The Adventures of Merle Blades

A very few of our readers may recall the fall of 1955. In September of that year, I was a pimply- faced, skinny, frightened 13-year-old freshman sitting in Merle Blades’ required freshman VoAg class with about 25 other Hoosier boys in Paris Crossing High School in Southern Indiana. In addition to the general outline of the year’s course, Mr. Blades started by saying, “Few of you will ever...