I am the one that is truly sorry for my second reply, I have no excuse or basis for making those statements. I can not justify those words and what I do truly believe is that you are a gifted writer and a dedicated historian. I mistakenly thought that my first reply had been deleted, but regardless, if it had been deleted it would not have been a justification for what I said.

Sincerely,

Lee Castin

As for Walker’s alleged homosexual tendencies, I do not claim to have made a determination on that other than to draw from the available record. I will say that it would not be unusual in that day for a homosexual man to marry a woman for social reasons. Additionally, it is possible that Walker was bisexual or that he at long last embraced his sexuality in the end. I do not know.

I certainly do not pretend that this story is particularly novel. There are additional records of it (which is how I found out about it); however, I did attempt at telling it in a novel way for laypersons to enjoy, I am sorry that you did not enjoy it.

Your story, however, is a very interesting one. Thanks for posting it.

Lee Castin

PS: I’m sure you will delete this too!

A few days later my father took my older brother and I to a local gun shop where he purchased two small caliber rifles. Walker returned the following week and along with my father they took my brother and I squirrel hunting in the woods in north Faulkner County, Ar. Much of the day was pretty much as one would expect sitting patiently in the woods bored waiting for something to happen. After a few hours or so we all returned to the car, I had thought to go home, but as my brother and I sat in the back seat my father and Walker returned to the woods only to return after at least two hours. During the return trip home it was the cold and extremely harsh tone that the General took when discussing politics and particularly then President Kennedy that made wonder who this man really was. I made the mistake of telling my father as Walker drove us home that I thought that we liked President Kennedy and he told me with a hard stare from the front passenger seat to be quite. I remained quite for the rest of the drive home.

Walker returned again a couple of weeks later, my father was away for some unknown reason, and it seemed odd that he would arrive after dark at our front door with flowers and a wrapped gift which he said was for my sister whom at the time was thirty years younger than Walker. My mother allowed Walker to talk to my sister in the living room and also allowed her to keep the flowers and the necklace which he had brought. This now does not make sense at all to me, other than the age difference I now know that history shows that Walker was a homosexual. (Why did he have pursued my sister?)

During the following weeks Walker returned periodically, each time my father was not at home and he had a gift and or flowers for my sister. At times Walker would phone my sister ( and even at my age of eleven it seemed odd that my mother would let her take his calls.) My sister explained that she had a boyfriend and Walker ask “Can your boyfriend buy you a big diamond ring like I can?” Again this does not make sense, because my father was extremely strict in allowing my sister to date, but I don’t remember and objection from my father in regard to Walker’s attempt to date my sister.

The final visit to our home was just before Christmas 1963, Walker had returned during my father’s absence again to find only my mother and myself at home, My mother collected all of the gifts that Walker had brought to my sister over the many weeks and ask him not to return, he placed a fifty dollar bill on the Christmas tree and said “I thought she and I might be good for each other” took the gifts and left. That was the last time I saw Walker and I did not think much about him until the past year after putting my father in a nursing home. I still don’t know what Walker’s connection to our family was or how it came about. A few months after Walker’s departure my father receive total disability benefits from the VA and never worked a job again.

My father had not ever relayed much about his military service except he now has told me that much of his service was in Washington, DC and he had been a presidential guard during WWII. This was news to me and I now wonder why he has never told me of this before.

Lee Castin

Just as a can of paint found in Picasso’s studio may find a buyer who’d pay huge amounts of money to own it, a gun owned by a terrorist may find a buyer willing to spend lots of money on something that might otherwise have a minimal dollar value. We live in a society of collectors and hoarders, when does an object have an intrinsic value that holds its own over time vs. a dollar value and simply being sold to the one person willing to pay its price as a product?

Historically speaking, there are paintings that have captured incredibly important events (both from a historically significant point of view as well as from a mundane, everyday archival point of view) thus lending themselves to the same idea of object as a memorial or a way for future generations to grieve or rejoice in historic moments or to comprehend the ordinary lives of people in a certain period of man’s existence.

I could certainly see how McVeigh’s gun could be interpreted as a ‘collectible’ by some odd character, but I can also see how it could represent a piece of history of sorts surrounding his ultimate terrorist act. It could help lend another layer to his personality and who the man was behind the act. That’s important to understand on many levels, most of all to help us try to avoid similar acts in the future. It is pretty sickening though that the gun made its way back into private hands…makes you wonder what kind of person the buyer must be. If he bought it to donate to an exhibit on the other hand…it could become an important piece of the story if communicated properly and in the context of the terrorist event itself.

by James Nimmo

(OKLAHOMA CITY) I’m sure the sham of appearing at the Capitol and giving the impression this is a legislative procedure is exactly what was intended when GOPer Sally Kern and Krew planned their morality proclamation ceremony on July 2 in Oklahoma City.

If she were interested in promoting only morality and not instead, introducing her personal religious restrictions, why isn’t she using her own church, Olivett Baptist, as her backdrop?

As always with the mentally unbalanced words and actions are morphed into absurd definitions and shapes. Lies to support other lies are always invented, regardless of how holy the intent of the lies is supposed to be.

She speaks of divorce as contributing to national decline. How short her memory is for anything except bible verses.

Kern’s patron saint, Ronald Reagan, was divorced, as is Newt Gingrich and Rumbaugh twice each. Sen. Vitter of LA likes diaper sex with paid escorts and Gov. Sandford of SC abandons his family and state duties to amorize in Argentina. Gov. Palin of AK can’t teach her eldest daughter to say simple words like, “No”.

When you don’t set yourself up on a high soap box in the first place and then mistake it for a psychiatrist’s office you don’t have to fall so inevitably far when you come up short in your own life.

Kern should spend more time looking at the fruit falling close to her family tree ( http://tinyurl.com/krahr9 ) before she tries to juice the private lives of others.

THE JOURNAL RECORD
July 8, 2009
EDITORIAL: “Sally Kern is bad for business”
by Journal Record Staff,
http://www.journalrecord.com/article.cfm?recID=100329

State Rep. Sally Kern, R-Oklahoma City, last week touted a proclamation that was embarrassing and economically damaging. She should rescind it.

Kern drafted a document she called a Proclamation for Morality. In it, she cited quotes from the Founding Fathers and the Bible, all out of context, but used to support her contention that all our nation’s ills are caused by our debauchery. Specifically, Kern claimed in the proclamation, things such as same-sex marriage, abortion and divorce are responsible for the recession.

The Journal Record covers only business and legislation. It is not within our purview to tackle the many questions of faith raised by Kern’s words.

We shall leave it to the theologians to argue theology.
complete at: http://www.journalrecord.com/article.cfm?recID=100329