INDEX TO Advertisers
American Trucking Associations.............24 ATRI.................................................................38 Business Financial Group...........................35 Chamblee Ryan.............................................23 Cummins Sales and Service.........................3 Direct ChassisLink, Inc...............................20 Drivers Legal Plan.........................................31 Great Dane Trailers ......................................15
Great West Casualty Insurance
.............................................Inside Front Cover HOLT Truck Centers/CAT...........................4 Houston Freightliner....................................30 International Trucks/Navistar...................10 Lite-Check.......................................................39 Mack Trucks.............................................12-13
PrePass...............................Inside Back Cover Regions Insurance,
Inc...............Back Cover Southern Tire Mart ........................................8 TA/Petro..........................................................17 The Steering Wheel ..........................41, 49, 53 USI Southwest................................................18 W&B Service Company............................6-7
This publication was made possible with the support of these advertisers. They deserve your consideration and patronage when making your corporate purchasing decisions.
PRESIDENT'S Message
Big Dreams, Miles Ahead
When I was a kid, just about the time all kids get a bad case of the look-a-rounds, I found myself getting bored with the scenery.
Growing tired of hoeing weeds in the sun, and hauling out the seemingly endless supply of rocks that make their way to the surface as a result of constant plowing (or as I always suspected).
I was about 11 or 12 and my folks agreed to allow me to leave town, spread my wings a bit and spend my summers working for my grandpa. I literally worked for peanuts – I’ll explain.
I recall something one of the old ranchers who frequented my grandpa’s gas station said while he was waiting for a cattle trailer to be repaired. This was Marathon, Texas, circa 1984. I had just helped a ranch hand unload some calves in a nearby pen when the focus turned to watching said ranch hand coerce the one straggler that had managed to slip our panels.
There was a point when you could actually see this unhappy beast sizing up the seasoned cowpuncher. Even I knew this was going to be one of those interesting events that highlight those long, hot, West Texas summers.
Like a college quarterback, you could see her eyes shifting back and forth, blinking through her options. With her thoughts, so went her weight - rocking left to right, right to left. Ears trying to catch up with her head as she anx- iously twitched.
“JD…” I heard. “Pay attention here…in the conflict between man and cow, the outcome is never certain.”
YOU COULD FIND ME SPENDING ENDLESS
SUMMER DAYS TOTING AN OLD WOODEN DR. PEPPER CRATE BETWEEN
PASSENGER AND DRIVER SIDE DOORS. CLEANING OFF BUGS, BAKED ON GLASS BY HOT TRANS- PECOS WINDS. BUSTING
FLAT TIRES OFF THEIR RIMS FOR CARS AND
18-WHEELERS, HANDING WRENCHES TO MY GRANDFATHER,
RESTOCKING CANDY, PEANUTS AND FRIED CHICHARRONES (THAT’S
FRIED PORK-SKINS FOR YOU NON-LOCALS).
The rancher’s teeth gripped the tip of his tongue and without as much as a flinch, he let out a sharp, short, ear-piercing burst. This signaled a scrappy looking bob-tailed blue- heeler to shoot down from his perch on the back of an old white and rust colored pick-up truck. The toolbox from which he leaped also served as a makeshift urban habitat for pur- posely placed western diamondbacks. They make a pretty convincing deterrent to would-
Continues Summer 2016 11
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