We are now in high school and it’s Wednesday, October 14, 1959. The Wednesday morning chapel has begun and there’s two boys, one freshman and one sophomore on stage ready to perform.
I know the sophomore. He is Don Kiser, with whom I attended Rose Hill grammar school. The other young man with the electric guitar was L. J. Beeler. After high school he became a professional musician backing lots of big stars from Nashville.
I had heard that Don Kiser could sing, but this was the first time that I was to hear him perform. Well, these two young entertainers knocked it out of the park. I knew at that chapel program that L. J. Beeler had the potential to go as high in country music as a guitar slinger could. Don Kiser had lots of talent, good stage presence and a good voice. Over the next three years I had the pleasure to meet, be in the class with, and watch others perform on the chapel program weekly at Horace Maynard High School. These included Betsy Stowers, Ray Bull, Judy Stowers and Doug Meyers with Troy Seymour dancing the Charlston.
We in East Tennessee were entertained by a young blond-haired girl singing on the Bonnie Lou and Buster Show. Her name was Ava Barber, who later was invited to be a weekly member of the Lawrence Welk TV Show. In 1970, L. J. Beeler, now known as Chubby Beeler, joined Ava Barber and her husband Roger Sullivan on their tours.
In 1978, Chubby joined Mel Street and toured with him for six months until Mel’s death.
In 1980, Chubby rejoined Ava Barber and her husband again and remained with them until 2013.
Chubby had a career doing what he loved and brought pleasure to a multitude of people across America and other countries.
In 2021, I wrote an article about Chubby and his wife Sharon for the Historic Union County paper. I found Chubby to be the same nice, unpretentious humble man that I knew as a young high school student at HMHS.
Chubby left us September 21. There’s a void now on stage and we will not hear that beautiful sound again. Maybe someday when the Creator’s will takes place, we will hear it again.
Southbound Friend
My new friend since spring will be leaving soon, heading back south. Our friendship started off on rocky ground. He would come by, look at me, not knowing if he should trust me if he got too close, but after a couple of months he would be more neighborly as he made his daily trek by my home.
Eventually he would come closer, look me over and go on about his business. By midsummer he would visit me either on my porch or in the backyard and occasionally while I was working anywhere outside.
He started dropping by four or more times a day. He would usually stop in midflight and hover about two feet from my face, look at me, then back up in flight, turn and fly away hunting flowers for nectar.
My new friend is a tiny green hummingbird. Besides being pretty, hummingbirds help bees pollinate flowers, flowering trees, shrubs and farm crops.
I know with October here that my new friend will very soon be on his way south, cross over the Gulf of Mexico to spend his winter either in Mexico or Central America. The Gulf of Mexico is up to 500 miles across, and once this tiny bird starts across he must complete the trip with no place to stop and rest ’til it reaches land on the south side of the gulf.
How does he know how to navigate, how high to fly to get help from the winds aloft, and where to stop to spend the winter where he’ll find food (nectar) until his return over the Gulf of Mexico in the spring?
Hummingbirds return to their nesting sites in the United States to raise their young. They double their weight before starting their trips each spring northbound and again in the midfall southbound.
These trips can be from 600 to a thousand miles long. Pretty good for a bird that weighs less than this pen I am writing this article with. It is amazing when you think about what these tiny birds accomplish and how they benefit mankind.
This is another of the creator’s true gifts to mankind. I hope to see you again next spring, old friend.