We once had a project, installing a really large waterline in Dallas. It was actually in the Oak Cliff neighborhood south of downtown. This was in the late part of the 1980s. It was a really rough part of the city. I haven’t spent much time there in the past couple of decades, but something tells me that things haven’t improved much.

I’ll tell you how bad things were, it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary to find a dead body along the right of way of our project, which started out down near the Trinity River and came up through an expanse of undeveloped low-lands and continued along in the middle of neighborhoods. The low-lands were seen as a dumping grounds for whatever wasn’t needed any longer. Fine automobiles were stolen in the high class part of Dallas, driven there and stripped, many times set fire to “destroy the evidence”.

We setup our construction office on a rented vacant lot along Kiest Blvd. Not being completely naive to the happenings in Oak Cliff, we had a very large and sturdy chain link fence erected to surround that office and yard area.

Within the first day of so our office trailer was broken into, emptying the place of our fax and copy machines and everything of any value, even though we had burglar bars on the windows and door. We put in an alarm system that didn’t seem to do much good.

We called a service that supplied vicious dogs to businesses. “Sir, we would like to rent some guard dogs to help us secure our construction yard”. He asked for the address and when we gave it to him he said “we don’t offer our services in that part of town”. He went on to explain that guard dogs regularly came up dead down in the Kiest Blvd area.

From then on for a while the more expensive items were loaded in the back of a suburban and hauled away each night, returning the next morning. Not the easiest way to operate.

I made nice with about a half dozen of the young boys that lived in the projects that were adjacent to our yard. Being in the summertime, they were all just hanging out. I started taking them up on Illinois Ave to McDonald’s for burgers and ice cream cones. They all loved ice cream cones.

I would always tell them to go ask their momma if they could go with me. I even went with some of them to ask permission for them to go. I suppose I looked trustworthy, since the invitation was never declined.

Then we started going over into the West End, right in the heart of downtown to eat barbecue at Risky’s. Now that was a sight, with one white adult and a whole string of preteen black boys roaming around the streets of Dallas.

The boys were always so polite and well behaved. They always ordered more than they could eat, so they could take some back home to momma.

As our friendship grew, there was one little boy, Terry, that was about 10 years old. Terry was special. He had a large growth behind his right ear. About the size of a plum. He didn’t say much. But I started paying him to sweep out the office and empty the trash cans. I figured that would start something that would get out of hand, but the other boys really understood that Terry could be treated a little special.

I’m not sure what happened but once we started taking care of Terry, he became our Guardian Angel. The break ins mostly stopped.

A footnote to the Terry story. When I was back in Austin with the Oak Cliff project well behind me, a lady called me. It was Terry’s teacher. She ask if I’d be able to come to Memorial Stadium to watch Terry compete at the Special Olympics. Terry had kept my business card.

Of course I went and spent a whole day there. That was the last time I ever saw Terry. I went back to the projects a couple of years later and never was able to locate Terry or any of those kids. In that short period of time, the Projects had changed. And I don’t think for the better.

Oh, I forgot to tell you, all those boys called me Bossman.