Frank Player class of 1929 conducted by Stephen Gains on August 17, 1994 at Mr. Player's home in Atlanta, Georgia. The subject of this interview is Student life at Georgia Tech. Mr. 

Player, as we discussed earlier, I'm going to open it up for you to tell us about some of your experiences at Georgia Tech. 

Well, there's a great deal of difference in today's Georgia Tech and in my day. Some of the things that were very prominent in my day and no longer in existence. 

I mentioned first that is that I entered in the cooperative course in 1924, and back in those days, a co op course. I went to school four weeks, and then went out in the industry and worked four weeks. 

Well, I found that that was very confusing it. 

Commit yourself coming and going, and I understand that several years later and up to the today's date, the Coop course has been changed to a quarterly basis. Which is much more sensible than every four weeks. Changing. 

Well, my first job in the co op program was in a steel fabricating plant out in East Point. And I lived at that time out in Druid Hills, had no automobile. Very few Georgia Tech students had automobiles in those days. I had to get up at 05:00 in the morning and catch the street car on postal. 

Now, that street car track has been taken up since then, so the changes there, I ride into town down to five points and get on the East Point car from there to be at work out in East Point by 07:00 And I found out, first thing I found out was that working that long and that hard, I got hungry. I couldn't wait to lunch. 

So I got up a little extra early and made myself a good fit fat sandwich and put it in my pocket so that somewhere between seven in the morning and 12 noon, I could get a few bites off that sandwich, and that took care of me. 

Well, I enjoyed my work out there, but at the same time, this business of in and out every four weeks, I brought up the fact to me, that just wasn't able at any time to have any part in life on the campus. 

So the next year I changed over to regular, but in order to do that, I had to go to summer school to make up the difference. To catch up with the regular courses. 

Well, that did transpire now. 

The first class that I remember at Georgia Tech, and I never forgotten, never will back in those days to another factor that was present in those days. 

Mechanical engineering students who were required to participate, take part in a study course in wood working and in electrical working, and in foundry and machine shop. And my first assignment was in the wood shop. And there I met a very engaging and unforgettable character. And Uncle Hany was an elderly man. He may not have been as old as I am right now, but he looked at old but he was didn't act. He had a beard like Santa Claus. He made a good Santa Claus. 

He had a wonderful cherry atmosphere and about him, well, the first thing he did, it took us in the wood shop with all these machines that most of us had never seen before. And he called us over to an assembly plant. Assembly portion of the shop where the tools were stored. 

And they were locked up behind a wire fence and over that, over the entry to it was a large case, about I guess about 33.5 ft, containing a lobster. A great, big lobster. And look behind he assembled us freshman in front of that, under that lobster. And he said, I want you fellows to look at that lobster. Look carefully at it. See a little great big claws that he has. He said, I want to tell you something. You're in the middle now of a great here of sharp instruments that can cut off your hand. Finger and just a bit of an eye. Lobster is a whole lot smarter than many of you, and he can do things that you can't do, never do. 

If he were to lose one of those claws in short time, relatively, nature would permit him to replace that claw. 

But if you fellows lose one quarter of an inch of any one of your fingers on this sharp equipment, it's gone for the rest of your life. Never be replaced. That story sunk into, I think all of us, They certainly did. Me and I've never forgotten. It never will. I loved Uncle Heni and enjoyed working with him and training that we got up there. 

And the use of tools has become very much appreciated by a good many wives which you will have in the future about worked around the house. 

If you want to hear about something that took place on the outside of Georgia Tech, outside of the grounds, which also has made a great impression on me. 

Bill Fincher, who was one of the system football coaches, Big man, great Big Schepel thought it would be a fine idea to get as many of his boys who were football players or other athletes together and on a construction project. 

So he came up with a deal down in Florida, down middle Florida, and he let it be known that this was available and to sign up the limit of 35. 

So I signed up and we assembled to go to Florida in a bus that contained, I think it was 37 passenger bus, the driver and system, and then 35 passengers. 

That bus came to the corner of North Avenue and Tech Wood, and that's where we assembled at 07:00 one morning. And I used to have a picture of that but let out the should shouldn't tell him. I guess I borrowed that and it disappeared. Never have found. 

It says he just can't remember giving somebody alone but they didn't bring it back and he forgot who it was. 

So I had to let go at the lost. 

That picture of a good photograph of all of us lined up, stretched out across the front of the side of that bus. And we loaded into the bus and let out for Florida. And we rode all day. And you must remember today, the roads are so far superior to the ones that we were on them. 

We were on, for a large part of it, almost a single passage roads and some unpaved entirely and some on brick. 

Anyhow, we made it as far as Tipton the first day, and we put into a likely looking filling station and to spend the night. And I made my first big mistake on that trip. We were so happy. 

I was I was so glad to get out of that bus bouncing around all over the road, that I spied quite a pile, a rope, big rope, inch, inch, inch and a half in diameter, But all thrown in a corner at that filling station, I said, that's going to be my bed, so I piled on that rope. And for a little while it felt real good. 

But as the night went on, it got harder and harder. And the next day I had bruises all over my back and sides from sleeping on that on that coiled rope. 

So don't ever do that. Remember that? 

Well, we got on down to Sebastian, that's about mid Florida. Somewhere a little bit north of Vero Beach. And the place we were going, we unloaded, it looked like a prison camp. Because we went in and we found that the prepared some huts for us. Small houses, wood houses up on on blocks, maybe about 2 ft off the ground. And we were assigned for to a cabin. And we got our assignments and got some rest. Then we spent that night there. We didn't go to work until the next morning. 

But we were given a meal. And that meal was a revelation, the principal. Part of that meal, I think was the fact that we had only sulfur flavored drinking water. And then we found out that we had a glass of milk and by golly, and milk was diluted. It was, it was canned milk diluted with sulfur water. And so then we were expected to go to work the next day. And the work that we were assigned, it took the 35 of us to do the whole area. That was to be a golf course, part of this real estate development place. Our job was to get out as far as we could see in open ground and dig up palmetto roots. 

If you ever tried to big dig up a palmetto root, that would be a good experience for you because it's tough, it fights back in area has tunnels that run out in the ground and they're just like wire. We had mattos to dig out festal roots and we were pretty well whipped at the end of that day. 

So another encounter we had, but we were so whipped from a day's work out in the hot sun that we weren't aware of the presence of most tremendous mosquitoes I ever saw in my life. 

They were so big that in writing back home, I knew that Pops wouldn't believe any verbal description later. 

So I've reached out and easily caught one, squeezed it, and pressed it out and put it in my letter. Here's the Gal Nippers, they call them down here that are eating up. Get the first claim I'll ask you to send me is a mosquito net, a good, big, strong one. 

So, they did, and we put up the mosquito net. In the meantime, there was present all around this Spanish moss. 

I don't know whether whether you're familiar with that or not, but Spanish moss hangs from the trees and it will burn slowly and may go out of smoke. 

So we found that we could get a big hunk of that moss and set it on fire in our cabinets. And it wouldn't flame. It would just smoke and smoke and that would run the mosquitoes out. 

So we would open up the windows and and run the mosquitoes out with the smoke from that moss, and then close the windows and and go to bed. And that worked worked fairly well, but the mosquito nets were being the working conditions. We found that under that hot sun, the less clothes we had on, the better off we'd be for a while. 

But of course, the intensity of the sun burning some of us, I know one of the boys in my hut got so badly blistered. 

That poor boy was that it was out of commission for three or four days because he had big blisters all over his back. 

So we had to be careful and shock off our clothing little by little, but we eventually, in a few weeks, reached the point where all we wore was a pair of rough shoes. Most of us had football shoes that we wore, a leather shoes and a very short, very brief shorts. And we were able to stand that, that sunshine. 

Of course, when we got back to Atlanta, we were, I was afraid that I had to ride the street car every day, every morning, whether or not they were going to let me sit in front of the car. 

We were so brown, black from that back in those days, we did not have the assignments of areas where we had to pick them well. Everything went along pretty well there until pretty close to time to leave. 

And back in 1926, this was, there was a big hurricane that came up and it hit Miami and did tremendous number of damage there and came on up and visited us. 

So we were bound to enter our cabins for three or four days while this hurricane proceeded. And it was terrific. I never seen anything like it. Several of our huts were turned over completely with people in them and poison. Nobody was seriously hurt, but it were deprived of any sheldhoodt. All and funny little thing happened always, but for amusement at some, if you look for it. We had no indoor bathrooms. They were all outside. And it was one not far from our cabin that looked like a telephone booth. And I happened to be looking out the window and of our cabin. 

And I saw this, what appeared to be a telephone booth fall over and start rolling from the force of the wind and rain. And it went up against another tree and stopped. And fortunately, it stopped with the doors on top, and the door went up and a man came out of there. And it looked like somebody rising from the bed, coming, fell out of the casket. 

Well, God got a little laugh out of that. 

But more and more water began to accumulate in our cabin, and we were wondering how we're going to get rid of it. Fortunately, it hadn't turned over. 

It has gone back on its haunches and shake, and we listed, it all died down and let us flop back down. 

But we began to get water in our floor and we had, after we got about 3 " of water covering the whole floor, I hit on an idea. 

I mentioned earlier, I believe the workshops that tech provided for required for freshman to enter, and while in those workshops, made several items which I found real handy. And on this occasion, I had a hammer which I had made and a chisel which I had made. 

So, I got out that hammer and chisel and sat down in the water and cut a hole about 4 " square in the in the middle of the cabin, and drain water out through that. 

Well, that's enough. I think about that experience, but not quite. I needed to save every cent that we made. We were paid we were told $5 a day. 

And we didn't know until the end that it was really only $4 a day because they took out $1 for our board. And I had take we found a little bank up in the city of Sebastian about a mile and a half away. And I just took my envelope every week. Every Friday we got paid off up there and put it in the bank. 

And when the departure time approached, well, I guess it's time for me to work the bank and get that money out and I want to forget it surely. 

So I hiked up to the bank, and as I got there, I saw the biggest chain and the biggest padlock I ever saw. I think hang on that bank. And it was pulled and every cent of my pay for the whole summer's work was lost. That concludes, I think that that's enough for you. I know that. I experience that. I'll never forget. I ask about the professors. We were very close to our professors in those days. I hope they still are. You fellows, that process now are the same. 

But there were people like DM. Smith, he was a math teacher and he was just a love everybody. All of the people in my class certainly, and others that I've spoken to just loved him dearly. 

And also he was great on coaching delinquents, to bring him up to Tar in almost any subject that he could say. 

But he specialized, of course, in mathematics. And I remember my last year, I was fortunate. I was not a good scholar. I flunked several courses. Wasn't no use to be ashamed of everybody else was flunking to. 

But in my senior year, I got on the hang of it and got out of all the exams except math, calculus, and Dean Scholes was a professor of that. 

And I knew that I, I had not been doing very well in calculus examination came, and I had to pass it in order to to graduate. 

So, I went to DM. 

Smith and I told him my situation, and I said, don't you think you can help him get through calculus And he said, why? 

Sure. All right. I don't think we can do if you're willing willing to follow what I tell you and go and really work. And I had two weeks from that time to the time of the examination. And I had that time all day. 

So I took coaching lesson from DM in the morning, then I went home and studied all afternoon. And finally, the day came and I felt fairly at ease and I went through that. 

And then the next day or so, I was still back my fingernails and so get through that, that calculus exam and I ran into a skills. 

And he said, I'm amazed I said at you're going to flunk me out He said, no He said, you surprised me He said, you had the best paper class and I'm going to give you I've already agreed. I'll give you 96 myself. 

Well, that really relief and that was one experience I had with, with the professor. 

Well, I'm running a little bit bit short here now. I want to talk about something else. 

Okay, well, staying on the subject of professors, are there any other professors that you can remember? 

Do you have any stories about professors on campus? 

Maybe some funny stories of things they did. 

Well, we used to think that our professors were real old. None of them probably as old as I, except Uncle Heinie. 

But have you ever heard of Bo cap Fields? 

You heard good deal about him, I guess. Please tell us. We don't know how he was. 

I never had a class under him, but he was a character and he drove a T model forward, didn't even have a starter on it. He got out of creation and he parked it right at the west entry to the administration building. Right up to the close where he could get out and get the left. We get between the brick in the building and the cranked of his car. He was quite a character. And I don't know that anybody ever called him Boca to his name. 

But that Boca was known by the name boat was known all over the campus. And everybody admired him and loved him. He was a good, good man. Let's see who else we want to talk about now, Dr. Britton. Dr. Britton was one of the most lovable characters I think I have here. In fact, I had to go back and talk to Dr. Britton about a loan because my money was all tied up in that bank. I had hoped to have enough to go to school. No fees at school were vastly different from what they are today. 

I think the high you paid by the semester, and I think the highest my bill ever was was $72 for tuition in Georgia Tech. 

But anyway, I had to go to talk to Dr. Britton about a loan. And told him about my experience down in Florida and putting all my money in the bank and losing. 

So he made arrangements for me to have enough credit to pay the feet. And I saw him on numerous occasions and always very pleasant, very pleasant to everybody. As a matter of fact, is lovable character. Who else do you have on tap? 

We want to talk about. Steve, you had mentioned basketball that you'd like to hear a little bit about. Basketball. 

Well, basketball was nothing like a prominent back in those days as it is today. 

But then but so how? 

My first consideration of basketball, the court that I went out on was on the east side of the present athlete, present headquarters for the Alumni Association. And it was an outdoor court up on an elevated level to bring it up to the street level. 

And it was, the floor was made of two by six pieces with about a quarter of an inch of airspace for drainage on it. That was the base, that was the basketball court at Tech. 

And many of the games had to move down to the YMCA to deal with the YMCA, the use of the white basketball court. 

But during that period, we did get a court quotation mark built over at the corner of Third and Tech Wood. And a farmer must have built it because it was built exactly like a dairy farm. It had seats along the sides of only about 500 people. Believe the floor was was was all right. 

Except that it was used for very other purposes being drilling, military core would be in there drilling and when the weather was bad and we bring in their accumulation of sand and dirt and I don't think the core got swept more than once. 

Every week or two, slide on that surface of the sand acting like like walls of road log lets you side on. And that had 12 12 by 12 piers that held the roof. And I found out that it was an excellent source, providing the dribbling experience. 

And I can check out a basketball and go down there and that dusty court and throw the ball up against one of those wooden peers, won't pi piers, and then catch it, pivot and go to the next one and do the same thing down the court. And that provided a pretty good practice session. And I knew I had stepped in there from high school. I played basketball in high school. Factors, captain of my team. And I knew that I was going to have to hustle to make college basketball. That's the reason I practiced rib dribbling by bouncing ball against these peers. And then I also practiced foul shooting by myself. 

But I threw up to the to the basket ball while I was doing all of this during the lunch hour, the schedule on the campus was 11:00 on was was vacant and he'd have 11 to about one also. 

Every day during the year, I would go down there by myself to this barn and practice basketball for handling basketball. And Roy Nor, who was a math teacher was our coach. He had played basketball in college and he was pretty fair coach, but we never were. The category of champions, we had a pretty good record and we had lessons in geography and traveled. 

We traveled all over the West, the eastern part of the United States, and particularly during Christmas, I don't remember while I was in college of ever having Christmas at home. 

We were out on basketball trip and we went up through Ohio and Indiana and Pennsylvania and Michigan, and played playing those teams. 

I'll have to admit, we got beaten by most of them, but we had great experience and learning basketball. We found that basketball was played in different geographical locations quite differently. One for instance, Ohio was rough and tumble, just slam bang and go over into Indiana. And the area was very fast and swift and good ball handling and so on. 

And we had God, I can't think of all the different experiences that we had on trains and playing in different circles of basketball, but it was interesting. The only bad part about it was that I found I couldn't keep up with my scholastic work. 

We were, we were playing nine or ten games in 1012 days and I was just plumb, worn out and was not able to do that. I got behind a couple of times in my studies and but all in all, it was a great experience. That's quite different from the beautiful facilities that they have today. The quality of boys coming in. 

Now, none of us were on scholarships, that didn't come along until some years later. We all were hardworking people who paid the full tuition. That's about all I think I can legitimately tele basketball. It has constantly improved and its quality and facility. 

And nowadays, it's I'm sorry to say, but it's necessary if you don't have a top basketball team and football team, and even now baseball team, you've got to have scholarships to give these qualified quality players come into. 

And it's sad to me that a boy who had not brought into the school on any of those scholarships is never welcome to even try out for the team. If he hadn't scholarship, the coach is going to have time for him. That's too bad. 

I think a boy ought to be able to have an opportunity to participate in any of those sports if he has a desire or some ability to do it. 

Well, let's move on and we discuss basketball. 

I'd like to ask you about some of the other organizations that you were involved in during your time at Tech. 

Could you tell us some things about the fraternity you were involved in? 

I was a member of the SPE, Signify Epsilon fraternity and had a very delightful experience with them. I was not living in the fraternity house. I lived at home and came back and forth by a street car. No, very few of us had automobile. I understand that today, parking space for student cars is one of the greatest problems on campus. And I don't believe there are over a dozen automobiles owned by students when I was in school. Most of the fraternities including mine. 

Had a T model car that they had bought a junkyard foro $25 And then the boys at the spare time would work on that car and get it running so that by the weekend they could have it available to get some $0.15 gallon gasoline, about three gallons, and put it in that old car and run around to visit the girls. 

Social pattern in those days is vastly different from her day to the fraternity house would, who wants to go to so and so, and so, and so, and those that volunteer and all jump, pile in and fill up for a T model forward and go around and make a stop at this girl's house. 

And they'd all pile in and stay for a little while, and then they get back into the T model and go to another girl's house. 

But none of that seems to go on at all anymore. I think that's ridiculous. 

But we enjoyed it. 

I know the girl, I'm sure the girls enjoyed it too, having very few of us in those days dating one particular girl. 

Well, not many of the girls in those days with dating one boy. 

My wife was very popular in college and she says, well, I never thought about timing myself down to one day one boy and I just dated around 56 or eight different dates. Anybody called me for a date? 

I was honored and pleased to have a date. In fact, I knew I knew her back in those phase two. 

She and one other girls was still in life, were considered two of the most beautiful girls in the college circle. I was not even in consideration. Back in where in the background. 

Let me ask you, do you have any memories associated with being part of the cosine club? 

Well, I was a member and war cosine had around for a while, but we really did very little. If nothing, I don't think nothing of any real consequences. Did you have any kind of initiation ceremony you had to go through? 

A little bit. A little bit. Not wild. I see. I guess one of the projects of cosine was to gather up from the girls in the community. Cakes for, for the cake, Rum, the freshman cake. Rum and cosine assumed responsibility for that. And that's about all I know of that, don't remember that we really did. 

But the girls would, would bake a cake and bring it as their contribution to the run. And then there would be one of them elected to make the presentation to the winner. And everybody, consecutively, beginning with the winter on down, got a cake as far as the cakes went. And there would be maybe 35, 40, close to 50 cakes that the girls had brought in. And the first 50 of them would get got a cake. Do they still have the cake race? 

No. I had a disappointing experience with the cake race myself. I was in, I guess, the best physical shape I've ever been in at that time. And I decided I was going to win the cake race. 

So a day or two before the cake race, I went out. I had been running in exercising every day, but not specifically for that. 

But I decided to enter the cake race. 

And I learned what the time of it was and just by myself, I went out and the course was started on the Grant Grant field. 

And then I went out a big old wooden gate, used to be there at the north end and ran across and headed north. 

And there is a big sewer pipe that runs right in the middle of Grant Field and runs up, right on out to 14th Street. And It's a tremendous thing. 

And the race started in Greenfield and went out to North Gate, and very soon got on top of that sewer and ran to 14th Street and then down 14th Street to the waterworks back. And that's a long pull from 14th Street back. It doesn't look very long if you're in the automobile now, but it's a long, hard pull. 

So I decided I would run that course myself at a phenomenal speed and just got acquainted with it. 

So I did and I had no trouble in running in the timing that previous winters had come in. I thought, gosh, it's easy. 

I said I'm going to run over that pipe and get to the 14th Street and come back and just kind of loaf and then when we got back toward that pipe, I was going to speed up and come in went. 

So my strategy boomerang on me worked All right. Until I got back to that pipe and I was going to pass everybody there. And I couldn't get by anybody ahead of me. And you could if you run over too far to the right or too far to the left, you'd slip off that pipe. You had to stay in the middle of it and got to be a single file vacuum. And instead of coming in first, I came in 35th. That old pipe still has that. There was a terrible breakage of it some months ago. I don't think as much as exposed now as it used to be. That was I believe it was 9 ft in diameter. That pat concrete just made a perfect single file path path. 

But that's all. No more. 

Well can do you have any memories of the both club? 

Both, yes. 

You know, Bulldog club and and the cosine or considered honors to be elected to, but they really didn't do much. They had the initiation, had parties, each bulldogs. Have you heard about the initiation of the bulldogs? 

I guess you have. Please please tell us your experience. Please please tell us your experience with that. We'd love to hear it. 

Well, the big feature of their biggest part of their initiation was it you were required to go out to a certain girl's house and knock on the door, or ring the bell and see you come for dinner. 

And this was on assumed, and I and the girls wouldn't like to admit it, but they were all excited and just hope I get a bulldog. I get a bulldog, you know. And they were usually enough to go around pretty well. 

And I'm not going to tell you who mine was because she she's still very active and good friend, but I don't want to presume to have her name on tape, but you were supposed to go in and not say anything, except I've come to dinner and the family was supposed to be, oh my goodness, you're okay. Had to have him sit down to the table and have dinner with the family. And you were required to do some foolish thing like pull out a ham sandwich or dog. And after worst meal I ever had. Granda Brohm, how that will vary from fraternity to, I mean from individual to individual. The year to year, the things that they, that they do and save. 

But then in that vein, giggling on the part of the family and especially any younger children that happen to be at the table supposed to be embarrassed, and then you get up and walk off. That's the worst meal I ever had. 

I'm glad I brought my Then some of them would take one being initiated out or out in the suburb somewhere, and wherever they they choose and make them get out of the car and leave them. And that got to be rather dangerous. I don't think they ever do that anymore, but leave them in unfamiliar territory midnight or later. 

Did you hear that from from some of the other part of that? 

Well, could you tell us some about your experience being on the student council? 

That's a long time ago. I don't remember too much about that. 

I know we had I had several meetings with the student council, but forgotten those problems that we brought up and individuals discussed. No. 

I really, really they didn't take me quite a while to recollect that or that nothing momentous as far as my my experience on the counsel, the honor of being on it and privileged. And we did counsel met infrequently. 

But we did meet and we discussed problems that came up on the campus. 

But specifically, I can't recall any but Frank Gordy, I knew Frank Grody well up until the time of the visited death. He was not actually in my class at take. 

He was, he won one year ahead with me, But I knew him there and he was a very energetic and enterprising young man. 

He availed himself of a period in our day of a holiday, an hour between 11:00 and one of free time on cameras, and he didn't want to waste that time. 

So there was a little service station on the corner across from the Coco building, which is now a beautiful little part. 

But this was an ugly little old building that stood there on that corner. 

And Frank made some sort of arrangements with them to rent him a little place that wasn't any larger than the smallest telephone booth right on the corner of that building, corner of Lucky Street and Off Avenue. And he read that corner up with a electric hot plate, and he's set up L. And he built a screen in front with a sliding window on it. And he started making hot dogs and selling them to the students. 

And he did did very well with that little, he wasn't over 18, " the hot plate and this little screen door to push him out. And he would go over there every day at 11:00 which began the con period in the curriculum. And sell his 0 dogs. And Frank he no like, and I don't blame him, people to say fluted out of school. He was having problems with his scholastic work because he was devoting so much time to improving. 

And this hot dog, I think he added, what do you call them, what's the other things? 

So, popular plate biscuits. But, you know, pinion rings or Freeman Pies. French fries. 

No, French fries were not Mel? 

I don't think lar But anyhow, he just kept expanding that until he outgrew that place. And then he built a little place just west of that and called it the Yellow Jacket. And that began, continued to grow and expand in physical construction and in volume of business. 

And he always stressed, quality, insisted that everything that he had be fresh, that it be delivered that day and he wouldn't keep any meat overnight and so on. And he's always been a dedicated to the freshness and quality of his food. 

So he had an opportunity to sell that place at Yellow Jacket at an attractive figure. 

So he sold it. 

And then he moved up to the just one little narrow space in the present location, which has been expanded right and left ever since. 

But it was only a very, just a slot in the cut of that building up a near, almost at Spring Street. And he's expanded from there and there and there. And it didn't marvelously well with it. And he was a hard worker. He just worked, I thought, 18 to 24 H a day. And paid attention to every, every detail. And then in his later days, he put in another varsity out on Cheshire Bridge Road. And then there's another one, I understand that they have up up on total Marietta. He had a tragedy in one of the children killed and gun exchange. 

And now is the Varsity on North Avenue is operated by his daughter, Nancy, and the other one that Chad Bridged old is operated by his daughter in law. 

So, the family is still in the varsity business. 

Let me go back and ask you, talking about Frank's original place where you saw on hot dogs, what did you say the name of that original station was? 

Woo Pep Wofford Oil Company, and they called it Wok Pep. It's, I don't think it's in existence. I'm sure it has in existence. 

Now that corner has been, was first occupied, to my knowledge, by Vocal Pep. And then later it became a service station for the Atlanta Waterworks. 

And then more recently of course, by part of the Word Works building building play side on 14th Street. 

And I hope to see any minute the Coca Company or somebody doing duplicating a little corner across on North Avenue. That's a terribly good place. Certainly not accredit to the campus, the Cocoa company. 

Let me ask you, do you have some memories about George Griffin? 

Well, I knew George, I guess almost the entire time of his association with Tech, a student and as a dean and track coach and friend of the student, he was a great friend. 

Any boy get into any kind of trouble and plenty of things thought was to go see George and he might take over the job of getting him out of jail or whatever. He was great. In fact, George was a member of my church and lay reader in my church. And he used to be the amusing, really get up and pop and read a lesson. 

Say well, the lesson of day comes from Joe, 91836 and reads as follows, The way he did it in such a funny way that everybody laughed, but they went right along with him. Because completely informally, I enjoyed quite well. I could till his death all. Can't offhand recall any specific event that might be a general interest. 

But he was always doing something working for the benefit of a student. He loved them and they loved him. And they had a friend, George. 

Well, do you have any memories of wearing a rat cap? 

Any stories associated with that? 

Well, yes, I wore my area of a breath cap, period. 

Well, have we had to not be seen without it might get paddled or something, But I determined that one of these days I was going to get that franchise myself and I set out working for it and accomplished it in my last year. I had to concede half of it to another student that I'm sure was very worthy. And we ran it and actually we made about around $300 out of it. 

And that was a lot of money back on day, they had signs up on the campus to see us for the cap that was a forced customer. All all the upper classmen would insist on, they dare not go around without that right cap on. 

So we didn't have to go very far to sell the caps. 

We just had to set up staff up counter and they'd come to buy and made a arrangements with the firm, I can't recall the name at the moment, but they were up on Spring Street who made those caps for us. And they made them, I think, about $1 a piece. And we sold them for two or 2.5 a piece. 

Let me ask you, do you have any memories of the Biltmore Hotel? 

Biltmore Hotel? 

The I I that some various sundry memories of the Biltmore Hotel. That used to be a very fine hotel and had some important social and business engagements there. 

But the only only real personal experience I had with it that during my survey class, take, one of the requirements was to take a transit and determine exactly the distance between the antenna stand on the, on the roof. And I used to remember what it was something like 314 ft and 2 " or something. 

So, but they did have important meetings and there I don't I don't recall specifically any single event that I attended at that time. 

Let me ask, you might say this, At the Georgian Terrace Hotel, we really had more social activities that involved tech students than the belt one. They had Saturday afternoon tea dances as a regular course for quite a long time. 

And, uh, more tech involved social events, I believe, were carried on at the Belmore, at the Yard and Terrace, then at the Beltmore. I know one was that all? 

I can't think of it now. What's that famous dance teacher who was a tech student. And was that Arthur Murray? 

Arthur Murray, yes. He was a tech student and he started teaching dancing. I have dancing classes and had a number of events there. My wife was one of his pupils. Let me see. 

Do you have any memories of other social spots in Atlanta that tech students would go to? 

Anything that comes to mind, Yes, if I can think of the name now. 

But could I get time out and go ask my wife? 

She just came in. Steve, you ask about the operation of Garber Hall. 

Well, that was a center for all sorts of activities of tech students, but special one very special was the dances on Saturday night. And they were promoted and operated by one of the students, Butch Beer, DEA, R, D, and Brick Beard. And Butch operated a great place. 

It was located at the corner of North Avenue and Peach Tree in a brick building upon the second floor. It's now the location of a big bank building. 

But that was, I'd say, a unique and a very fine operation that which had there he had several of the tech students, a couple of football players, big ones, big line. When he could find acting as what do you call it? 

A bouncer. A bouncer? 

Bouncer, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. 

Bouncer and the the boys who were interested in dancing, and a lot of them were in those that day, would bring the dates girls up there. It's up on the second floor and walk up a straight line of steps to get there. And he had a nicely decorated the floor of quite some size, adequate for a good dance hall floor. 

And he had a colorful crystal ball that appealed to everybody, hung down in the middle of that, and it rotated through the evening and spread the colors around. And which featured the fact that all of his affairs were well chaperone. And these days I find from my grandchildren that a word chaperone is not known anymore. 

But in those days it was very important and they had three or four of the grand dogs of the plan there as on the floor always as as chaperones for the occasion. 

One of his ground rules was that to be absolutely no drinking and if any were detected, these two or three big tech tackles and so on would invite them out. And if they wouldn't go on their own power, man enough to take them out. And that didn't have to happen long after. The ground rules were well understood by the, by the customers. 

And I think that was a great tribute to him, the success and the quality of that social event that which operated there for so many years. And sorry to say that he is no longer with us. He has passed on. 

But after graduating from Tech, which went out to California and got into insurance business and did very well. And his widow is living in it back in Atlanta now. We see her very helpful but but she was a good citizen, smart operator. Happy to have known him. Did you ask me about the Spanish teacher that Well, that was rather interesting. I certainly enjoyed every minute of it. I was a student at Marist over on Abby Street, and Dr. Permo, about as near as I can get to the pronunciation of his Spanish name. He was Spanish blood who was on the faculty at Georgia Tech. 

But two or three days a week, he came over to Marist and conducted Spanish classes over there. It was on a tight schedule at Tech, however, And he had to get back over to the Tech campus. 

So there were not many automobiles in operation at that time. I bet you there weren't over 12 or 15 automobiles by students on the tech campus. 

But anyhow, when I was in Marist High School, I had a motorcycle, mean motorcycle with a side car. And they enrolled me over there to transport by Quick Express, Dr. Compere, after he had concluded his class at, at Mars. 

So he and I got to be good friends and we scoot over to take and drop him at the building, at the administration building. And he was a great character as I think all take faculty. 

He was my first opportunity to physically visit the campus of Georgia Tech and to get acquainted with one of the faculty you about exhausted my feeble memory, except I guess I ought to tell you that I did graduate and a little bit unusual about that graduation might be of interest that the services were held in the brand new Fox theater. 

And because we occupied the big stage in there, and it sure was a great relief enjoyed to walk up that path to the rostrum and get my deployment in hand. That's about finishing with.