“Smokey”

An icon of my teenage years died forty years ago on June 3. He is buried a stone’s throw from my dad. Were he still with us, Smokey would be 110 years old.

Ah, but Smokey still is with us – in the memories of generations of students at Howland High School in Warren, OH where he worked in the cafeteria and cheered on our sports teams, members of Howland Community Church where he sang in the choir for decades, and customers of Andrews Shopping Center at Howland Corners where Smokey worked after school was out. Still in business, Andrews is a hardware store from a bygone era akin to Ralph's Pretty Good Grocery in Garrison Keillor’s Lake Wobegon. The store's motto: "If you can't find it at Ralph's, you can get along pretty good without it." Like Ralph’s, Andrews had everything, including Smokey.

Don Cunningham was his real name, but to all of us at Howland High School he was affectionately known by his nickname, Smokey. He lived in a house a few blocks from the high school. Though I'm not sure who Smokey lived with or who cared for him when school was out, a nephew perhaps, I know for a fact that during the day when school was in session, he was ours. All ours. Smokey belonged to the student body of Howland High School. He was our school mascot of sorts.

By day, he worked in the cafeteria. I can see him standing there wearing his white apron over a red plaid flannel shirt. As we returned our lunch trays, Smokey would take them one by one. Gathering the silverware into one hand, he would scrape the leftovers into the garbage pail at his side, place the tray and silverware in the window that opened into the dishwashing room, and strike up a conversation all at the same time. His words weren’t entirely understandable. His top plate of dentures didn't fit well. When he talked, his tongue, teeth, and words mashed together in an oft-unintelligible gibberish. But the meaning was always clear: Smokey loved us, we loved him, and it made his day to greet and bless us at the trash pail on our way out of the lunchroom.

By night, Smokey worked a very different job for Howland High. Wearing his trademark white sweater with a big block H sewn onto the chest, khaki slacks, and tennis shoes, Don Cunningham the cafeteria worker became Smokey the cheerleader. Howland's #1 Fan is what the caption beneath his picture read in the programs that were available at all the sporting events. Whether it was a baseball, basketball, or football game, a wrestling match or track meet, the one constant through decades of Howland High School athletics was Smokey.

Everyone, including the opposing team, knew and loved Smokey. When there was a break in the action, Smokey would scamper out onto the floor or field, plant his feet, scrunch his eyes shut, and with his arms flailing upward to punctuate each letter, he would lead the crowd in spelling out the name of our school.

H! - O! - W! - L! -A! -N! -D!  What's it spell? Howland! 

As he pranced off the field, we’d yell, "Tigers!  Tigers!  Tigers!" 

I remember the last race I ran in high school. The mile run. Runners from across Northeast Ohio were there. The top finishers would advance to the regional qualifying meet the following weekend and then the state championship. The rest of us were simply trying to do our best in what would be our last race.

I was overcome with emotion after crossing the finish line at the thought of my high school career being over. Still winded from the race, my hands on my hips, chest heaving, I walked through the first and second turns of the track, sobbing. That’s when I felt an arm grasp me around my waist. I looked to my right to see gray-headed Smokey looking up at me through his thick lens black frame glasses. He had somehow gotten over or around the fence that separated the grandstand from the track, made his way over to me, and wrapped his arm around my waist, hugging me to his side. He said something to me in his gibberish that I understood to be a word of consolation. I put my arm around his shoulder and we walked side-by-side down the backstretch, through the third and fourth turns, and off the track.

Smokey had a mental disability. Were it not for the community of Howland Corners – school, church, Andrews store – he would have been a candidate for a “care facility” of some sort somewhere. But we took him in because he had taken us in with a force of affection that still has its hold on us to this day. I understand the Howland Historical Society has a Don “Smokey” Cunningham exhibit.

In a fit of nostalgia seven years ago on a Saturday in early June, I made the 3½ hour drive from Lexington to Columbus for the Ohio High School Athletic Association State Track & Field Championship. A senior from Howland had one of the top times in Ohio that year in the two-mile run. As an alum of Howland’s track and cross-country teams who still plods his way through a few miles a few times a week, I went to root him on. He won and became our school’s first state champion in a distance event, finishing his career with a gold medal around his neck. 

Forty-nine years ago, I had my heart set on that kind of a prize. I now see I ended up with something much more satisfying, the memory of Smokey’s arm around my waist for my last lap around the track and the sound of his voice telling me he was proud of me and loved me.     

That’s a memory as good as gold.