Charles Doggett and Virginia Lora

00:06 My name is Virginia Lora. I am 26 years old today is May 23rd, 2012. Where's your Nashville, Tennessee? And I'm sure with someone I just meant

00:19 My name is Charles Everett Doggett. I'm age 52 on May twenty-three 2012 in Nashville, and I just met Virginia.

00:34 Is it all right if I call you Charlie on the recording? Well, I was born in the Mississippi River delta of southeast Arkansas a little town called Warren Bradley County farming community in July 4th, 1940. My mother always told me that the reason I was born on July 4th. She went to a Fourth of July picnic and ate watermelon, and she thinks the watermelon put pressure on her and made the birth have I doubt if that's Medical, but it's always fun to tell.

01:29 What is a for the record? What's your mother's name? My mother's name is Louise. My father is Lloyd Everitt. So I carry his middle name does my son. What was it like growing up in Warren County? Where is Bradley County warrant is the town. That's the county seat of the Tomato capital of Arkansas. It's Farm. I only was there until about four or five years old. My dad went off to World War II so Mom and my little brother and myself moved.

02:09 Fort Smith Arkansas to live with Mother's mother or grandmother, and we stayed until Dad returned from the war and 45 46, and then we moved around after the war several places. My dad works in a clothing store and first as a clerk, and then eventually is a manager in by her so lived in several small towns in Arkansas, but ended up growing up Elementary School Junior High in El Dorado.

02:51 Everywhere else. It would be El Dorado but in Arkansas they pronounce it El Dorado. And what was that? Like, what was it like doing the radio is a kind of a medium-sized town right on the Louisiana line. I Was A Boy Scout love the outdoors went camping and swampy land bows killed water moccasins every camping trip, but never told Mom I El Dorado was known then as being the home of the Lionel company l o n which no longer exists and four years in the South only there were lying all gas stations. That's where the headquarters dad managed of department store there.

03:51 And I went to school through the 9th grade in El Dorado. You know, it's a as a boy Sports and Athletics is highly valued and I never was real athletic. So I excelled more in band. I was a place cornet or trumpet starting in older Elementary up in the high school and was very active and boy scout almost an eagle was a life Scout and love camping out and Hiking probably more than anything.

04:33 Why was that just love the outdoors and I never wanted to hunt when I was like 12 or 13. It's coming of age in South Arkansas. I received a 22 rifle but I wasn't a hunter and never really used it much since I've become more of a hunter with a camera on and love the photograph but I did go fishing as everyone did then and enjoyed fishing to a degree. I'm not that patient, but but but just being out of doors was enjoyable. Do you have a favorite memory of your time is of Boy Scouts?

05:21 Mainly just being out of doors of a fun one is one of our camping trips.

05:30 Two boys from our Junior High

05:34 Early in the morning walk-through our camp as we were getting up fixing breakfast. They had their rifles as a lot didn't they were going hunting and about 30 or 40 minutes later. One of the boys come running back into our camp as we had finished up breakfast saying Billy's been shot. Billy's been shot. So we all grabbed our first aid kits and tried to be good boy scouts. We went and what he had done there was a creek to cross and so he didn't want to get wet. So he threw his gun over the creek it fired and shot through his hip out of which was fortunate. And so we the bullet went all the way through we doctor did on both sides bandaged it created. He couldn't walk very well. So we created a stretcher with clothing and Limbs and we carried him to the nearest fire.

06:33 Mouse and called an ambulance, you know one of those boys Adventures 13, maybe okay, 13 year old part of the adventure of being outdoors and being in Boy Scout. So but then is I, you know between the 9th and 10th grade dad got an offer for a better job and

07:11 What we thought was a really big city Tulsa Oklahoma and so between 9th and 10th grade, we move to Tulsa my mother and brother never really like Tulsa that way I'm a little sister was too young. I have a brother three years younger than I am Jerry who is now deceased and I have a brother. I mean a sister 12 years younger who lives in the suburb of Kansas City. And so we moved Tulsa dad and I loved it. I got excited about the city. I got involved in buying and school and ended up because I was

08:01 Thinking about being a medical doctor. I helped another Future Doctor form a medical Club in the high school. And this was a big high school 3,000 students and so future nurses and doctors form to Club. I ended up being the program chairman and that was one of my big activities during High School. I stayed in band till through my junior year and dropped Outta but did get to go between sophomore and junior year to amass Summer band camp and of all places Canyon and a Gunnison Colorado right on the Black Canyon of the Gunnison river, which it was beautiful. And another one of those travel Adventures my family vacations.

09:01 4 then head either men to the Ozarks or a couple of times. We went to Panama City Florida and those were Adventures. But today they're not either his exciting as some other things I've been able to do. See you finish High School in Tulsa High School in Tulsa Will Rogers High School graduated with a guy named David Gates. You're too old young to know him, but he was the lead singer in a music group called bread. And also Anita Bryant was in my graduating class. She was first runner-up for Miss America in 58 and was a singer for a while. Well was actually better known as the Florida orange juice representative for a few years.

10:01 But then I because I was interested in medicine. I went to OU the University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma and loved it.

10:16 I had done so well in high school in math and sciences that they owe with lots of A's and B's and they they said we're going to put you in such an advanced trigonometry class at Advanced chemistry class. And let's do the advanced is a Lala G Class.

10:37 Well that just about ended much. Hope of me going into medicine. I did not make the grade but big part of my motivation Beyond pleasing. My mother whose favorite uncle was a medical medical doctor was to help people and I hadn't told mother but I really was planning to be a medical missionary. My idol in high school was probably Albert Schweitzer of as much or more than anyone and so that was kind of in the back of my head I go for the record who is Albert Schweitzer. He is Avery was at least then very well-known medical missionary highly intelligent and also,

11:39 Classical musician who went to Africa in a little like Charles Livingston with you. Probably also don't know but an earlier African missionary and so in the early years. I had my kind of gold some being a missionary in Africa village.

12:02 Didn't work out at least at first so because I was wanting to help people I had gotten involved in what was called the BSU Baptist Student Union grew up as a Baptist in South Arkansas and and in Tulsa and the

12:28 They offered all these opportunities. We went to Oklahoma City to help with the orphanage. It was called in and we did other projects and so I got excited and when I wasn't making the grade in pre-med I said well the heck with that I can help people through the church and so by the second or third year and change my major couple of times and ended up majoring of was sociology major, but

13:09 So I was there for three semesters summer between

13:16 My freshman and sophomore year which would have been the summer of 59. I went with two other buddies at OU to Seattle Washington has student summer missionaries and we got in one of the boys had a Volkswagen Beetle. We drove all the way had a ball the program we were in was called tentmakers. If you're familiar with the New Testament Paul was a tentmaker he work making tents and he paid his own way. So that was the idea because I had in high school and some in college works as a checker and Sackboy and supermarkets. I quickly got a job in a supermarket and the other two guys became Carpenters helpers.

14:16 And we worked and helped a little struggling Mission church and the inner city of Seattle for the three months of the summer of the the church were what were we doing in the church? We helped with a summer vacation bible school. We did a survey of the neighborhood. We were basically we had jobs we were active members but we had already been active in their own churches. We work with the pastor and others. We threw up reach my first sermon that summer a little church and we you know talk to the people about their lives and their faith and help lead some people to understand who Christ is and a few became members of the church. Is that like getting to know a community in that way?

15:16 So it was an adventure and of course it was different then a big University campus in Oklahoma or my earlier days in Arkansas, you know, it was a big city and we were in a poverty area of that City. So I got acquainted with you know, some people that I have not

15:43 Before and loved it and said that was that was what you did that summer. Did you go back there the following summer or that would have been nice but the following summer I wasn't even it. Oh you I went one more after the summer came back to you first semester during that semester. My father took a job back in Arkansas. I automatically became an out-of-state student the tuition more than doubled and I was working my way to school. I had multiple jobs all the way through college. So I said, well, I'll just have to go somewhere in Arkansas. What by then I will head my

16:37 Carnage set on some church-related work in the back of my head of missionary probably and so I said well, I'll go to the Baptist College in Arkansas, which is Washita Indian name o u a c h i t i a l Baptist College then now a university and that's where I finished college with a sociology degree and minors in Psychology and and religion and while there I started a

17:20 Student mission project in what we then called a negro Baptist Church in Arkadelphia that town and for that college. I was apart of other projects during that year and a half before my senior year my senior year. I was offered the opportunity to be a pastor of a little Country Church chidester, Arkansas. It had been a Saw Mill town, but the Saw Mill was closed down.

17:57 And I said well if you know, you're going to be in church work at that's one of the main things maybe this what God's calling me to do. Well that's course where I learned he wasn't calling me to be a pastor. But the most of the deacons referred to me as son and I was in the course, it was a small porch church that had a lot of student pastors, but I love that. I learned a lot about working with people got to create even some of my sermons and had fun. What did you do in your role? I was there. I went every Saturday spent the night with one of the church members preached on Sunday morning and Sunday night had committee meetings help get certain activities going most was being done by volunteers some Wednesday night Baptist Churches have prayer meeting on Wednesday night, but I was in school. I was not

18:57 Tired to come Wednesday night, but I did it was part time job. And so, you know, I probably I don't even remember what I mean 30 or $40 a week back then but it was it was a good experience baptized two people in a borrowed baptistery from now the church we didn't have what I buried them man. I performed a wedding. I did all the things that pastors do and it was it was interesting. But I said, you know, oh and the other thing I had done prior to that in college was I had joined a little small Church in Arkadelphia and was the volunteer free youth Minister working with the teenagers during my junior year and

19:57 I actually love that a lot more than Pastor. So I think maybe youthworks more where I need to be and so I guess I was getting towards that the end of that year. I had decided I would go to Seminary but probably point to Religious Education as opposed to Theology. And so I did and it said well, what am I going to do for the summer? Do I stay here? Well, in the meantime some guys were on the campus interviewing people for summer jobs, and I had the best summer job I've ever had.

20:46 You know, I told you I loved Boy Scouts the regional Boy Scout leader. Was there looking for a camp chaplain at Quapaw Boy Scout camp for all of Central Arkansas. And now this person there's not that much for a chaplain to do Boy Scouts aren't hyper religious. So you will also be the senior patrol leader training and structure and you will be our morale person in charge of all the evening activities and campfires.

21:26 Love the idea of it. So I spent three months started out at National camping school and worked all summer with boys and I was just a big kid. That was after I just graduated from college and and loved it. And then at the end of the summer is when I went to Seminary.

21:52 Okay, Seminary was at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth, Texas. I had been there for some Mission conferences from both colleges and was familiar with the campus a little bit. It was a two-year program together Masters and religious education.

22:20 And of course I wanted to work as a youth Minister while I went part-time while I was in school but couldn't find the church. So I started out I was in the first week or two hours a night desk clerk in a motel and then got a job at the Fort Worth Boys Club managing their swimming pool. So that's a little better and then a church invited me to be there part-time youth minister in Dallas, which is 30 miles away.

22:52 So I for what ended up being three years. I was part-time youth minister at Beverly Hills Baptist Church in Dallas, Texas and a student at Southwestern that was two year degree. But in my second semester driving back and forth between Dallas and Fort Worth of the freeway, then was a Turnpike that meant money and I had no money. So I went the Old Highway and through the town of Grand Prairie. There's a bunch of bars and nightclubs and that particular night some guy 29 year old came out of one of the bars. He came across the middle line and plowed into my car and

23:47 Broke my jaw in three places. I was bleeding teeth knocked out falling down over the steering cable and the

24:05 Make a long story short, I nearly died of in I was inhaling blood they did the tracheotomy in and all and course they call my parents that he's not going to make it. You need to get down here from Arkansas and it was a pretty traumatic thing. I lost that semester the next semester the church. Let me work full-time and I went to school part-time to try to get back. So it took the third year to get my 2-year degree and

24:40 Oh, it was already getting to be a busy life when I graduated. I needed full-time work and was fully into youth Minister working with teenagers love doing Summer Camps and Retreats and banquets and parties. And so I was invited to be the youth minister of a church in Miami, Florida. So I got to move from Dallas to Miami that was another adventure to me. Miami was like a foreign country to this little Arkansas boy had a I had a ball and did pretty much the same sort of things with the youth there that I had been doing and without getting into too much detail. There was some conflict in the church some members were trying to run the pastor off and trying to

25:40 Me to take sides and I said I'm too young. I can't get involved in this and I got out of there. I was there two years and got to go visit a friend who was a missionary in Bahamas and love the Everglades lots of animals and started getting into photography a little bit there and did so far both churches. So you're the best youth Minister will be there for you know that I was beginning to be. Well no, but a larger church in Dallas offered me the position and so I came back to Dallas as the youth minister at Hillcrest Baptist Church.

26:30 And which at that time was in South Oak Cliff its scent move, but that's okay. And the I had a very good experience there the one of the things I did and all of my churches because of my interest admissions we have in Southern Baptist Church is a program called royal ambassadors, which is a boys program Mission education program that includes camping like Scouts and some other things but if the purpose is to teach about and get boys involved in Mission, and so I work the program pretty hard and in the end up to three churches now and

27:28 And became known as one of the few youth ministers who really was doing something with the missions program.

27:36 So after about two years at Hillcrest in Dallas, I was invited to be the National Royal Ambassador consultant for youth age group and it was probably beginning to go to my head. But I I couldn't turn that how old were you by miss one? Let's see that would have been

28:07 6929 and I had been too busy and having too much fun to get married, but I was beginning to worry about it. And so, but I went to the National Organization at that time was housed in Memphis, Tennessee.

28:31 So I moved to Memphis and became basically like a traveling salesman for a boys program. I was the consultant and did conferences all over the United States got the plan and direct a national conference for boys did some Mission projects in Mexico, but I was approaching 30 and so I kind of was a little panicky and dated two or three girls in Memphis. That wasn't right and I kept remembering ginger in Dallas that I dated and Ginger was the daughter of probably the best volunteer youth worker at ever had her her mother was just wonderful in that of course. She introduced me to her daughter.

29:31 And we dated some in Dallas but hadn't gotten too serious. Well on some of my trips where I was going to or through Dallas. I stopped in to see Ginger and sort of one thing led to another and by 19 August of 1970. We were married and First Baptist Church of Dallas the the big church with w a Criswell and so

30:06 And then

30:10 She didn't like my travel so.

30:15 We had to I started looking around after a while, even though I love my work and went to a church back in Dallas as a minister of education and administration. I pretty much ran the church where the pastor that all the pastor stuff and I did the education finances and we remodeled building and and did that. Well Ginger really was not a good church staff person. It's too much like living in a fishbowl. And so I knew that wouldn't work. She didn't like me traveling. So I talked to friends and Nashville who work for what was in the Baptist Sunday School Board to see if there was maybe an editor position and I came to Nashville.

31:15 1977 as a editor of Youth materials for discipleship training did that stay there toll 1999 for 22 years of work for Sunday School Board, which became known as LifeWay Christian resources and

31:42 During that time actually while in Memphis we are son Jason was born and then in Nashville Julianne was born her daughter three years younger than Jason. He was born in 73 and she was

32:00 79 six years difference and then

32:09 Things were really busy family. And I guess I'm kind of going over the family part pretty fast. I love the kids. It was a challenge the marriage became more and more of a challenge. The eighties were very difficult years. I think for all of us and in 88, my mother died of cancer in 89 Ginger who was never happy file for divorce her reason was I'm not happy and the so we went through the divorce which took a year then child custody the courts gave me full custody of Julie who was 11 years old then Julie was the daughter.

33:09 Jason was of age. You could go where he wanted. He was 17 and so he chose to live with me and Ginger was very angry. And so she packed up and went to Texas and didn't even come by say bye to Julie.

33:32 A single parented through the 90s Jason eventually was a rebellious teenager.

33:42 Dropped out of school ran away from home in North Carolina. That didn't work out then he went all well then he came back and said well, I'm I'd like to go to school. So you went to wanted to go to Memphis College of Art. I borrowed money for Memphis College of Art to get him in school to private school and where Amy Carter went and he stayed for a year, but said, it's too much like school. I know of another school I can go to and graduate in 9 weeks and they guarantee me a job.

34:29 I kind of rolled my eyes, but I always was the American training institute. He became a truck driver at this so tall skinny musician artist I said Jason. Do you know any truck drivers know I said, but anyway says there you go trying to tell me how to run my life. So he actually became a truck driver that lasted for about six months and he totaled a truck jackknifed it and an icy Road in West Virginia. He was driving for Dollar General and so he

35:18 He quit and anger cuz they were going to let him go for a while and it he wouldn't work. And so that's when he ran away. And when the Californian ended up with his mother in Texas for a while. And in the meantime, I was dealing with special needs daughter who had physical had had to have major surgery because of several problems in 90 and was special education autistic Augsburger syndrome, Julia.

36:03 Now what I was going to say in 97?

36:10 Her feet were swelling.

36:13 And the doctor said we need to check her blood. She had kidney failure complete kit. She was born with only one kidney headed shut down. So in a few weeks while we put her on dialysis within seven weeks she woke up one morning and on the way to the bathroom collapsed with a congestive heart failure and died.

36:43 Now the year before year and a half before my father had died.

36:49 And so this was you know, this was difficult and coerce her mother and brother were blaming may you like I can do anything about kidney failure, but we went through that I moved and got a house downtown and a townhouse and was starting all over and then LifeWay deleted my position and retired me early and the good thing was

37:18 Because I had done so much volunteer work, which I haven't even mentioned in Mission and made several mission trips to Africa. I was invited to be the business manager of a mission in West Africa and live for three years and The Gambia West Africa and then when I came back they are they offered to extend it but there were multiple reasons why I chose not to and came back love nature photography tried to sell photos for a while bottom line. Is it cost more than I could make and I was getting back aches. So from carrying stuff to arts and crafts fairs and

38:10 So since then I'm of volunteer educator at Nashville Zoo Deacon another volunteer work in my church First Baptist Nashville. I occasionally take a mission trip somewhere and travel when I can just got back from Mexico last January going to Grand Canyon and other Canyons of the Southwest and August and hope to take more basic play Healthy. Love to go hiking and camping Sunday. I don't Camp as much as I used to that you continue in some mission trips.

38:58 Yes, I've done mission trips to to Kenya one to Tenzin. The I've been on the Amazon River in Brazil done some in the United States Tennessee and Kentucky most of us just helping with children's programs. Mostly but sometimes they planing. I've been to Canada where we painted and did that kind of work. Well, I've done Bible School up there so

39:35 We have about one minute left and thank you will said 40 minutes is hardly enough. But is there anything you'd like to say about?

39:44 Free I don't want to take up that last minute. So if there's anything you'd like to share, you know, I love adventure and I hope that my life particularly working with Children and Youth has somehow.

39:58 Help some people along the way.

40:04 Sometimes you don't know the influence your having on other people.

40:09 And I'm curious. Is there anything?

40:11 I'm sure there's a lot of things what what what would be the most Salient lesson that all the work that you've done has taught you?

40:22 You know you

40:25 If you enjoy what you're doing you're happy and I've enjoyed every where I've left and every job I've ever had and so you can call it the power of positive thinking you can call it optimism, but I think it's your happiness depends on your attitude and I'm basically happy in spite of some pretty tough things that have happened.