Most of these stories were told to me, as I was growing up, by various members of the family.   Most of the tellers have passed on now, so I will try to document what they said.   I am also trying to put them in chronological order, since I heard the stories in random order, usually triggered by some event that reminded the teller of the tale.

William Armstrong Turner (12/24/1831 - 06/18/1899 Born in North Carolina). married Mary Ann Callaway (12/05/1833 - 04/09/1919 Born in Georgia)
William Argstrong's Page
William Armstrong Turner was born Dec. 24, 1831 in North Carolina. In the 1880 Census, William stated that both his parents were also born in North Carolina.   One unresolved question is, did William move from NC with his parents or alone as a young man?  
William married Mary Ann Callaway on Oct. 17, 1856 in Taladega Co. Alabama.
William Armstrong served in Hilliard's legion 10th Confederate Cavalry, 5th Alabama Battalion, company 'C' from April of 1862 until the end of the war in 1865.   At the Hilliard's Legion link above scroll down and click on "5th Battalion [Cavalry]", then click on "Muster roll", and then "Co. "C"". At the bottom of the enlisted men, note "TURNER, William A".   Here is his service record from the National Archives.   Before May, 1864, He had been transferred to Ramsey's Battery (Horse Artillery).   Ramsey had recently assumed command after Huwalt was captured.   Here is a timeline of the units he served in at the time he was present.   I discovered his service activity by a search of the Texas "Confederate Pension" data base, which revealed that Mary A. Turner, wife of W. A. Turner, who lived in Wood County, received a confederate widow's pension.   I applied to the State of Texas for a copy of her application and received these images of Mary Ann's pension application.   After receiving a copy of her application and some of other documents that the state had, I was able to verify some of the other signatures on some of the documentation as being members of my family.   Mary Ann states the date and place of their marriage, and the unit that William served in.   In addition John (my Son) found William and Mary Turner and Mary Ann's parents, James and Naomi Callaway, in the 1860 Alabama Census (See William's Page).   Note: William Armstrong's occupation was listed as "mechanic".   Since Armstrong was a somewhat unusual middle name, I am assuming he was named after his mother's maiden name or some important person his parents knew.  
They moved to Texas in 1870.
William died June 18, 1899 in Wood County Texas.   He is buried in Ebenezer Cemetary between Quitman and Winnsboro near the community of Oak Grove Texas.
Mary Ann was killed in the 1919 tornado in Wood County Texas and is burried beside William at Ebenezer.

Ary and Sue, in their research, listed William Armstrong's birthplace as North Carolina, with no town or county and no other ancestors are known before him.  

As told by Sue M. Turner:
"We talked to Ary's aunts who said that their grandparents came from Talledaga County, Alabama.   We went there and found in the cemetery a family plot but we were never able to prove that it was the family.   It had impressive stones as though they had some money.   William Armstrong must have had money when he came to Texas because he immediately bought land in Wood County.
From our investigations we determined that William Armstrong came with a group from Alabama.   I cannot remember the name of the town now where they boarded a ship that sailed into the Gulf an up to Jefferson.   James Callaway seemed to be the leader of the group.   One of the stories we heard was that the road from Talladega to the place of embarkment was a toll road made of wood.   Each landowner had to keep his part of the road in good condition.   Without this, the road would be impassable much of the time.   We could not find that any of the Turners other than William Armstrong came to Texas at that time."

I was told by a number of folks both relatives and others, that Mary Ann was too feeble to go to the storm house and was killed in the great East Texas tornado of 1919.  
When I was staying at Uncle Johnnie's, I ran into Neil Penix, who told me that the tornado cut a path one mile wide across Wood county.   Neil and I were standing in a little strip of woods west of Uncle Johnnie's and he showed me the tornado's path across Grandpaw (Tom) Penix's land, west of Mary Ann's house, you could probably see it today.  

03/30/2021:
I just received this information from my son John and his Son Chris:
Recently Chris and I have taken another look. Others have tied William A. Turner to the family I found, and told you about in the 1850 census of North Carolina.   Joseph and Francis "Frankie" Turner with a son William of the correct age.   With that information now confirmed we have now traced our direct line all the way back to a John Turner born in 1465 in Sussex, England.   A generation later there are 2 generations of Turners prior to crossing the Atlantic who are listed as Knights and recorded as "Sir".   It appears that the Turners of our line came to America during the life of James Edward Turner born 10/22/1620 in Terling Village, England and died 3/25/1666 in Charles City, Virginia.   James decendants migrated further south and spent several generations in coastal North Carolina before William went to Alabama, and eventually Wood County, Texas.

In 2023 I found some info in Find A Grave referring to several William Armstrong Turners 
living in Isle of Wight County, Virginia.  
 
Isle of Wight County, Virginia is just across the border from North Carolina, 
which is where W.A.  indicated he was born.

Noah Richard born 08/26/1856
Noah apparently worked as a deputy sheriff in Tarrant Co. Texas as a young man (probably before marriage late 70s, early 80s).   During his service, he was directed to take a very unpopular prisoner to a distant jail.   The prisoner was so unpopular, he had inspired a necktie party. Noah loaded the prisoner into a covered wagon and drove off down a back street (I assume in Ft. Worth).   Unfortunately, word had leaked out and a group of citizens met him not too far from the jail.   The mob was angry, noisy, and threatening to take the prisoner and hang him right then and there, when a stranger stepped up out of the crowd and asked Noah if he could use some help.   Noah said yes, and the stranger climbed up into the wagon and asked Noah if he had an extra pistol.   Noah gave him one, whereupon the stranger faced down the crowd saying the first few to come forward would be the first ones killed.   The crowd reconsidered how desperately they wanted to hang the prisoner and dispersed.   The stranger handed the pistol back to Noah as he climbed down from the wagon. Noah later discovered the man's name was Frank James (Brother of Jessie).

Noah was married to Martha Jane Fletcher 10/30/1883 (at age 27), and had nine children who survived to adulthood.   These were my great grandparents on the Turner side.

Uncle Johnny (John Richard Turner) told me a story about his dad, Noah.   It seems that when Uncle Johnny was a boy, he sold Cloverine Salve and was able to buy a Stevens Crackshot .22 rifle.   Uncle Johnny, was very proud of his rifle, and took it with him everywhere becomming a very good shot.   Of course he couldn't afford to buy expensive ammunition (.22 longs or long rifles), so he had to buy .22 shorts.   After a few years he noticed that he was no longer able to hit anything he shot at with his beloved rifle.   So he took it to his father, Noah, who was plowing a field and asked him what was wrong.   Noah, sighted at a nearby target and, sure enough, when he fired, missed.   Noah said the rifle was "leadded" and flung it under a nearby bush.   Uncle Johnny was totally devastated, and retrieved the rifle but never shot it again.

Susan Katherin Bivens 08/16/1854 Red River, Texas. - 9/24/1904 Wood County Texas.
My great grandmother: Katherine Bivens' father was Lee S. Bivens who left to fight in the war between the states, leaving little Katherine (about 6 or 7 years old) with a neighbor family, and never returned (at least as far as we know).   She lived with neighbors until grown when she married to Henry Pierson Childress (marr 12/23/1873).   Somewhere along there she acquired the nick name of "Kitty".   We don't know who Kitty's mother was or when she died, but kitty died at the age of 50 when Leatha was 13.   Kitty's father was Lee S. Bivens (who apparantly went off to serve the confederacy and never came home although we don't think he was killed in the war).   After her father didn't come home from the war, Kitty was raised by friends from the time she was an early teenager (she was born in 1854 so would have been about 11 when the war ended).

Andrew Ripley Turner 10/06/1890 - 02/13/1960 Born on the prarie in Jack County Texas.
Leatha Ida Childress 02/26/1889 - 09/03/1971 Born in Red River County Texas.
My grandparents: they were married on 10/08/1911 in Little Hope Texas (Wood County)
Incidentally, an old friend of mine who was familiar with that part of Wood County at the mention of "Little Hope" would say "it's right down the road from litter barrel".

Leatha Ida Childress was born 02/26/1889 in Red River County Texas.   Her mother, Susan Katherine Bivins, was known as "Kitty" (see Susan Katherin Bivens above).   Her mother passed away when Letha was about 13, so she quit school and stayed home to help raise her younger siblings.   Their only child, my father, Ary Lee Turner was born in Wood County near Pine Mills Texas, Jan 20, 1914.   No doctor was in attedance but, Dr. Black, came by a couple of weeks later and checked every body out, all was OK, but Dr. Black didn't issue a birth certificate for dad.   In the 1970s or 1980s Mom and Dad decided to go to Europe, so Dad needed a birth certificate, but non was ever issued so he had to get an affidavit from my Aunt Ozie (Childress-Dobbs), who had lived nearby when Dad was born, to attest to his authenticity.

The origin of "Rip"
Martha Jane (Noah's wife) loved to travel and go camping, so when she and Noah heard of some land for sale in Jack county Texas, they wanted to take a trip to see it.   This probably sounded good to Noah since he had lived in Tarrant county when he was younger.   The fact that Martha Jane was very pregnant, had 1 and 4 year old daughters, and Jack County was well over one hunderd miles away, didn't seem to bother them.   After the crops were laid by, they loaded their clothes, some food, and the two girls (Bernice and Ella) in the wagon and headed out.   This was in the fall of 1890.   They were going across the prarie of grass stretching to the horizon and was starting to turn very brown as fall approached, when Mary started into labor.   Noah stopped and set up camp by a branch (creek) and there on October 16, 1890, in their covered wagon, Mary delivered her first son to survive to adulthood.   A ranch hand rode by a few days later, and discovered them.   He stopped and talked to Noah who confessed they hadn't planned to stop just then.   When the ranch hand returned to the ranch headquarters, he told the owner about the Turner family camped with a newborn baby boy, two little girls, and not much food.   The owner sent the hand back with a freshly killed haunch of beef, a real treat in those days (before refrigeration) since beef didn't keep as well as pork (which clould be salted), and had to be eaten soon after killing.   Mary and Noah were very thankful for the generosity and decided to name their son after the ranch owner, Mr Ripley, hence my grandfather, Andrew Ripley Turner, known to his nephews as 'Uncle Rip'.   The name was ultimately passed to my brother Rip (Ben Ripley Turner).   I have often wondered if the Ripley family still owns land in Jack County?

Staying with Grandmaw and Grandpaw
When I was very little, I spent a lot of very happy time at my granparent's house.   I can remember in the evenings after supper Grandmother Letha and Grandfather Andrew would sit in their old wooden rocking chairs in front of the open gas stove, listening to the radio.   I remember hearing reports from post war Europe, which were always very noisy (a lot of static) and hard to understand.   The radio sat on a small square spindle table in the corner of the dining room (where the stove was).   That small oak table was the first piece of furniture Grandfather Andrew and Grandmother Letha bought as a married couple (1911) making it the oldest piece of furniture in the family.   That small oak table, purchased second hand in 1911, now sits in my den.

As a small boy, staying with my grandparents, I remember Grandfather Andrew would come in early on a winter's morning and say gruffly, "get up boy".   Of course, when I ran across the cold linoleum floor to the family room (which also served as the dining room), I would find my clothes, very warm, on the arm or back of one of the old wooden rocking chairs before the old gas stove.

Grand paw used to take grannie and I to the movie in down town Mesquite every Saturday night.  

Once, I must have been about 5, grandpaw took me deer hunting with him on the Fidler ranch in south Texas along with several other men I knew from Mesquite.   I remember we stayed in a two room log house with dirt floors and a limestone fire place in the main room (the room with a door to the outside).   We cooked our meals over the fire in the fireplace.   I believe Hack Wagner and Bob Shaw were in the group that went to south Texas with us.   Knowing what I do now, about men and deer hunting, I find this very unusual.   When I think of all the things he did for me, I realize my grandfather loved me very much.

When I was a little older, grandpaw would take me to work with him (he had to work half a day on Saturday).   His first job that I can remember was for the Coca Cola company, refurbishing wooden coke cases (this would have been right after WW II).   Later, when I was about 8, he worked as a finish carpenter for a contractor named Ed Burke, and would occasionally take me to work with him when he worked a half day on Saturday.   He showed me how to hang a door when I was 8.   I was impressed by the way he worked, even then, I learned that being a carpenter was all about thinking and planning ahead so things would fit together and even assembling things wasn't made more difficult by something you had alread finished.   I saw him take out his pocket knife and whittle the end of a complex piece of moulding so it would fit snugly in the corner.   He always kept dry powder glue in his tool box, and would use it to glue pieces of wood which were too small to nail, into small or tight areas.   I didn't realize it at the time, but this was my first exposure to "craftsmanship".   I now have grandpaw's old tool box in my shop.   After sitting in my father's shop at the farm for many years, some of the tools were rusted, so I cleaned them up and now use them.   They still work fine mostly because grandpaw took very good care of them, after all, thats how he made his living for many years.  

Grandmother Letha had an old wash pot which she occasoinally used for making soap, and a little more often for scalding chickens.   I remember seeing Grandmother Letha catch a chicken by the head as it was walking around the yard and ring its neck until the chicken went flying, headless, and then flopped around for a few seconds.   Then it was scalded in the wash pot and the feathers plucked (I helped).
Dad once mentioned that he had bought Grandmother Letha a variety of tools, but she never used them for what they were intended.   She always found another very good use for them.

I believe it was in 1953 I got up one morning and discovered that the High School was on fire.   In those days, the entire school system (all 12 grades) was on one city block, which is the front half of the present Mesquite High Shcool campus.   During the day of the fire every one in town worked getting furnishings out of the school and storing them at a variety of locations in town.   I worked with a group on a pickup, hauling text books.   We were storing these books in the old First National Bank building on the North West corner of the square.   During the day we made many trips and I noticed that the old bank building still had the high teller's desk running from the door back to the offices and vault in the rear.   I also noticed there were two pieces of furniture in the bank, one wooden desk chair with arms and an old Dearborn Stove.   Many years later, I noticed a similar stove in my Dad's work shop and mentioned that the last time I had seen one like it was in the bank on the day of the high school fire.   Dad then told me he had bought the old bank building, as an investment, and this stove had been in the bank.   He later gave me the stove so I could work in my garage in winter.   I recently gave it to John (my oldest son).   The old stove has been in the family for over 50 years and it was second hand when Dad bought it.   That old Dearborn still works great.   After I moved into this house I got the stove back from John and have been using it in my garage (shop).   Here it is in my shop.

Because of the high school fire, the next year, I went to school in the basement of the Presbyterian Church, located where the old Savings and Loan building is now.

Grandpaw's Snow Cone Stand
Grandpaw had a heart attack in the early fifties.   In one of his post attack conversations with the doctor, he was told he had to quit smoking.   Now Grandpaw had smoked Camels as long as I could remember and probably quite a while before I was born.   When the Doctor told him to quit, he reached in his shirt pocket and handed his current pack to the Dr.   As far as I can remember, he never smoked again.   This is one time that Grandpaw's legendary stubbornness worked in his favor.  

Speaking of stubbornness, Dad once told me, about his parents, that when you said something to Grandpaw about some new idea, he would say "no it ain't", but in a few weeks you would frequently see him doing exactly what you had suggested.   Now when you said something to Grandmaw (Letha) and she didn't like it, it was useless.   She just didn't want to be confused with any more facts after she had made up her mind.   Its strange and probably a matter of prospective, but I remember my Grandmother Letha as the most loving and sweet lady I had ever known.   She was the closest thing to a mother I ever knew.

Since Grandpaw was in his early sixties and couldn't work as a carpenter anymore, he cast about for something else to do.   He apparantly saw an old snow cone stand for sale somewhere and decided that would be a good summer job for himself.   He bought the old stand (which was built on a small trailer frame) and proceede to competely dismantle it.   I can remember seeing the bare trailer frame in his drive way.   When he was finished, he arranged to rent a corner on the southwest corner of the square in Mesquite.   Now at this time, Mesquite had an entertainment on the square every Saturday night called "Amateur Night", so every Saturday night grandpaw did a land office business (Texas summer nights are very warm and Snow Cones hit the spot).  

Mesquite's old black water tower.
Right across Main street from the Presbyterian Church, to the north, stood the original old black city water tower.   The water tower was filled by electric pumps from 5 deep artesian wells located about three blocks west of that church, near an old creek bed, and surrounding a small red brick pump house.   The water in these wells was said to be some of the purest in Texas, and I remember going into Dallas and how their chlorinated water had a strong "whang" to it.   The water tower had a white square board which traveled up and down the outside on some kind of rails controlled by a cable and pulley with a float in the tank.   The system was manually operated, when the white board got too near the top of the tank (float at bottom meant empty), a city employee would go the small red brick pump house near the wells, and turn the pumps on.   Later in the day, he would come back an turn them off (hopefully when the tank was full).   I rememer some time the pumps would be left on too long and the water tower would overflow, causing it to rain on that part of Main street.   This happend one winter when the termperature was well below freezing, causing a small spectacular ice storm on the north side of the Presbyterian Church.

Speaking of Mesquite's old red pump house.
About 200 yards from my Granmother's house stood a small red brick building which served as the municipal pumphouse and jail.   Outside the pumphouse were 5 electric pumps each atop a deep well.   These 5 wells supplied the water supply for the entire city (Mesquite).   I remember the water at home having a very sweet taste and when I went to Dallas, it's water had a strong taste of chlorine.   My Dad once told me, that occasionally, some drunk would be put in the cell in the red pump house and the next morning, having slept off the alcohol, he'd start yelling for someone to let him out.   The wells, pumps, and pump house were in what is now a parking lot for a very small strip mall just west of a creek bed and between the East and West boud lanes of Military Parkway (AKA Davis and Main in Mesquite).

Ary

Uncle Clifton:
Dad and I went to visit Uncle Clifton when he lived in Haynesville.   I believe it was shortly after Grandfather Andrew passed away (Feb. 13 1960).   It was in the winter and it was cold.   When we got to Uncle Clifton's house, Old Sport (a large English Bulldog) was laying on the porch and actually got up to greet us (Dad had always maintained that bulldogs appeared to be smiling due to their characteristic underbite).   Later, Dad mentioned to Uncle Clifton that Old Sport would really smile if he was allowed into the house on this cold day.   Uncle Clifton replied "Yes and if you let him lay down in front of the fire he would laugh out loud".

The old Lawrence Mansion:
When I was small, Bob and Rex Shaw lived behind us, with their son Bobby.   Bobby and I were about the same age and frequently played together and sometime we went to visit Bobby's aunts, Opal and Garnet Lawrence.   These ladies lived in what is now the Lawrence mansion on Long Creek Road north east of downtown Mesquite.   It was a truly amazing place for small boys to visit.   The legend was that the nephew of the original owner was a sometime member of the Jessie James gang.   The reality of visiting the Lawrence girls was way better than any legend.   The sisters were very good cooks and treated small children like royalty.   They had a small refridgerator on the back porch which was full of cold drinks.   In the kitchen they had two large stoves a gas range and a wood range.   My dad told me they said the wood range was better for baking.   One of the sistes told me that once when the James gang was hiding there, Frank shot a deputy sheriff on the stairs.   She then showed me a pattern of holes in the ceiling and wall around the area where the stair went through the ceiling that she said was from the shotgun blast.   I remember the bedrooms had very high ceilings and no closets but, instead had large chifferobes (sp).   The bedrooms I remember each had large four poster canopy beds made of heavy wood.  

One of the reasons this would have been a good hideout was it sat on the state highway (352) and two floors, an attic above and a small tower above that.   I remember Bobby and I climbing to the tower one day, we went throught the attic which was floored and contained a wealth of very interesting items (to a small boy).   There was a dress maker's dummy (the first one I remembered seeing), and what must have been a tricycle, but like nothing I had ever seen beofre.   The tricycle had a gold wrought iron frame and a large rectangular, velvet covered seat.   The tower was all anybody could expect, a steep ladder (which might be called a stair) went from the attic through a small hole and into the tower.   In the tower, which must have been about 6 or 7 feet square, there was a piano stool and of course the four windows looking in all four directions.   The view was great, espeically since the house was surrounded by pasture and a large cedar break to the north.

My dad told me that, as a boy, working with my Grandpaw when he hired out as a hand to help with the harvest at the Lawrence farm.   This must have been in the middle to late 1920's, Dad would have been 10 or 12 years old.   Dad said they arrived at the mansion a boy 6 o'clock AM and the Lawrence ladies had already laid out a full breakfast on tables set under one of the rows of cedars in front of the house.   These tables were made of planks laid across carpenter's saw horses.   Dad said there were three kinds of meat (probably ham bacon and sasuage), biscuit, gravy and eggs both fied and scrambled.   Dad didn't mention whether or not they had toast but many times I heard him comment that only poor people had to eat cornbread with their meal, light bread was for people who were better off (financially).   Dad's job for the harvest was to keep the boiler in a steam tractor fired with straw.   The steam tractor provided the power for the harvesting machine.
At dinner time (lunch to northerners), there was another large meal set under the cedars, with several kinds of meat, vegetables, and bread with several pies and cakes for desert.
The Lawrence Mansion is now a Texas state historical monument and the City of Mesquite's Opal Lawrence Historical Park.

Cynthia
On October 20 1962, I married Cynthia Claudette Rutledge at the First Methodist Church in Mesqite.
Cynthia and I had only been married a month when Thanksgivving came along.   CT (my nickname for her) had not learned to cook at home since her mother, Jessie, loved to cook so the girls (Cynthia and Sandy) didn't get much opportunity.   Cynthia asked me If I wanted anything special for Thanksgivving, and I said yes, pumpkin pie. Unbeknownst to me, CT phoned her Mom and asked how to bake a pumpkin pie.   Jessie (understanding her daughter was a beginng cook) said to get a Pet-Ritz pie shell and some Comstock Pumpkin Pie filling, dump it in and bake appropriately.   When CT went to the store (Safeway) they were out of Comstock but she did find some Libbeys Pumpkin.   Not knowing the difference, she proceeded to bake the pie.   I remember it smelled like a pumpkin pie when it was baking.   When we had finished our Thanksgivving dinner, she brought out the pie and cut it, giving me a large piece.   I bit into it and discovered the starngest taste, it tasted like grass, kinda green flavored!   Cynthia did a lot of baby sitting as a teenager, and whe was absolutely magic when it came to babys, a fact that later became a precious gift.
On Janurary 18 1968 John Andrew Turner was born (5lb. 13 oz.) at Florence Nightengale Hospital (Baylor), in Dallas,   John was named after two of my favorite Turners, uncle Johnnie and Grandfather Andrew.  
On March the 11, 1970 Jason Matthew Turner was born (5lb. and 3 oz.) at Presbyterian hospital in Dallas.   CT decided to give Jason (or Jace as we call him) with biblical names.  
CT's Driving experiences
We had purchased a mini-motor home for camping and since we could't afford another car, CT drove it to work.   She worked about three blocks from home at a State Farm Insurance Agency located in a neighborhood bank building.   One day, as she was leaving work, she backed out a little too far and hooked the rear bumper with an Austin Healy parked across the bank parking lot behind her.   Now the mini-motor home was about 8 feet wide and she couldn't see what had happened at the rear.   She placed the truck in drive and proceeded through the parking lot heading for the street and thinking that the motor home didn't seem to have much "pep" (her words)!   A bank gaurd seeing her coming, ran out into the parking lot waving for her to stop.   When whe stopped and got out the guard showed her she was towing the Austin Healy by it's back bumper.   The Guard got them unlocked, found the owner, and there was no damage so every thing was worked out.
One day CT came in from work and told me the camper was making a loud noise when she turned a corner.   I asked which direction and she said on left turns.   I went out to the driveway in back of the house, and got in the camper, started it up and tried turning from side to side listening.   I couldn't hear anything unusual, so I stopped the engine, got out, and walked around the camper.   I noticed that a small piece of moulding on the right hand rear of the camper was pulled loose and twisted back.   I raised my eyes and looked across the alley and saw a large horizontal gash about 18" above the ground in the neighbor's fence.   That explained what made the loud noise on turns.
Insurance Liability
Since CT worked for an insurance agent, she was always telling customers to never admit liability when they were involved in an accident.   One day CT was going to the store (we had sold the camper and owned a 3/4 ton pickup).   She backed down the drive and started into the alley when there was another loud noise.   She ralized she had backed into a passing car (which was probably speeding down the alley).   She jumped out of the truck and rand down the drive shouting "it's all my fault".
The "Clumbsy Oaf"
Cynthia was the kind of person who usually had positive thoughts about everybody and rarley said anything negative about anyone.   She did however, have a great sense of humor.   One time CT, John, Jason, and I had gone to the farm for the week-end. It was early fall and Mom (Sue) had backed two peach cobblers.   Sue has always made superb peach cobler.   She baked these on this particular day and put them into the fridge so they would be cool for supper.   But since the fridge was small, she placed them one on top of the other.   In those days the house at the farm only had two rooms and a bath, the kitchen and den were combined into one long room.   We all ate at a picnic table Dad had finished, which sat in the middle of the kitchen.   On this day, we had all finished eating the main courses, and it was time for dessert, Mom asked Dad to get one of the cobblers from the fridge.   Dad turned around, still seated, and opened the fridge door, picked up the top cobbler.   As he lifted it from the fridge to the table, he didn't realize the second cobbler was stuck to the bottom of the first.   As luck would have it, about half way from the fridge to the table, the lower cobbler turned loose and fell to the concrete floor shattering the dish and spreading fresh cobbler across the floor.   There was absolute silence for about two seconds then everyone heard Cynthia say "Clumbsy Oaf".   This brought down the house and will forever be remembered by all present.

The Screwdriver:
One evening when I came home from work, I walked through the back door into our breakfast nook,   I looked down and in the middle of the table was my 1/2 inch wood chesel.   Now this chisel had been handed down from my grandfather, who had been a carpenter, to my father and finally to me.   I picked it and was about to ask why it was in the middle of the table when I noticed a large chunck of the bit was broken out.   I proceeded to suffer a mild cardiac arrest and was finally able to ask Cynthia how this had come about.   She simply replied, the handle was loose on one of her cook pots and she needed a screwdriver to tighten it.   Immediately, I wasted a whole lot of air trying to explain the difference between a chisel and a screwdriver.
About two years later, Cynthia and I were at my favorite store (at the time) Sears.   I was in the tool department and she had been shopping elsewhere.   As she walked toward me she paused in front of bins filled with different sizes of wood chisels, and muttered under her breath "screwdrivers".