A Winters Express opinion column
By Charles R. Wallace
Publisher Emeritus
A few years ago, Californians voted to stop changing our clocks for daylight saving time, but nothing happened. The U.S. Senate just voted to make daylight saving time permanent starting in November 2023. A quote from Florida Senator Marco Rubio, one of the sponsors, says it all. “Hopefully this is the year that this gets done and, pardon the pun, but this is an idea whose time has come.”
If the House of Representatives passes the bill, and the president signs it, we will have more light in the evening and won’t have to adjust our clocks ever again. I’m not holding my breath, but I would like to see the end of daylight saving time in my lifetime.
I got to hang out with a couple of my childhood idols on Sunday. The Historical Society of Winters hosted an open house for their Wide World of Winters Sports and Bob Graf and Spider Thomas showed up. Missing was Byron Randolph, who I’m not sure got an invitation to the event.
My father would take me to see my brother Polk play baseball at the high school diamond, but the stars of the show were Spider and Bryon.
Watching them pitch was amazing. At one point Bryon had six shutouts in a row. Opposing players would just shake their heads and mutter to themselves. I remember one saying out loud, “How are we supposed to hit that stuff?
Spider played both baseball and basketball and at some point while playing at Sacramento State College, was voted the best two-sport athlete in California. Over the years I would run into Spider, mostly at Bob Graf’s annual birthday wiffleball tournament. Spider was always the gentleman and always had a smile on his face.
Both Spider and Bryon played in the minor leagues but never made it into the majors. Both ended up teaching and coaching for a living, which some would call a good life.
My friend, Rich Chiles, also made an appearance on Sunday. We played together in high school, and he did make it into the pros. Watching him hit against the Oakland A’s, when the Twins were in town, was the highlight of many summer afternoons. We are both members at Yolo Fliers Club, so I often get to see and talk to him. He gets quiet when someone brings up his baseball career, but he deserves a pat on the back for what he accomplished playing and coaching baseball.
Bob Graf was a good friend of my brother, Polk. Even though he is a lot older than I am, he was still at Cal Poly when I got there. I’m sure there are stories as to why it took him nine years to graduate, but that is another column.
When Bob ran at Libby’s cannery in Sunnyvale, he hired a lot of Winters people during their summer season. He put me in charge of making fruit cocktails, seven days a week, and to this day, I think that is the biggest paycheck I ever received. Nice union job and plenty of overtime. The job lasted eight weeks and it was enough to fund another year of college. Those were the days.
Remember to turn your clock forward on Saturday night and have a good week.
