Sandy was even more famous as the designer, builder, and perennial champion of the Flying Scot, an 18-foot sloop sailboat. I owned and skippered a Scot with my family members as crew. We can crow that we beat Sandy in a few races, but never in championship regattas.
After weekend regattas when I drove and trailed our boat back home, Maxine, the three girls and little brother sang. I was sometimes allowed to add a basso “Oom Pah Pah” ending.
You probably have guessed I had no ear for harmony. I was dubbed a ‘Crow’ in the Abilene chapter of the Society for the Preservation and Encouragement of Barbershop Quartet Singing in America (SPEBSQSA). The singers welcomed my volunteer press releases, but members never invited me to sing in a local quartet or the chorus.
One time I was able to strike a national chord when my typewriter sang a barbershop article about Gordon (Sandy) Douglass that filled a copy in one page of the SPEBSQSA national quarterly.
Early in my Abilene ‘crow’ days, I wrote an “anyone can sing” press release that invited tryouts to sing along with Key City barber-shoppers. I went and auditioned. Tried singing bass. Then baritone. Then lead. All three parts sung at the same time sounded a bit out-of-key. I was never asked to join the chorus to sing “Keep America Singing… carry a song in your heart.”
When I put my hearing aids on I can still hear the overtones and undertones of a Barbershop Quartet singing close harmony. Could use a little in our country now. Oom Pah Pah.
Image from Everett Collection at Shutterstock
