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The Night Watchman, by Jim Sears My Dad's Rare Aft Deck Yellow Jacket, by Steve Hendricks My Yellow Jacket Story, by Jack L. Sims My Grandfather's '57 Catalina, by Colby Choate Assorted Memories of Uncle Mac, by Pic Cyr My Dad's '57 Yellow Jacket Riviera, by Sam Lievsay Lunch with the French Street Gang, By David Kanally Roy Rogers and his '57 Skyliner, by Lawrence Matthews Growing up in Denison, by Mary Lee Conatser Miller Finis Terrell and Leadership by Example, by Bob Terrell George Wesley Theakston, by Elaine Theakston and Valerie Marr by Jim Sears William J. Sears was born east of Denison, across the Red River in Kemp, Oklahoma in 1923. He lived there until he joined the Navy in WWII. He was one of several Kempites (Kempians?) to go to the Texas Panhandle after the war to look for work. He found it at Phillips Petroleum, and I was born in Borger in 1950. My older brother and two older sisters were all born in Kemp.
W.J. Sears clowns with a cigar in the '50s In 1951 our family returned to Bryan County, Oklahoma for a year or two before moving again, this time to a cotton farm near Chillicothe in Hardeman County, Texas. After a couple of years on the farm, my dad got a job with a railroad, and we moved into Quanah, the county seat. We lived there for two years, until he was laid off in the spring of 1957 and had to find work again. I don't know why he decided to look for it in Denison. Perhaps it was because he had family nearby and could stay with them while he searched. At any rate, he got the job at Yellow Jacket Boats, and we moved to Denison in the summer of 1957. He lived there for the rest of his life, as did my mother until she moved to a nursing home in Whitesboro a couple of years ago. It has occurred to me that, had the boat company had no position available at that particular time, my dad might have found work in some other town, and I might have grown up in a place other than Denison -- perhaps even somewhere in Oklahoma. My dad began with the company as a production worker. He moved into the night watchman job shortly after he started, because he had an allergic reaction to the fiberglass. So far as I know, my father had no particular experience that qualified him to be a night watchman, although his father had been a policeman for a few years in the 1940s. Dad carried a revolver at the boat company. I don't know whether it was his personal property or the company's. I don't remember seeing it again after the company folded. I think at least one other watchman worked there, but I don't know any specifics about their schedules.
Dad William, author Jim and brother Richard Sears in the '50s My brother, who was three years older than I, was the first to accompany my dad to work. He may have gone more often than I did. I can't ask him about it now, because he drowned while swimming in the Red River in 1961. I don't remember how many times I went, but I would be surprised if it was more than a half-dozen. Most nights my dad worked there alone. By the way, "there" was not the facility at the end of Yellow Jacket Boat Road. He worked at the newer fiberglass fabricating site on Hwy 69. Back now to my dad and his job. I suspect that nights at the fiberglass works were, for the most part, lonely and uneventful. It was probably his idea to take along me or my brother on occasional weekends to break up the monotony. A small room on the east side of the main building, perhaps a foreman's office, had a radio. My dad spent a lot of time there. He may have listened to the Grand Ole Opry and St. Louis Cardinal baseball broadcasts. I remember seeing a dozen or more Zane Grey and Louis L'Amour novels in our car at one time during those years. When I was in that room with him, I remember that he had to get up and leave every hour to walk around the premises. I don't think he ever came face to face with any prowlers. There was at least one occasion, however, on one of the nights when he was working alone, that he heard noises and found evidence of tampering. Whoever it was must have fled when they heard or saw him coming, thereby avoiding a confrontation. My recollection of the inside of the place has faded over the decades. I vaguely remember boats in various stages of construction. The fiberglass was everywhere, and I was warned to minimize my contact with it to avoid the itching it causes. I'm not sure whether it was the fiberglass, the paints, or other synthetic materials, but the interior of the building had a strong, unpleasant odor. Although I did take my John Deere pedal tractor there once, and I did ride it around inside the building, I usually played outside until after dark. I remember shooting my Daisy air rifle all around the place. My dad sometimes took his .22 rifle and shot at targets he set up on the east side of the buildings. Another activity he engaged in briefly was woodworking. My mother got her first full-time paying job outside the home in December of 1957, when she began her 27-year career at Levi Strauss & Company. Among her first purchases with "her own money" were the Encyclopedia Americana and The Book of Knowledge, which she bought from a door-to-door salesman. My dad saw the plywood scrap pile at work as a source of affordable shelving for his family's new books. Using a band saw and other tools readily available to him, he built a three-shelf mahogany bookcase for the encyclopedia. A smaller unit to house The Book of Knowledge was fashioned from some other plywood, perhaps beech. I assume he obtained permission to build them. They were both projects that took more than a night to complete, with multiple finishing coats, and they would have been visible for anyone to see in the daytime. Apparently someone higher up than the foreman did see them eventually and objected to the moonlight woodworking, because Dad stopped after the two bookcases. I believe the grounds for the objection had more to do with the use of the company's tools than with the taking of the scrap. Or perhaps it was felt that any additional wood shop projects might interfere with his watchman duties. But before he renounced on-the-job carpentry, and maybe before he made the bookshelves, Dad succeeded in building what may have been the only two wooden boats ever to come out of the fiberglass division of the Yellow Jacket Boat Company. They were each just over a foot long, and they were both rowboats. He painted one of them red (for my brother) and the other brown (for me). I don't know what became of the brown one, but we found the red one several years ago in a storage area at Mom's house. The matching red oars had been lost, but the brown ones from my boat were still there. Attached is a photo I took of them at my sister's house in Whitesboro. The boat is in need of some restoration. I don't know the source of the mysterious brown interior stain. You can see two modifications that I attribute to my brother. A screw in the bow was probably for attaching a string to tow the boat in the water. The board tacked to the stern was for mounting a small, battery-powered outboard motor that has long since been lost or discarded.
Author Jim Sears aboard his trusty John Deere in the '50s My sister also has the two bookcases. I don't know whether she kept the books. I sometimes joke that we could sell the cases with the provenance of "furniture stolen from Roy Rogers." The operative word there is "joke." I don't seriously believe that my dad took anything without the knowledge of his employer. He was an honorable man. The photo below is his memorial plaque, presented to the National Museum of the Pacific War in Fredericksburg, Texas and permanently displayed on a wall in their Memorial Garden.
My Dad's Rare Aft Deck Yellow Jacket by Steve Hendricks My father Bob Hendricks, was an attorney from McKinney. We spent many, many weekends on the Islands of Texoma when I was growing up. The story on this boat that I remember was that Yellow Jacket built two of these aft deck boats; one for Roy Rogers and one for Dwight D. Eisenhower.
The one we bought is the one that Roy owned. We owned it from 1956 till about 1960-62 when we traded for a GlassPar boat. We saw it once more at Texoma after we traded it off. by Jack L. Sims My fondest memories of my childhood are with my family at Possum Kingdom Lake, Texas having family fun in our 1956 Yellow Jacket. by Colby Choate
Here I am with my Grandfather, Richard Allen, in 1993 when he gave me the boat. I have a 1957 Yellow Jacket Catalina that my grandfather purchased new. I was given this boat in 1993. This boat has a late 60's Evinrude 55HP motor. My grandfather still has the original Mercury as well. This boat has not been restored and is needing a little attention. The boat has always been kept inside. The boat was in the water last around the mid 70's per my grandfather. I went to the Keels & Wheels show in Seabrook in April of 2011 and saw the restored Yellow Jackets there, and am now inspired to restore mine. The one thing that I would like to do to this boat is keep it the way that my grandfather gave it to me. Mr. Skelly glassed the deck on this boat and raised the height of the transom when the new motor was put on in the late 60's. I know that this will not make it an original boat but it's part of my family's history.
The boat has a thick stack of registration stickers documenting its history.
The Choate Catalina has been well sheltered all its life. Mac McDerby and Roy Rogers drive Yellow Jackets from Denison to New Orleans written by Leonard Melson, in November 1998, submitted by Valerie Dalton
Leonard Melson's story: These are a different view of Roy Rogers, the famous movie star, and singer. I thought you might be interested in Roy Rogers the man and a great guy who loved the outdoors, both as a boater and general outdoorsman (he hunted in several times) as well as always being ready for a boating adventure of any kind.
I was introduced to Roy Rogers when I went to to set up a distributorship for Yellow Jacket Boats. The man who I set up (Cy Breen) had been a cameraman for Republic Studios, which is where he met and became good friends with Roy.
Cy mentioned that Roy was an avid boater and asked if I would be interested in supplying a boat in exchange for using his name to promote Yellow Jacket Boats. I said yes as at that time, Roy Rogers was the best known of the western movie stars, and in fact was one of the best known movie personalities in the world.
As a result of sending him a boat to use in which he won many races, he became interested in the Yellow Jacket Company as an investment, came to Denison, looked at the firm, liked what he saw and purchased a major interest in same.
As a result of this he and Richard (Mac) McDerby started talking about a boat trip from Denison, down the Red River to Shreveport, and from there down the Missippi to New Orleans . This would be a great fun trip and the promotional value for Yellow Jacket Boat would be excellent.
When the Denison Dam was completed in 1944 and ready to be dedicated, in the process of getting maximum coverage, it was noted that the Red River had been used for commercial traffic back in the 1880's and 90's. However due to silting of the channel, there had been no commercial traffic since early 1900's. In addition to flood control and water conservation, it was suggested that with the dam to control spring flooding, the channel could be cleared and the again could be open to commercial traffic.
The plans were made to have a group of Military Landing Craft come up the , to the foot of Denison Dam. They were to stop in Bonham, Texas, the home of Sam Rayburn, (Mr. Sam) and bring him to Denison as the featured Speaker which also included the Corp of Engineers key people, both Governors of Texas and Oklahoma, as well as local mayors, and other dignitaries. McDerby was a test Engineer for Higgins Boat Company in , and a publicity hound of the first order, as well as an outstanding public relations person.
He had made several films with Higgins which were used for publicity during the war to train operators of Higgins Boats (they were the largest builders of military craft during WWII) and for general promotion of Higgins. Mac was the captain of the three Higgins Landing Craft Boats that came up from New Orleans to Denison. As a result of this trip (1944), Mac met all the local people, saw the opportunity for boat sales connected with , and as soon as he could be released from Higgins, came to and founded Yellow Jacket Boat Company (1959).
In 1956, they planned the only other trip from Denison Dam to by boat since Mac came up in 1944. The trip was a huge success. Mac and Roy Rogers had a fun trip and received all kinds of publicity from the media, (both personal as well as commercial for the Boat Company), and received a lot of promotion. So much for this story.
Assorted Memories of Uncle Mac, by Pic Cyr I have hundreds of Uncle Mac stories. In fact Uncle Mac gave me a 3' model Yellow Jacket used in the 1954 New York and Chicago boat shows. I have had it with me all the years, one of my pride and joys.
Our family would go visit Uncle Mac and Aunt Catherine. My father was in the lumber and insurance business. Since I was four years old, I was in the lumber and millwork supply business and have seen many high end homes. Uncle Mac's home was and still remains in my mind as one of the finest home I ever saw. I well remember the bar/gun case, but it also had a room to room intercom system and piped music into every room. Uncle Mac still had most of the furniture from the house when he died, wonderfully crafted. Reading the French Street Gang article brought back old memories about Keith Hubbard, Clifton and myself playing together and climbing little Red Bluff and BIG Red Bluff near the house. The house looked like something that Frank Lloyd Wright had designed. Interior was open. Uncle Mac also had a great Chrysler Imperial 2-door hardtop. Uncle Mac also was head of the offshore boats that supplied the first offshore rig drilled in the Gulf of Mexico. It was drilled off Morgan City, LA and Mac was a big part of that operation. It was drilled by Kerr Magee right after the war and Uncle Mac bought PT boats in New York and ran them down the East Coast into the Gulf and to Morgan City. For the 50th anniversary of the project he was given a plaque for his contribution to the project. There was a movie made in the 50s with Jimmy Stewart about it, it was named Thunder Bay. Uncle Mac was the first offshore supply/crew boat operator, this is a very large business in the oil business today, and Mac was the first. There were many firsts in Mac's 95 years. Mac also taught the Landing School for Higgins Boats. He was the only teacher that Higgins ever had. Mac moved to New Orleans in the early 60's and started building a fiberglass boat company, and called the boats Thunderjet…ell built boats and sold them mostly in New Orleans and the area around there. He built a 14-footer for us, I beat the heck out of it skiing and running in rough water. Got it when I was 14. He also built the first fiberglass pirogue, or Cajun canoe. I still have mine after 50 years. He then started West End Marine, which my Dad was a part owner, and sold Trojan and Stern Craft boats. He sold boats to Al Hurt, Pete Fountain, and other well-known people. After that, he was the head man that ran the New Orleans Boat Show in the Super Dome. He retired from that and they would come get him when they had a problem, but it has never been the same since he left them. There's not much to it any more; it's not in the Super Dome any more. Well hope you enjoyed my rambling, but if someone doesn't write it down, it gets lost and never recovered, and now I am the old people at 62, most of his generation are gone. Really miss him and my Dad. Every New Years for about 10 years Mac and Cliff and Aunt Catherine would come for New Year Day, Mom would fix a big meal and we would watch all the Bowl games, all hell would break loose if Texas happen to play LSU. Still have never had as much fun as those New Year day games. I also have the props and trophy from his race boat that set the world record for the Catalina Island Race. It was the boat you have that has Mac in it and twin engines. It was 15' long.
The cup beneath the boat reads, "World Record", below that is "38 mins 6 seconds ", The plate at the bottom reads:1957, then "Long Beach-Catalina Marathon," then "R. A. McDerby--John Miller". John Miller was a young man who worked for Uncle Mac and was his co-pilot. My Dad's '57 Yellow Jacket Riviera, by Sam Lievsay Here are two photos of my Dad's Yellow Jacket on a weekend outing at Lake Texoma, probably about 1957. This is a Riviera model. He and Mom had a lot of fun in that boat on Lavon and Texoma. I know the outboard was a 35 horse Evinrude...Dad sold this boat sometime in 1961.
Sam Lievsay and his dad recently met up with webmaster David Kanally at the 2010 Wooden Boat Association Ride 'n Show at Lake Lewisville. Here, l-r, are Sam Sr., Sam and David:
Lunch with "The French Street Gang" "I'm not sure what kind of shape this boat is in," I shouted over the whine of the tires and the roar of the wind on the soft top of my Jeep Wrangler as we barreled north from Dallas to Denison, Texas on US 75. Lew White was in the passenger seat trying to hold up his end of the conversation over the road noise. Lew was along for the ride at my invitation. We had spent some quality time together in 2007 restoring my 1934 wooden sailboat, and are both members of the Wooden Boat Association of North Texas. Truth be known, I also wanted his expertise in assessing the work required to bring the boat we were going to see back to useable condition. A 79-year-old shipwright, Lew is an accomplished woodworker and knows more about building and fixing wooden boats than I ever will. He did his apprenticeship in Portland, England building the hardy line of Tod boats in the 1940s, and until his retirement, had been involved in building boats on both sides of the pond for fifty years or better. Toward the end of our one-hour drive, we reached the Eisenhower Parkway exit (President Eisenhower was born in Denison), and before we knew it we were in the heart of downtown, turning right onto Main Street and then right again, into the parking lot of Main Street Lumber, Chuck Pool's place of business. Within minutes we were in the wood-paneled offices at the rear of the store, waiting for Chuck to finish a phone call. Sixty-something Chuck emerged and greeted us with warmth, humor, and a drawl that told us Chuck was a lot more south than north, and a lot more west than east. We toured the hardware and lumber store, which also contains show areas for the custom doors and frames done by his millwork business. Chuck is proud of the workmanship of his craftsmen and the creativity of his marketing guy. "When a customer gets a proposal from us, he can already see the quality." Chuck says. We climbed into Chuck's SUV and drove through town back toward Chuck's place. The drive took us past the Denison High School, "Home of the Fighting Yellow Jackets" (Aha! thought I, that's where the boats got their name.) We also passed the Methodist Church where the Pool brothers went to Sunday School and their folks contributed time and talent and gifts helping to build a faith that keeps the bad times brief. We drove along streets lined with small clapboard houses built in a simpler, humbler time, and then on to a modern subdivision of expansive brick homes along Waterloo Lake, once the town's water supply, but now a pretty little lake to build nice houses around. We pulled into Chuck's driveway. He opened the garage door revealing a 14-foot Yellow Jacket boat sitting on a '50s vintage Yarbrough Highlander trailer with an old Scott-Atwater 35hp outboard motor laid on its side on the garage floor. The boat had become the repository of detached parts, life jackets and even a bag or two of potting soil and garage paraphernalia--typical of a man whose busy schedule, ambition and curiosity keep a long to-do list out in front of him. We tossed the junk out of the boat and had a look. It was an early model; the seats were mounted rigidly to the deck, without the trademark "Flote 'n Ride" spring suspension of later models. The decking was in reasonable shape, with only a couple bites taken out of the edge of the 1/4" mahogany plywood. The stain was very dark and the varnish was reticulated, so a total stripping and staining was a must (and some plywood replacement to really do it right). The hull was in pretty good shape, but would need a fresh coat of paint. The rear seat had been reversed, facing the stern for fishing. That would need to be turned back around for the boat to return to its original configuration. But as wooden boat restorations go, this would be very doable. Lew would prepare a checklist of restoration steps. Chuck would find someone, preferably locally, to take on the job. Chuck then invited us into his "memories room" where a large poster and photos of his dad's exploits aboard a WWII bomber hang, alongside autographed pictures of Roy Rogers and Gene Autry, and also photos of Chuck's family. Roy Rogers was a partner in Yellow Jacket Boats, and became the firm's spokesperson and endorsing celebrity. (More about him later). Lunch did come to pass eventually. We took a swing past Main Street Lumber to pick up Robert. Keith was already patiently waiting at the Cotton Patch. It was around this lunch table that Lew and I learned we were in the presence of the "French Street Gang"...these guys had grown up together in the '50s on French Avenue, the same street where the McDerbys lived. Mac McDerby was the founder of the Yellow Jacket Boat Company, and Mac's son Clifton was one of the gang. Robert adds, "Uncle Mac had built a rotating hideaway bar that was a gun cabinet on one side and a bar on the other. It wasn't too common to have a bar in your home in those days, so depending on who was visiting, it could be a bar or turned around to be a gun cabinet. If you turned it half way around, you could reach into some bookshelves inside. We used to love that thing." The conversation soon got around to how Mac McDerby and Yellow Jacket Boats came to Denison in the first place. Mac worked for the Higgins boat company during the war, training troops in the use of Landing Craft Infantry (LCI) for the D-Day invasion. He was aware of the advantages of plywood for boat construction from his days at Higgins. At some point during his Higgins career, Mac was navigating up the Red River promoting the sale of War Bonds. He reached Denison, and while attending a dance there, met Kitty Conatser, to whom he became engaged and then married. The early name of his company was the McDerby-Conatser Boat Company, which began building Yellow Jacket Boats in 1949. Mac would use molded plywood hulls designed by Richard Cole, and built by Industrial Shipping of Mahone Bay, Nova Scotia. (The conversation about the history of Yellow Jacket went on, but the story has been more fully documented in the book, "The Real Runabouts IV", by Bob Speltz, and on the web at http://www.martyonline.com/james_riley/. Additional history about designer Richard Cole and hull manufacturers Industrial Shipping and Theakston Boat Company may be found by clicking here.) The remainder of the lunch was spent spinning yarns of various colors and lengths. At some point in his youth, Clifton McDerby decided he wanted a small-scale Yellow Jacket, so he and his dad built one six or seven feet in length. They built this boat in a room on the second floor of a building behind the furniture store in downtown Denison. When they were finished, they realized that the boat was too big to fit through the door to bring downstairs, so they had to knock out part of the wall to get the boat out. By the late '50s, major boat manufacturers were making the transition to fiberglass as the hull material of choice. Yellow Jacket Boats made the same move, but the effort was short-lived. Mac never lost his ability to dream, however, according to Chuck. "Even in his last years, Mac would say to me that if I could get him the wood, he would build the boats." Mac was well into his 90s when he passed away in 2004. Before Lew and I left Denison, Chuck borrowed a few minutes from his next appointment to share a couple other remarkable moments in the town's history. It was in Denison that the then-musicians, The Marx Brothers, transformed their act to comedy and became film legends. Denison is also home to the first ice cream soda and the first free, graded public school. And happily for Lew and for me, Denison is home to the one and only French Street Gang, keepers of the legacy of their parents, their heroes and their hometown. Roy Rogers and his '57 Skyliner By Lawrence Matthews I don't remember a great deal about Roy Rogers as he visited infrequently but I do recall on one visit he drove a Ford Fairlane 500 Skyliner (probably a 1957 model). What made this so memorable was that on these cars the hardtop roof retracted into the trunk, so you could have a convertible or a hardtop. I think we drove Roy Rogers crazy one day asking him to demonstrate it for us which he did. Here's a link to a video on YouTube that shows the car and the top being retracted: Pretty futuristic stuff in 1957. By Mary Lee Conatser Miller We all have many good memories of growing up in Denison - of which our Yellow Jacket memories were great. We grew up in Denison at 930 W. Sears St. and our father, Clifton Conatser, was also involved in the business.
Left: Clifton and Darlene Conatser with daughters (l-r) Mary Lee, Candy and Cheryl in a Christmas card photo from 1954. Right: (l-r) Candy Conatser Channell, Mary Lee Conatser Miller and Cheryl Conatser Vandiver at the Sisters Seminar at Lake Texoma in 2004. At one time, Clifton Conatser's family and his three siblings all lived within one block of each other in the 900 block of Sears in Denison. Finis Terrell and Leadership by Example by Bob Terrell The following story is based on my memories at age 15, so some of the details may be a little off. My father, Finis Terrell, was born in 1916 in Delaware Bend, TX, a site now under the waters of Lake Texoma. Early in his career, he worked for the Army Corps of Engineers in the building of the Denison Dam. In the late 40s, the Corps decided to move its offices out of Denison, and while my dad had an opportunity to move with them, he decided he would stay in Denison and seek employment opportunities there. He was soon hired (as one of the first employees) of the newly-formed McDerby-Conatser Boat Company in 1949. This was before the company was located out by the Red River; they were doing business in a building downtown, on Woodard Street next to the B&B Grocery. As I recall, my dad didn't have any prior experience in boatbuilding, but he was a craftsman, and a good, detail-oriented leader. He learned the Yellow Jacket business from the ground up. The company later moved to the Red River site, into a building that had been a storage building for the Corps of Engineers. Before too long, Dad was promoted to Plant Superintendent, and oversaw operations at the factory all during the company's heyday. Dad worked alongside his men. He would never ask an employee to do something he wouldn't do himself. He had quite a reputation for quality work. In fact, I remember that when some customers brought their boats in for repair work, they would request that my dad be the one to do the work personally. He worked both ends of the plant…the fabrication end and the loading and shipping end. He never really considered himself the boss in the traditional sense. When things got busy, Dad worked seven days a week. I spent many Saturdays and Sundays at the plant during those days. Dad was a hands on guy. I remember seeing him with a hand plane and a straight edge in his hands. He just loved that company. On February 16, 1959, my dad got up at the usual time in the morning. He had been at the plant the day before, which was a Sunday. He had been finishing up some paper work and loading boats. On Monday morning the 16th, he went into the bathroom to get ready for another day at work, and had a heart attack and passed away. It was difficult for all of us to lose him so suddenly and at such a young age. Yellow Jacket was home to him. He worked hard, loved his work, and set an example for all of us.
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Crowds gather on the shores of the Red River as the McDerby/Rogers trip to New Orleans begins.
Roy at the helm of his specially equipped, twin-engine Yellow Jacket Racer, the "V-2". We were testing on Lake Texoma, before the boat was shipped to Southern California. That is Roy driving the boat. It was loaded with the other guys to test for speed. The boat would be fitted with long range fuel tanks for racing, so the crew was ballast. As you can see from the dress, it was winter in Denison.
Roy (in trademark cowboy hat) and Mac (in Captain's hat) are surrounded by the crowd as they tape a radio interview prior to departure for New Orleans.
Roy and Mac prepare for departure as Denison crowds look on.
Roy and Mac pose for publicity shots with their 1956 Yellow Jacket Cruisettes en route to New Orleans.
The Yellow Jackets have no trouble making good time towards New Orleans.
Roy and Mac down river, west of Shreveport, with a ferry in the background.
The caption for this photo has been contributed by Mac McDerby's nephew, Pic Cyr: "This picture was taken at Ponchatrain Beach which was an amusement park and that was the stage. You may ask how I know...I was there about 5 ft from Roy when that picture was taken. Mac was my uncle and he called my Dad and said for us to come to New Orleans and bring my sister and I and Mac's son Clifton to greet Roy on at stage when they arrived at the beach. I was 8 years and I can still see him jumping in the water, notice his wet pant legs and beard. We sat down beside him and he sang songs to the crowd. He and Mac, Catherine, Mac's wife and my parents went out for dinner that night. We had breakfast with Roy the next day. We went shopping with him and were with him when he left the hotel. My sister was 7, cute with blonde hair, kissed him goodbye, he turned around and said, I have to have another one of those. One of the finest men I ever met. I enjoyed looking over your site. Spent a lot of time with Uncle Mac the last 10 years of his life. He did a lot in his 95 years."
Author Leonard Melson and sister-in-law Mary Lou in a late '50s model Yellow Jacket Riviera
I am attaching a picture that we received during one of Roy Rogers' trips. You may have heard the story about Uncle Mac (R.A. McDerby) being on a YJB promotional tour off Catalina Island in California and becoming lost in rough weather. Roy Rogers, of course, arranged the rescue.