BILL CHERRY'S GREATEST DALLAS PARK CITIES REAL ESTATE BLOG: ROBERT KENNEDY PLAYED THE PART OF SAFETY SANTA CLAUS

After the Second World War, people started venturing away from home. That's when McCoy Farqua decided he'd take his first trip to Galveston. From all he'd heard, the island was far more laid back and less urban than Dallas where he lived.

When the train got to the island's depot, McCoy rented a room at the Panama Hotel across the street, then went searching for the Galveston Daily News building. McCoy wanted to see and fix in his mind the place where Texas' oldest newspaper was published. After all, McCoy was in the newspaper business himself. He was with Dallas' afternoon paper, the "Times-Herald."

Next door to the paper was one of Galveston's famous restaurants, Perusina's. He went inside for lunch. It was then and there that he saw his first Galveston character, Robert Kennedy.

McCoy was feeding nickels into one of the slot machines, mindlessly waiting for his lunch, when Kennedy, dressed in a white Santa Claus suit and drum major hat, stooped to come in the door. From his shoe soles to the end of the hat's feather measured at least eight feet. And that, by the way, was how Robert dressed when he was in Galveston, summer, winter, spring and fall.

Robert was actually a Canadian who had somehow found his way to Galveston, sold insurance for a while, then moved to Dickinson where he went to work for a truck farmer. But a great deal of his time was spent as that character he had invented known as Safety Santa Claus.

Inn the summertime Safety Santa stood on the deck at Murdock's Pavilion on Galveston's famous Seawall, warning tourists about the currents of the gulf. In the winter months, he would go to the schools in the county with Sheriff Frank Biaggne, one after another, and lecture the children on bicycle safety.

McCoy was so fascinated with Robert "Safety Santa Claus" Kennedy that he introduced himself, invited him to join him for lunch, and before long they were fast friends.

A year or so later, after McCoy had bought his Hudson Hornet, he called Robert and told him that he wanted to write a story about his Safety Santa character for the Times-Herald. To do that, he thought Robert should put on his white Santa Claus outfit and drum major hat, and that they should then go to Murdock's where McCoy would observe Safety Santa in action. McCoy would even bring along one of the paper's big Speed Graphic cameras to take pictures of Safety Santa in action, he told Robert.

By the time McCoy had driven from Dallas, picked up Robert at the Dickinson farm where he'd also freshened up after the drive, it was approaching the dusk of a summer's night. As they started onto the Galveston causeway, they heard a tug's horn, then they saw the boat pushing a string of barges from the east. Then the black and white striped wooden arms came down and the bridge's draw sections started to rise.

The Hudson Hornet was about five back from the last car that had made it to the other side. McCoy and Robert pushed the car's bench seat back, stretched their legs, and prepare for the wait. The windows were rolled down and dusk's breeze was crossing the water as it blew cool into the car.

Just then the driver's door of the car in front of them opened, and a fellow got out and started walking toward the drawbridge. He had on a suit, tie and straw hat. He took the hat off, bent over and went under the black and white striped wooden safety arm, and before they knew it, he was scaling the open section of the bridge, using the rail to help pull himself up.

Everyone else got out of their cars to see what the fellow was doing. He got almost to the top, then sailed the straw hat into the water below. It was then that they realized that he was planning to jump into the water. What to do?

By then the bridge operator was out of his booth and trying to coax the fellow down. Next a sheriff's deputy, siren blaring, came flying up the left lane and stopped at the black and white striped safety arm. By then the fellow was apparently either saying his prayers in advance of his jump, or saying the prayer that he be given the final burst of nerve it was going to take to make the dive that would let him breathe his final breath.

Robert, as Safety Santa, got out of McCoy's car. He put on his drum major hat, then pulled its strap under his chin. He walk toward the drawbridge. The feather was flapping in the breeze. Everyone was watching. He got on his hands and knees, steadying the drum major hat with his left hand so that he could crawl under the black and white arm.

The fellow was still holding on and still in prayer. The bystanders were silent. Now their eyes were on Safety Santa. The cluster of seagulls on top of a group of the bridge's pilings were watching, too.

It was then that McCoy realized that he'd better get out of his car and start taking notes and photos, because he was getting ready to see Safety Santa's biggest challenge play out before him.

He went under the black and white arm, but he was afraid to try to scale the open part of the bridge, so he put his pad and pencil under his right foot, then cupped his left hand around his ear while keeping the Speed Graphic in his right. He was thinking he'd be able to hear Safety Santa and the jumper's conversation, even snap a few dramatic pictures.

Just then the fellow glanced to his right, turned his head back so he could resume looking at the bay, then everyone saw him do the double take. He jerked his head back and mentally processed what he was seeing. There was a skinny fellow in a white Santa Claus outfit, black boots and all, and with a drum major's hat with the big red feather on top flapping in the wind, holding onto the bridge's rail, and scaling up to him.

The fellow started to laugh, and he laughed even harder, then he laughed even harder than that. By then Safety Santa had reached him. They shook hands, then the fellow and Safety Santa, arm in arm, worked there way back to the flat part of the bridge. The fellow was still laughing as the two of them got in the deputy's car.

McCoy wrote the first draft of his story as he and Safety Santa sat in the old John Sealy emergency room, while the doctors tried to figure out what to do with the fellow who went from contemplating suicide to having his biggest belly laugh.

Copyright 2004 - William S. Cherry

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