Remembering Uncle Dave.

I met Uncle Dave the first day he became our new Division Sergeant, when he surprised me in the middle of losing my temper with a combative prisoner whom I had just arrested. I was reading chapter and verse to this prisoner who had just punched me in the mouth and I unloaded on him, throwing the proverbial hissy fit screaming and hollering so violently that I was covering the poor guy in spit.

Uncle Dave walked in in the middle of this spectacle and needless to say I was extremely embarrassed that he had seen that side of me on his first day on the job. To my delight Uncle Dave did not berate me then for my inappropriate actions with the prisoner, but he did introduce himself and shake my hand. Uncle Dave was already a legend on the Patrol and he was especially well known for his dry sense of humor. Uncle Dave was about 6'2" tall and as skinny as a rail. He had a hawk nose and wore a mustache that was just beginning to show signs of gray in it after many years a police officer. Uncle Dave was a cowboy and he spoke with a slow western drawl that reminded me so much of the old timers I had grown up with in New Mexico.

Uncle Dave had been tapped by the Western Zone Commander V.J. O'Laughlin to come to Rock Springs and reign in the ten out of control Patrolman in Division E, of which I was one. Our previous Sergeant was trying to make a name for himself and climb the ladder of rank within the Patrol, and he had goaded us and prodded us into increasing our activity (writing citations and making arrests) until we were getting a lot of complaints from the citizens of the state about our excessive activity. Uncle Dave was sent to calm us down.

Gary B. our previous Sergeant was nick named Adolf because we considered him a task master who would write us up over the smallest infractions of his rules. One of these rules was that we take no more than fifteen minute coffee breaks twice a day. The first time we went to coffee with Uncle Dave, we all jumped up to leave at the end of fifteen minutes and he almost shouted, "Sit down!", you don't leave until I leave." We sat in the coffee shop for two hours that day and we were so nervous about staying past the limit, that it took us days to finally relax and enjoy our much deserved coffee breaks.

One day Uncle Dave called me into his office for a little talk, and while we were sitting there chit chatting he said this in his western drawl, "Say T I noticed the other day that you have a bit of a temper", he of course was refering to the hissy fit he had seen me throw with the prisoner. I kind of sensed that this talk was coming and trying to prepare for the ass chewing I knew was coming said, "Yeah Sarge, I've got a pretty good temper, but most of the time I can keep it in check." He sat back and grinned at me and said, "Well T I'm gonna help you out with that temper!", and from out of his desk drawer he pulls out about a three pound smooth river rock. He continued, "Don't feel to bad, I used to have a bad temper too, but let me tell you how I got rid of it. When ever I would lose my temper, I would take this rock in my right hand and smack myself real hard in the testicles (he didn't use the word testicles) with it and my temper went away so fast that I couldn't even remember why I lost it......... and now I'm giving it to you!"

He handed the rock to me like someone who was handing a precious heirloom to his son. He never chewed me out, or mentioned the incident he saw me involved in with the prisoner in a negative way; he taught me a lesson in tact, kindness and concern in a humorous way. My immediate reaction was hysterical laughter, so hard that I fell out of my chair and rolled around on the floor in front of his desk until I thought my sides would split.

That was the humor of Uncle Dave and I have used this story many times. Because of his kindness and concern for me, I will never forget him. He's gone now, but I know this much, if Uncle Dave is not in heaven I don't want to be there.