Birthday bash celebrates Norris, REA

Monday, July 11, 2011
Jamie Mockry of the Keystone Business Center holds a cake while Sen. George W. Norris, portrayed by the Rev. Clark Bates, blows out the candles for his 150th birthday, celebrated in conjunction with the REA's 75th anniversary. (Bruce Crosby/McCook Daily Gazette)

McCOOK, Nebraska -- Jerda Garey remembers when the electrician came to wire her house.

She demonstrated her counting skills by enumerating the coin-like "knockouts" being produced by the electrician's work.

"One, too, three ... and on to 60," Garey said. Finally, the electrician had had enough.

Sen. George W. Norris' great-grandsons, David Norris Rath of Monroe, Louisiana, standing, and Gary Hofer of Waitsburg, Washington, seated, share a bench with a bronze of their ancestor. (Gene O. Morris)

"Kid, can't you go outside and do something else?"

Retiring MPPD manager Jim Phinney recalled one farm installation where the utility received a call from a consumer far out in the country right after power was installed.

After a long drive back, they found the problem. The home's single light bulb was unscrewed.

Five generations of Norrises who gathered for the celebration included front, from left, great-great nieces, Dorothy Chipperfield, Benkelman, Hollis DaPron, Bird City, Kansas, and Elaine Kogl, Commerce City, Colorado; back, great-great-great-great-grand niece Elizabeth Eckman and great-great- great grand nieces Scottsbluff; Karma Eckman, Holyoke, Colorado, Dana Francis, Denver. (Gene O. Morris)

The stories came just before Saturday night's banquet at the Keystone Business Center, celebrating George W. Norris' 150th birthday and the 75th anniversary of the Rural Electric Administration, two events forever entwined.

A new display on the second floor of the Keystone, portraying historical events connected with the REA, was unveiled.

The Rev. Clark Bates and his wife, Dawna, who oversees the Norris House in McCook, ably portrayed Sen. George Norris and his wife, Ellie, as masters of ceremonies for the banquet. Walt Sehnert led the singing of "God Bless America" at the conclusion.

George W. Norris "was not just a man 'of' the people," said Flora Lundberg, president of the Norris Foundation. "He was a man 'for' the people."

His future was shaped by childhood memories of the struggles his mother had just to accomplish household tasks.

The Norris Foundation's goal is to keep the late senator's memory alive and active for years to come. Lundberg said when recently saw a young boy on a tour see the statue outside the Norris House and say "'Hi, George!' I felt we were headed in the right direction."

Great grandson Gary Hofer of Washington said recounted George Norris' tenure in tiny Bolles Junction, where he wound up remodeling a tool shed to live in for a year while teaching and attempting to start a law practice.

"One thing that a law practice needs is people who care about the law," Hofer said.

Before Norris returned to Nebraska to establish a law practice, he had a confrontation with a drunk logger who insisted the "school marm" have a drink with him, while Norris preferred a cigar.

Finally the future senator, a diminutive man, had to pull a gun.

"I'll have a cigar."

Great-grandson David Norris Rath of Louisiana said he had hoped Sen. Ben Nelson could attend the banquet in person -- he sent a representative but was needed in Washington because of the budget crisis -- because the senator had arranged a rare visit to the senate floor to see Norris' actual desk, which Nelson now uses.

"I can tell you, Sen. Nelson, unlike some of his colleagues, keeps a very neat desk," Rath said.

Norris was a man of conviction, Rath said, illustrated by his filibuster against arming World War I merchant ships, and his penchant for supporting causes and candidates regardless of their political alignment.

He was patient, waiting 12 years to see the Tennessee Valley Authority enacted and 11 years for the Lame Duck amendment.

He had integrity, always paying his own way for trips back to McCook, despite being entitled to a free pass.

Rath recounted a family story about his father's visit to his grandfather's Senate office, where, as a normal young boy, he naturally pressed a forbidden red button, summoning a secretary.

"His hand must have slipped," she kindly offered as explanation.

Officially a teetotaler, especially when Ellie was around, the senator was known to enjoy a home-brewed ale, and once had to turn down a celebratory bottle of fine scotch from FDR when the TVA was passed, because Ellie was around.

He was also known to have a heavy foot, once frightening the family with a trip in a 1941 Dodge with "fluid drive" near their vacation home in Wisconsin.

That vacation home, which he purchased in 1905 for $750, recently appraised north of $1 million.

Rath spoke with pride of current references to the Norris-LaGuardia labor act, drawn up to benefit coal miners.

"He was sure his convictions would lead him down the right path," Rath said.

He quoted his great-grandfather's love of "the peace of that park across the street from my house in McCook' where he watched "trees grow into stately giants."

Bill Pratt, director of the Nebraska State Historical Society echoed Norris' patience. "Most of what people remember George Norris for came about in the 1930s, when he was in his 70s."

The Lame Duck amendment, TVA, Unicameral -- it was the economic of the Great Depression, that made it possible, he said.

The TVA was one of the most ambitious projects in American history, but Norris saw it as a prototype for a similar project along the Missouri.

Norris major beliefs, Pratt said, were that some problems are best addressed by the federal government; a belief in the individual; that sometimes the little guy needs a boost; the federal government can best keep big business in check; and the importance of compromise -- "when I can't get what I want I take what I can get."

Overriding was his belief in the future and the value of hard work.

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