Written By Kenneth Kinder

Even though I have been retired for a few years, I still receive our local labor bulletin along with the monthly international journal for electrical workers (both working and retired). These two items keep me somewhat abreast of the current events of the work market, and the activities involving a lot of my old comrades. In the local bulletin we are informed about our local work market, brothers health, social functions, deaths, retirements etc. The international journal does the same thing only on an international basis. My reason for bringing this subject to print is that by these means I can keep track of a lot of people I have worked with on the many jobs that employed a large group of traveling members.

The last several years that I had to travel in order to find employment, I would try to carpool in order to save money, energy, and have company on the long commutes that were usually required. Sometimes these carpools involved several people, and sometimes only two. Richard B. Moore and myself. R. B. as I called him was seven years younger than me, about half my size, and a bachelor. He was a quiet person and on a lot of occasions looked rather disheveled, but he was one of the kindest most gentle down to earth individuals I have ever met. He came from a family of four, one brother and two sisters. His brother and one of his sisters did well in marriage and family; but he had one sister that had a bad marriage and found it difficult to raise her three children as a single parent.

So uncle Richard stepped in and furnished the needed support that was required. He was there for their holidays, school activities, graduations, to counsel when a male figure was required, and give his nieces hand in marriage. He was also Santa, the Easter Bunny and all the other financial figures that are involved in raising a family. Not only was he there for his sisters family but he helped his stepmother out when his father required attention. His dad remarried after his mothers death and after a few short years he then died. R.B. didn’t know his stepmother all that well but he then became her caregiver. I am stating all this to give you a little background as to why I always searched him out when I needed someone with whom to share rides, jobs, or company. He was the one that bought up all the family farm land to keep a link with their history. He would try to work the land along with being an electrician, and this was accomplished while we had Aero-jet, Rancho Seco nuclear powerplant, Mather and Mc Clellan AFB. under construction. Because of these jobs he could work the shifts that allowed him the opportunity to work and irrigate his farms. This eventually became to much to handle, so he would then lease out the property rather than sell.

Life was pretty simple for RB as his main requirements were a new Ford pick-up every few years, a good hound for bear hunting, a good pipe and tobacco, and a friend with whom to share his stories. When I first met RB and he told me about his hounds, “I ask him what kind of hunting he did? He said you know a bunch of us get together, don our red jackets and black derby’s, mount our steeds and holler Tally-Ho to the fox.” I just about split my britches in laughter when he said this as he would be the most unlikely person in the world to fit into this lifestyle. He then told me that he loved to hunt bear. He didn’t especially care to kill the bear but on most occasions it was required in order to keep the hounds hunting.

I know this is going to offend some of my friends but he also explained how he would train his hounds to hunt was by using cats as their first hunting object. His aunt had a bunch of cats on her farm in Woodland and he would sacrifice a few of them to get them started hunting. I don’t think his aunt ever wised up to the disappearance of her cats. I know that he ordered his hounds from some where back East. Either Tennessee, or one of the Carolinas. He paid several hundred a piece for his hounds. I can’t recall if they were walkers, plot hounds or exactly what breed they were. I do remember that he measured out their food and drink. He said this was to keep them lean and mean and eager to hunt. When they got on the trail of bear, they would track for day’s if necessary. When they surrounded, or treed a bear that was when they would start baying the most god awful racket you ever heard. In order to not kill every bear they cornered, he would sometimes throw an old bear hide and some meat for them to chew and celebrate their conquest. If they didn’t get this reward he said they would soon stop hunting.

On a few occasions he might lose one of his hounds. To solve this problem he would leave food and water at the location they started the hunt. “He said normally they would eventually return to this location and wait for him to return and retrieve them.” One time he was hunting up in the north-east part of the state in the mountains out of Burney,Ca. He lost his favorite hound ( Spring Mountain Betty), and he just couldn’t stay and search for her any longer. He came back to Sacramento to work but he ran an advertisement in the Redding newspaper offering a reward for the return of his prize hound. Almost a month went by when he received an answer to his advertisement. This elderly lady called him , and described his dog to a fair-thee-well. When he responded in the affirmative. She started chewing him out like he had never been chewed before.

It wasn’t that she chewed his butt out as much as she chewed around and let it fall out. She started telling him that he had mistreated his hound by starving it. “She said that when she found her, her ribs were showing through her sides and she was as skinny as she could be.” Poor old R.B., when he showed up to retrieve his hound, he said “he hardly recognized her,” as this well intentioned lady had fattened her up to the point she could hardly walk, let alone hunt. He tried to give her a reward but she would have nothing to do with that. “She said that if he promised to feed her, that would be reward enough.” He didn’t have the heart to tell her if he hunted her in the shape she had gotten her that she would I believe he called it turn her stomach in-side-out. If this happens your hound is done for.

So he took Betty home, put her on a diet, and got her back in fighting trim once more. At various times he also will own a jeep and this is his choice of vehicles when he goes into the wilderness to hunt. He was telling me about the time he had been back in the woods for several days, and he decided it was time to come to town, restock his supplies, get a shower, and sleep in a bed. After he registered and went into his room, leaving his pack of hounds tied to the back of his Jeep, he had no more than gotten into the shower that his pack started howling. They made such a commotion that the manager started pounding on the door for him to quiet this pack of outlaws. The end result was he had to let the whole bunch share his motel room. Can’t you imagine what that smelled like? R.B. no longer has his hounds, and he confines his hunting to looking for pretty rocks while out riding around in his Jeep.

My son Matthew once said to me, "that the electricians were an elite group of tradesmen.” Meaning that he had never seen me with low class individuals. I told him, and I think he later realized “that all trades, and occupations in life have a variety of individuals. From the low class to the type that you are proud to call friend. You might have to work with all types; but you don’t have to associate with them. I choose my friends slowly, and try to keep them for a lifetime, and that is the reason he never saw low class around our house.”

R.B. was the type of person that seldom spoke ill of any-one and he would pretty much blend into the crowd. But he was a man that kept his word, did his job, and could be counted on when you needed help. I guess you can’t ask for much more than that. I spent a lot of happy hours in his company on the road, on the job, at the union hall, or just enjoying a cup of coffee. About all there is left to say is, R.B. lets don our red jackets and black derby’s, mount our steeds and holler Tally-Ho to the fox cause they don’t make them much better than you.

Ken.

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