Juniors

  I suppose it can be hard for a son to live up to the name "Junior".  One has to be thought of as a part of their father and try to live up to the name.  My brother was a junior.  He tried his best to be his own person, but our father would remind him that he was the junior in our family.  Thankfully, I didn't have that problem.  I was just the baby in the family.  

 I met two men who were referred as the "Junior".  One was mostly a military man with a touch of being a politician.  The other was an entertainer.  Both did well in their careers, but they were also compared to their fathers.  In this case, they were together at a hotel dining room in Columbia in the late 1960s.

 The first was Will Rogers, Jr.  He was a burly man whose father had been a famous humorist.  Junior had been in politics in California and served in the Army during World War II.  He was cordial to me, even though he seemed a bit rough.  He looked like a guy you could play poker with, and he would probably beat you.  Or, he would intimidate you to the point that you would have to lose.  His father was much more beloved than himself.  He had a hard time living up to that reputation.

 The second was Emmett Kelly, Jr. He was a circus clown like his father.  His act was much like his father's, and he lived up to his father's reputation.  He was truly a gentleman.  Since I was a teenager at the time I met these two men, Kelly took the time to meet me and warmly greet me.  He wasn't in his clown makeup, so I saw him as a real person.  He was warm to me in the brief time I said hello.  I could tell that he loved his life.

 Juniors can have a tough life living up to their fathers, if they let it consume them.  However they approach it in later life can be the difference between happiness and bitterness.  I got the impression that Mr. Kelly was happier than Mr. Rogers.