Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 First of all, thanks to
a_magumba for supporting my last post even though so few people read it, haha
As promised, here is part 2 of my trip to the deep south. I woke up in Asheville, tired after nearly 2 days straight of walking around in heat. Needless to say, we didn't leave the inn for a little bit. The room was kind of cold from air conditioning, but the moment I stepped outside, I couldn't have gotten into that car soon enough. Why did I even bring a hoodie again? Does it even get cold in the south?
The plan for the day was an hour or two at Lake Winnepesaukah, then hitting up the five alpine coasters in Pigeon Forge/Gatlinburg. We must have arrived at Lake Winnepesaukah around 12:30 PM. I didn't really know what to expect from this park, and I still don't really know what I think of it. We parked in what I guess was a parking lot, but it was pretty much just a bunch of scattered gravel. It had just rained on our drive there, so it was kind of wet. We walked to the entrance gate, which felt super casual and old school, then bought hand stamps and proceeded inward.
The park was very, very odd to me. I've never experience anything old school like this before. It was just... surreal. The flats were very classic, like I've only seen in pictures, they were unthemed with carnival-style casual entrances lacking a queue, and scattered around the main entrance area. I kept walking towards the back, bewildered, and eventually found this weird ass dark ride named Wacky Factory on my left. So we went and began the day with that.
Wacky Factory (1 time) Huh. This was... this was a weird ride. The cars pushed open all the doors themselves, which made sense, but was still really weird to me. All the rooms after that consisted of flashy lights, mirrors, and eventually, some giant bus thing that honked at us. I remember one really low clearance tunnel that I feel like could have offed the head of someone seven feet tall easily.
I really have no idea what I think of this ride. It was strange. Very strange. I'm just not used to old school stuff like this, so I don't feel right reviewing it. But from my perspective, it felt kind of lazy and poorly made. Again, I need to give it another chance some day.
Following that, we walked further down and found the main attraction, right across from that closed wild mouse.
Cannon Ball (Credit #74, Ranking #47, 1 time) This ride was so short, but it was pretty good. I'm not going to lie, I prefer GASM at SFOG, but it was still really fun. Plus, my first ever exposure to buzz bars. And yes, I did hear the buzz sound. The airtime was fun, the ride was smooth (much, much smoother than GASM), and had a nice layout and paint job. I enjoyed it- not my favorite wooden coaster, obviously, but it was very enjoyable, and is easily subject to rising in my rankings.
Sky Ride (1 time) I was weirded out by this sky ride for sure. I expected to get off it on the other side, only to be surprised that they cheaped out and went with only one station. Instead it awkwardly went towards the ground across the lake, then turned around. They were also spacing each car one apart- I guess to put less stress on the ride system, since the park was pretty empty that day.
This ride was great. It gave such an awesome view of the park, as well as the lake below. I could see plenty of enormous fish swimming in the lake, could see the lake stretching off in the distance, paddle boaters beneath me, Boat Chute off in the distance, and just about everything I needed to. I much prefer the feeling of the ski lift style to the full-on enclosed gondola. Here's to hoping they won't murder this one too, because I loved it. I just wish there was another station at the other end- the ride back felt repetitive.
Antique Cars (1 time) ... I have no idea why I rode this. Honestly, I don't know why I rode this. I guess I just wanted to say I rode an antique cars ride? The line was kind of long, the operations were slow, and there weren't enough cars on the track. Eventually I drove it around and... I guess there's not much to say. It was just a cars ride around a grassy lawn, with the occasional rock or statue somewhere. It was kind of cool, but it wasn't really amazing. Again, not sure what compelled me to do this.
Wacky Worm (Credit #75, Ranking #92, 1 time) But then I did my first ever wacky worm credit. My dad and I were the only people riding this thing. We actually got some pretty intense laterals going around that final turn, not going to lie. The ride was pretty much how I expected- a goofy little transportable coaster. But hey, you know what they say: a credit's a credit. So don't you forget it.
The Boat Chute (1 time) Whoa, what a weird ride. I just recently learned it's almost 100 years old, which is really impressive. I didn't know anything about this ride, so I was hoping it wouldn't just be a simple lift hill and drop like half of the boat rides in the world. Instead, we dove deep into this dark tunnel. For about three minutes. Actually, probably more. Most definitely more. It just kept going. It was quiet, warm, dark, and peaceful in there. I rather liked it- though the little cracks of light were unfortunate. Of course, eventually that abyss ended and we climbed up a real clankity lift hill. I love noisy old-fashioned lift hills, so this was a very pleasant surprise.
After landing from the (somewhat decent) drop, we got a spray that just kept going. And as in just kept going, I mean that it began raining right after the ride ended. And once we got under the roof at the loading dock, it turned into an absolute downpour. We decided to book it to Matterhorn after a while, since it was just a couple dozen feet away and under an umbrella, while the rain continued obliterating the dry ground.
Matterhorn (1 time) This was the first time I've ever done this model of flat ride. I did it while it was raining outside, so every now and then I got a nice little spray from the air. I think this ride might have pushed my dad a little with its spinning. He didn't look entirely thrilled by it. I, on the other hand, loved it. Well, maybe he did too, but hell knows. It was just plain fun, and the swinging cars made it even better. It must have been pretty close to banking 90 degrees through those turns at points.
After Matterhorn, I didn't really feel like doing much more, and I wanted time for alpine coasters. The rain calmed down, I stuck my hand in a clown trash can for a photo from my dad, and then we headed back out to the car as the skies began to clear. Again, I don't really know what my opinions on this park were. I know one thing that made it worse for me was that all the operators were dead inside. Entirely dead inside. Extremely unprofessional too- sitting on fences, talking on phones, chewing gum- and again, being totally dead inside. That was by far the worst part of the experience.
Almost instantly we entered Tennessee. I guess parks really have a thing for erecting themselves on the borders of states for some reason. We drove east to Pigeon Forge- well, more like my dad drove as I listened to some random Green Day or blink-182 album and tried to sleep. After an hour or two of driving, we arrived in Pigeon Forge. Before even reaching the main road, there it was on my right. Goats on the Roof.
Goats on the Roof (Credit #76, Ranking #3, 2 times) Yes, you read that right. Yes, I consider this to be a credit. It's my list, not yours, so just calm down. I rode it and felt like it was worthy of being called a roller coaster, as well as a credit.
Butterflies can eat my ass though That being said, they are undeniably different from normal roller coasters, and I found the experience near impossible to compare to other coasters. So I decided to rank them on their own, separately. Calm down, it's not my fourth favorite coaster of all time. Just my fourth favorite of the alpine coasters I've ridden.
It was still hot in Pigeon Forge. What a shocker. Humid too, but not nearly as noticeably so. We paid for our ride, then lined up in the short queue and hopped right onto the little Wiegand car.
This was my first ever alpine coaster. Well, second, after Matterhorn Bobsleds ;) After riding this, I could officially say that I am an alpine coaster sucker. The lift hill being long wasn't a problem at all. It was so fun to look around. I hated that holding down the brakes put you in an uncomfortable position, but it was acceptable. Needless to say, I didn't pull the brakes once until the end. The ride was trimmed a lot though, so it wasn't full speed. I didn't see the camera coming, so in my photo, I was turned around as I admired the scenery- I found The Island at Pigeon Forge, but didn't see Dollywood. I kept looking for it everywhere.
After riding it, my dad and I paid for the cheaper second ride and did it again. I would have ridden it all day if it weren't for the fact that the other four existed. So off we went. And just around the corner we hit our second target.
Smoky Mountain Alpine Coaster (Credit #77, Ranking #1, 2 times) This was definitely my favorite. Not only was it really long, but... the lift hill. Holy crap, what a lift hill. It was just silent- dead silent. I slowly crept up the cable, hearing the occasional
clunk below the wheels, but other than that, I was just surrounded by trees everywhere. I heard so many sounds from wildlife, and it smelled gorgeous. That lift hill could have gone even slower than it already was and I wouldn't have cared.
This ride also seemed to be trimmed, but it was really long, and most of it was hidden inside the trees. At one point we went by an ugly construction site, but hey, construction is necessary for beautification. So that's alright.
This ride actually had a longer line, and we came back later at night to ride it again to a line of similar length. At night, this thing was amazing. It's too bad the lights were so ugly- there were a lot of them, but they kept flashing bright barfy unrelated colors out of unison, which bothered me. I would have preferred it was mostly static, which some of it was- that or it was lit up bright white or blue. But I swear, at night, this thing must have been untrimmed. It hauled like crazy. There was nothing in this world like it. I wish I could have done it forever.
Jurassic Jungle Boat (1 time) Flashing back to the daytime, while I was in line,
Guy_With_A_Stick told me to go on Jurassic Jungle Boat- something I didn't even know existed until then. We found it just across from The Island, completely open to the air. The facade was actually pretty nice looking. I liked the weird statues of explorers standing near the entrance, though I did mistake them for people in line at least a couple times. My dad and I paid, got on the boat, and took off.
Well, "took off" is the wrong phrase for sure. This thing was slow as hell. The theming was nice, and the ride was longer than I expected, but it was so goddamn slow. Absolutely painfully so. Not to mention that it was really rough and I'm 90% sure this thing wasn't even a boat. It kept grinding along the ground uncomfortably through the whole ride. Did I mention that this thing was slow? Because it was. And it stopped all the time too, for a long amount of time. I have no idea why.
There was one point where a dino spit water on my neck, right at me, and I didn't see it coming. I loved the T-rex walking on hot cinders, and the animatronics at the very end. The finale where you get pushed up on a tilt track would have been so much cooler if the whole ride wasn't so slow that any action was exciting for simply being anything other than nothing.
Not going to lie, as nice as it looked, this isn't something I'd pay to ride again. If they get actual boats, or speed up the ride system, I'd come back. But as it is, this is just not an attraction worthy of revisiting.
We continued our scheduled programming down that main street of Pigeon Forge. Good God was this place tacky. It felt like Las Vegas without the gambling, and without the charm (which they don't really exactly have in the first place). Everything was brightly colored, there were very few trees, and it felt like everything was either mini golf or go-karts. Or those weird ass flat rides that look like they're trying to murder you. You know, one of the dozens.
Luckily, we escaped this hellhole into the mountains of Gatlinburg. Wow, what a gorgeous place. It was misting lightly when I arrived at my next attraction, so the rails were wet.
Gatlinburg Mountain Coaster (Credit #78, Ranking #2, 1 time) This thing was very similar to Smoky Mountain. The lift hill was also enclosed in the forest, quiet and gorgeous. Not as nice, but still nice. The trees were much closer as well. This was the first alpine coaster I rode that I truly felt was untrimmed. It was absolutely insane and off the rails (but not literally). Great laterals, great speed, and great length. Above all, great scenery. Gatlinburg is absolutely gorgeous.
I would have ridden this again at night... but you'll see later that things didn't exactly go my way.
Rowdy Bear Mountain Coaster (Credit #79, Ranking #5, 1 time) This was my least favorite of the alpine coasters simply because it felt much more ordinary. While the other ones all had their little quirks and specialties, this one felt pretty dull. It was really short, too. I honestly can't remember too much from this one- I know I took my phone out and took some photos on the lift hill (shhh don't tell), and that when it ended we were right next to some hotel or apartment complex across a small river. Some guy on the balcony was waving at us as he sat and observed.
We then went upstairs, as there was an alpine glider up there, and did that.
Rowdy Bear Alpine Glider (1 time) This was much more expensive than the alpine coaster, and I wouldn't say it was really worth it. I liked how free the restraint system was- felt more like a zipline to me, but with a metal rail and a lift hill. So off I went up the short lift hill. The ride's turns disappointed me, as they felt like an Arrow suspended coaster crawling through heavily overbanked helices. It swayed, rather than keeping me flying out. At one point I took my right hand off the bar to wave at the camera, despite them telling me not to. That was stupid. I hit some kind of trims on the rails with my hand, then swung side to side uncontrollably as I tried to grasp for the handlebar again. So don't do that.
The ride just wasn't that great. It seemed like it had a lot of potential, but I just didn't enjoy it for some reason. I know it's a prototype, and that might be why it was so small, but I wish they had done more with it. Or maybe cut out the second dueling track and make the original one longer.
From there, we continued onto the last alpine coaster... and what a trip that was.
Ober Gatlinburg Ski Mountain Coaster (Credit #80, Ranking #4, 1 time) Had I known how hard and costly it would be to obtain this stupid credit, I don't think I would have followed through with it.
The first thing we struggled with was finding parking. It cost money to park in the lot, but we did it anyway. On the way out we found this little tiny turtle dude trying to commit suicide as it walked away from a river and towards a street. We and a few other strangers set it back to its home, then we continued on towards the tram.
Agh... the tram. The tram took forever to arrive, and it of course cost money to take to this little place up there called "Ober Gatlinburg". The views were great, and it was a truly unique experience. Also, the guy we had narrating for both the trip up and back was hilarious. The ride took forever.
Eventually we reached the top. I intended to do the alpine slide as well, but it was closed, so I just did the coaster. Which was... it was rough. Very much so. It wasn't built by Wiegand, so I much preferred the seating arrangement; you didn't have to put yourself in an uncomfortable position to keep the handles down. The ride felt lonely where it was in the corner and in the trees, but at least it was untrimmed and it had actual airtime, somehow. My only problems with it were the roughness and the lonely feeling of where it was, though it could just be that we rode it at sunset.
My dad and I got some water and the carameliest caramel corn we've ever had and went back down the mountain. At the bottom we found this pizza place just across the street called Big Daddy's Pizza. My dad chose an outside table, from which we were facing towards our parking lot.
While we were waiting, we saw a little flicker out of the corner of our eyes. And as the sun set, dozens upon dozens of lightning bugs came to life, lighting up the ground in the distance. It was the first time I've ever seen one, and it was wonderful.
Then, lighting up the sky in the distance, was a big ass flash of lightning over the hill we just came down. That was not the first time I've ever seen that bitch. I said that if it happened again and I heard thunder, I was going in. Our food arrived, and I was on edge for the next minute until another flash happened, much closer this time (about 1-2 miles away), and I got up, losing control of my body
yet again (a feeling that, being an intense astraphobe, I am far too familiar with) and said "Okay I'm going inside," ditching my dad.
We ate inside, and after we were done, I stepped back outside to find it pitch black and pouring rain. Some dude was leaning up against the wall in front of us and muttered, "Don't like the weather, wait five minutes." I asked if he'd seen any lightning and he said no. And a little after that an enormous flash lit up the sky as lightning struck less than a mile away. So I basically chickened out and had my dad go get the car, a couple blocks away, and drive it to the restaurant. I waited a bit inside, building up confidence, and then sprinted out into the car. I scraped my arm against a railing while doing so. I am staring at that scar while I type this. A battle wound indeed.
I don't remember any lightning after that, but Gatlinburg Mountain Coaster was obviously off the table. We drove back towards Pigeon Forge, where the rain had stopped entirely and the skies were clear. Since it was around 10:40, we took the last twenty minutes to hit up Smoky Mountain at night.
After that, we went to this place called Mad Dog's Creamery, where my shameful cone-eating skills were put to the test. And finally, around midnight, we got to the hotel and slumped down into our beds. In the morning awaited what was hyped up to be possibly the greatest park of all time...
And in the morning right now awaits more of my crappy side job. So I'm going to go hit the hay now, but hopefully repeat this pattern and post part 3 tomorrow. For anyone who made it through all of this, thank you for reading. I really do appreciate it. There's still two more parts to go, so I'd be glad to know someone's reading, ha ha. Even if no one did, I'd write 'em anyway. ;) Gnight.
TL;DR: As if.
submitted by If candles had been on a cake, it would have taken quite a “huff and puff” to have blown them out. A few months back Dad (L.C. Coon) celebrated his 88thbirthday. Some parents deserve the honor the Bible instructs children give. Lanehart Calvin (thankfully branded L.C.) and Faye Coon do. A bit back, my blog was
Five Things I Learned from Opal Faye Frazier Coon (Mom). Thanks for reading these somewhat longer ruminations.
The School of Family📷
Lessons thoroughly learned are those coming from constantly being in a particular environment. It is the reason business people and missionaries enter an “Immersion Program” for language study. For good or bad, family life is an “immersion program.” Parents’ approach to life shapes a youngsters future.
Rodney and I were immersed in a family marked by consistency, integrity and the unspoken practice of “the Golden Rule.” It was not perfect. There is no perfect family. After reading about Abram and his descendants, our family was not remotely as dysfunctional as that bunch.
Back to Dad! L.C. Coon is a quality amalgamation: responsible, committed, progressive, caring, interested, interesting, a life-long learner, self-educated and trustworthy. Other positive adjectives and adverbs could be on the list. The arriving generation would do well to consider Dad as a model. His approach has worked.
Be Quietly Influential
📷Time stoops all shoulders. A few years back, Dad stood 6’ tall. These days, he is a bit shorter. In most areas of life, Dad will always stand considerably taller than 6’. Seldom do I visit, without at least one man much younger than me expressing how Dad has influenced him.
We don’t give such validation to men who are inconsistent. As was true of Mom, I could write more about Dad than you’d read. However, do indulge me. It may be worth it. We were immersed in several things by the daily experience of living at the home of L.C. and Faye Coon.
Work Hard and Work Smart
When he was 80, Dad would still have been able to work me to exhaustion. In his world, work is what men do. In his mid-teens Dad cut timber. He is familiar with the life of a share-cropper. Dad’s early morning📷 departure to drive 30 miles to work as a roustabout for H.L. Hunt Oil Company was the norm of my childhood. Oilfield work is hard now. It was much harder then.
Dad wanted his family to progress. so he always had a second job or entrepreneurial enterprise. A quick list of ways he added to the family finances included growing red-worms and night crawlers, (Yes, in the 1960s, fishermen would stop by the house. Mom, or on the rare occasion I; would go to the “worm shed” to count out 50 or 100 worms.) Other endeavors: accounting for small businesses, completing Tax Returns, reading water meters, delivering live bait and fishing tackle across South Louisiana, owning a country store and after “retirement” from H.L. Hunt his own oilfield service company and owning multiple self-storage businesses. I missed some. Dad didn’t waste time. In the areas of his expertise and interest, Dad not only worked hard; he worked smart. He knew how to do things quickly.
Total Commitment to Jesus and a Local Church
Around 19, Dad was “born again” as instructed in John 3:5; carried out by following the instructions in Acts 2:38. He became part of a Pentecostal group who are radically monotheistic. To learn more about the beliefs and the Pentecostal experience Dad had send me a note. You might discover that you’d like to experience something similar for yourself. Influences on Dad’s conversion include heralded names, Evangelist W.E. Gambling and Ruth Caughron.
Shady Grove is a rural church in Louisiana’s LaSalle Parish. At Dad’s conversion, Shady Grove was one of the strongest Pentecostal churches in all Louisiana. Again, iconic people shaped him from a convert into a committed disciple. A.L. Clanton pastored Shady Grove immediately before becoming Editor in Chief for the United Pentecostal Church. Pastors Clanton, O.R. Fauss, and T.C. Bonnette among others put something into Dad. Without exaggeration, Dad has held every “job” in a church other than Ladies Ministry Director.
For decades he served as Shady Grove’s church secretary/treasurer. Most Sundays Dad spent several hours preparing church deposits and recording contributions. We were part of late night prayer shifts, barbecues to raise money for
Sheaves for Christ and going to Jonesville to construct a church building for Church Planter Ben Deville. Dad has a Bible-based view. Decisions were screened through Bible truth. It seems the best way to do life.
Appreciation of the Bible
Dad has read through the Bible dozens of times. This year, he is reading it yet again. By November of a given year, he has likely completed the reading for that year. He has already started again.
He has heard thousands of sermons and Bible Studies. If Dad tells me, “That man is one of the best preachers I’ve ever heard,” the preacher received quite a compliment. Notes from things he has heard preached📷 are distinctively written in Dad’s Bible. Of course, I do suppose the only way to have a Biblical worldview is to know quite a bit about what the Bible says. Dad knows a lot. By observation and application, I gained an appreciation of the Bible.
Do What They Say Can’t Be Done
Dad was not a gambler, but he was willing to take meaningful measurable risks. In the early ’70s, my parents bought a country store. Their banker said, “Don’t do it. It is too great of a risk.” Dad and Mom had already counted the cost and calculated how it could work. They bought the store, rebranded it L.C.’s Grocery and paid it off in a few years.
He didn’t just tackle difficult things for our family’s benefit. In the 1960s, every home in the communities of Sharptown and Nebo depended on a well or cistern. Wells depend on the water-table. Cisterns depend on rainwater. Neither source is assured. Neither source is guaranteed to be usable. Before my teens, Dad and other community leaders pursued grant funds for a water system equalling that in any city. Of course, where it can be 1/2 mile or more between houses, it takes a lot of expensive piping.
A rural water system is expensive. Also, naysayers in the community were active in their opposition. Some thought, the water was going to be too expensive. Others imagined a
government water system would give the federal government more control over their life or that the water might contain some unhealthy additive. (For this to make any sense, you have to understand how we southern country folk are a bit skeptical of new things. So it was and in many ways still is.) Dad and the others were undeterred. He visited home after home making the sales pitch to get home-owners to sign up.
A minimum number of participants was required to receive the grant. As the deadline neared to have an adequate number of participants the applicants lacked a few. Dad revisited those who had rejected his prior presentation. The group found enough participants, got the grant money and made it happen. If they said it couldn’t be done – Dad seemed to see that as a challenge. Without arrogance and with no bragging about it later – he just got it done.
Retirement is for Someone Else
During the oil crisis of the 1980s oil producers reduced staff. H.L. Hunt Oil offered early retirement. Dad took it. Within weeks Dad had established his own one-man company doing the same work he’d done for Hunt. Dad knows everything there is to know about the production side of getting oil out of the ground. He never lacked for clients.
In a decade or so, Dad retired again. It didn’t last. A small self-storage facility in Midway (a suburb of Jena) came on the market. It was Jena’s only self-storage. Dad and Mom bought it, cleaned it up, expanded it and ran it until it was time to retire.
Retirement didn’t last! In a few years Dad built a similar facility on the other side of town. In 2017, when Dad was 87 they sold their business and retired. Maybe? We will see if this one holds! Type A personalities are never ready to retire. Dad must be a “type A.” That trait certainly came to Rodney and me. I’m not able to envision spending four days of each week fishing or on a golf course. Work is enjoyable, particularly if what you do makes a difference and adds value.
Present Yourself Well
Dad has always been elegant. He and mom are an attractive couple. Dad has stood tall and has a ready smile. His head-full of silver hair is impossible to miss. Some men slouch their way through life. Not Dad. Even now, with the impact of years, if the situation calls for it the will is there. His shoulders go back in the posture that has defined him for a lifetime. Pastor Jerry Dean and Evangelist Tim Mahoney, among others, have mentioned how elegant Dad presents himself.
Until recently, Dad’s attendance Sunday church services were coat and tie events. You didn’t wear your gardening clothes to church! It was ingrained, look your best, even on a budget. I’ve not pulled off the look as well as Dad and my smile is a great deal slower to arrive. Would that my smile were more like Dad’s.
Make Time for People
Dad’s cliché to describe a talkative person is, “He can talk the horns off a 📷brass billy goat!” Some days the phrase could likely be applied to Dad. L. C. Coon can get a conversation going with anyone about anywhere. In part, Dad’s quiet influence has come as a result of his willingness to listen. It wasn’t a pretense. Dad was genuinely interested in people and their story.
With his getting into such conversations we listened in on some tall tales. In the late ‘60s we stopped at a small tourist shop in Maggie Valley, NC. An old fellow ran the place. He had all the mannerisms of a true hillbilly. Dad got him started in a conversation. In short order, we learned that Maggie Valley was named after his long-dead wife Maggie. Of course, he’d needed to have been 150 years old for that to actually have been true. The problem was with this particular teller of tall tales was that when he started you couldn’t get him to stop. Dad is too considerate to walk away with anyone still talking. Finally, the rest of us went to the car. It took Dad forever to find a breaking point.
It was not just casual talk either. For decades many people who had no other person they could trust brought their story to Dad. He listened, if possible he gave advice. Often, he would listen to the same story again later. Confidences were not divulged. He was a patient listener who cared about the person talking. I’m not always as patient as Dad.
Family Vacations Matter
Some of the money from Dad’s second job was spent on an annual vacation. We aren’t sure how the idea of vacation became part of our family culture. In those years, a significant percentage of that population never left Lasalle Parish. My grandparents were not given to travel. However, the ambition to travel came. I’m glad it did.
Don’t misunderstand about “family vacation.” We did not travel to Hawaii, New York, or Fiji. The money available didn’t take us far but it was fun. For 5-7 days we headed to places like:
- Gatlinburg and the Smokey Mountain National Park. Did anybody else stay at the Wilson Motel in Gatlinburg?
- Biloxi was a destination if money was tight. Another year it was Destin, Florida before Destin was much of anything.
- Hot Springs and being entertained by the auction houses for free along the main drag or paying a bit to see a chicken play the piano.
- Branson, Missouri became a preferred spot. The Baldknobbers, The Presley Family, Foggy River Boys, Shepherd of the Hills, Silver Dollar City, the Corn-Crib Theatre, and the Family Fun Spot offered enough to bring us back. Did anybody else stay at the Jesse James Motel or the Silver Slipper? How about breakfast at Little Pete’s?
Those vacation trips were when our family spent the most time together. Norma and I applied the “family vacation matters” principle to our own life.
Criticism is a Waste Breath!
I’ve seldom heard Dad be critical of anyone. As a child, I never heard him speak ill of a pastor or any person in the church at Shady Grove. To do such a thing would affect how Rodney and I viewed that person. The decision to seldom criticize is wise!
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There are some areas where I’m my father’s son. In most ways, Dad will be the best of the “Coon Crowd,” which includes several preachers, authors, educators, and entrepreneurs. There will be no day when it is not an honor to say, “L.C. Coon is my dad.” My sons are grateful for the times they spent with Dad in the oilfield or just hanging around their place in Sharptown. Even now, our “holy children” – Kaden, Wyatt, and Elsie revel in Dad, “Grandpa” to them, getting down in the floor to play.
What a ride it has been! I’m thankful the ride continues.
Unfortunately, the lessons I learned have not always been applied. Yet, I’m fortunate to have been immersed in the family of L.C. & Faye Coon.
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