Month: May 2019

Is it just me or have the questions on Final Jeopardy been really easy since James has been winning so much. It reminds me one question on Final Jeopardy a long time ago I thought it was real easy I don’t remember the exact question but I knew the answer was Mr. Bojangles. Alex went to the contestant and of coarse as her answer the right answer who is Mr. Bojangles. Then Alex says no we cannot accept that. Then the next contestant didn’t know the answer. Then Alex went to the returning champion, I don’t remember who that was, and his answer was who is Bill Robinson and Alex says ” that’s right Bill Robinson was Mr. Bojangles but we had to have his real name. Do what Alex? Why is Jeopardy so pickee sometimes and other times their not? But I have good news, after I have done my research, I now see why Jeopardy wouldn’t accept Mr. Bojangles as the answer. It turns out Bill Robinson was known as Bill “Bojangles” Robison and Mr. Bojangles in the song was a homeless man who called himself Mr. Bojangles. So now I get it Bill Robison was just plain Bojangles and the man in the song was MR. Bojangles.

Bill “Bojangles” Robinson is best known for tap dancing with Shirley Temple. In their first movie together, The Little Colonel” Bojangles Robinson and Shirley Temple hand in hand tap danced up a staircase. This caused outrage “throughout the South” that a black man was holding hands and dancing with our little Shirley. Many theaters refused to show the movie.

As I recall the Jeopardy question did have something to do with “dancing with Shirley Temple and I think that me and the contestant that said the answer was Mr. Bojangles from the song because we heard it from somewhere. Here’s what I think may had happen. You have to keep in mind this a song from the 70s long before the internet. I think a radio DJ thought the song was talking about Bill Robison and said something like you know this song is about that black man from the Shirley Temple movies. It has to be true if a DJ says it is. It’s just that Alex Trebek didn’t listen to same radio station.

This is the second time I’ve had this song on my blog. The first time I featured the Up With People song What Color is God’s Skin? I included this song with the other post because the girl that stayed with my family sang this song as a solo and in true Up With People form, she never said a word to us that she would sing a solo. This is one of my favorite songs of all time, but if your not familiar with Up With People you may have never heard it before. It’s worth listening to without question.

For me a chain wasn’t the reason I was sitting here thinking of my Granddad. It was a simple jar of peanut butter. You may not give a lot of thought to something as simple and everyday as a jar of peanut butter, but Granddaddy did. For you see Granddaddy was part of what we now call The Greatest Generation, we call them that for a good reason. Granddaddy was in the Army during World War 2. He was in the Battle of the Bulge and in the heat of battle he was hit by shrapnel, he was placed on a tank and on the way to get medical attention the tank and all the wounded soldiers around it were captured by the Germans. So now not only was he wounded he also became a POW. Never knew much of the details of what happened when he was captured, but there was one thing Granddaddy said that one day he was talking to another POW about what they would do if they lived, and both really didn’t believe they would, and made it back home. Granddaddy then told the other soldier “I’m going to eat peanut butter everyday for the rest of my life! Isn’t it funny what may become important to us but Granddaddy had nothing to eat there and peanut butter was just a dream to him.

Time went by and Granddaddy was in his eighties when me, Mama and Grannie would drive Granddaddy to Muskogee to his doctor’s appointments at the V.A. hospital, we make a lot of trips to Muskogee. There was one visit where Granddaddy had a different doctor that he had never seen before. The doctor asked Granddaddy about his time as a POW. Granddaddy told him his peanut butter story and the doctor laughed and said something about him being full of peanut butter. On the way home Granddaddy told us about the doctor that wanted him to tell him a war story, Granddaddy thought a was a little funny he wanted know that. Well of coarse a little time went by and it was once again time to take him back to Muskogee to the V.A. hospital. When that same doctor entered the exam room, he had a large basket filled with all types of candy and crackers everything made with peanut butter. As it turns out the doctor was so impressed by Granddaddy’s story that he went throughout the hospital telling everyone he could about the WW2 vet. who dreamed of peanut butter when he was a POW. Many people gave something to put in the basket. Now I know I need a really profound line to end this story, but maybe just telling the world the story is enough.