Wednesday, September 5, 2001
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Wednesday, September 5, 2001 |
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In remembrance of Howard . . . By SALLIE SATTERTHWAITE In a picture on my book shelf, all seven of Peachtree City's mayors are standing in a row on City Hall plaza for a formal shot illustrating a 1994 magazine story. For some reason, somebody invited me to get into the picture, as a souvenir for writing the story, I guess. I never imagined they'd publish this shot, but there I am, wearing a red ski sweater and athletic shoes right in the middle of all those past and present mayors in suits and ties. I've looked at that picture often this week, and I'd like you to see what I see. The shortest person in the lineup is Howard Morgan. I have one arm draped over his shoulder and the two of us are laughing at some private joke. And I can still hear him laughing. Howard was not an uproariously funny guy. With his precisely scientific approach to life, his thoughtful and measured syntax, he tended to be pedantic. Once he had the floor and a subject he cared about like public service, or civic responsibility he seldom noticed the occasional eye glazing over in his audience. Just as well. If he'd stopped orating, we'd have lost a lot of wisdom over the past 30 years. It was my honor to serve on city council when Howard was mayor in the early '70s. His council meetings were run on the order of town meetings, sometimes lasting into the small hours in chambers blue with smoke. But when all was said and done, everyone left satisfied that his or her concerns had received respectful consideration. That was important to him. He was proud of helping to open government to the citizens. On the county level, "That was an education," he told me in an interview. "I wanted to get acquainted with the county, and when I called, I found out you only go to County Commission meetings if you had business with them. "They met in the grand jury room upstairs in the [old] courthouse with the doors closed and the blinds pulled down," he said. "Anyone with business to bring before the commissioners sat in the hall until they were called, then went in, said their piece and left. I was probably the first person ever to sit through a County Commission meeting just for the sake of doing so." A voter to the end (as poll manager for his precinct, I can tell you he voted when he could barely stand), Howard used to rail against voter ignorance, a vice he ranked worse than voter apathy. But voter apathy he knew "from painful personal experience." When he sought reelection to the city council seat he held after his terms as mayor, his supporters assumed he was a shoo-in and stayed home from the polls. This in 1984 when turnout records were broken in the national general election. He lost by half a dozen votes. We were also neighbors. Two council members, one mayor, and a former mayor lived on our street, with another ex-mayor just around the corner. Dolly Morgan was Dave's tennis partner for the "Cowan Invitational" Joel threw each summer. Dolly's now 85 and still plays. Dave does not. And we were friends. I have to tell you that the Morgans relate to two of the most mortifying moments of my life. The city was young, and guidelines scarce, and we were learning how to do government as we went along. I don't recall the details, but I think I stepped out of line by speaking to a city employee in regard to some problem, and I guess he complained. Howard called me on the carpet, privately. I'd seen him angry on several occasions, and he was this time, but polite and calm. Nonetheless, I felt like a chastised child and vividly remember his closing statement: "You were trying to do the right thing, but what you did was counterproductive." That was more than a quarter century ago. To this day, the word "counterproductive" makes me cringe. The other occasion was when Howard and Dolly invited us to dinner to see photos from their latest trip abroad and we simply forgot to go. No excuses, no reason just forgot. Nonetheless, they were gracious enough later to sit down to brainstorm with us when Dave was considering early retirement. "He takes a personal hold on what to do," Dolly said last week, still using the present tense in referring to her life partner. "When he retired at 58, he took a reduced pension, but we live kind of simply, nothing fancy, and we only have the one car." Howard showed us how they did it. They tracked every cent they spent for a year, calculated what it would cost to live in Georgia, planned their investment strategy (another of Howard's passions), and took early out. They were willing to live modestly in exchange for having time to enjoy their lives, and in fact were retired for about as long as Howard had worked. And did they enjoy it. Reminiscing last week, Dolly listed a few of the places they'd been: South America, New Zealand, the Caribbean, Mexico, China, Tahiti, Nova Scotia, Russia. "And don't forget, we crisscrossed the United States," she inserted. Howard was equally happy at home. He was an excellent musician, Dolly said, which surprised me. It shouldn't have. They introduced us to the genius of Louis Moreau Gottschalk, inviting us over to watch a videotape of the American composer's music. Dolly plays piano and organ very capably, but her husband was better than she was, she said, until he could no longer find glasses that worked right for him, and quit in frustration. Until recently, he kept up mowing his lawn constantly, as worried neighbors watching him careen about on his mower will attest and his weekly bridge game with longtime cronies. One of them, a retired Presbyterian minister, will lead his old friend's memorial service Saturday morning. "He had a good long life," Dolly said, "and we both appreciated it." I know they did. As he was enjoying the moment, the shutter froze our laughter. Howard, with your bulldog grip on things, you probably remember what that was about. I don't. But I'll remember you and what you taught me and what you did for my town. [Sallie Satterthwaite's e-mail address is SallieS@Juno.com.]
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