Photo credit: Google maps

The beakers filled with a blue liquid were on the table after we returned from recess, some excitement was building, a science project awaited. It was 1971, our 3rd Grade year at L’Ouverture Elementary School in Wichita, and four of us were gathered at our blacktop table. One of my favorite classmates, Paul McCord was seated across from me, and he was contentiously smiling while stating a proposal to his audience:

“How much is somebody going to pay me to drink this?”

Allow me to preface the response Paul received by describing the type of 8-year-old who stared at us from across the table. Paul was energetic, exuberant, likable, and adventurous – to a fault.

“Sure,” I said. “I bet you a dollar.”

Connie Dietz was our teacher, and she’d prepared the lesson that no one experienced because Paul picked up the beaker and proceeded to guzzle all of its contents. Out of what I presume was “extreme caution,” Paul was then taken to a hospital where his stomach was pumped. He was fine, but I was a bit shaken. Paul’s father, a minister, and a very nice guy, unsettled me further though when he later asked (with a straight face) “Did you pay Paul the dollar?”

That same year, timelines escape me, two other events occurred that shaped Paul’s reputation – I was invited by Paul’s parents for a sleepover after school on a Friday, and later that evening, as soon as Paul’s parents fell asleep, Paul said “Let’s go!”

I wasn’t always an obedient child, but I couldn’t conceive the idea of sneaking out of the house, clearly against the will of my parents, and not be severely reprimanded. Paul had no intention of being punished, we left his room and quietly headed down what had to have been squeaky stairs in that old house and walked out the front door. Moments later, Paul told me to climb up a tree at a neighbor’s home and he informed me that he climbed up the tree often and could see inside some of the rooms. It was dark, and no lights were on in the house, so I don’t believe we officially did anything creepy, but it was part of an illicit sojourn that ended soon afterward when we snuck back to Paul’s house.

Weeks later, my mother hosted a birthday party for me at my house, and Paul arrived along with a few other friends from L’Ouverture. Sometime soon after arrival, Paul disappeared. We were mostly gathered in the back yard and discovered he was no longer on the property. My mother no doubt contemplated calling the police, I don’t know if parents had left phone numbers to reach them, cell phones were decades away from usefulness in these situations. Around 30 minutes later, Paul strolls back to our front yard where several other neighbors had been enlisted to search the area. Not sure why we were concerned, Paul explained that he had traveled two blocks to the east, crossing a very busy street, and then visited a different friend. Paul then walked through the house to join the party in the back yard as if nothing was amiss. I don’t know what my mother said to Paul’s parents, or in turn what they conveyed to Paul, but I wondered what impact it held for an 8-year-old who was bent on living life on his terms. His curly blond hair, blue eyes, and mischievous smile apparently forgave many sins.

Years pass, many good friends are left behind, lost track of, as school years transitioned to adulthood. In 1996, or early the following year, I received a call from Mrs. Dietz asking if I’d like to attend a celebration of life for an old classmate, Paul McCord. A few of his former friends met with his parents to reminisce about Paul and his hijinks as an elementary student. I told the three aforementioned stories, other students remembered different tales with similar outcomes, and I left the gathering feeling that Paul’s parents were pleased, not disturbed, that we had reinforced their memories of who their son was, and how that explained what transpired on October 27, 1996.

Paul entered the residency phase of becoming a doctor at Cook County (IL) Hospital, the type of challenging workplace modeled in the TV show “ER.” During that time, worked a six-week rotation at a hospital in Kotzebue, Alaska, and after his residency, he moved with his wife Amy, who he’d met while attending Northwestern.  He purchased a snowmobile, GPS system, and area maps, and within the first two years of residence in their new home of Barrow, he’d traveled thousands of miles to meet and treat indigent and other members of the rustic, frigid world of northern Alaska. By all measures, Paul was adept at handling what could be cruel weather conditions along the northern coast of the Arctic Ocean.

According to the Daily Sitka Sentinal article published November 18, 1996, the National Weather Service reported on October 26, that the coastal ice off the shore of Barrow was thin and sporadic, area wind conditions could easily cause coastal ice to float well into the Arctic’s interior. Paul was scheduled to travel the next day to tend to patients in Wainwright, a 90-mile trip, reachable within two hours at moderate snowmobile speeds.

He set out at 2 p.m. that Sunday, aware that blizzard conditions were probable, but with a task to accomplish, Paul refused to wait the storm out. As I recall from our gathering with former students, and his parents, Paul was especially concerned about a woman experiencing complications from her pregnancy.

Indeed, the storm raged on the path toward Wainwright, winds howled at over 50 mph, temperatures were well below freezing, and visibility dropped to zero. Paul persevered for 65 miles, but ominously, his satellite beacon tracking system emitted a signal at 9:50 that evening. Over six days, dozens of search and rescue vehicles, including a Coast Guard C-130 plane attempted to find Paul but failed, speculation was that he was indeed blinded by the blizzard conditions, lost his way, and ended up in the water. The National Weather Service said that coastal ice, due to this storm, had been pushed 40 miles to sea before colliding with larger floes.

“That’s how he made contact with people,” a fellow doctor said about his colleague. “He was willing to become one of them.” Paul did fit in with whichever crowd he found himself surrounded within, he was indeed an adventurer, and welcomed a challenge, even if it included navigating a snowmobile into an unforgiving Arctic storm.

Only 34, we wonder what else Paul would have accomplished, how many other patients he would have mended back to health, how many other people he would have invited into his world, and himself into theirs. Social barriers seemingly didn’t exist for Paul.

I felt remorseful telling his parents that night as we celebrated their son: “He just didn’t have any sense of limitation, he had no guard rails.”

Nothing said could have surprised his parents that evening, but if they needed consolation to help heal the devastating loss that had befallen them, knowing that Paul was both liked, and respected probably went a long way. I miss his antics, his unbridled energy, and his spirit for exploring life to its fullest.

Photo: Candor Visuals

At McCollum Elementary School in west Wichita, Mr. Haynes, the other sixth-grade teacher, set up the television in his room for both classes to watch a few World Series games that October 1963.

This was done with my teacher Mrs. Johnston, near retirement, likely eager for an afternoon off curricularly. The dear woman let us store transistor radios in our school desks and pull them out periodically (and during recess) to check the game’s progress. Though the next month that year would pitch the nation a political cataclysm, that our nation – even its schools, especially its young – could pass time together watching a game where the key player repositions his cap, fidgets with the uniform, looks around the diamond, and sometimes goes behind the mound to dust his fingers before every throw – indicates how much faster we are moving through the day than we were then.

Few schools could today pull the abovementioned off – attention spans and all of that. – Mike Witherspoon

Photo Courtesy of Lou Heldman

How long have you been working within your current profession? Have you switched careers? Once? Twice? Never? Former Wichita Eagle President and Publisher Lou Heldman reflects on his journey from high school newspaper editor to communications instructor. He’s changed jobs, but at the core of his passion, it’s been about journalism.

During your career, what is one memorable news story that in some way challenged you the most?

I am tremendously proud of the way Wichita Eagle journalists handled the BTK serial killer story, from his reemergence in 2004, in response to an Eagle article, to his capture in 2005. Our news staff, led by editor Sherry Chisenhall, produced detailed and credible reporting throughout the process, and then a riveting book, produced with the full cooperation of the homicide detectives who brought the killer to justice. That coverage required resources that local newspapers no longer have.

As you consider the integrity of news reporting over the years, and the serious challenges to that integrity many in the public display today, what do you believe can be done to improve trust in traditional print or digital media?

Sadly, in today’s us-against-them environment, I don’t see even the best-intentioned news outlets gaining trust from those whose beliefs are challenged by honest reporting. I no longer differentiate between print and digital media since virtually everything appearing in print is also in digital.

Describe a story, or series of articles, that provided the most satisfaction in your craft.

Early in my career, I was managing editor of a newspaper in Fort Wayne, IN, that was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for our coverage of a devastating flood. We had a small staff, so we all had to work to the limits of our talent and energy to produce the journalism that led to the award.

Which newspapers do you scour on a regular basis to satiate your craving for information and opinions?

In order of time spent weekly: Wall Street Journal, NY Times, Washington Post, Wichita Eagle and Wichita Business Journal. I also get news from Axios, Politico and helpful links from Facebook and Twitter. 

When you were still educating students at Wichita State University's Elliott School for Communication, which elements of the communication process did you emphasize as most fragile, or most difficult to achieve?

My courses in the Elliott School and Cohen Honors College focused on innovation and the business of media, to help students develop knowledge and critical thinking skills about the future of communications. I wanted them to be educated consumers of media and be employable.

What do you say to prospective reporters to persuade them that journalism is an important profession? 

In my experience, most of those who seriously pursue journalism have a hard time picturing themselves doing anything else. They don’t need to be persuaded. Journalism clicks with their sense of self, which often includes deep curiosity and the desire to make the world a better place.

Photo Courtesy of Bing Hui Yau

At a recent family gathering, it was suggested we describe our fondest memory of a smell, an olfactory exercise in conjuring stories from the past. It led to numerous childhood thoughts of both meaningful and whimsical moments in our lives, each standing the test of time. A warm feeling, a good laugh, a realization that something happened we never knew about, many of those anecdotes slightly adjusted our opinions — or greatly expanded our respect — for those who participated.

Would you like to share a moment for Candor? Simply type up a memory related to smell, or sight, or sound, or touch, or taste (gotta be my favorite), or, mix and match the five senses in your tale. Send it to editor@candor.news

In the meantime, here’s my attempt to include all five senses (risk-taker!) at once:

Grandmas are gold, and my mother’s mother, Velma, was a kind and caring person. When it came to her grandchildren, the word spoiled doesn’t begin to paint the picture of how each of us were treated. In the front yard, one night after a meal of homemade, gravy-style chicken noodle soup (poured over mashed potatoes, of course — how many starches are too many for a kid?), my brother, Jeff, and two cousins, Kent and Troy, headed to the front yard to engage in a friendly, yet intensely competitive, game of wiffle ball. Summer’s heat was fading, but the humidity still forced sweat as we wielded the thin yellow bat, craving the dull thud of plastic on plastic, and the attempt to round the bases, which were a decorative rock, a stick-drawn square in the dirt driveway, a tree, and the imagined spot that became home plate. The ball stung, briefly, when an opponent drilled you en route to the next base, but as much as you hated to admit it, you were out — considerably more satisfying to defenders than a forced ending when touching a base. We were too young to talk much smack — that changed soon — but for now, just a feeling of raw competition was reason enough to look forward to our time together.

Grandma eventually called us in, it was getting “too dark.” After each game, a fairly accurate accounting of the score was agreed upon, and best performances, and of course, winners, were declared. It was then that we soaked in one last round of approval from the cicadas, complained that there was still enough light, and, as always, were overruled and headed inside. The house was too small in every way, yet inviting, somehow large enough to at one time contain a family of seven. Each of us took a turn cooling ourselves at the family room’s window air conditioning unit, and then landed on a an outdated upholstered couch, or simply sat on the creaky, wooden floor. Grandma scooped out small bowls of ice cream, frequently peach, that she’d hand cranked, or too often for her liking, store bought. Though oddly adorned, the living room reflected a collection of misfit items that created a child’s quintessential environment: board games, toys (one, a metal device that spun a dial which, when settled, displayed each state’s capital), a TV, and random art and knick-knacks on the walls and furniture, typically nature-themed. My grandfather’s chair sat front and center facing the TV, and when alive, his pipe rack, along with a pouch or two of tobacco, rested behind it. Like my grandmother, he was a kindly soul, and his spirit remained in that room, greeting me each time I entered.

A train whistle, maybe a 100 feet away, signaled it was entering the crossing at Dodge Street, and soon, the doorbell rang on two occasions, my Aunt Jackie to fetch away my cousins, and my mother to take us back home. When could we come back? Pleeeeeeease?

Louis the Clown welcomed (or frightened) visitors to Joyland, which opened in 1949

Cheryl Cordry on the carousel

When the end of the school year rolls around and summer begins, my childhood memories often take me back to Joyland. As a child, we would go there for a family night outing, often including my aunts, cousins, and friends.

Everyone had their favorite ride, and mine changed over the years. I loved the Tilt-A-Whirl, but when I could reach the pedal, bumper cars became my favorite. My dad, however, loved the roller coaster and it was always his favorite - hands in the air on the first big drop! My mom did not share his love for the roller coaster and never wanted to ride, especially after he picked her up, carried her over his shoulder, and away they went in the first car. Personally, I thought Louie the Clown was more terrifying than the roller coaster!

FAMILY FUN NIGHT in front of the carousel at Joyland, circa 1956; Pictured in the Back Row are Cheryl’s aunts, Joan and Shirley Liby; the Middle Row features Patrick, Gerald, and Faye Michaud; Seated in the Front Row is Cheryl, who provided these photos

As a teenager, I remember going to the KLEO Moonlight swim. The pool was huge, with really tall diving boards and winding slides. I never did muster the courage to jump from the tallest diving board.

When my children were in grade school, the end of the school year party was always at Joyland. You haven’t lived until you ride a school bus full of loud, excited 4th graders from Andover to Joyland!

I am grateful that Joyland was still around when my first grandchild arrived. We were able to ride the train, Ferris wheel and the carousel. He was very suspicious of Louie the Clown, as well. Not long after, the park began to struggle and eventually closed. I am so thankful that Botanica has the carousel, restored and in a beautiful setting so the memories of Joyland can live on for all of us who loved it so much.