I like to examine home interiors when I watch old movies from the 1930's. It reminds me of my great-grandmother's apartment. She lived to be 93, until she died in 1965. So I knew her for ten years. She was quite elderly (too me especially).

But here is an interesting twist about her. She was rich! She left a $1,000,000.00 estate when she died. That would translate to about $35 million in today's money. Her father started the Corbett-Heekin Tin and Spice Company right after the Civil War, which ultimately became Heekin Can, then American Can (canning). And her husband, my great-grandfather who died in 1931 was a successful printer (Sullivan Printing Works on Gilbert Avenue). And as late as the 1950's, she owned by inheritance a city block in downtown Pittsburgh.

The ultimate snob, she always had a 'handmaid' and a 'driver'. Her driver, with her for about 35 or 40 years, was named Carl Hubbard. I don't remember him, but I think his life may have briefly overlapped my birth in 1955. But my mother was very fond of him because, when she was a child, he would take her and her brother (my uncle Bob) for rides in their big Buick sedan. He would take them to see my mother's 'cousin' and namesake, "Susie The Gorilla" at the Cincinnati Zoo, c. late 1930's. When my mother was a child, she didn't know the difference in the color of people, and thought that Carl's hands were black, because he didn't wash them well enough.

Here is the real twist, relating to the Olympics this week. Carl had a brother named Dehart Hubbard. Carl and his brother were both exceptional and accomplished athletes. Dehard Hubbard was the first African American to win an Olympic Gold Medal, in 1924 (Paris), setting the long jump world record in 1925 (25-103/4) and tying the 100-yard dash record(9.6) in 1926. He died June 23, 1976, just before the start of 1976 Montreal Olympics, boycotted by most sub-Saharan African Nations.

His daughter married a guy name Blackwell. They had a son named Ken Blackwell, who became a Black Republican politician in Cincinnati, ultimately chasing the Ohio Governorship a couple of years ago. He failed in that election, but while he was running, he was the Ohio Secretary of State.

So that's my Olympic story of the day.

There is one more thing I want to relate regarding my great-grandmother. Her apartment was called the Grassmour, anchored on Madison Avenue, a long and wide parkway (boulevard) in Cincinnati. When I was almost five years old, I remember my mother taking me to visit great-grandmother, 'Mother' as she was addressed. But this was no ordinary visit. It was the late summer or early fall of 1960. JFK was campaigning in Cincinnati for the Presidency. It was known that his open car motorcade would drive by my great-grandmother's place on Madison Avenue.

And so, at nearly five years old, I was taken out on the balcony of her apartment (where I was never allowed), to witness the drive-by of Presidential Candidate John F. Kennedy. I didn't know the significance of the event at the time of course. But I embraced it many years later. Imagine, I actually saw JFK in 1960. Don't know if Jackie was there; doubt it, since I think she may have been pregnant with their son Patrick, who would only survive a couple days after birth.

TRL