In 1936 Tom Grooms had a pasture behind his house on Evergreen Street in Greenfield.  This pasture had a muddy pond where we went swimmin before I was old enough to swim in the Obion River.
 
From 1935 until 1938 my Mom and Dad operated the old Colonial Hotel just across the highway from the train depot.  In those days traveling salesmen came in on the passenger trains and stayed at the hotel.  Single men and women also stayed there on a permanent basis.  Room and board was furnished to all.
 
In 1936 a vagabond, barnstorming pilot, came in to Greenfield in an old open cockpit Fairchild bi-plane.  He landed in Tom Grooms pasture and came to the hotel to stay.  His name was Mel Garvin.  In addition to being a daredevil pilot Mel was also an alcoholic.  One day while under the influence he decided to put on a show for Greenfield by doing some stunts over town.  He put the old bi-plane in a spin over the depot and pulled out at just the last minute.
 
Mel stayed around Greenfield for a few months.  I recall my dad saying that he and someone else had to go to Kentucky to bail Mel out of some problem.  This was the middle of the Great Depression and times were hard.
 
Memory does not serve me as to when Mel left Greenfield but we never heard from him again until sometime in the early 1970's.  My dad had already passed away and I stopped by to see mom one day and Mel was there to visit her.
 
As Mel started to leave he shook my hand and then my mom’s.  I heard him say “this is just a little something that is still due.”  After he left mom opened her hand and unfolded a one hundred dollar bill.  She explained that when Mel left town he owed her a room and board bill. 
 
As a kid just starting grammar school airplanes were a fascination for me.  In the days when Mel was here, and airplanes came over, everyone ran outside to see them.  Only dreaming of the chance to one day fly, my very conservative mother, surprised me by saying we were going to Tom’s cow pasture and take a ride with Mel.  Needless to say this was a thrill that has never diminished in my mind.
 
Sometime in the 1950;s Tom Grooms started selling building lots at the south end of this cow pasture just off Jefferson Street.  The Drewry boys started building houses and selling them.  A street was opened up and was named Fairlane Drive.  By the late 1960's Fairlane Drive had filled up and was one of the best sections of town.  In 1969 my wife and I bought the last lot available on Fairlane, which was located midway of what was once Tom’s old pasture.  We built our home and still live here today.
 
As I sit here typing this story, I look out my window and can still see in my minds eye Mel’s scarf flapping back toward me and Mom, at just about the point a six year old kid first left the ground in flight........................  It don’t git much better than that.