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Articles by Leon Smith
Mustard-Based BBQ Sauce
Mustard-Based BBQ Sauce This mustard BBQ sauce tastes great! Most BBQ sauces are ketchup-based, but in the South, we prefer the mustard variation. Brush on grilled ribs, or pour over cooked pulled pork and heat through. Submitted by JFREE44 Updated on April 14, 2026
Studying tsunamis with GPS satellites
On 30 July, a magnitude 8.8 earthquake off Russia's Kamchatka Peninsula triggered a tsunami that spread across the Pacific Ocean. In addition to warnings from seismic centers and deep ocean pressure sensors, scientists had an early warning from a surprising place: the upper atmosphere. It turns out that Global Positioning System (GPS) error correction-the thing that helps your car know where to go-can help detect tsunamis.
Recurrent syncope secondary to autonomic dysfunction in spinal cord injury: a case report
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Interesting Gadgets and artifacts
Chaotic, cool, powerful or just useful gadgets and artifacts? Available on modern shopping sites? This story holds them all! If you clicked on this story for something like this clock, see entry five. Ever thought of holing your precious items in a stylish looking box? Perhaps you are looking to gift something to your loved ones, but you want it to feel more special? This would be exactly for you. You can set the password yourself, and there are even more layers of puzzles inside.
Leon Smith had no problem selecting Dan Evans for Davis Cup clash with Colombia
They lost both matches and surprisingly failed to qualify for the quarter-finals in what was the most disappointing week of Smith’s long stint as captain. Evans, who also indicated he may not make himself available for Davis Cup in future, is known as someone who voices his opinions but his comments did not go down well with his team-mates.
The only thing to fear
When Franklin Delano Roosevelt took office in March, 1933, the nation was nearly paralyzed with fear that they would lose their life savings because banks were failing. For if a family’s own bank failed, the loss was totally theirs, for it would be months before the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation would be founded. So they began rushing to the bank to get their own money before someone else beat them to it.
Fun with magnets
I’m thinking of a magnet, at the end of a cable, hanging from the boom of the toy crane which Daddy brought for me. “Watch this,” he said, as he pulled a nail out of his pocket and laid it on the floor , then he backed the crane up, swiveled the boom into position, and winched the magnet down. It touched the nail, but did not pick it up. “What’s wrong, Daddy?” “Let’s find out,” he said, “hold the nail up to the magnet.” I did so, but the nail still didn’t stick.
Eric Clapton’s finest song
Eric Clapton may have lived a peaceful life with his parents in his home in Ripley, England until he was six or seven years old, when he learned it was all a sham, that his sister was really his mother, his father a Canadian airman he never met—and the ones he thought were his parents , his grandparents. In the midst of this turmoil and sadness, he found comfort listening to American blues singers on BBC radio.
Fun with magnets
I’m thinking of a magnet, at the end of a cable, hanging from the boom of the toy crane which Daddy brought for me. “Watch this,” he said, as he pulled a nail out of his pocket and laid it on the floor , then he backed the crane up, swiveled the boom into position, and winched the magnet down. It touched the nail, but did not pick it up. “What’s wrong, Daddy?” “Let’s find out,” he said, “hold the nail up to the magnet.” I did so, but the nail still didn’t stick.
To know God’s will
Driving home from North Charlotte, I considered veering off I-485 to make a side trip to Concord, to look for a guitar store I had wanted to see for years.
To know God’s will
Driving home from North Charlotte, I considered veering off I-485 to make a side trip to Concord, to look for a guitar store I had wanted to see for years.
I’ll be seeing you(or if too short)Songs that really speak to you
“Sometimes songs really speak to me,” he said. “Which ones?” I asked “Like ‘Side by Side,’” he answered. “Oh we ain’t got a barrel of money…” I sang “Maybe we’re ragged and funny…” he added. “But we’ll travel along,” …I countered. “Singing a song… “ he said, then paused.
You Ain’t from Around Here
In Spring, 1970, I left Columbus, wearing a suit and an overcoat, to fly into Texas, to be interviewed for a teaching position at a University. I tell the story as I remember it; but I have changed some names. In Ohio, the new leaves were nearly as wide as dimes: in Texas the leaves were nearly as wide as pancakes. I had traveled to the subtropics, with winter clothing. But no matter, for when I went to claim my luggage, the airline had lost my luggage.
The three pigs | Anson Record
“Won’t they smother, Daddy?” I asked when the farmer put the three little pigs in a tow sack, and placed them in our trunk. “No, Son,” Daddy smiled. “It’ll just keep them out of trouble ‘til we get home.” As soon as we stopped rolling, I got out and ran to the back of the car to hear that they were very much alive. They kept squealing and squirming until we reached the same hog pen Daddy used when he was a boy.
Why the chickens came at Christmas
Walking up the hill near my house, I pass some ducks, a donkey, and some sheep who live near a pond—then after a soybean field, two horses whose lot comes right up to the road, none of whom pay me much attention as I pass by. About half a mile later, I pass a fenced-in lot, where a rooster and fourteen hens spend their days walking around, pecking in the grass. I talk to myself during my walk: just loud enough to hear the words, because the spoken word has special power.
Untitled | Anson Record
The worst punishment I ever got from mama was getting my mouth washed out with soap. It happened after two kids stopped roaming the neighborhood to scurry up the bulbous vine and squat on the arbor. At my house, arbor squatting was as verboten as standing on the lid over the well. But they didn’t fall through, but just sat up there and looked around. After a while Elmer, who was 5, discovered a white substance on one of the leaves. “Looka here, Elton, “ he grinned to his older brother.
Willy Privette learns how to fly
Willy Privette was limping toward the jail, the only place he could sit down at a table to eat, and the only place he could lie down to sleep in peace, if he could stand being cooped up that long. Willy was a real man; his story is true, even though I have changed the names, told it from his point of view, and have interpreted only an event or two.
A house and a home
The house on Home Street was a blue one, even though the bungalow was painted white, and the space it surrounded was as far from Heaven as you could get. The light on the inside of the house was aluminum gray, about the same color as the car wash behind the two-story apartment next door, and as dingy as the redwood house on our other side — both of which augmented the sadness.
The Monroe Oatmeal Cookie Blues
During geography period, our teacher asked us where we had travelled. Someone said “Charlotte,” where you could ride the escalator at Sears and Roebuck ‘til you wore yourself out, then walk to Tanner’s to get some fresh-squeezed orange juice and peanuts. Someone probably said “Myrtle Beach,” where you could walk on big beaches that had sand instead of cracked up seashells, and where you could buy homemade ice cream at Painters.
Learning to see | Richmond County Daily Journal
“Look here, son,” Daddy said as we waited to walk to Sunday school. When I came over, he handed me a clear plastic disc. “A magnifying glass,” I said, looking closer at the measuring worm dangling from his web. “That lens will do more than magnify,” Daddy said, as he reached up, pulled a dry oak leaf and handed it to me. “Hold the glass about six inches above this leaf,” he said.
Winter’s grace | Anson Record
It was summer, I was sitting in a test on English Literature, and though the air conditioning was working quite well, my Old Spice had long ago said “uncle.” Old Man Winter warned us the first day of class what we were in for: four weeks of intense study of his favorite writers — the boring Victorians, who would use four words when two would do.
Keeping promises
“You know I expect an A in this course,” she said as she walked into class for the first time. “I have made nothing but A’s my entire career at Capley, and this class is not going to get in my way.” “I would be delighted for you to make an A in this class,” I said, “if you earn it.” “I will get an A,” she promised as she turned on her Nikes. I watched this lithe cross country runner find a seat at the back of the room.
Mama Songs | Anson Record
I was poking around in my parents’ wardrobe when my fingers struck something wooden — so I pulled it out to find a tiny mahogany instrument with four beige-colored strings.
Cooters and the human condition
On my morning walk, I was gazing into the grass along the roadside, when a runner came up to see what I was looking at. “A terrapin in the grass,” I said. “That’s a terrapin?” the girl said. “It looks like a tortoise.” “We call them ‘terrapins,’” I said, as the terrapin started to move. “Let’s head him back home,” I replied, and turned him back toward the swamp.
Oral examinations, Emperor Jones and absolutes
The sky was grey and the temperature cold when I trudged to the dingy quarters above a dentist’s office for an oral examination on all the course work I had ever had, ever hoped to have had, or should have had, and turned down. Dr. Grabow chaired the meeting, a man who smoked a pipe and was quick to remind anyone who would listen that his dissertation ran more than 750 pages.
Finding my way by shooting film
I had one prospect for a job after college, shooting 16mm film to be used in an agriculture TV program which ran at 7:45 on Saturday mornings in a nearby state. I must have been the only candidate from UNC who had been a member of the 4-H Club, had planted loblolly pines on family land, and had raised Hampshire hogs in his back yard.
The woman with 2 voices
It was late afternoon in the spring of 1977 when I stopped to speak to a friend at the local PBS station. What follows is the best reconstruction I can give of what happened. “I am glad to see you,” Jim smiled as I walked into the control room. “You’re my audio man.” “We have a lady in studio B, made up, and ready to manifest an alter ego,” he said. “All the crew is here but the audio guy, who is AWOL. The talent already has her mic, so all you have to do right now is set her audio level.
From stagecoaches to schoolhouses
In 1867, Abbot and Downing’s carriage shop began building “the finest stage coaches ever built,” for Wells-Fargo & Company. Their Concord coaches were crafted in the New Hampshire city of the same name. There, wheelwrights fashioned wooden rims from two semicircular pieces of hickory, mortised and tenoned the edges where the halves joined. The rims were joined to their hubs by wooden spokes.
The man who wrote ‘Teddy Bear’
I thought I was a pretty good judge of character because I could often intuit things about persons I met. But writing this article, I have discovered that intuition must not be my only guide, if I would be serious about knowing the truth. Here’s why. A buddy of mine, who I will call “Slick,” received acclaim in his senior yearbook, as the most talented man in his senior class of 1960.
Living spaces - Anson Record
Long before we ever lived in it, our little shotgun house sat behind Grandpa’s homeplace. Daddy said he had it moved in the early ‘30s, when it had only three rooms: a bedroom, a small kitchen, and a hallway-sized dining room. ”Our cook lived in it when I was a boy,” Daddy said. ”She was good to me, made me fried apple pies.” He paused. “Mr. Sam Birmingham rolled the house up here on logs,” Daddy continued, “pulled it with two horses.” Daddy and Mama ran off to Chesterfield and got married on Sept.
The man who took a life
In summer 1981, I taught an evening class for adults, which met upstairs in a church building right across from a school. The students brought their guitars in through a large parking lot, illumiNatd by one incandescent light at the far end. The stairs of the old building creaked eerily as they walked up the steps to the second-floor classroom. Nearly 40 years later, I remember a quietly beautiful young woman in her 20s who smiled as she sang our simple songs, but never spoke.
Carrying the news
“Son,” Daddy smiled ,”the Good Book says ‘if a man won’t work, he hadn’t ought to eat.’ Your Mama and I want you to eat, so we got you some work — carrying the Charlotte Observer.” And that was the end of the discussion. Daddy brought me a used Schwinn Hornet, maroon, with a shock-absorbing spring on the front fork. I never liked the bike much because the front wheel always scraped when turned left.
Food: A taste of Copenhagen
I ate my way through Copenhagen on my last visit, ending up at chef Bo Bech’s restaurant, Geist, for a meal I remember vividly — notably, the herb salad with smoked bone marrow and tomato. The Danish mentality of foraging, and natural ingredients, has also stuck with me. Many kitchens now use herbs and plants such as woodruff, verbena and sorrel, inspired by the landscapes of Denmark. And, of course, this year, all eyes will be on the epicentre of this tradition: the new Noma restaurant.
The glorious ride
I pulled the old Model A onto Pigeon Ridge, where I realized that every passenger in that old car had a nickname. My baby sister, Bingo, sitting beside me should have been known as “Ivory,” because she could play her namesake tune when she could barely see the tops of the piano keys. To give her better “zishun,” Mama used the Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary we got with S&H Green stamps. Bing gave concerts to amazed neighbors.
To hear an old car run
I nodded toward the old Model A Ford sitting in the woods above our house. “When do you think we can get her cranked, Daddy?” I asked. “It’s too cold right now,” he said. “We’ll do it soon as the weather warms up.” We got no more windfall money that winter, so I spent a lot of my spare time hanging around my disabled car to see what I could learn. I found out: if it was liquid, Potchie leaked it. Water at the back of the radiator, gas where the fuel line met the carburetor, and oil from the motor.
Driving lessons:Special memoriesof time with dad
By the time I was 10, I knew the year and model of every Ford, Chevy and Mopar on the road, and could not wait until the day I could drive. Seeing this, Daddy decided to give me some driving lessons, which he did without even cranking up the car. Our classroom was a 1951 Plymouth, baby blue with a fastback, sitting in the driveway of our little shotgun house.
Anson Record, Wadesboro NC - www.ansonrecord.com
Until he moved to Polkton to live with us, Major spent his entire eight fice-years around self-sufficient Scots folk, who got joy from building what they needed, growing what they ate, making their own biscuits, drinking water from a dug well, watching doodlebugs, and polishing pennies. What you learned you got from somebody else, or you figured it out yourself. I honestly don’t know how long Major had been with us before he left.
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