shoes and socks and danced like a sugar plum fairy through field and grass reciting Keats and Coleridge to a group of cadets, no one seemed to think it strange or extraordinary because it was Rick Lovefellow doing it and everyone knew Rick Lovefellow was crazy as hell anyway. Boo shouted at crazy old Rick Lovefellow for four years and old Rick just grinned that huge grin which spread all over his face and then seemed to ripple through any crowd he might have assembled around him. Boo once caught him wearing a pair of shoes that looked like they might have been taken from a dead soldier’s feet after the battle of Tippecanoe. Terrible shoes with big gaping holes exposing toes and metatarsals to the world. Of course, Rick had put several Johnson’s bandaids over the holes and painted them black, but still the finished product did not deserve to grace Rick’s feet at a Saturday morning inspection when all the earth expected cadets to shine like grounded stars. The Boo found him that day and roared at Rick with his turbojet voice and crucified him without using nails, and humiliated him in front of an entire battalion, and Rick just grinned.
On another occasion Rick slouched his way across the parade ground during summer school, wearing bleached, torn blue jeans which Rick thought gave him a sexy, symbol-of-the-sixties look. Boo’s dress edict of the summer declared that no cadet will wear blue jeans on campus. Boo’s voice boomed across the parade ground and halted Mr. Lovefellow dead on the spot. “Mr. Lovefellow, don’t you realize you are wearing blue jeans on campus?” “So I am, Colonel. So I am.” “What are we going to do about it, Bubba?” “Let’s let it go by this time and play the game some other day, Colonel.” “Give me your pants, Bubba.” “Pardon me, Colonel.” “Give me your pants, Lovefellow. A cadet cannot be seen walking around campus wearing blue jeans.” Rick, a little more serious now, said, “Colonel, Sir, pardon me, but it would be a hell of a lot better than a cadet walking around in his underwear.” “Shed ’em, Bubba.” So several cadets saw Rick Lovefellow racing for first battalion, his bare legs exposed to the harsh Charleston sun and his buttocks covered by a pair of new fruit of the looms, but they just nodded and noted that Rick Lovefellow was still crazy as hell and didn’t think too much more about it.
At the graduation review of 1968, The Boo was shaking hands with the band seniors as he was accustomed to do. Something caught his eye about thirty yards down the line of seniors. Something odd. He walked down the line and found a grinning Rick Lovefellow sporting a huge gold medallion about the size of a volley ball suspended from his neck by a gaudy red ribbon a foot wide. Boo slowly untied the medallion and whispered soft thunder into Lovefellow’s ear, saying, “You Bum, if you want to sit in your room until 0900 hours Saturday morning, you just look like you’re going to pull one more stunt like this.” The Boo turned away from Rick and spotted Colonel and Mrs. Lovefellow standing about twenty feet behind their son. The Boo walked up to Mrs. Lovefellow and growled, “Does this belong to your son, Madame?” She swore she didn’t know the lad.
Basil Rathbone, English actor who won his major fame by playing Sherlock Holmes in the movies, came to The Citadel to deliver Shakespearean readings as a tribute to the 400th anniversary of the Bard. The salute guns awakened him at three in the morning and he thought it strange, the customs and traditions adhered to by these military colleges. Basil was not the only person awakened. A senior private in first battalion woke up and looked out in time to see cadets going in the vents on the north side of second battalion. The next day he told The Boo what he had seen. Colonel Courvoisie went down to second battalion and checked the vents which led under the barracks. On one vent he found a false, wooden bar, painted to
On another occasion Rick slouched his way across the parade ground during summer school, wearing bleached, torn blue jeans which Rick thought gave him a sexy, symbol-of-the-sixties look. Boo’s dress edict of the summer declared that no cadet will wear blue jeans on campus. Boo’s voice boomed across the parade ground and halted Mr. Lovefellow dead on the spot. “Mr. Lovefellow, don’t you realize you are wearing blue jeans on campus?” “So I am, Colonel. So I am.” “What are we going to do about it, Bubba?” “Let’s let it go by this time and play the game some other day, Colonel.” “Give me your pants, Bubba.” “Pardon me, Colonel.” “Give me your pants, Lovefellow. A cadet cannot be seen walking around campus wearing blue jeans.” Rick, a little more serious now, said, “Colonel, Sir, pardon me, but it would be a hell of a lot better than a cadet walking around in his underwear.” “Shed ’em, Bubba.” So several cadets saw Rick Lovefellow racing for first battalion, his bare legs exposed to the harsh Charleston sun and his buttocks covered by a pair of new fruit of the looms, but they just nodded and noted that Rick Lovefellow was still crazy as hell and didn’t think too much more about it.
At the graduation review of 1968, The Boo was shaking hands with the band seniors as he was accustomed to do. Something caught his eye about thirty yards down the line of seniors. Something odd. He walked down the line and found a grinning Rick Lovefellow sporting a huge gold medallion about the size of a volley ball suspended from his neck by a gaudy red ribbon a foot wide. Boo slowly untied the medallion and whispered soft thunder into Lovefellow’s ear, saying, “You Bum, if you want to sit in your room until 0900 hours Saturday morning, you just look like you’re going to pull one more stunt like this.” The Boo turned away from Rick and spotted Colonel and Mrs. Lovefellow standing about twenty feet behind their son. The Boo walked up to Mrs. Lovefellow and growled, “Does this belong to your son, Madame?” She swore she didn’t know the lad.
Basil Rathbone, English actor who won his major fame by playing Sherlock Holmes in the movies, came to The Citadel to deliver Shakespearean readings as a tribute to the 400th anniversary of the Bard. The salute guns awakened him at three in the morning and he thought it strange, the customs and traditions adhered to by these military colleges. Basil was not the only person awakened. A senior private in first battalion woke up and looked out in time to see cadets going in the vents on the north side of second battalion. The next day he told The Boo what he had seen. Colonel Courvoisie went down to second battalion and checked the vents which led under the barracks. On one vent he found a false, wooden bar, painted to
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