Chapter 42

I woke up at my regular time on Monday feeling good. I had an enjoyable weekend and it looked like it would be a good week except for getting dunked in a horse trough some more. Dick and I did our regular run. My stamina was back up to where it was before my winter layoff. I began to appreciate why baseball had spring training.

After costuming and makeup I found out they had been pulling my leg about redoing the water trough scenes. Everyone on the set was in on it. They all could see how tired I was getting of that particular scene. There were actually bets on whether I would show up today!

I felt a little insulted by those bets. I had been working since I was eight years old, first at home than when I was ten I had a paper route. You did your job unless you were really sick. If I skipped middle school every time there was a test or even worse, a school dance I would never have graduated. If you had a job you did it, taking the good with the bad.

Today was to be a walkthrough of a scene that was put in to lighten the movie up. They didn’t want it to be all gunfire and fistfights. John Wayne and I were to install a water faucet on the ranch’s new indoor plumbing system. This would result in us being soaked.

When I was told of the scene I started thinking.

I asked Mr. Wayne, “What sort of faucet are we installing?”

“I have no idea, just an older type they have in prop storage.”

“Could we use a brand that was actually in production then?”

“What are you thinking Ricky?”

I then proceeded to explain how our family, not wanting to say it was only me, owned thirty percent of a company, Detroit Faucet that was founded in 1880. I thought it would be neat to have our product in the movie.

Wayne mused, “Since the faucet wouldn’t have a name on it that could be read on the screen we would have to say its name. That is called direct product placement. Since you were so good at the salary negotiations I think we can do it for free.”

“Mr. Wayne I would like to take it further. I would like a clip to be included in the television special and then have Detroit Faucet be a sponsor of the show.”

“Young man I like the way you think. Let’s make it happen.”

Mr. Wayne got with the writers and they changed some dialog. Now there was a reference to the Detroit Faucet that Mr. Wayne had found in the Sears catalog, being delivered by Wells Fargo. Now, Big Jim, the nickname of James Braxton played by John Wayne, had the faucet in hand, he makes the statement.

“This will be easy.”

The next shot is of water pouring all over Big Jim and Sir Nick. They fix this problem and turn the faucet on again, this time Sir Nick takes the water flow in the face.

“Easy huh?” asked Sir Nick, as he changes the water flow with his fingers right into Big Jim’s face.

The scene ends up with Big Jim and Sir Nick laughing about their shared misfortune. This scene would be a makeup scene after the tough love Big Jim has had to show Sir Nick. It is the most lighthearted part of the movie. The rest of the movie is serious as outlaws and regulators are fended off.

We spent all morning on that scene. Getting wet, drying out, doing retakes. After four takes the Director, Ron Dodge, was happy with what he saw. He liked the adding of the faucet scene. He felt this modernization showed that they were living at the end of the old west. The small modernization was a symbol of the much larger changes in the west such as the Johnson County Range War.

Open ranges were coming under private control. This large change was at the root of the range war. After this war was finished the old west was no more. There would be minor incidents but for all practical purposes, the west was won. I could see someone using this example in their Ph.D. thesis.

After my part was done for the day I still had a little time before lunch so I went to the prop masters office. Mr. Rodrigues was there so I explained to him that I wanted to obtain pictures of some of the faucets in storage. What did I have to do to get them? I didn’t go into detail why I wanted them and he wasn’t curious. He made a phone call. After fifteen minutes a still photographer showed up.

We went to the shelves where they were kept. There must have been fifty types of faucets with multiple copies of each. I went through them and selected a dozen that looked good to me. I asked each of them to pick out some that looked nice to them. This added another eight faucets for a total of twenty.

I told the photographer, Mr. Grey, that I would like a picture of each. He asked me if I needed the pictures right them or could he take them elsewhere for proper lighting. I told him proper lighting would be better.

He said, “Okay I should have prints by tomorrow.”

That sounded like a quick and dirty job to me, and that was all I expected.

“Thanks,” I replied.

After lunch I headed over to Hollywood High, this was my last week. I was eager to get it done with and sit for my exams so I was finished with ninth grade. I was more eager to see Nina. She was glad to see me if the greeting she gave was any sign. I was leaning in for a second kiss when Miss Powell entered the room.

“This is Biology class, not practice Biology,” she remarked.

Flustered we backed off quickly. That was the end of it from Miss Powell. I shudder to think what would’ve happened if Mr. Hurley had caught us. I would be returning to school after graduation to work off my detention.

Miss Powell made a boring subject for me to become interesting. I realized that I loved mechanical things but really didn’t get this living stuff. This living stuff as I called it was so much more complex, than my simple mechanical thoughts, it was incredible. While I hadn’t any desire to go into any form of organic science I was developing a great respect for it.