A lasting difference

A big heart

Editor's note: The original version of this column was published Jan. 19, 2010.

It's 1964 in Harrison, Ark., population 5,280. A smallish man with a grin on his face and a bounce in his step hurries out of his Lion filling station carrying a frayed rag in his left hand.

After a moment of small talk, he asks the driver parked at the pump if he wants to "fill 'er up." Hey, why not? Gas back then runs less than 20 cents a gallon. "Check that oil?" The driver again nods yes.

The hood goes up. After wiping the dipstick on that crimson rag, the man slams the hood, then quickly sprays and wipes the windshield. Finishing up, he carries the $5 bill back to the register and pours himself another cup of coffee.

Meet Great Uncle Jim Masterson, a man with a big laugh and an even larger heart. He was a father, a World War II veteran and as ardent a high school booster as there ever was.

Several men always were plopped wherever they could find a spot to sit in the office of his small filling station, which smelled of stale cigarettes and coffee, oil and gasoline. Like a barbershop, it was a gathering place for locals to talk politics or sports, especially track and football.

His frequent visitors included members of the school athletic teams who attended class just a few blocks south along Pine Street. They'd grown up with the man's son, Alan, who'd become the quarterback for the Golden Goblins. Over the years, many of these boys had spent nights and days in the Masterson home.

No one attended more Harrison games and track events than did Jim and his buddy Tommy Harrison Sr. He cared about and supported these kids. More important, they knew he did. Jim gave much of his time and resources, even though he was never wealthy or politically influential. He was a simple man with a simple business who lived in a modest home, but whose impact was anything but simple or modest.

It became customary for dozens of team members to hang out at the station, where they'd wash their cars and talk about the "emo" stuff of teenagers. Their steady girlfriends always seemed to wind up there, too.

These were young men and women in pressed jeans and bobby socks who'd attended kindergarten, elementary school, then junior high together. Jim and his wife, Jean, knew their parents and grandparents. In many ways, he considered them his own kids.

Back when I was one of those teenagers, I envied Alan and what appeared, through innocent 15-year-old eyes, to be an idyllic life.

The filling station on the corner of Pine Street is still there, but the Lion sign is long gone. It's changed hands several times since my Uncle Jim died. Aunt Jean later remarried. She died a few years back. Then Alan, the pride of their lifetimes, passed away in 2009 at just 63.

All that remains of that once vibrant family are the memories of those who knew and cared about them--and now a plaque that celebrates how much Uncle Jim cared. But more on that in a moment.

Other than Alan and Aunt Jean, I was the last family member to see Jim before he died in 1986. It was the night before his heart-bypass surgery in Little Rock. I found his hospital room and sat on the end of his bed for almost an hour, joking and talking about his reservations. Then I gave him a hug and reminded him that many people were pulling for everything to go well the next morning.

He never made it out of the operating room. Alan called the next day to say his father had died during surgery. He was 70.

I relive this family history with you in some detail for a reason. In January 2010, the Golden Goblins' booster club in Harrison gathered 250 strong for its annual Hall of Fame induction banquet.

The group's 2010 selection committee had decided to posthumously induct Jim Masterson for his lifelong devotion to the school and its athletic programs all those decades ago. He joined his close friend, the late Tommy Harrison Sr., and about 20 others.

As a surviving relative from those years, I was asked to accept his plaque, which I did. Then I asked the football coach, Tommy Tice, if he might hang it somewhere in the Cash Field House, which seemed like a spot Uncle Jim would have liked.

Driving home that night, I reflected on how any of us can know the impact of our lives on others. For a group of folks in my hometown to decide decades later to honor Uncle Jim for his service affirmed for me that the things we do matter and can make a lasting difference, although we might not see it at the time.

More than anything, the recognition was further confirmation of the truth that everything we do to benefit ourselves is buried right along with us when our time to depart arrives. It's only what we do to benefit others that endures beyond our lifetimes.

------------v------------

Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected].

Editorial on 11/15/2015

Upcoming Events