Eddie had a car, or at least access to a car. That would come in handy. There's nothing worse than discovering your ride home has evaporated and having to face the prospect of spending the night at Crump Stadium, or Whitehaven, or Leonard's. OK, maybe that Leonard's part might not be so bad, just difficult to explain the next morning. I recall on more than one occasion being chauffered around by Eddie in a big four-door car, usually with an entourage of cousins, siblings, and neighborhood kids, on the way back from a school event. Eddie had an easygoing disposition and was quick to smile, always laughing at my jokes.
I'm not sure how I got to know Eddie. I had gone to South Side in the 9th grade, and Eddie was part of that huge wave of kids who came over from Longview to start the 10th grade at South Side. It was an odd experience for me--I knew way less than half of the students in my own class. I felt like a stranger in my own school, so I clung to the pals that I already had from the old Trigg/Latham/McLemore nieghborhood. One of them, somehow, knew Eddie and introduced me to him. We discovered we had some common interests--cars, baseball, barbecue--and quickly became buddies. Mustering all of the sensibility that 15 year-old boys are capable of, my friends had nicknamed him "Tank," a moniker that seemed to fit. After I had known him for a year or so, I dropped the Tank appellation, at least to his face. Eddie was always affable and ready to help, giving a ride if he could or listening to your account of the last Cardinal game.
In the summer of '63 I developed a burning desire to go to St. Louis to see my beloved Cardinals play. I would drop subtle little hints to my folks, like "I sure would like to go to St. Louis and see a baseball game," but they seemed to be as thick as a brick and would never respond. I knew I had to present them with a "done deal," so I offered up my proposal to Eddie. We could ride the train to St. Louis, catching it on a Friday night, wake up the next morning in St. Louis, see a game on Saturday and Sunday, and return to Memphis on Monday, a week before school started. My birthday was in August,, and our senior year was coming up. I had made good grades and stayed out of trouble. It all made sense to me. Tank got on board with the idea, which then allowed me to make my presentation to my folks. They were impressed, but hesitant. "Are you sure Eddie can go?" "Yes." My folks exchanged looks in that nonverbal communicative way parents seem to have. "OK," they said, but there was one condition: they had to meet Eddie's parents. Oh no, I thought, oh no.
Some background--several years earlier I had a really good friend from the old AB Hill neighborhood. We hung around together a lot, and I had spent time at his house. Eventually, as parents seem wont to do, my mom discovered that his dad had killed a man in a bar fight. I had known that all along, but had hoped they would remain unaware. I had met his dad, and he seemed OK to me. Things happen, you know. One minute you're sitting there minding your own business, drinking your Falstaff; then the next minute someone is messing with you. Knives are flashed, fists fly....then it's over, and you get back to your Falstaff. I could understand that. My mom insisted that my friendship with his son had to come to an end. It was a sore point between us that lingered for a while, although today I thoroughly understand that they wanted to protect. me. Eddie's parents hadn't killed anyone, at least as far as I knew, so maybe it would all be OK.
On the appointed evening, Eddie's mom and dad came to our house, along with Eddie. I wanted the earth to open up and swallow me. As it turned out, though, Eddie's parents had also insisted that they had to meet my mom and dad before they would let him go off on a trip with me. Our respective parents hit it off well, laughing and talking and telling stories. I think they might have even double-dated at some point.
On an afternoon in late August, our parents took us to Union Station, and we boarded the train. Eddie had on a blue dress shirt and brown tie. As soon as the train pulled out of the station, he retrieved from his bags a big cigar and lit it up. Our journey to adulthood had begun. About to turn 17, I was, for the first time in my life, going to spend time overnight and out of town completely without adult supervision. This was a coming-of-age, and I was on a quest to see my idols, the St. Louis Cardinals, on the hallowed grounds of Busch Stadium.
The train was packed with lots of adults who were making the same trip. They played cards and poured liquids from tiny little bottles into their Cokes and 7-Ups. They seemed to get happier and happier as the evening progressed. We slept little that night and were happy to pull into St. Louis early in the morning. We took a taxi to the Holiday Inn and checked in, then dressed for the day game and headed to Bush Stadium, where we had been told to meet a policeman named Casey, who had tickets for us. Officer Casey did indeed produce said tickets, and we found our seats behind 3rd base. I was thrilled by the boistrous crowd and the sights and smells of the stadium. We got to see Willie Mays hit a homerun, boo the umpire, and cheer on the Redbirds. The game went extra innings, & in the bottom of the 10th, Tim McCarver, who was from not just Memphis, but SOUTH Memphis, knocked a base hit. Then there was a mighty roar as our hero, Stan Musial, came to the plate. Cool and calm, swinging the bat and settling into his famous corkscrew stance, Stan belted out a base hit that won the game. Hollywood couldn't have scripted it any better. That night we talked and talked and laughed and sent out for a pizza and played table top football and talked some more and almost never fell asleep. The next day we awoke to a furious rainstorm. We went to the stadium, but it was raining there, too. We were, nevertheless, very happy. When we checked out Monday morning, we discovered that the room had been comped. Eddie's dad was a contractor for Holiday Inn, and apparently that allowed us to have a perk. It turns out we could have stayed over for the make-up game on Monday, but calling home was never an option; and we were happy to get back, happy to have had our road trip.
"Let's go to St. Louis again," Tank put in my annual. Wish we could, buddy. Wish it always.
Oh the stories you tell. This one made me tear up. His folks bought our house in prospect park when my parents moved to Florence Al. Never think of that house that I don't think of Eddie there after his accident. I am sorry to admit I never visited. I wonder what.
Actor Christopher Reeve, known for his movie role as Superman, was at the height of his career when he was tragically injured in a riding accident. Handsome & talented, the 6’4” Reeve spent the rest of his life as a quadriplegic. Although confined to a wheelchair, he devoted substantial resources to nurturing & exercising his body & never gave up hope that he would walk again. He continued working, as a movie director & also as a spokesperson and advocate for research into spinal cord injuries, but after 9 and a half years of struggle, the condition took its toll on him; & he died at the age of 52. Superman. Gone.
The young Eddie Bright, considerably shorter than 6’4”, went to UT-Martin as a freshman. In the spring of that year, right before the weekend, Eddie decided to avail himself of the campus swimming pool. He gleefully jumped into the pool, relishing as he had always the exhilaration of the jump, the splash, the buoyancy of the water, and the sheer joy of being alive. And then the screen went blank. Something had gone wrong with the dive, & his neck hit the side of the pool. I’m not sure what happened next, nor probably did Eddie know, but suddenly he was in a hospital in Memphis, & I got a call from Glen Carter telling me that Tank had been seriously injured, & that he might not make it.I sped to the hospital, shooting through a very ripe-orange/early-red light & got immediately pulled over by a policeman. I blurted out as much of my story as I could without losing complete composure, & the officer let me off with a gentle warning & an expression of sympathy.
Eddie had received an emergency tracheotomy & was paralyzed from the neck down. He was having severe respiratory problems, & for several days it was questionable whether he would make it. I went to see him several times in the hospital, trying to offer whatever cheer & emotional comfort I could. And then he came home. Paralyzed, from the neck down—unable to move his hands, scratch his nose, or hold a fork—the same kind of paralysis Superman would experience some thirty years later.
I vowed to make it part of my routine to go to see him, at his house on Alcy Road. His positive, mattter-of-fact disposition always impressed me. He explained how he had a term paper due after that fateful weekend, & he hadn’t started on it yet, so it really wasn’t so bad to have had the accident. At least he didn’t have to finish the paper. His folks had gotten him a color TV, with as big a screen as one could get in 1965.We would watch Cardinal games & westerns and talk about cars and girls—all of the important things. Tank had a younger sister that I thought was quite cute, but I kept those thoughts to myself. Sometimes I would bring a buddy with me, maybe Glen Carter or Carrel Turner. After a few years Eddie talked about the prospect of technological advances being pioneered that would help quadriplegics. His folks were going to take him to Houston to see what could be done for him. I remember, when leaving, mentioning the popular Dean Martin song, “Houston,” Right before I left his house we sang the song in unison: “Houston, Houston, Houston.......I’m going to Houston.”
And then college life absorbed me. Books & part-time job, ROTC & extracurricular activities, a serious girl friend plus my own family obligations. I kept meaning to steer the car off the freeway & onto the Prospect Park exit, but there always seemed to be more pressing matters. Then I was graduating & leaving town.....catch him next time, see him on the next trip, just can’t right now. When I came back, home from the Air Force, it was the same thing. I’m a Busy Guy, you know, with Things to Do. I also felt ashamed that I had neglected him for all those years. We had so much to talk about. Maybe he had gotten better. Maybe he was even walking.Maybe I would go to see him.
I went to the 40 year class reunion thinking that he might be there—what a sight that would be. But I was told at the warmup party that Eddie had died in 1999. One of our classmates had been there, working in ER, the night they brought him in. I had not fully understood that a quadriplegic is prone to having a shortened life span. All those years of gasping for breath, being totally dependent on a ventilator, they take a toll on the body. Superman lived approximately one year less than Eddie, & he succumbed to his paralyzed condition in less than ten years. Eddie made it for THIRTY-FOUR years. It was I who was the loser from not going to see him. I could have used a dose of his courage, his perseverance. To outdo Superman one has to be mentally tough, emotionally strong. One has to be....a SCRAPPER.
Perhaps you have an Eddie in your life—that coach, that Sunday School teacher, that special person you used to pal around with; and you keep meaning to find them, see them, call them....but just haven’t. We have cell phones & internet, snail mail & email, Facebook & Messenger, text messages and postcards, Post-it slips and candy grams, smoke signals & talking leaves; pick your weapon. It’s a lousy feeling when you realize it’s too late; and not even Superman can help you then.
Rest In Peace. Eddie Bright. The indestructible Tank. Superman.
Michael Cobb
"Eddie,"....we knew him as Eddie
Eddie had a car, or at least access to a car. That would come in handy. There's nothing worse than discovering your ride home has evaporated and having to face the prospect of spending the night at Crump Stadium, or Whitehaven, or Leonard's. OK, maybe that Leonard's part might not be so bad, just difficult to explain the next morning. I recall on more than one occasion being chauffered around by Eddie in a big four-door car, usually with an entourage of cousins, siblings, and neighborhood kids, on the way back from a school event. Eddie had an easygoing disposition and was quick to smile, always laughing at my jokes.
I'm not sure how I got to know Eddie. I had gone to South Side in the 9th grade, and Eddie was part of that huge wave of kids who came over from Longview to start the 10th grade at South Side. It was an odd experience for me--I knew way less than half of the students in my own class. I felt like a stranger in my own school, so I clung to the pals that I already had from the old Trigg/Latham/McLemore nieghborhood. One of them, somehow, knew Eddie and introduced me to him. We discovered we had some common interests--cars, baseball, barbecue--and quickly became buddies. Mustering all of the sensibility that 15 year-old boys are capable of, my friends had nicknamed him "Tank," a moniker that seemed to fit. After I had known him for a year or so, I dropped the Tank appellation, at least to his face. Eddie was always affable and ready to help, giving a ride if he could or listening to your account of the last Cardinal game.
In the summer of '63 I developed a burning desire to go to St. Louis to see my beloved Cardinals play. I would drop subtle little hints to my folks, like "I sure would like to go to St. Louis and see a baseball game," but they seemed to be as thick as a brick and would never respond. I knew I had to present them with a "done deal," so I offered up my proposal to Eddie. We could ride the train to St. Louis, catching it on a Friday night, wake up the next morning in St. Louis, see a game on Saturday and Sunday, and return to Memphis on Monday, a week before school started. My birthday was in August,, and our senior year was coming up. I had made good grades and stayed out of trouble. It all made sense to me. Tank got on board with the idea, which then allowed me to make my presentation to my folks. They were impressed, but hesitant. "Are you sure Eddie can go?" "Yes." My folks exchanged looks in that nonverbal communicative way parents seem to have. "OK," they said, but there was one condition: they had to meet Eddie's parents. Oh no, I thought, oh no.
Some background--several years earlier I had a really good friend from the old AB Hill neighborhood. We hung around together a lot, and I had spent time at his house. Eventually, as parents seem wont to do, my mom discovered that his dad had killed a man in a bar fight. I had known that all along, but had hoped they would remain unaware. I had met his dad, and he seemed OK to me. Things happen, you know. One minute you're sitting there minding your own business, drinking your Falstaff; then the next minute someone is messing with you. Knives are flashed, fists fly....then it's over, and you get back to your Falstaff. I could understand that. My mom insisted that my friendship with his son had to come to an end. It was a sore point between us that lingered for a while, although today I thoroughly understand that they wanted to protect. me. Eddie's parents hadn't killed anyone, at least as far as I knew, so maybe it would all be OK.
On the appointed evening, Eddie's mom and dad came to our house, along with Eddie. I wanted the earth to open up and swallow me. As it turned out, though, Eddie's parents had also insisted that they had to meet my mom and dad before they would let him go off on a trip with me. Our respective parents hit it off well, laughing and talking and telling stories. I think they might have even double-dated at some point.
On an afternoon in late August, our parents took us to Union Station, and we boarded the train. Eddie had on a blue dress shirt and brown tie. As soon as the train pulled out of the station, he retrieved from his bags a big cigar and lit it up. Our journey to adulthood had begun. About to turn 17, I was, for the first time in my life, going to spend time overnight and out of town completely without adult supervision. This was a coming-of-age, and I was on a quest to see my idols, the St. Louis Cardinals, on the hallowed grounds of Busch Stadium.
The train was packed with lots of adults who were making the same trip. They played cards and poured liquids from tiny little bottles into their Cokes and 7-Ups. They seemed to get happier and happier as the evening progressed. We slept little that night and were happy to pull into St. Louis early in the morning. We took a taxi to the Holiday Inn and checked in, then dressed for the day game and headed to Bush Stadium, where we had been told to meet a policeman named Casey, who had tickets for us. Officer Casey did indeed produce said tickets, and we found our seats behind 3rd base. I was thrilled by the boistrous crowd and the sights and smells of the stadium. We got to see Willie Mays hit a homerun, boo the umpire, and cheer on the Redbirds. The game went extra innings, & in the bottom of the 10th, Tim McCarver, who was from not just Memphis, but SOUTH Memphis, knocked a base hit. Then there was a mighty roar as our hero, Stan Musial, came to the plate. Cool and calm, swinging the bat and settling into his famous corkscrew stance, Stan belted out a base hit that won the game. Hollywood couldn't have scripted it any better. That night we talked and talked and laughed and sent out for a pizza and played table top football and talked some more and almost never fell asleep. The next day we awoke to a furious rainstorm. We went to the stadium, but it was raining there, too. We were, nevertheless, very happy. When we checked out Monday morning, we discovered that the room had been comped. Eddie's dad was a contractor for Holiday Inn, and apparently that allowed us to have a perk. It turns out we could have stayed over for the make-up game on Monday, but calling home was never an option; and we were happy to get back, happy to have had our road trip.
"Let's go to St. Louis again," Tank put in my annual. Wish we could, buddy. Wish it always.
Carol Cook (Harrell)
Oh the stories you tell. This one made me tear up. His folks bought our house in prospect park when my parents moved to Florence Al. Never think of that house that I don't think of Eddie there after his accident. I am sorry to admit I never visited. I wonder what.
Carol Cook (Harrell)
I wonder why.
Michael Cobb
SUPERMAN
Actor Christopher Reeve, known for his movie role as Superman, was at the height of his career when he was tragically injured in a riding accident. Handsome & talented, the 6’4” Reeve spent the rest of his life as a quadriplegic. Although confined to a wheelchair, he devoted substantial resources to nurturing & exercising his body & never gave up hope that he would walk again. He continued working, as a movie director & also as a spokesperson and advocate for research into spinal cord injuries, but after 9 and a half years of struggle, the condition took its toll on him; & he died at the age of 52. Superman. Gone.
The young Eddie Bright, considerably shorter than 6’4”, went to UT-Martin as a freshman. In the spring of that year, right before the weekend, Eddie decided to avail himself of the campus swimming pool. He gleefully jumped into the pool, relishing as he had always the exhilaration of the jump, the splash, the buoyancy of the water, and the sheer joy of being alive. And then the screen went blank. Something had gone wrong with the dive, & his neck hit the side of the pool. I’m not sure what happened next, nor probably did Eddie know, but suddenly he was in a hospital in Memphis, & I got a call from Glen Carter telling me that Tank had been seriously injured, & that he might not make it.I sped to the hospital, shooting through a very ripe-orange/early-red light & got immediately pulled over by a policeman. I blurted out as much of my story as I could without losing complete composure, & the officer let me off with a gentle warning & an expression of sympathy.
Eddie had received an emergency tracheotomy & was paralyzed from the neck down. He was having severe respiratory problems, & for several days it was questionable whether he would make it. I went to see him several times in the hospital, trying to offer whatever cheer & emotional comfort I could. And then he came home. Paralyzed, from the neck down—unable to move his hands, scratch his nose, or hold a fork—the same kind of paralysis Superman would experience some thirty years later.
I vowed to make it part of my routine to go to see him, at his house on Alcy Road. His positive, mattter-of-fact disposition always impressed me. He explained how he had a term paper due after that fateful weekend, & he hadn’t started on it yet, so it really wasn’t so bad to have had the accident. At least he didn’t have to finish the paper. His folks had gotten him a color TV, with as big a screen as one could get in 1965.We would watch Cardinal games & westerns and talk about cars and girls—all of the important things. Tank had a younger sister that I thought was quite cute, but I kept those thoughts to myself. Sometimes I would bring a buddy with me, maybe Glen Carter or Carrel Turner. After a few years Eddie talked about the prospect of technological advances being pioneered that would help quadriplegics. His folks were going to take him to Houston to see what could be done for him. I remember, when leaving, mentioning the popular Dean Martin song, “Houston,” Right before I left his house we sang the song in unison: “Houston, Houston, Houston.......I’m going to Houston.”
And then college life absorbed me. Books & part-time job, ROTC & extracurricular activities, a serious girl friend plus my own family obligations. I kept meaning to steer the car off the freeway & onto the Prospect Park exit, but there always seemed to be more pressing matters. Then I was graduating & leaving town.....catch him next time, see him on the next trip, just can’t right now. When I came back, home from the Air Force, it was the same thing. I’m a Busy Guy, you know, with Things to Do. I also felt ashamed that I had neglected him for all those years. We had so much to talk about. Maybe he had gotten better. Maybe he was even walking.Maybe I would go to see him.
I went to the 40 year class reunion thinking that he might be there—what a sight that would be. But I was told at the warmup party that Eddie had died in 1999. One of our classmates had been there, working in ER, the night they brought him in. I had not fully understood that a quadriplegic is prone to having a shortened life span. All those years of gasping for breath, being totally dependent on a ventilator, they take a toll on the body. Superman lived approximately one year less than Eddie, & he succumbed to his paralyzed condition in less than ten years. Eddie made it for THIRTY-FOUR years. It was I who was the loser from not going to see him. I could have used a dose of his courage, his perseverance. To outdo Superman one has to be mentally tough, emotionally strong. One has to be....a SCRAPPER.
Perhaps you have an Eddie in your life—that coach, that Sunday School teacher, that special person you used to pal around with; and you keep meaning to find them, see them, call them....but just haven’t. We have cell phones & internet, snail mail & email, Facebook & Messenger, text messages and postcards, Post-it slips and candy grams, smoke signals & talking leaves; pick your weapon. It’s a lousy feeling when you realize it’s too late; and not even Superman can help you then.
Rest In Peace. Eddie Bright. The indestructible Tank. Superman.