This has always been one of my favorite pictures of my Father. He was Superintendent of a two-school district on the West Side of Fresno called Madison School District.
I think that wherever Dad went he did a pretty good job. However, one interesting thing about Madison; one day Dad discovered about $500 worth of lunch money missing. He and his vice-principal, Don Peoples, were responsible for taking this money and depositing it to the bank. Well, Dad reported it to the police and he immediately became the chief suspect. But, worse, the whole incident was reported in the newspaper. Further, they gave Dad a lie detector test which he agreed to and he failed it! Well, that only made him look more guilty. It was a very tense time for all of us in the family. In fact, I think the newspaper article mentioned the lie detector outcome. A couple of weeks went by without any resolution, but with Dad being the very heavy suspect. A couple of weeks later, Don Peoples got into the trunk of his car where he found the bag of money. He had taken it to deposit it in the bank, thrown it in his trunk, and promptly forgot about the deposit and even that the money was in his trunk. Everything turned out ok, but not before there was a little tarnish on Dad's reputation. Dad was a thoroughly good man.
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I think it is important to note that though Don Peoples found the money a few weeks later, no newspaper retractions were made, and Dad did not know this until years later when Mother, in her illness living with Carol, baby John, and me on East Avenue in Reedley, called the Fresno County Sheriff's Department. The sheriff immediately sent an officer to our house to discuss the whole affair, and it was disclosed to Mother that Dad had been completely exonerated.
Nevertheless, Dad for years felt under the dark cloud of suspicion, and discussed it with me. I think, affected some life choices like accepting a job in Nevada to get out of California.
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