Find an old picture, and the memories will follow.
This photo from the fall of 1985 is the dorm parking lot at the University of Tennessee at Martin. We lived on the third floor of Ellington Hall.
There were four buildings. From east to west... Austin Peay, where I stayed my first summer, and GH Hall. Then across on the other side, Ellington Hall, and Browning Hall out by Mt. Pelia Rd.
In the picture, the old green truck is on the right. On the left is Ricky Swayze's car, then Bill Lowry's Ford Ranger truck, and Charles Parrish's Chevrolet truck.
The third floor also had the baseball team, and some rodeo guys. Billy Schwabb was a bull rider. Neal Hardin, another rodeo guy was our suitemate on the other side of a shared bathroom. Billy and Neal were serious about the rodeo team. Both wore belt buckles that were huge, and I never saw Neal without a cowboy hat on. Neal had a unique way of talking. He was country for sure, and all cowboy. When he was needing to go somewhere, and about to leave, Neal would say, "We'll boys, I'm gonna blow out of here like a fast wind." Can't make that up.
The Tullahoma guys on the third floor were, Charles Parish, Ronnie McNeese, Stan Welch, and Daryl Stidham.
There was alot going on up there.
Minnows in the stairwell...
Bill and I fished alot. We enjoyed fishing. We also enjoyed a good cheap meal at a time when we had to watch our money.
Bill still loves to fish, and still lives in Martin with his wife, Dr. Suzy Lowry, and their family. They also have several dogs. Jughead is a pit mix and was just the sweeting thing.
Last trip there, Bill and Rylee did some fishing in his pond. This is from May, 2024.
The stairwell at the end of the dorm continued to the roof. The door up there was locked. The last flight of steps was a good place to put things you didn't want in your room.
Bill and I had a round styrofoam cooler with minnows left over from fishing. We put ice in it to keep them fresh, and left it at the top of the steps. We would check on it later, and go fishing again.
The days went by. We forgot about it.
The garbage chute in the dorm connected all three floors, and gravity fed into a dumpster at the bottom. There was always a stinky smell. The minnows went unfound.
We fussed, with everyone else, about the smell of the garbage chute. Till one day, we saw our RA (Resident Assistant), Harold, descending from the upper stairwell. He had a unhappy look on his face, and a round styrofoam cooler at arm's length. We quietly stepped aside in the hallway as Harold made his way past. We tried to look as surprised as everyone else. Harold disposed of the cooler. We never admitted it was ours, but they knew.
A bunch of our fishing was at Garrett Lake, just east of Dresden off highway 54. https://maps.app.goo.gl/8LPMM9TXAzdbomLy5
There is a long gravel road that goes around the shallow end of the lake. That's where we went to fish. We took the trail to the left, and walked towards the shallow end. Then waded out in the water in the coves, and fished for bream, bass, and crappie.
https://www.tn.gov/twra/fishing/where-to-fish/west-tennessee-r1/garrett-lake.html
Sometimes about dark, we heard a big splash on the far side of the levee, in the shallow water. The local guys said that's where the big bass are. They also said that's where the snakes are. We didn't have a boat at that time, so we didnt go there.
Same semester, same dorm. Same third floor room.
This time we had a couple of dozen crickets left over. We kept them in our room in a cricket cage.
We fed them slices of apples and oranges. After the minnow problem, we made sure they were well cared for.
One night, for reasons I won't go into, our wall mates got on our nerves. Bill and I were up late, talking about it. One of us had the idea of throwing crickets under their door.
The doors in the dorm were solid and heavy. There was a 3/4 inch or so gap at the bottom, to allow air to circulate.
The plan sounded good. Long after midnight when all was quiet, we eased out into the hallway with the cricket cage. We both got a handfull of crickets, and threw them under their closed door. They slid under, into their room. We ran back into our room, and closed the door quietly.
The next day, one of those guys asked us, "Do yall have bugs in your room?" We kept a straight face, and said, "Yes, we do."
Basketball in the back lot
The back of the lot out by Hannings Lane had a couple of basketball goals. It was far enough from the dorms that you could play till late in the night and not bother anybody. We had some great games out there. Between the fraternity houses across Hannings lane, and the dorm, we had plenty of people for a good game. I remember a guy named Kim from the dorm. We made alot of friends and played late into the night many times.
Fishing from the window
We had the idea of taking a dark sock, and making a critter to cast out of our window. When Bill was done with it, it looked like a big rat. He tied it to the end of a fishing pole. Then he tried it out. He stuck it out of our third floor window and cast it down by the sidewalk. It worked pretty good.
Late at night, students returned to the dorms by the sidewalk. Some were walking back from parties across the street at the fraternity houses. Others had been downtown on Church Street at Cadillacs, Hillary's, or the Stable. Once they parked they had to walk in from the back parking lot.
By the time they got near the dorm, they had almost made it safely home for the night.
With our window open and the lights off, Bill slung our rat out there. We waited. There were security lights in the area, but is was dark enough, and late enough to be spooky.
When they got close, he retrieved the rat, fishing it back and forth, across the sidewalk.
When they saw our rat they almost always screamed, and ran. Groups of two or three girls were the best. The more they had been partying, and the later it was, the bigger and better their reaction.
There was a lot going on, on the third floor of Ellington Hall.