Band - Mr. Putman

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Band was the one redeeming feature of Junior High School. In the band room I was one of the better trumpet (cornet) players and moved back and forth between 1st Chair 1st and 1st Chair 2nd. Once Mr. Putman made me play 3rd Chair 3rd just so I could learn to play the part. I thought I was pretty good. I don't even remember what we played - except it was usually some English march that sounded like it was played by a junior high school band. We tootled and honked and had a big ol' time at ball games and in parades.

Mr Putman - Bud Putman was the only reason that any of us really had fun. He was a funny man and had some really weird (weird but good) ideas about music, band and life in general. I remember one day that he stopped us from playing and talked for a while as our lips recovered. The subject that day was from the novel War and Peace. He said that somewhere around halfway through the book there was a statment that said something like, "If you want a life where you don't have to think, where your meals and clothes are furnished and where you simply have to do what you're told; then join the army. Now that I think about it, that was Mr. Putman's way of snickering at organized mayhem, but I took it as something that made a lot of sense. Not that I didn't want to think, but the whole idea sounded like something that I should maybe pursue.

After I returned from Iraq I had dinner with Bud and his wife Mary. They - like some other of us - are getting a little age on them, but they are fine people and we enjoyed reminiscing about those golden years so long ago.