As Robison awaits arbitration, details involving settlement offer raises questions
October 24, 2018BAYOU STUDIES SYMPOSIUM TO BE HELD DURING ROUGAROU
October 25, 2018
Bobby Hebert, The Cajun Canon. Ron Estay. The Canadian Legend and Coach Ed Orgeron
In my years in the Assessor’s office, I was given tickets to athletic events by oil companies’ tax representatives. It was not illegal, although there was a value limit First it was tickets to the Astrodome in Houston for Astro baseball and LSU football when they played there Later, the Superdome and the Saints. But when the Saints became winners, the tickets stopped coming. Now. more important people wanted them.
I vividly remember one LSU-Rice game because Curtis “Chee-Kin” Martin, was an all-star LSU Tiger. He was a foot-ball and basketball All-Star. LSU signed him right after graduation and he took to football like a duck (or chicken?) takes to water and he became the pride of Cajun land.
The nickname camp from his elder brother Lanny Martin who was so good playing Golden Meadow High School basketball that he was nicknamed “Goose’ after “Goose* Tatum. the great Harlem Globe Trotter, so Curtis was nicknamed “Chicken” but pronounced “Chee-Kin” by his fellow Cajuns and everybody else. (Curtie is the son of Victor; my dad Roosevelt’s brother).
Dot and I drove to Houston and the game soon became 44 to 0 in favor of the Tigers. I met engineer Marco Picciola II at the food bar who greeted me with “”Wow! What a great game, right Leroy?” I answered, “Marco. I want the Tigers to win and I am enjoying seeing “Chee-Kin Laving a held day, but 44 to nothing … come on. where 3 the drama and suspense?” He answered “Lee, I don’t care if it would be 100 to a its a great game and I’m having a great time!” Now there was an avid LSU fan.
After college, the Saints signed free-agent tight end Curtis Martin and sports writers raved about him “catching anything that came his way” at Saints training camp.
Dot and I watched his first game against the Pittsburgh Steelers and everything was going great when, in the fifth play from scrimmage the cartilage on both sides of his left knee were ripped apart He had been a hero, but his football days were over. A very sad day indeed for us Cajuns and anyone who ever knew him.
He settled down with a successful job. wife and children but “Chee-Kin” Martina memory will long endure.
“Thy grandeur was brief but Oh! So brilliant” … a quote from James Dean’s eulogy that applies to my “cuz” Curtis “Chee-Kin” Martin.
Now curtesy of “Monsieur H. G. Lea PuitV1 (figure it out) come with me in my column’ Time machine as I fan the story of a historic football night in Cajunland.
A Gig at Yat’s Steak House
I was playing music with a rock find roll band called the Dominoes at Yat’a Steal: House in Hem ma (How I got from Cajun music to Rock and Roll is a story fir the future. if I have one…..I’m 99. remember… I rate my age with good humor and I hope you do. too )
It was October 31. 1959 and Yat had a special Halloween dance, but the dance was of secondary importance…… it was the annual “Battle of the Bayous” between LSU and Ole Miss in Baton Rouge. Every dancer had a small radio with an ear plug as had every band member except ma The dancers were out of step with the music and the band was just out of sync. Everybody was listening to the game. Then a laid cheer went up….Billy Cannon had made his historic run through 9 tacklers to score a touchdown which WEB the only score in the game. “Goeax Tigers”. That date is sacred in the annals of football in Louisiana and some consider it as important as important as the Fourth of July. I’m joking. but just barely.
After the dance Yat said. “I shouldn’t pay you. you didn’t play very well but then nobody was listening to you anyway. He was kidding. I think, but we got paid. BYE NOW!
