Inside the Vault

(Those who would not be accurately described as "George B. Koch" might not understand the humor here.)
Not great at doing as you're told, eh? Well, since you're here already, you may as well take your time and browse. Taking a trip down Memory Lane is fun, but watch out for potholes in the road!

 

 

Early On

Going to school - “You can walk now”
“Mrs. Giles”
Reading ahead in first grade
The xylophone - second grade Miss Adams
Buster and Gasser third
Mrs. Short
Mrs. Belik and Univac (via Eunice Weitbrocht)
Hydrogen balloons
Scholes vs. Swajcarts
Flickering filament
CO2 rockets
The “A-bomb”
    Potassium permanganate and red phosphorus
    Potassium percholorate and red phosphorus in drops
Hit by lightning
The butterfly mount and peanut butter toast and pickles and slightly too much 
Peanut butter and Dad threw it away and Ted's new one
Our workbench - a bed headboard
Garbage picking
“At the Hop” Danny and the Juniors - a 78.
Innocents Abroad
Hairdo in sixth grade
20,000-volt transformer and rubber gloves
Spark coil & Nancy's friends
Window tapper
The Cadillac 26" bike
The fake cigarettes and sore throat
The copperhead snake
The home newspaper with Phil Twilly
Ted, Ione & Butch  IHB
Two headed monster & stairs
The coffee can fire
The DoubleMint Gum wrapper
Mr. Joe & Mr. Nobody
Sticky chicken
Bob "scared" of closet vs. Nancy & Caps snapper
The Matzs & Jesus
The addressograph
Being a minister
Rev. Letcher's club foot dog
Adding sayings to the Bible
Mr. Passell's glue
Bernadette
Cast Iron swings & acrophobia
Tic Toc
The bird's heart attack
The block of calcite (Ted at US Gypsum)
Bob's noses
     Bob's barbed-wire nose
     Bob’s marshmallow nose
The Trumpet
     Trumpet and high school
     Trumpet and concert band
     Trumpet and PTA
Morrie Coleman and mad dashes
Carl Sandburg's handshake
Lining up by height
Milk Duty
Fifth/sixth grade sex
Mr. Schlicting at the barbershop
The master key and tunnels at high school
Guidance office - “Door must be opened before entering or exiting” sign
Tapping the phone line at school
Bruce Siewerth
"Tonight, tonight" & microphone
Arsenic, old lace, and school master clock
South Pacific and speakers at school cafeteria
Taking 4th in soapbox derby on Wolf Road hill
The perfume tackle in 7th grade
Scratch immunization & buzz

Life on the Farm

Bag swing and elbow muscles. "Eh?"
Pillow, milk, about, height
Good old cow manure
Farm drowning kittens and throwing them away
The garbage pile
School, College & Troublemaking
Flying saucers at Elmhurst College
The Underground Paper and harpies
Bob's laser pranks
Mr. Schmule and window dancing
Dad cried
Gary and gorilla at Forbes Hall
Gary and swearing at KSRC
Bob ?? w/ WCFL wave trap at WRSC
Classical show w/ tape delay
The robot voice
The 1812 overture in the wastebasket
Hallucinating
     Staying up 72 hours and hallucinating
     Programming at BoFA and hallucinating
The dirty movie
Specs and dad in car
Gary Kentgen's NASA letter
Nancy and the joke at dinner
Nancy and the 9-year joke, “What’s black & white & red all over?”
 +

Legacy is the right word, isn't it? Rockets, mushroom clouds, depressed teachers, hit by lightning, starting on fire, window tapper, secret keys to the school and more. Then moving on to the college years and beyond, hallucinations, the famous Specs and Grandpa car adventure, a dirty movie, and classical music in trash cans. Mr. Schmule and window dancing.

If anyone knew these people better, they never would have let them near the particle accelerator and other such...machinery. Who knows how quickly they could have rewired it to blow up the Dean's office.

But this isn't ALL to blame on Dad and Bob. Grandma was known for her worms and display-case mannequin pranks. Grandpa had limburger cheese on hat bands, on the bus heater, on elevator buttons, and he had the year-old invoice. Other relatives pretended to be investors so they could scare secretaries and storm into company presidents' offices. The legacy continues, right? ...Right? Ask Richard Dean Anderson. Ask the whole church. Ask ME. I won't say anything, but ask me anyway.

Luckily for Dad he has another George to pick up where he'll leave off (whenever that happens). Apparently the motto back in the '60s and '70s was, "Where there's a Koch there's fire." I'll figure one out soon enough. Happy birthday.

Next year, you get a standard card.