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Ralph Voss Memories of Lyons, Approximately 1957 Just past the west edge of Lyons on the north side of the U.S. Highway 56 is a gently sloping field where Babe Archer once operated a golf driving range. Babe was a bachelor that my older sisters thought was incredibly handsome. In spring, summer, and on into the fall, he’d open the driving range most nights and people would smack buckets of golf balls eastward down the slope. Babe hired my pal Robert Drake (also known as “Sax” because he moved into town from Saxman, a tiny burg southeast of Lyons). It was Sax’s job to pick up the golf balls each morning so they would be ready to hit all over again that night. Babe had an old stripped-down car at the driving range, nothing but the engine and chassis, gas tank, wheels and tires, steering column and steering wheel, and front “bench” seat. Sax wasn’t a licensed driver yet but Babe would let him drive down on the range to retrieve the golf balls. I would go out to the range to help Sax in the mornings. We picked up golfballs with spring-loaded plastic tubes that you could fill up by bringing them down on top of each ball. When the tubes were full of balls, we’d dump them into big baskets that rode on a plywood platform behind the seat. Naturally, Sax would gun that buggy, and we often would take breaks from serious ball-gathering just to ride the range. One morning Sax was barreling down the slope while I rode in the passenger seat to his right. He turned very sharply to the left when I wasn’t holding on and I went flying off my seat, rolling off across the driving range, a horizontal dervish. I rolled to a stop against a cottonwood tree at the bottom of the slope. Sax stopped the buggy and came racing over, his face ghostly white, just knowing he had killed me. For a fleeting stupid moment I wish he had, as a lesson against such carelessness. I was skinned up pretty good in places, and my ribs hurt, as did my arms, but I was okay to our mutual relief. I’m sure Babe Archer never found out about this incident, and I certainly did not tell my folks about it. I could have been killed, but I didn’t dwell on that, of course. What if I had rolled over something sharp protruding up from the ground? What if Sax had turned closer to the cottonwood tree, hurling me much harder against it? What if, what if? Of such what-ifs are lives made. I went home and was sore for many days afterward, but luckily never suffered any other consequence. I always remember this episode when I drive by that slope, which is now simply a small alfalfa field. No sign remains of Babe Archer’s old driving range. |