Monthly Archives: February 2019

The Passing of a Great Man – Ron Woodland

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On December 2nd, 2018, Sullivan lost a great guy in general and a great Conservationist in the Sullivan area. Not many knew it, but he was also an aviator back in his early days and I only became aware of it when I read his obit.  Many of us on the Sullivan Fire Department back in the good old days…the 70`s, 80`s, and 90`s…met Ron when he transferred to the Sullivan District Office of the Missouri Conservation Department as District Forester, as Manager of the District.  Ron was a quiet kinda guy with a subtle sense of humor, but you could tell that he truly cared about his people and the local firefighters and departments in his district. Whenever Ron would visit with us at the fire station on Springfield Ave at Church Street, he was often accompanied by Mike Reavis…who we often saw more of…Mike was Ron`s right hand man and they were a well-oiled machine whatever work they were doing for the Conservation Department. Ron was very instrumental in obtaining state grants to purchase radios, hoselines, pumps, surplus jeeps, brush trucks, and personnel carriers and other types of equipment that would enable our department to better fight not only natural cover and brush fires, but other emergencies as well. When I was a junior firefighter, Ron and Mike helped us obtain four surplus jeeps and then they helped us build them into brush fire jeeps, giving us multiple rakes, water packs with hoses, and fire resistant long sleeve shirts to wear at brush fires. A few years later, they obtained a surplus personnel carrier for us, we were able to put five inch pipe around it to make it nearly invincible and safe for forest fires, yet we were able to use it at other emergency incidents as well…they assisted in obtaining an air trailer unit for us that we were able to take to structure fires to refill air bottles…they knew we were interested in an aerial unit so they found an old Air Force surplus truck with a boom and basket on it…while we tried it out in training, we didn`t feel it would work for us due to the age and size of it. However, they never let that stop them from trying to help us until we got on solid ground as a fire district and were able to make our own equipment purchases. Even when we reached that level, they still provided us with rakes for forest and brush fires, shirts, gloves, and continued to help us with grants for portable pumps and leaf blowers. Ron was not one of those managers confined to a desk, either…when we were short on help, he would come help us rake and build the fire lines in the wooded areas, or backfire the lines…I felt lucky to get a photo of him walking out of the woods one day, once we had the fire under control…not many knew it at the time, several thought he was headed back to the office, but he was actually on his way to another fire to help out again….

The only other job I saw Ron take on occasionally, was wearing the Smokey Bear suit…most of the time others took on this role, but one day I spotted Smokey during Fire Prevention Week at St Anthony`s School, the older school building, and when I saw Mike Reavis was standing next to him doing the talk wtih the schoolchildren, I knew right then who Smokey was…it was a great role for him to play……Smokey would often shake hands or give hugs to the kids, he didn`t talk at all, so Ron was a perfect match for the role. 

 

Ron retired after 38 years with the Missouri Conservation Department and I am sure he was missed then, as he is now.  Rest in peace my friend, Job Well Done. 

Two MVA`s on EB I-44 At The 232 and 230 MM

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On December 21st, Sullivan Fire Department was dispatched to a car into the back of a tractor trailer on Eastbound I-44 at the 232 mile marker. As emergency vehicles were responding to the call, a Missouri State Trooper became involved in a second vehicle accident at the median crossover just east of the Stanton Overpass, near the 230 mile marker. St Clair Fire Department responded to assist and were given the accident at the 232 mile marker to handle….

…when I arrived and turned around on the North Service Road near the old Kovac`s, I saw a tractor trailer stopped in the easbound passing lane and about a hundred feet behind it was a silver or gray colored car with heavy front end damage….behind the car was St Clair Ambulance and behind the Ambulance was St Clair Fire District`s smaller Rescue Squad Truck. I then drove down to the median crossover to check the second vehicle accident….

…and found Sullivan Fire Department, Sullivan EMS, and several State Troopers and County Officers on scene…a State Trooper car struck by another car at the scene…injuries unknown…St Clair Fire Department`s Chief Officer was assisting Sullivan FD as well….

 

Here Comes Santa Claus….December 2018

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Here comes Santa Claus…being pulled by Sullivan Fire Department down Elmont Road…they stopped this year down at the end of the block from me..my neighbor Nikki took her son Eddie down there to see Santa, so I walked down to shoot some photos for the local paper….of Santa and his Elf….

Many thanks to Sullivan Fire Department and Santa for spreading Christmas Cheer and Joy to all of the Sullivan kids, big and small, this joyful Christmas Season !! 

Annual Fall Leaf Raking and Burning

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This was a very wet and cold fall, as I stated a few stories back, made even more apparent when it came time to rake and burn leaves at the home of my parents. Before Mom and I headed down to Arkansas for my fall vacation, every inch of grass and gravel was covered by leaves at their house and on our return from Arkansas, while I could easily move the leaves around, made easier with a new leaf blower this year, finding a day to burn them without any wind blowing, was another story. It was nearly the last day of November before I was able to burn all of the leaves that I had raked and blown up into a huge pile stretching down the gravel driveway from front to back of the house….

MVA Nov 25th, 2018 1500 Block Elmont Road

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Around 4 pm on the 25th of November, I drove to the 1500 block of Elmont Road to photograph a two car accident that occurred at the culvert bridge just north of Shady Lane and south of Dorson Circle. After parking on the side of Elmont Road, I walked up to find a red PT Cruiser heavily damaged in the middle of the road at an angle, both bumpers tore off of it, serious damage to the drivers side and rear of the vehicle and one tire and wheel tore off of it. There was a black four door coupe about a hundred feet north of the red car and nosed off the roadway into the ditch. Car parts were strewn all over the roadway and all around the PT Cruiser…..standing there in the midst of it all was a good friend and Franklin County Deputy, Doug Garner….

…he and another deputy were in the area and responded to assist Sullivan PD. One occupant of the PT Cruiser was transported and both occupants of the black coupe were transported to MOBAP Sullivan as well. Chief Eric told me the black coupe was northbound on Elmont Road, approaching the culvert bridge, when the driver of the southbound red PT Cruiser, also approaching the culvert bridge, dropped the right tires off the roadway, brought the Cruiser back on to the roadway, which then caused the Cruiser to spin, bringing the Cruiser out into the path of the northbound black coupe, where both vehicles collided nearly head on…luckily no one was seriously injured in the collision. Both vehicles were towed from the scene with heavy damage….

 

Arkansas Fall Trip November 2018

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I have to say, in my book, the fall season of 2018 will go down as one of the coldest in both Missouri and Arkansas…I do not recall one as cold as I experienced….we may have had them colder than that when I was growing up and Dad took me deer hunting in south central Missouri because Missouri gun deer season also starts the second weekend of November, as does Arkansas`s season, and there were seasons when we had to have the heat on in the camper just to keep the milk from freezing up in the fridge. There were a few mornings in Arkansas this year, southern Arkansas no less, that we woke up and began quartz crystal collecting at 24 degrees…yes I am sure that indicates that we are as crazy as some people think we are, if we are willing to go outside and collect and dig in temperatures that extreme to most. 🙂 

I just wish I had packed my heavy winter coat for that trip, instead of leaving it at home, thinking it would be like all the past seasons, warm and fuzzy. I would bet the farm that everyone that brought ski pants or insulated coveralls to wear, were nice and warm and comfy the entire time they were outside. 🙂  To read that story and see the photos and videos…go to my rockhunting website :

 

http://www.jwjrocks.com/

 

Enjoy !! 🙂

Missouri`s Late Fall Season Nov 2018

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First time I can recall fall color waiting til the end of October and first of November to make it`s appearance, but sure enough, that is what happened to us in east central Missouri…we had some weird weather early on in October and then we had one of the coldest fall seasons that I can remember as well, not only up here but down in Arkansas as well. I didnt take my heavy winter coat and wish I had packed it. While it was a later than normal fall, it was still very pretty….

…now this shows you just how strange a season it was…this is a couple of blocks south of me on Elmont Road…those are two Maple trees side by side in the front yard, one in full bloom and the other hasn`t made it`s mind up yet….below is a beautiful Maple in the front yard of a friend of mine….on the other side of town on Vine Street….

…and this next Maple tree is amazingly enough…located on Maple Street in my town…gee, imagine that. 🙂

…these Maples form the eastern border for our Sunny Jim Bottomley City Park, a few blocks northeast of me….

 

 

Dillard Mill Oct 2018

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Onyx and I were returning from rockhunting on October 28th, so we stopped off to photograph Dillard Mill cloaked in fall colors…not the best color I have seen there, but not bad either…

…even for late in the day, there was sure some good water reflections. 🙂 the creek in the photo below is one we cross all the time on Hwy 49. 

Greenbriar Hills Color

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I started working at Greenbriar Hills Country Club back in March of 2018 as a seasonal job on the turf crew there…really enjoyed it, my bosses all like rocks in some fashion, and are nice to work for too. Starting in September, I asked my big boss if I could take my camera with me and shoot sunrises when it looked like we were gonna have a pretty one and he was okay with that…and asked him about shooting fall color while working and he was good with that too. So on the morning of Sept 6th, as I was driving back from mowing Green # 2, I stopped on the bridge over the UP railroad tracks and shot this stunning cotton-candy sunrise….

 

…and again from 4 Fairway as well….

…and a few min later, I shot Green 7 as well as the lakes and fountain in one of the lakes, looking to the west…

I was on my way up to mow number 9 and 10 greens, as I drove down the cartpath by 9 Fairway, I looked back over my shoulder and liked the looks of the sun`s morning rays coming down thru the trees behind me….

A few mornings later, I was mowing 5 Green and spotted these pretty clouds up over the hillside east of me….

…and it bloomed into this beautiful cloud filled sky soon after….

A few weeks later, I was on my way back from mowing the Putter Green and as I approached the Driving Range, I spotted these pretty clouds in the eastern skies…I`ll post the lighter version so you can see some of the driving range as well as the darker version to get a truer sense of the cloud colors….

…a few minutes later, it morphed into this on my arrival at 5 Green….

After finishing up 5 Green, I headed west on the cartpath and from the Halfway House, looking across the lake, past 7 Green and uphill, I could see the beginnings of some fall color in the Maples on the hill above finally….

and in the Maples of subdivision homes to the north of the golf course, as seen from the hilltop teebox of number 12…

I was told that a retired NY Giants Baseball Player lives in the white colonial style house top middle of the photo. About an hour later, on my way to mow 14 Green, I spotted the pretty white Egret that has been hanging around our lakes, does a lot of fishing there….this time he was over on the west side of the lake under the pretty fir trees….

A few mornings later, I looked up from mowing 2 Green and spotted these pretty fluffy and deep orange clouds coming up over the treeline back to the west…..

…and a little lighter here….

A week later, we were finally starting to see the fall colors creep on into the trees around the course…we had some early cool temps, then it got hot again and kind of stalled things a bit, confused not only the trees but many of us as well…so we wound up having a rather colorful fall season,albeit a late one. One day late in the morning, I was mowing around the teeboxes, and was up on the hill near 12 when I spotted alot of beautiful color, so I took a quick photo of the color around the box….

…there are a lot of trees besides maples, planted up on the hill, that really sport some nice fall colors, and the cartpaths wind their way thru this canopy of color quite well, makes for an enjoyable day let me tell ya….

We were seeing a lot of deer once again, they were very active back in the springtime and of course in the fall you deal with the rut and they become super hyper-active, which can create a lot of extra work for us in maintaining the golf course. I didn`t seem to have my camera with me during some interesting sightings of the bucks…there were some big ones down there every morning…and we had a couple of does that had several fawns as well…we saw the triplets nearly every morning somewhere near the Clubhouse and on the other side of the course were two fawns with their momma. On my way home one afternoon, I had a fawn and doe cross the road in front of me and when momma stopped in the yard across the street, I stopped and photographed her through my truck window….

The next day, while I was out mowing greens again…we do that daily….headed down 3 Fairway to 3 Green, I noticed the maples on the hillside near 4 Teebox were coming on with the fall color….

…and after working on 3 Green, I headed to 4 Green, noticing these wild looking fluffy clouds on the way up there…

…thirty minutes later I was headed up to the hill and chose this cartpath up the beautiful canopy of fall colors….

…after finishing up on the hill, I drove down the hill and crossed 12 bridge,  then shot back across the lake, showing the fall color between 8 and 12 Teeboxes….

…and then drove over to 12 Green to mow it….this is the fall color backdrop behind the green, up on the hill in one of the subdivisions there….beautiful backdrops where I work at….

I was on my way up to the Clubhouse later that morning, so I took the street up around the course and discovered alot of fall color in the yards of the homeowners….luckily for me, most of them seem to like Maple trees too….

Five days later, even more color all over the golf course, central was the hillside tho, and from every angle it just looked better and better. I stopped along the cartpath up on 13 Fairway….

….to shoot 4 Teebox and the hillside of color behind it…one of my co-workers was on his way somewhere in a cart….

Later that afternoon, up on the hill, it was pretty too….

The next day was the last week of color for us, but also the week of the very best color too…it started raining and many of the leaves came off in the ensuing days…this was a little wet weather waterfall I spotted near 4 Teebox….

…the shortcut path up the big hill….

…and a beautiful tree/shrub next to 9 Fairway cartpath…..

…one of our trees in 6 Fairway was a late season stunner….

…shot that from the cartpath along 13 Fairway…which I think looks great either direction….

…and this little Maple beauty is a great fall color anchor at the entrance to the Driving Range…

A week later I started my fall vacation in Arkansas and while down there freezing my butt off, during the coldest fall season in southern Arkansas that I can remember, there were two small snowstorms in Missouri that ended my season at Greenbriar. It was nice while it lasted tho and I sure enjoyed it, made alot of new friends there…Nate one of my supervisors, is planning to go rockhunting with me this winter season if we get some good weather and he gets some free time to go. 🙂