Mom didn’t have much of an education and her only real job experience was just manual labor so when dad got too sick to work much she took a job tending bar. It didn’t really require experience, provided steady work and paid better than anything else she could find. However, it didn’t take her too long to figure out the guy running the bar was the one making most of the money so sometime around 1960 she rented a building in Ft. Cobb and opened up her own business. I don’t remember what she called that place. Not too long after that she decided paying rent wasn’t that good of an idea either and started looking around for a building to buy.

By this time she had learned all the ins and outs of the business. I have no idea what the laws are now but at that time bars in the city limits closed at 12:00 midnight. Those outside city limits could stay open until 2:00 A.M.  She knew that lots of her customers weren’t ready to go home at midnight … especially on the weekends. With that in mind she narrowed her search to buildings outside the city limits of the towns in the area and that didn’t leave much to choose from. She finally found an empty house right on a curve in the highway 1 mile west of Binger and decided that would be the place.

We moved to Binger in the summer of 1962 and they started working on the place. It was just a small house on a 5 acre lot and I don’t remember what she paid for the place but it wasn’t much. Regardless of the price my dad was convinced it was no different than throwing that money away and they bickered (to put it nicely) about it from mom’s first mention. One day while getting the place ready mom brought up the subject of what they would call it and dad jumped on the opportunity. It’s been too long for me to remember the conversation word for word but his response was something to the effect of “well it’s so little you couldn’t get nothing in here but a room full of midgets … you ought to just call it The Midget Bar!” He was obviously being sarcastic but in a tit-for-tat move of master strategery (thanks W) she did just that. In keeping with the whole ‘midget’ theme, the sign she hung outside with the name on it was so small you could barely read it from the road. They were quite a pair!

Larry Craddock

I loved contract cable splicing. I enjoyed the work, the travel, and the sense of freedom that came from knowing I could find work in almost any part of the country whenever I wanted but it had its drawbacks too. Samie and I were both constantly homesick and then when Erik was old enough to attend school we found ourselves moving him in and out of different schools too often. One day we just decided that if I had to dig ditches for a living we were moving home. So we did. Erik was 6, Stephanie was 4 and Samie was pregnant with Nathan. That was the spring of 1980.

We moved back to Anadarko, Oklahoma and I found a contract cable splicing job in the Texas panhandle close enough to drive home on the weekends. So I stayed in a motel through the week and came home on weekends but what I really wanted was a job where I could stay home. I looked and would have settled for less but what I really wanted was a job at Western Farmers Electric Cooperative. It seemed like, and turned out to be, the best organization in the area. Harold Todd, a good friend, worked there and encouraged me to apply. I had actually turned in an application there years earlier but never heard back from them. Nevertheless, after Harold’s encouragement I decided to try again.

A few years earlier I had worked a short stint for the local cable tv company where I added tower climbing to my repertoire and decided that maybe that and my cable splicing experience could somehow get me on in whatever department was responsible for such things.

Fortunately, Harold worked in the print shop, which at that time was located directly across the hall from the communications department. One day he arranged to let me in the back door and introduced me to the manager of the communcations department. We talked for a few minutes and I told him I was interested in working there and what my background was. They were in a growth period and hiring but he really didn’t have an opening. However, he made an opening for a telecommunications support mechanic and posted the job. The job title turned out to be code for someone who would change tower lights, repair or replace microwave building window air conditioners, clean battery connections, sweep floors … you got it … whatever needed done.

I submitted a truthful but unimpressive application. The real truth is that I was a high school graduate with an undesirable discharge from the U.S. Army and very few directly applicable skills. Everyone involved with hiring was ex-military and the division manager was a WWII P.O.W. It didn’t look good I talked with the dept manager again and he was very honest with me. He told me he liked me, thought I would probably do a good job and would like to hire me but the odds were stacked against me. I listened to every word he said but something clicked inside and believing … no actually ‘knowing’ … that job was mine was the easiest thing I’ve ever done.

I showed up at their doorstep every week and made sure they knew I was interested and I wasn’t going away. They finally got around to interviewing for the job and the dept manager called me at home to tell me not to get my hopes up; there wasn’t much chance I would get the job. I remember it like it was yesterday. Samie was sitting on the couch hearing only what little she could of my end of the conversation. When I hung  the phone up she asked me what he said and I responded with “I’m getting the job.” I wasn’t lying and I wasn’t practicing positive speech … I was just repeating what I already knew in my heart.

During the conversation I had told him I wanted an interview if that was possible. I don’t know what he did to make that happen but it happened. When the time came I knew I had to be completely transparent so I made no excuses for my past. I told them the truth … I told them I had no excuses and if given the opportunity to do it over there were lots of things I’d change but I knew that opportunity would never come. I told them that through a work God had started in me I was no longer that person. They listened but the looks on their faces let me know they were just being polite. That is until I pulled them down to my level … after my confession I asked them to look at their own pasts and ask themselves if there weren’t things they’d like to have a chance to change. Then I told them they didn’t need to answer because I already knew there were. My words weren’t judgmental … I was just trying to help them understand that we’re all human and sometimes all a person needs is another chance.

I hope this doesn’t sound arrogant but a week later I wasn’t even surprised when they called and told Samie I had the job. I have a little trouble with people always playing the “God told me” card and I rarely use it so bear with me. No, I didn’t hear an audible voice, but somehow I knew that job was mine from the beginning. During that process ‘faith’ was redefined for me. There was no spiritual grunting, no mental mantra chanting, no determined exercise of my will … He just placed it in my heart that the job was mine and it was the easiest thing in the world to believe Him.

I started work for Western Farmers Electric Cooperative on May 13, 1980 making just over $7 / hour. That seems like last week but it’s now been over 30 years and I’m almost embarrassed about my pay. I’m a salaried professional doing a job I absolutely love. I’m anxious to get to work every day. And I’m thankful … I’m thankful to WFEC for allowing me the latitude to carve out my own career; I’m thankful for the freedom this country affords us to recover from egregious errors if we just try; and most of all I’m thankful to God for the endless work of making us better people.

Larry Craddock

11/1/2010