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The Coffeebreaker talks about: Gene and Me

I was looking at the local news on my computer the other day and a sports article liked to have shook me out of my Gene Autry cowboy boots.  It started out, Back in the Saddle is a classic song done by Roy Rogers.  It dates back to 1941, well, before my time (end of quote).  I felt as if col…

Where does women's soccer go from here?

Where does women's soccer go from here?

  • Caleb Turrentine

Ever since the final whistle of Sunday’s World Cup final, I don’t think I have stopped being in a good mood. Despite the U.S. men’s soccer team losing to Mexico in the Gold Cup final that same night, the feeling of seeing the women’s national team win back-to-back world titles is something t…

What, me worry about MAD’s sad demise?

  • Michael Bird
  • Updated

Alfred E. Neuman, the mascot of MAD magazine for most of its existence, would probably make fun of the press release announcing, essentially, the death of the magazine last week.

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Dubay to give away 750 American flags July 4

Combat veteran Dr. Greg Dubay and fellow members of Operation Combat Bikesaver will hand out free American flags Thursday at the intersection of Highway 14, Barnett Boulevard and Friendship Road in Tallassee.

ALDOT won’t close interstate lanes for holiday

As an added precaution during the heavily traveled Fourth of July holiday, the Alabama Department of Transportation is doing its part for road safety by having no temporary lane closures on Alabama interstates after noon on Wednesday through …

We Are Loaded With Benefits

  • By Mike McElroy

I wonder if young people still use an expression we did when I was a teenager. It referred to having money. If someone thought I had more money than they did and therefore should buy them a Dr. Pepper after school, they’s say, “Come on, man, you’re loaded.” Blessed be the LORD, who daily loa…

Sweet Young’Uns still purveying timeless hits

  • Willie Moseley

Like the 1960s rock band The K-Otics, The Sweet Young’Uns have Tallassee roots but their chronology is pretty much the opposite from the band cited in last week’s column.

All Authority Calls for Total Obedience

  • By Andrew Schmitt

My son has entered the phase of his young life in which he asks, “Why?,” in response to seemingly every command I give. Oftentimes, my response is, “Because I said so.” Admittedly, there are times when I surmise that this is a lazy alternative to an otherwise fuller explanation. However, the…

Local music history is enduring

  • Willie Moseley

I was out of town on business weekend before last so I missed the concert at the Mt. Vernon Theatre during the “Tallassee Now” event.

Starr epitomized the definition of class

  • Willie Moseley

If you look up the definition of the word “class” it wouldn’t be surprising to encounter a photo of former Green Bay Packers quarterback Bart Starr.

A to-do list on Lake Martin for this summer

A to-do list on Lake Martin for this summer

I’ve been in Alexander City for more than two years and spent two great summers here, but there’s still so much I haven’t done. The life of a sports editor is a busy one; I’m constantly running from one event to another, trying to cover all our area sports as best as possible and attempting …

Summertime is not really an offseason for sports fans

As the spring sports schedule started winding down, I have to admit I got a little bit excited knowing I was going to have some nights to myself without work for a while. Between baseball, softball and soccer, there was very little time for rest.

Be careful what you post on social media

  • Lizi Arbogast

We’ve all heard the warnings about social media postings before. Whatever is posted on the internet stays there forever. You can never truly delete something. Those posts can follow you forever.

Why replay in sports is a good thing

Why replay in sports is a good thing

  • Caleb Turrentine

Even if you missed what happened at Churchill Downs on Saturday, there is no doubt you saw a post on social media about how instant replay was ruining another sports moment. After “The Most Exciting Two Minutes in Sports” appeared to be over, there were people in a small video room determini…

Denison left legacy for generations of musicians

Denison left legacy for generations of musicians

  • Michael Bird

Dr. William Rae Denison, director emeritus of the John M. Long School of Music at Troy University and director of the Collegiate Singers for over 30 years, passed away in February after a brief battle with cancer.

The 12th Precinct revisited

The 12th Precinct revisited

  • Michael Bird

Late 1970s New York City. Mean streets, dangerous times. A dingy squad room. Underpaid detectives. A compassionate leader occasionally overwhelmed by the pressures of his job as the captain.

American industry and ‘the Ozymandias syndrome’

  • Willie Moseley

The community is several states’ distance from Alabama but a recent visit evoked a comparison to the travails Tallassee and innumerable other American communities in more than one state have experienced. Such personal contemplation seemed to be unavoidable.

Give a boy a chinaberry, step back and watch

Give a boy a chinaberry, step back and watch

  • Ronald Brantley

Recently I wrote a column about the things I hoped my new great grandboy would experience and one of those things was to ride a stick pony made from a chinaberry tree. The response from readers has been overwhelming.

New TV drama about UFOs not a soaring success In the summer of 1967, I faked a photo of a UFO “buzzing” the WCOV-TV broadcast tower on Adrian Lane in south Montgomery and I almost got away with it. The image passed magnification scrutiny by an employee at Shop 21, a photography hobby store on Court Square downtown, but a phone call from a television reporter to our house motivated my mother to immediately kibosh my spurious initiative. I called the reporter and fessed up but I had the satisfaction of knowing my ruse had worked. I still have the photo. In that era, reported sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs) were plentiful, and a U.S. Air Force program called Project Blue Book was in charge of investigating such phenomena. Fiction about space travel, life on other worlds and interplanetary invaders dates back as far as the late 1800s (H.G. Wells’ “War of the Worlds”) and sci-fi pulp magazines have been around for almost a century (Amazing Stories debuted in 1926). Moreover, a 1902 French movie called “A Trip to the Moon” was based on Jules Verne novels. However, toward the end of World War II, some military pilots began reporting unexplained lights that followed or circled their aircraft. Such phenomena were dubbed “foo fighters” and authorities had various convenient explanations for such sightings. In the late 1940s, public interest in unexplained encounters with “something in the sky” mushroomed. There was the fabled 1947 Roswell incident (a reported UFO crash in New Mexico) as well as sightings of airborne objects (usually disc-shaped) by veteran airmen. In 1948, a Kentucky Air National Guard pilot was killed when his airplane crashed after he climbed to chase a high-flying UFO. Hollywood soon picked up on the concept of aliens visiting Earth. Most plots envisioned invasions but 1951’s “The Day The Earth Stood Still” presented a benevolent ambassador named Klaatu who arrived in Washington, D.C., in a giant flying saucer to warn Earthlings against spreading their violence beyond their own plane. That film was arguably one of the greatest movies of all time. Project Blue Book was initiated in 1952 and continued through 1969. In its 17-year history, the program’s research reportedly didn’t discover any threat to national security or evidence to indicate that UFOs were otherworldly. The late ‘70s witnessed a brief television series called “Project U.F.O.” which was produced by Jack Webb of “Dragnet” fame. It followed the efforts of two Air Force investigators of unexplained aerial phenomena. The weekly voiceover introduction was memorable, as Webb intoned “Ezekiel saw the wheel …” Now comes “Project Blue Book” on the History Channel. It, too, is based on the original Air Force initiative and interpolates the exploits of J. Allen Hynek, a real-life investigator who was an advisor to Project Blue Book and two shorter-lived earlier programs. However, this new series has been about as exciting as stirring a bowl of skim milk. Chock full of cardboard actors and cookie-cutter plotlines, “Project Blue Book” presents a perhaps expected allusion to a big government conspiracy, which includes the deaths of witnesses. All the military guys in the show are publicly adamant that UFOs don’t exist. Not surprisingly, the cigar-chompin’ generals and their subordinates are maneuvering to keep that perception intact. While I’ve missed an episode or two, it seems like things have gotten more outlandish on a weekly basis. One plot turn revealed the government is performing mind-research experiments on military pilots who encountered UFOs but those pilots thought the UFOs were communicating with them telepathically, so go figure. There are also other clichéd facets like a sub-plot involving Soviets spies and Hynek’s unsuspecting wife, atomic testing and a mysterious man in a black outfit who’s shadowing Hynek. The hype for “Project Blue Book” notes “the cases depicted are based on real events” and each real-life incident that inspired a weekly episode is briefly noted at the conclusion of the program. One would suppose such references are to the credit of the show’s creators but this series isn’t too inspirational. I’d be willing to bet more people have seen UFOs than might be willing to admit such encounters. That said, “Project Blue Book” isn’t particularly a compelling series, even if a viewer has been there, done that.

  • Willie Moseley

By: Willie Moseley