You can count the number of home games my Dad has missed in the past 80 years on one hand. One of the best examples of his dedication to his Alma Mater happened in 1963. My sister Brenda and I were riding with mama and daddy on our way to meet Uncle Hugh in Fulton, Ms., when a car was passing another in a blind curve struck us head on doing 60 mph on Aug. 22. I remember the date because it was one day before my grandpapa’s, this was my daddy’s father, birthday. I was 5 years old and was laying in the back-back of our Ford Station Wagon asleep, and only suffered a large bump on the head. My sister Brenda was in the back seat and the metal Pepsi cooler in the back with me slid into her back and bruised her shoulder. My mother was in the front passenger seat and got broken glass from the window in her foot. But, my Dad took the full impact of the wreck and broke his right leg and right arm, several ribs, 2 fingers and 2 toes. Years later, a doctor would comment on an x-ray that was taken of his neck and said that he possibly broke his neck as well. Anyway, the couple that lived in the house where the wreck occurred let us use their phone to call Charles and Gwen to come and get us. I remember being fed watermelon and that is all I remember of this accident. I have no other mental images to draw from and I must rely on my sister, Kathey, for the details of this event, even though she was not even there. She was staying with my grandfather, Ike Hill, in Atlanta at the time. According to Kathey, Daddy did not complain about his leg but was concerned about getting my mother’s foot cared for. The next morning his right foot was black and swollen and he went to see his family doctor in Decatur. Dr. so and so immediately admitted him into Decatur General, where he stayed for a week with his leg in elevated in a sling until the lacerations had healed and the swelling had gone down enough to set his leg and put it in a cast up to his thigh. Now, he missed the opening game that season on Sept. 6th, but he exclaimed that he would go the following week. My mother drove him to her father’s house in Atlanta, and Ike helped him tape a crutch to his cast on his right leg, since he could not hold on to it with his right arm that was also broken. My poor mother had to drive him to the game, help him in and out of the car, help him up two ramps and up 23 steps to his Alumni seats, all the while praying that he would not fall and break his neck, which as I said before, was probably already fractured. I always stayed with grandpapa on game day or went to the Fox Theater, so I do not remember the game or who won or lost. But, I do remember that my Dad was not going to miss the game, not as long as he was breathing. These past few years that I have been taking my Dad to the games in a wheel chair that I have to lug in and out of the motor home, and push him up those same 2 ramps and help him up those 13 steps to his Alumni seats that he insist on sitting in, since he has been doing so for 60 years, I try to think of my mother and my step-mother who went to the games with him for 25 years, must have endured. I know that I complained a lot these past 10 years taking my Dad to the football games and loading and unloading him in and out of that motor home, and pushing him up those 2 ramps and carrying him to his seat, but I wish I was taking him this fall to the 2014 season opener. I will miss taking my Dad to see his favorite team play.