that. Roy Rozell was working with the Soil Conservation Service then as a state biologist, I guess, and he’d get me all that kind of stuff and I would plant it and then in the fall of the year I’d put those duck ------ back in there. Essentially I kind of had my own private hunting reserve there because nobody knew all these places were there like that. That’s where I really got interested in duck hunting. It was the first opportunity I ever had to hunt very much I guess. In doing so Roy Rozell and I got to know each other pretty well and I think his association with Larry Givens is what lead to me coming with the service. I guess Larry was looking for somebody to manage the Soil and Moisture Program for the Fish and Wildlife Service along about then and Roy Rozell recommended him to me and I met with Larry two or three different times and finally agreed to move to Atlanta.
W.T. OLDS: Was Larry at that time the Regional Supervisor for the Refuge Division in Atlanta?
MR. LANKFORD: Yes, that was in February of 63, (February of 63) Do you want me to just go on with where I went and all that kind of stuff? (Sure, Yeah, I was just kind of marveling at you came into the service in 63. That is the same year I came with them.) Well, most of us, the same agents, our paths crossed a lot of times. When you sit down and you start talking to people. But there was a bunch of people involved in that controlled saining program in Florida about the same time I was. Do you remember Red --------? (Yeah, I sure do) He was down there. He had the project, he was project leader down at Lake Reed while I was in Leesburg. I want to say Dick Smith was involved in it in some way but I am not sure about that. But there were a number of different people, oh, Bob Webb, (Oh, yeah, my goodness) was involved in it. A bunch of people that were kind of passing through because that was kind of an opportunity that, I guess, particularly for Fisheries bound just to know that was the thing to really get in to. (Oh, yes) A lot of people passed through but when you get to talking you find that we have a lot more in common about where we’ve been and some of the people we’ve worked with. Anyway, when I first came to the Fish and Wildlife Service there was a Bureau of Sports Fisheries and Wildlife. Supervisory Soil Conservationist for the Southeast was basically my job. I was there until 1968. (Was that here in Atlanta?) Here in Atlanta Supervising the Soil and Moisture Program on the refuges in the Southeast. While I was in that I had an opportunity to attend the Departmental Management Development Training Program in Washington. I think Dick Smith was in the program right before me or right after me. Right after me I think. John ------- was right after me too. Don 6
------ was right before me. Bill Myer was in the same group that I was in. I always had a lot of respect (For Bill?) For Bill Myer. (Yeah, I kind of lost track of Bill. I believe he went out to Portland) Yeah, I think, and retired. (I think he was the deputy regional director out in Region one out in Portland and then retired out there. He may still be there.) I think he’s still there. I was trying to think of Jack something from Boston that attended with me and he passed away right after that. I can’t think of his name. He was a good friend of John -----. (Do you remember the year you went to the departmental training program?) I’d say somewhere between 68 and 72. Probably about 70 or 71 somewhere along in there. When I was in there I got really interested in things that were going on in the Western part of the United States. I took an assignment with the Bureau of Land Management and met some people that I later worked with in Montana and Idaho. I got real interested in the Western portion of the United States and had an opportunity to go out to Portland in 1968 as the Assistant Regional Refuge Supervisor, I guess they called it. I had responsibility for Idaho and Montana. Fantastic opportunity for me. I really enjoyed it. When I first went out Vernon Ekedahl was my supervisor. Vernon and I still correspond with each other at Christmas. He’s still alive and still relatively vigorous. (What was his name again?) Vernon Ekedahl. (Ekedahl) E-k-e-d-a-h-l. Now, whoever’s doing these things for the Western United States could spend some time with Vernon to an advantage. He has a lot of history, a lot of history and I am sure he remembers a lot more of it than I do. (Where is he located now?) I’d have to get his address for you because he’s changed. He had been living in Portland. His wife died and he moved on to California to be close to some of his children. I do have his address. (Ok, I can get that from you later.)
W.T. OLDS: So it was in 68, then, that you left Atlanta and went out to Portland in Region one?
MR. LANKFORD: Yes. I worked with Bob Shields the supervisor for Nevada and California. Brussell had Washington and Oregon. I had Montana and Idaho. Then Ed Smith came out and replaced Vernon when Vernon retired. Good group out there. That is where I met Ken Black. That’s one of the things I really enjoyed about the service. It was an opportunity to meet so many people. And primarily, people, that pretty much had the same views that you do. You kind of have a lot in common with people. That was a really interesting time for me, it really was, I enjoyed every bit of it.
W.T. OLDS: How long did you stay out in Region one?
MR. LANKFORD: I was in Portland until 72. (Do you remember who was the regional director out there during that period of time?) I know that John Finley was the regional director when I went out there but I’m not sure if he was the regional director when I left. It seems like he was. John Finley was originally a product of North Carolina. I think when he retired he went back to North Carolina to live. I had known John here in Atlanta when I was here. Really top notch guy. John was regional director when I went out there. As I say, I’m really not sure whether he was when I left or not. Things have a way of changing so much. Anyway after I had been in Portland Lynn Greenwald came out there as the Chief of the Division of Law Enforcement for a while. I got to know Lynn pretty well. He’s a refuge product out of Albuquerque where he found the whole refuge system. He grew up in the system. I had met Lynn two or three different times. 7
He had gone from Albuquerque to Minneapolis and then back to Portland and then from Portland he went in to the Washington office as the director. When he first went in he went in as the Chief of the Divisional Refuges. He asked me to come in as the Chief of the branch of Resource Management and I went in replacing Bob --------- as a matter of fact in August of 72. I was in that job from August of 72 until January of 74. From 74 to 76 that is the time they were implementing the program management system in the service. I was selected, I guess, the service had a way of doing those kinds of things back in those days, as the program manager for the Mammals and Non Migratory Bird Program. That was a very, very interesting experience, it really was. You were in Washington about the same time weren’t you?
W.T. Olds: I sure was.
MR. LANKFORD: I was in Boston before I came to Washington. I came to Washington about August of 74 I think. That was about the time they were really gearing up, I think, for the program management system. Really interesting, it really was. Well, as it is in any organization, anything new, you know, you meet a certain amount of resistance but there were some very strong individuals in the early days of the Fish and Wildlife Service. I can recall ---------- the program coordinator for Mammals and Non Migratory Birds essentially, I was the one that helped, at least, draft the budget justification for the Mammals and Non Migratory Bird Program. When you get right down the eventual distribution of those funds I did have some latitude. Not without close scrutiny by a number of people, don’t get me wrong abo
Prolegomena to any future e-publishing model
No full textConsiders why, after nearly twenty years of development, the electronic publishing model has not replaced the paper based model for academic journals. Gives three insights that attempt to explain this: the first is the ‘means-end’ confusion of commercial publishers, the second is the failure to realise it is the purpose not the form that is important about the current journal model, and third is the failure to recognise that a net-based replacement for the journal does not necessarily need a publisher. Finally some 'ground rules' to be used when thinking about, or designing, any future electronic publishing model are proposed
W.T. Smith Livery Stable
No full textSidney Smith on horseback in front of the old Smith livery stables.
The spot now hosts the location of the Synovus, formerly Sea Island, Bank. Before the bank was an armory.https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/pub-hist-business/1004/thumbnail.jp
C.B. Biezeno (March 2, 1888 - September 5, 1975)
No full textObituary of prof. C.B. Biezeno, written by his former PhD candidate and his later colleague prof. W.T. Koiter.Mechanical, Maritime and Materials Engineerin
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No full textMarriage license for Perry F. Smith and Lucy Eiland. W.T. Martin was the Notary Public
Single- and Multi-carrier Quadrature Amplitude Modulation: Principles and Applications for Personal Communications, WATM and Broadcasting: 2nd
No full textSingle- and Multi-carrier Quadrature Amplitude Modulation Principles and Applications for Personal Communications, WLANs and Broadcasting L. Hanzo Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, UK W. Webb Motorola, Arlington Heights, USA formerly at Multiple Access Communications Ltd, Southampton, UK T. Keller Ubinetics, Cambridge Technology Centre, Melbourn, UK formerly at Department of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, UK Motivated by the rapid evolution of wireless communication systems, this expanded second edition provides an overview of most major single- and multi-carrier Quadrature Amplitude Modulation (QAM) techniques commencing with simple QAM schemes for the uninitiated through to complex, rapidly-evolving areas, such as arrangements for wide-band mobile channels. Targeted at the more advanced reader, the multi-carrier modulation based second half of the book presents a research-orientated outlook using a variety of novel QAM-based arrangements. * Features six new chapters dealing with the complexities of multi-carrier modulation which has found applications ranging from Wireless Local Area Networks (WLAN) to Digital Video Broadcasting (DVB) * Provides a rudimentary introduction for readers requiring a background in the field of modulation and radio wave propagation * Discusses classic QAM transmission issues relevant to Gaussian channels * Examines QAM-based transmissions over mobile radio channels * Incorporates QAM-related orthogonal techniques, considers the spectral efficiency of QAM in cellular frequency re-use structures and presents a QAM-based speech communications system design study * Introduces Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) over both Gaussian and wideband fading channels By providing an all-encompassing self-contained treatment of single- and multi- carrier QAM based communications, a wide range of readers including senior undergraduate and postgraduate students, practising engineers and researchers alike will all find the coverage of this book attractive
Smith, Minnie (Death, 1901-09-27)
No full textAddress: 723 E. Sixth St.Age at death: 33-4-23341/Pg 97/1901/F. Col. M/Ohio/Dr. W.T. Findlay/J.B. Habig & Son/Ripley, OhioOriginal record filed in drawer labeled 'SMITH-SNYDE'
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