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And do you want to hear about Ludowici, Bob?

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Absolutely.

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Absolutely.

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While I was with the department, we

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got word one day that Triple A was about to put all of Georgia

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on the blacklist because of the traffic light,

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fast-changing traffic light at Ludowici.

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So I called Triple A in Washington and asked

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if I could come up and talk to them.

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And we talked about it and asked them

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if they would hold off until we could see if we could change

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the situation in Ludowici.

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And they agreed.

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Somebody from the highway department,

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as transportation was then called, went with us.

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We talked to them, by the way, and they

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agreed that they would provide a new traffic

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signal for Ludowici.

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Ludowici wouldn't have to buy it,

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that they would provide it.

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So we drove down to the meeting.

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I called, by the way, to set up the meeting.

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This was back in the county unit days, of course.

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I called Ralph Dawson, the former district

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attorney for that circuit, who was

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the kingpin for Long County.

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And he said, why are you calling me?

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I don't hold any office here.

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And I said, I understand that, Mr. Dawson,

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but I want to see if you'd set up the meeting for us.

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I know you know all the players.

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And he said he'd be glad to.

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So as we were driving into Ludowici,

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a man named Chapman, as I recall,

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flagged us down at what was then a service station.

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The building still stands.

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The station has been closed for some years.

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And I don't know whether he'd called

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to find out what car we were traveling in

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or whether he was flagging everybody coming through

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or what.

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But he stopped us and said he wanted

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to talk to us about that crowd that we

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were going to meet with, if he was

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any other political faction, and talk about the crowd who

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were the office holders.

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And we thanked him and went on to the meeting

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and had just been there for maybe 30 minutes or so

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when the double doors like these flung open.

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And a group of people came in with brass knucks

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and other things.

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And it was the darndest fight I've ever seen in my life.

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Somebody picked up the official city seal there

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and was about to hit somebody with it

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until an officer grabbed him.

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And the fight went on for a few minutes

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with the building and others getting as far out of the way

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as we could.

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And then the out crowd left and the in crowd sat down.

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And we continued the meeting.

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After some time, they agreed that they

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would accept the traffic signal, which they did.

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And they put it up.

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And things went along well for a few years

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until you remember that Governor Maddox put up

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billboards in later years when a similar problem had returned.

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But anyway, that was one of my most fascinating experiences

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during those days.