Part II

Dateline Dayton — As I said last week, I had the pleasure of meeting a first-time visitor to our country from Australia, becoming his entertainment director and chauffeur for the week.

On Sunday, my friend Howard and I took Milton to visit another Cash Register Collector Club member and retired NCR repairman Bob, who lives near Akron. Bob continues to work with cash registers. He has developed a nice little business, specializing in selling and servicing National Cash Registers, from the 1940s through the 1970s.

Bob has an unbelievable inventory of registers along with many older models that are part of his cash register and memorabilia collection. As you may imagine, Milton was in heaven seeing all of these registers, asking Bob many questions and sharing stories of their time in the field. What was scheduled to be a two-hour visit, turned into almost four; however, it was great to see Milton enjoying the day.

A visit to Bob’s always includes a tour of his old home, which is absolutely beautiful. The guide for this part of our visit is Bob’s wife, Paulette. She tells us the history of the home, a family residence, a boarding house and a nursing home. We asked about ghosts. When they were buying the home, the prior owners gave them a picture of the nursing home administrator and instructed them to always have the picture on display.

Hmmm.

Once while cleaning, Paulette moved the picture, placing it face down on another table. Bob was working in the basement. Suddenly he came upstairs visibly shaken. He asked where the picture was. When Paulette discovered what she had done, she immediately returned the picture to its proper location. All was well. Once while watching television they both heard a thump and footsteps upstairs.

A Time to Rest

Bob is trying to move his workshop into a large room where Paulette previously had a gift shop. This project, along with maintenance items around the home and his business, keeps Bob busy. So we appreciated him taking time to show our Australian club member his extensive inventory, collection and home

Ever since leaving Australia, Milton had been on the go. We decided Monday would be a day of rest. He did venture out to a store, across the street from his motel, to shop for his wife.

As I mentioned last week, Milton has many interests. Tuesday I took him to the Air Force Museum. Since I could not spend the entire day with him, I dropped him off there when the museum opened and I didn’t come back until just ahead of closing. Milton thoroughly enjoyed the day, taking in three Imax movies, the Presidential planes and exploring the museum itself.

The Beauty of Our Land

In the evening I took Milton to Hooters for supper, where he enjoyed a burger and beverage, along with what he refers to as “eye candy.” Afterward we returned to my house because he wanted to take some pictures, which he failed to do on Saturday, when he was here for supper.

On Wednesday, I again couldn’t join Milton, but took him to Carillon Park after a short visit to my office where he met my co-workers. He had an educational day at the park, learning about the rich history of Dayton and the Miami Valley. For supper, Pauline and I took him to Marion’s for pizza. No visit to Dayton is complete without their pizza.

On Thursday my friend Howard took Milton to visit the NCR archives and I joined them for lunch, which my boss had arranged at the Engineers Club, across the street from the archive. In the evening, he enjoyed supper with Howard and Marilyn, and the opportunity to view his collection more thoroughly.

Friday morning I had Milton at the airport at 4 o’clock for his flight to New York, a short visit with our club’s president, and his Saturday flight home.

It was a delightful experience to be able to, at least, provide Milton the opportunity to see some of the sights of our great country. He’s looking forward to our visit to Australia. We’ll see. Maybe someday.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Mr. Hennessey may be contacted at pmhenn@sbcglobal.net