A Hudson Christmas

Christmas was different for me during the second year of college.  I stayed on campus to work and play basketball, but everyone was moved from Sutton Hall so maintenance could be accomplished over the holiday.  I shared a room in Hudson Hall with another fellow who worked in the dinning hall of the New Dorm.  He was on a work crew that refinished floors and cleaned chairs and tables.  I was assigned to a crew finishing floors in Showalter Hall. Three levels added up to a sizable amount of floors.  They were stone composition that required chemical moping followed by heavy waxing and polishing.  I learned to run the large floor polisher in addition to spending a great amount of time on the end of a mop handle.

The cafeteria had a skeleton crew on duty to feed workers from around the campus.  There was a sizable number in this group and the basketball players added additional hungry appetites.  All work and basketball practice stopped over three days of the Christmas holiday, so the cafeteria closed.  A few of us were left stranded on campus to fend for ourselves. The fellow who worked in the cafeteria brought a small canned ham from food storage to our Hudson Hall room.  We bought a few other supplies to go with it and had three days of meals in our room.  We kept the ham stashed outside under a box on a snow drift.  It kept it plenty cool so there was no danger of it spoiling.  We were pleased when our Hudson Christmas was over and we could get warm food at the cafeteria again.

When team members returned to Eastern everyone seemed exhilarated from the days off and moved forward with great zeal toward a championship.  Whitworth, our cross town rival was always doing pranks, such as taking our victory bell, hiding it, or transporting it to their campus.  One year, as mentioned previously, they painted a large “W” in our football field.  Last year as you may recall they moved the statue of Sacajawea from Showalter Hall to the front gate.  I’m not saying the Savages didn’t do things in return, but this year they broke our unbeaten string of wins at fourteen and gave the Savages their only conference loss.   Phil Jordan, Whitworth’s 6 ft. 10 in. center made 24 points, a large difference.  Two nights later the Savages invaded Whitworth’s home court and beat them by 14 points.

Several weeks later Bill Grahlman asked me if I’d like to go into Spokane with him.  He and a girlfriend had some things to do and though I might enjoy the ride.  I agreed and we left campus at about seven pm.  He and the girl shopped in several stores in a mall and I stayed behind.  Finally they returned to the car and Bill said he wanted to play a trick on Whitworth.  I didn’t know the source of his irritation with Whitworth.  We had beaten them on their home court, so that seemed to even the score to me.  It soon became clear this wasn’t just a spur of the moment thought.  Bill wanted to drive out to the Whitworth campus and leave a large “E” in their lawn.  He had purchased two bags of salt and planned to sprinkle the salt on the grass in the shape of the letter “E”.  I was astonished he would do such a thing and if caught what might happen?

It was obvious he’d made up his mind, and he wanted me to help so we could do it quickly.  He pointed out that at this hour between quarters very few if any people would be around.  He indicated we could walk in the pattern of the letter and let the salt drain slowly from the sack.  What we were doing wouldn’t be obvious and the results wouldn’t show until much later.  In a weak moment I agreed to help him so we could leave and head back to E.W.C.

We drove by the main building that had a large lawn.  Bill’s girl friend was behind the wheel and stopped to let us out.  Salt in hand Bill started laying out the big E.  I followed his tracks in the wet grass with my salt sack, reinforcing the letter.  When Bill finished he signaled to me and I completed my salting in short order.  This had only taken a minute or two and we were back in the car headed for Cheney.  We were quiet in the car for a few minutes, but then I told Bill I didn’t feel good about what we had done.  He tried to laugh it off, but I don’t think he felt that positive about our outing either.  That was the last time I saw Bill.  When spring quarter started he had left campus to join the service.
*Taken from "Which Road Should I Follow?, Volume 1, Growing up in the country", an autobiography by Edwin K. Hill.