Robert Hammond and Elizabeth Hammond

[00:00] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Okay. I am Beth Hammond, and I am 57 years old. And today is November 27, 2021, and I am here with Maasai dad in New Smyrna beach at his home, New Smyrna Beach, Florida. New Smyrna Beach, Florida. Yes. Now you do your part. You're Bob Hammond.

[00:24] ROBERT HAMMOND: I'm Bob Hammond. I'm 80 years old. A couple of days ago, and it's the same day as she just said, in the same place.

[00:38] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That's it. That's good. Okay. I wanted to do StoryCorps with you, Daddy, because you have lived your life so fully, and it's been exciting to be your child with all the adventures that we've had. And you were born and raised in Miami, Florida, one of the few native Floridians that exist. I guess there are more now than there used to be, but there are more now. But you were in Miami, and then you had. You went to college and to dental school and all of those things. So talk about some of the adventures that you've had in your life.

[01:10] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, mainly we were. Like you said, I was. I was born in Miami, right. A couple of weeks before World War II, before Pearl harbor, and grew up in Miami. And then I went off to college at Florida Southern College in Lakeland, Florida. It's a great small college in Florida. And shortly after that, I met your mother. 59 years ago, I met her. And so the biggest adventure I've had is being married to your mother for 58 years. We had 56 good ones. Stop. We've had a great time. We're still very much in love and enjoying doing our life together.

[02:08] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So after you got married, you took your road trip and you moved to Cleveland to go to dental school.

[02:17] ROBERT HAMMOND: After I left Florida Southern, I went to the University of Miami for a year, and I graduated studies in biochemistry. And then I decided I wanted to be a dentist. So I went to Case Western Reserve in Cleveland, where I studied dentistry. I also worked at the Cleveland Clinic, and I worked at St. John's Hospital, and I worked at a lot of places. And again, another adventure there was when you got tuberculosis, and that if it hadn't been for a physician there, a pediatrician there that provided your treatment for free, I wouldn't be a dentist today. But they did, and people came to help. So I left there, and I went into the Navy, and during the Vietnam War, I wasn't involved in that, but I was at Camp Lejeune with the Marines, and that was a good two years that I spent there. And then we Moved to Daytona beach to set up practice. And that's where I practiced industry for 45 years. And we picked Daytona beach specifically because of the size of the city and the outlet to the ocean so I could go fishing.

[03:43] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Because you grew up in Miami fishing and enjoying that. So I know that during our childhood there were times when we were fishing, we would beg you to stop because we were so tired. But no, we enjoyed the fishing. We did a lot of other things that went with the fishing.

[03:57] ROBERT HAMMOND: We did the fishing. I started out as a diver and all when I was a mime and all. I didn't fish that much and I was a diver when I came here. And so I would go out scuba diving. And then while I was waiting to be able to go for the next dive, I'd fish and I got to where I was fishing more than diving. The diving off Daytona beach isn't all that great, but it is in other places, all through the Caribbean. So that's where we. That's where your mother dove with me. And until I did something stupid like hand her an anchor one time, probably.

[04:40] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Wasn'T a good idea.

[04:41] ROBERT HAMMOND: She did die with me much after that. But that's how it happened to be in Daytona. Well, so, you know, you hear about the racing and that sort of thing. And at that time I was doing a little racing myself. And so it was interesting to be Daytona with all the rednecks racing around here.

[05:07] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Well, I remember us parking the motorhome in the infield while you helped that dentist at the 24 Hours at Daytona. And we used to sit in the front and do splits and tell you how fast they were going with the walkie talkie.

[05:18] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, that was. We were working on the 24 hour races for a few years in the part of the pit. And at that time when we first started, the car we had did not have a radio. And so your mother would stand on the track with a chalkboard and convey information to the driver for 500, you know, for 24 hours. So it was, you know, fortunately we're young enough to be able to do that.

[05:51] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So you were a dentist for 45 years, but you practiced dentistry beyond your office?

[05:58] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yes, I did. I practiced dentistry in the Navy, of course, and here. But I got. Part of the things that we did, your mother and I did, was to go on mission trips to indigenous people and not into remote areas. And so we've been to about 15 different countries and worked on the indigenous people. Indigenous people, by and large, get very little help. Guatemala City has hospitals and everything else. But you get 100 miles outside of Guatemala City and you'd be lucky if you even have an EMT guy there, something. And you certainly don't get any dentistry anywhere for, you know, part of the government care. And so there's a big need for pain relief and some restorative work. That's what we did in different areas. And we did this through church organizations who were reaching out to these people. So we were able to go to a lot of countries in Americas and we went to Africa and a number of areas and had a great time, you know, helping people like that.

[07:23] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So you took our oldest Bobby to Chile. Chile, right. And then later you took our younger daughter to Peru. And I know that that trip to Peru for that child, for Mary changed her life completely. I mean, you had to walk from the Amazon out to a tribal area where the houses were all on stilts without electricity. But what she said was when you came over the hill and you saw the field and had the horses in it, that particular moment changed her life.

[07:54] ROBERT HAMMOND: She really responded to that. We had to lug our equipment up a hill and everything else. And then the valley which flooded when the Amazon flooded, this was on the Napo river, which is a tributary to Amazon. And they had some horses. It was an interesting area. We practiced there. It's extremely hot. I became. I had a problem with the heat a couple of times. They were real good to us and they put us inside somewhere and I'd much rather been outside under a tree. They did. We were self contained and we had the equipment we needed to do dentistry, which, it's a field equipment that is developed just for that. The Rotary Club in Seattle would put these things together. So it was pretty interesting. But that was. The Peruvian trip, was a trip down Napo River. I think it was the Napo River. And we were there with the missionary that was involved in trying to create a better breed, a better breed of animals. And so she'd bring in good, well bred animals and then try and improve the genetic pool by doing that. She was doing a good job with that. So we supply. We supported that in that way. We didn't. We did not. We put out fires, people in pain, for the dental side. We also had a medical sign that we brought. We also had, in one trip we had a veterinary medic, a veterinary doctor, which was very, very popular. I wish we'd had it more times, but those trips were great. They were initiated through churches and through missionaries that could set us up to do the work. And Keep us safe as much as possible.

[10:17] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So one of the things that I've always admired about you is that you didn't wait for someday to have your adventures, to do your traveling, to do your things with us. I mean, I remember you saying more than once that in a way, you were sorry for taking me to the fancy restaurants, because now we like the fancy food. But we did a lot of traveling, and so we were able to have a lot of experiences. And you've tried to explain the reason why you did that, to show us.

[10:45] ROBERT HAMMOND: Places, experiences, and the relationships are far more important than owning things, buying things, memories, and building relationships. And so we were very intentional about building memories with you all taking. You went to. I think you went to every state except one or two, you know, and you went to Canada. You went to, you know, different places. And of course, we spent many, many, many, many weeks and months in the Bahamas.

[11:21] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Yes, we did.

[11:22] ROBERT HAMMOND: And that.

[11:23] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: And some of that was kind of scary.

[11:25] ROBERT HAMMOND: That was part of the adventures. But it was also introduced you different cultures, and you go around the United States and find different cultures, and you got to visit those things. And your daughters. I was intentional about getting them to show them more what the real world. How most people live in the world. Not like we live. They live in a much more precarious situation than we live in. So that. And that benefited me a great deal, and I think it benefited you all.

[12:03] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Yes, it did. I know it did. Good for increasing our vocabulary. So I remember when you had just retired from dentistry, and for your 70th birthday, you jumped out of a plane. And I remember Mama saying, why would you want to jump out of a perfectly good plane?

[12:24] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, it was just. It was just something to do things. Bucket list, as they say. And it was exciting, and it was quite invigorating. I loved it. I wouldn't make a life of doing that, because I think it's like a motorcycle ride. Eventually it's gonna. It's not if, it's when. So the same thing with last week. I went out. I went on a military jet last week and did the maneuvers and all like that. And that was a. That was a lot of fun. And, you know, I had to have him level out between roles. And also Maasai stomach. I reposition itself.

[13:09] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: It's interesting because I've never known you'd have any stomach problem, because we did a lot of traveling in the boats, and the boats were always on the smaller side. And we went out across the ocean, across the Gulf Stream. And Maasai brothers and I never Knew there was something that was special about that. Except for one time when we're like, this is not a good thing. But yeah, we. You always. Even when we did things that were big things, you do it in a way that provided the most experiences.

[13:41] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, like you said, they were. They were normally small boats. The first crossing. First a few crossings were done in a 20 foot boat. And we didn't do it by ourselves. We had other boats around us or with us. And on a good day, we could make it no time at all. On a bad day, it took two days. So that was it. But there we went virtually every summer. I've been to Bahamas every year since 1970 or so.

[14:25] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: And now you go with your friends to go fishing.

[14:28] ROBERT HAMMOND: We go. Right. We primarily go fishing. We have friends over there that we visit, we fish with and we've traveled around to a lot of the islands and that we primarily bone fish. Enjoy that.

[14:42] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So I always love seeing the pictures.

[14:45] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, well, you know, you can get pictures because it's crystal clear water and you can take your underwater cameras and take pictures and it's great.

[14:56] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: You've written a couple of books. I mean, they're books for the grandchildren. And I know that for me, reading it helped me to make sense out of all of these things that we've done in our lives. But what are some of the lessons that you really wanted the grandchildren to hear or to understand?

[15:19] ROBERT HAMMOND: I guess the big lesson is that memories and relationships and all are the most important thing. I've encouraged that, and I didn't really understand that real well until. Until I got involved in the church. And it became obvious to me that that was more important than trying to, you know, build up another car or something like that. So I try to relate that to them. I try to relate the idea that they can do virtually anything they want to do within reason by applying themselves. And how if you want to lead organizations or if you want to start a business or something like that, that is definitely possible. And it's just, you want to have that passion to do it. And I believe that you can do that. At least they can because of the situations they're in. And they've made me real proud. They've done really good with their life. I think the older ones have already started out in life.

[16:44] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Well, and that for me, that was meaningful that you've encouraged all of us so much, because there was a time when I didn't think I would go back to school. I really had wanted to teach college. I taught children for a Long time. But I wanted to teach teachers and it looked like I couldn't go back. But with you and mom is your encouragement, I was able to go back and earn Maasai PhD and now I teach teachers. I do what I love to do every day.

[17:11] ROBERT HAMMOND: That's right. You don't as a dentist. If you want to be a dentist, a good dentist, you've got to continue be educated. You have to go to continuing education all the time. And without doing that, you fall behind and you're not providing your patients with the best care or the care that they need to have. And so I always thought that was important to keep getting education. And at one time I got a little burned out on dentistry and I took a two year course at University of Florida and comprehensive dentistry and it re fired me up and I went for another 25, 30 years.

[18:04] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: You had to get that University of Florida thing in there?

[18:07] ROBERT HAMMOND: Oh, absolutely.

[18:08] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Because I'm a graduate of Florida State and so is one of the grandchildren and about to be another grandchild. Got that rivalry game going on today.

[18:20] ROBERT HAMMOND: I feel, I feel important. So I was thrilled when you did and your brother did too. He went, got his top degree in his profession and all. You might as well do that. You can't sell art during a recession anyway.

[18:35] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That's right. That's true. So you and mama have been together 58, 59 years, a long time. So what do you hope for? For the future.

[18:48] ROBERT HAMMOND: For the future, I'm focused more on again, on relationships. I'm excited about the new baby coming. That's going to make me great. And I've always wanted to be and never thought I'd make it, but that's the future. Your mother and I love each other very much and we enjoy each other and we'll just make the most out of the times that we have left here.

[19:22] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I remember when you first retired. During that next year and a half, you got a puppy and a Miata and your last new car and a motorhome and you bought a campsite down in the Everglades to use as a condo.

[19:38] ROBERT HAMMOND: I told you not to accumulate. Well, we did accumulate. Or actually, you know, it's like I told you before, you don't own anything. It all owns you. And so, you know, now I've got to go down and use that campsite. But I love going down there. I love being in the wild like that. It reminds me a little bit of old Florida because there's very little Florida left. It's a vastly overpopulated state.

[20:16] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Well, and when you're down in 10,000 isles. Sometimes you'll take your boat and go around the islands where you don't see people for a long time. And you stay in the little chickies they have set up.

[20:26] ROBERT HAMMOND: You can get lost out there, which.

[20:29] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Is why mama has a GPS device on your body when you go.

[20:33] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, we have fun down there. It's a lot of fun.

[20:38] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Good. So you have another adventure coming on December 13th.

[20:42] ROBERT HAMMOND: Oh, we have another dog. Yeah, we had a labradoodle that was a lot of fun. Very excitable. We've had dogs most of our time. We had a German shepherd that grew up with you guys. And that was one of the most fantastic dogs I've ever seen. It was such a balance between protection and loving and part of the family. Wrestling on the floor and the dog comes in to wrestle with us. That was a great time. So we. And we got this labradoodle and we were so excited because the dog was so excitable. And the dog can open and close doors. It can do all sorts of things and a lot of fun. So we're getting another one pretty quick here. Once they get to eight weeks.

[21:37] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That's exciting.

[21:38] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah.

[21:39] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So. So you're gonna have new puppy and great grandbaby close together.

[21:43] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah. Another grandson in law.

[21:46] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That's right.

[21:47] ROBERT HAMMOND: So I'm looking forward to that. For Mary Best. And Mary, we have your brother and his four boys here now, and your other brother and Eden will be here tomorrow. So that's exciting to have everybody together like that.

[22:06] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Yep. We're celebrating your birthday tomorrow. Lots of people who love you are coming.

[22:11] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, that's really a lot of people I love, you know, that's very exciting. One of the things that I really was a real important part of Maasai life was coming to a realization that there's a higher power than myself. And I wasn't raised in a church environment. And so whenever, you know, I used to drop you off at church and go play tennis, you know, I did Maasai be good daddy thing. But when I got interested in religion and Christianity and when I, you know, I got baptized, you were there.

[23:05] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I had been baptized a year before.

[23:07] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, you were there with mother and I as we were baptized. And that led to a lot of different adventures. It led to mission trips, and it led to. I was able to lead Bible study classes for quite some time, quite a while. And all that led to helping me understand Maasai life better and what I was trying to do in Maasai life. Maasai sister asked me when I was in college what I wanted to do with Maasai life. And I told her that I really didn't want to just breathe up the air, that I wanted to have some function and do some things that would improve a lot of other people. And dentistry allowed me to do that. I was able to get involved with other organizations like for the homeless and for the children's home and things like that. And that helped me live out Maasai desire to do something that would be meaningful or be helpful. And then the church led to that, because that's the main thrust of the church, is to love your neighbor as you love yourself. And. And so that helped a lot. And it provided the push to go to on these mission trips. And, you know, the mission trips were like down the Amazon on a boat, doing dentistry on a missionary's boat, going down rivers and canoes to do dentistry and just all sorts of things missing a landslide, rocks hitting the back of the truck as we're going through the mountains in Oaxaca, Mexico. And a landslide just about wiped us out and things like that. But in that way, we were serving other people. And that was what I wanted to be able to do that and fish.

[25:33] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Of course, and now golf. So one of the trips you took was to Tanzania and you spent some time with a Maasai Sai.

[25:41] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yes, that was exciting. We landed in Nairobi and they picked us up in a couple of these safari vehicles, as I call them, with three or four tires on the top. And I thought, hey, why are you having those tires? And I found out a half hour we already had to change tires, but that was. We went into Tanzania and then we went out in Savannah and just out on, not on roads, but just going cross country in these Nissan truck things. Not Suvarn sport vehicles, they were utility vehicles. But that was fun because we, you know, you go out looking for the. Maasai side and working with them. And it's a funny thing though, because you're out in the Savannah and Serengeti or whatever. And we examined, Maasai dentist friend and I were on this trip and we examined about 60 or about 60 young children, elementary school type age children. And we found one small cavity of all those, which is a whole lot different than that at that time in the United States or any other country. But they didn't have, they didn't have access to any sugar or anything like that. They ate curdle milk and, and some vegetables and you know, they didn't, they didn't have that access to. But it was really interesting to live in their culture and deal with them in that way and have Them cook goat for us. And also we had a snake alert. A black mamba that was in the. In the. With the tents had to go out and find that snake.

[27:56] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So there was some place that you went on missions where you had to sort of collaborate with the medicine person. Was that with the. Maasai side?

[28:04] ROBERT HAMMOND: Oh yeah. We had a medical there. All our trips were medical, dental trips.

[28:10] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I was talking about medicine man, a person who was actually there.

[28:13] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, well, we had some. We had trouble and a little trouble in Ecuador, but way down the river in Ecuador getting almost to Brazil and we had a little trouble there where he was. And that ended because the chief in the village was sick and so you know, he didn't come into our medical at all. And finally his son spirited away a physician so that the medicine man wasn't seated and they determined he had pneumonia. And so we were able to restore him to health. Which didn't endear us to the medicine.

[29:10] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I'm sure it didn't.

[29:12] ROBERT HAMMOND: Or whatever is the shaman or whatever. But those. We had those experiences. We were working on one group of indigenous people that had 10 years earlier had killed the missionary. And a year before, and we didn't find this out until the end of the trip a year before had threatened to kill the missionary that was guiding us. When we got done on that village, it was a totally different situation. When we came, we had to lug all our equipment up. When we left, they wouldn't let you touch anything they made. They. I don't know whether they're trying to get rid of us or they just trying to be nice.

[29:58] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Let's move you out.

[30:00] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah.

[30:01] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So you were able to help them?

[30:04] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, we help them with them in the moment. Now a month later, somebody else has toothache and then somebody else has a problem or somebody else gets sick or they get worms. We take worm medicine we take for parasites because they almost all have parasites, one sort or another. But we treat that sort of thing.

[30:27] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So coming towards them, what I know Maasai brother Bob is in business. Maasai brother Bryce is in the art world including working as a district level employee for the doing arts in the county here. I'm at the University of South Carolina. What are your hopes for us?

[30:48] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, they're being realized. Maasai goals for you were all realized. You I haven't had to support you. I haven't had. You seem to have a lot of interests and a lot of things which I wanted you to have. You seem to be happy and that's good. So I'm thrilled about what you all are. Doing you made me very proud, very proud. We never had any crises that we couldn't get through. All right, that sort of thing. I'm pleased with the way it is. I have Maasai grandchildren now that I've been trying to coach about. I was talking to one grandson about. He's working in a veterinarian office and he would like to be a veterinarian, but he's concerned about the time it takes. But I pointed out to him if he graduates from college and wants to do something, it's going to take him five to six years or seven years to gain enough, you know, to become a manager or whatever, you know. And so that's the same time in case you get out of veterinary school, you're a veterinarian and you can practice right? Then whenever you get out of undergraduate school, then you have to work your way up. So it's other than the outgrow of money and no income to speak of. But you know, in Maasai case I worked, I worked all week long and went to school at the same time. Dental school was an eight to four job year round, not just semesters, year round. But I also was able to work at night after that and I could, I had a job that I could study and so I was able to get through that. That and the help of a lot of people. So some of them, and I think to an extent people are running up these huge bills in college and there is, there is plenty of time to have a job and offset some of those costs. I worked every all well, I worked and paid for Maasai own schooling, but I worked all the time. I was in college and I was a science major and I was a graduate student. So if I can do that, I'm not all that bright. I just work hard.

[33:46] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I remember that lesson because I was. When I first went back for Maasai PhD studies, there was a particular statistics course that I was struggling with. I ended up with an A in that particular class. But I remember walking with you on the beach and I told you I am a C student, I just work hard. And you're telling me welcome to the club. So there's a lot to be said.

[34:05] ROBERT HAMMOND: For hard work, focus, hard work, hard work and smart work. You know, but it's, you know, it's all part of life and it's not a bad part of life, it's actually a good part of life. Being working and being employed or having your own business or whatever gives you an opportunity to, to build your self confidence, build your self esteem if you want it. Gives you opportunities to help others, serve others. I learned in Maasai marriage and Maasai business and Maasai life. When I got married, I made a decision that I was going to be faithful to your mother. And, you know, I made a decision that this is what I'm going to do. And I've been tempted, but I've been faithful to Mother. And when I went to business, as a dentist, you have very little way of telling if I'm telling you the truth or not. So I decided that I was going to. I was going to lay out the problems. I was going to tell you how I could solve your problems, tell you what it would cost you, and then I would do it. If something came up that changed it a little bit, I did that for the same price as well. So I wanted to be as honest as I could, and I wanted to force myself to make the right diagnosis by giving a price for it that wouldn't change. And so that in doing that, it's not like I get in there and I find out you need a root canal or something. And then I say, well, that's going to be another thousand dollars. I just did. And so it made me do Maasai diagnosis a lot better rather than just throwing a number at you to get you to accept treatment. And so they do that, and then you're out. Outside life is just trying to be as honest as you can and keep your word. When you say you're going to do something, do it, and. And that puts responsibility on you so that you aren't too glib about promising everybody something that you have no intention of delivering or you can't deliver. You know, it's not like you don't have any intention. You just. After it's said and done, you don't have the time or you don't have the interest or the ability or whatever. So those are things, I think, that have helped me in Maasai life a lot. A lot. I only have to make a decision once. I don't have to decide on every patient. If I'm going to, you know, do it, you know, if I'm going to be honest or if I'm going to just make one decision and keep that up there in front of you all the time. So.

[37:27] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So that's how well I know that I still. I still look at you and Mama like the compass. And I know when we would go boating, you would tell us, don't watch the compass. Get this heading, find a cloud and go that way. Because if you keep looking at the compass, you're going to Be all over the water, which is true. But I still come back to you with Maasai questions. And during the past two years, we've had this Covid thing going on, and I remember calling you several times early on to say, okay, what does this mean? Because you understand the medical. All the medical terminology and all, and so still, you're that compass. But this past two years has really changed so much in our lives. We've been fortunate to be able to get together sometimes as a family. But, you know, there were things that changed for you, like the travel you had planned and things like that.

[38:12] ROBERT HAMMOND: So this is a unique time. This is a. It's a unique time, and everybody's trying to handle it in the way they can, the way they think they should. It. There was a similar time during the Spanish flu, but this is something we're living through, that we've never had. And we're going to. Historians will look back on it and be able to read it a whole lot better on Monday morning than we can today.

[38:50] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I'm sure. I'm sure. Hindsight.

[38:52] ROBERT HAMMOND: But it is a historic time, so you just have to have to try and balance it as much as you can. And, you know, we overdo it sometimes, and sometimes we don't do enough, so we just have to work our way through it. So you never asked much about the.

[39:14] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Bahamas, and do you want to talk about the Bahamas?

[39:18] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, we took you guys over there and small boats.

[39:24] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So I have to say that first time you took us over in the small boat, we were coming back and we broke down in the Gulf Stream, and we really did think later maybe you were trying to reduce the size of your family or something like that, because it was really scary.

[39:37] ROBERT HAMMOND: It would have been very easy.

[39:38] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: It was really scary.

[39:41] ROBERT HAMMOND: That's one of those obsessive things that I do, that going over there in a small boat with too much weight.

[39:51] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So when we were heading out, you said, all right, I want all of you to get on the bow, and when I count to three, run to the back of the boat. And that'll put us on a plane because the boat had far too much stuff in it.

[40:03] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, I'm not real proud of that.

[40:06] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: You proud of that?

[40:07] ROBERT HAMMOND: There's a few things that I'm not real proud of. But we got away with it.

[40:13] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: And fortunately, we didn't understand the danger until later.

[40:17] ROBERT HAMMOND: Well, you didn't, but I understood you.

[40:20] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Were really good at hiding.

[40:21] ROBERT HAMMOND: I understood danger, but I was too obsessed to do it.

[40:27] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I will make it work.

[40:28] ROBERT HAMMOND: Yeah, right. So we did Those times in the Bahamas were great. We used to go dive in the Bahamas on dive trips with the dive clubs and all. And then we dove off our own boats and had a great time. Two times. Two times I came closest to dying. Both and dive accidents or could have been accidents. One was in a cave in North Florida. And when I very first started diving, and fortunately I had a dive partner that found. I found Maasai way out of the cave because I was about to have a problem with that. And then the second time was in. The Bahamas is when Maasai tank had. I had borrowed this tank and apparently it was dirty inside and it shut Maasai air off and I was down about 85, 90ft. I just shot a fish, was going down to get it turned upside down and the air stopped because all the trash went up and blocked the valley. And so I had to surface from 85ft and not, you know, blow out enough air, but not too much air and try not to breathe and try, you know, but that was. Those two times were probably the closest. I'm not going to talk about the time of breaking down the Gulf Stream.

[41:59] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Like I just said.

[42:05] ROBERT HAMMOND: We had a lot of fun doing that. We had a great, great time. We sat through a hurricane or two.

[42:13] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That's right, we did. One time I had been visiting with the children and I flew out. When I got back to the States, I heard about the hurricane. I was like, they don't know this. Or you didn't find out until that day that it was like the next.

[42:25] ROBERT HAMMOND: Day coming a few of those things and, you know, not much you can do. You just hunker down and ride it out. But having lived in Florida, we weren't totally ignorant about hurricanes.

[42:42] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Having been from Miami, you had them all. You're growing up.

[42:45] ROBERT HAMMOND: We lost. We had a house destroyed, nearly destroyed around us when I was 10, 11 years old in a hurricane. But that was, you know, I guess I was a little too young to realize how bad.

[43:06] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Well, you've, You've. You've been a fantastic leader for our family. You've provided an example of integrity and adventure and taught us to find what we love to do and make it our career.

[43:20] ROBERT HAMMOND: Find your passion, enjoy your work. Find, don't. If, if you. It just very sad when people work their lives and don't enjoy it and don't enjoy being at work, you know, and I told you about, and I told all your kids to find enjoyment wherever you are. I don't mean to slurp duty or not do what you're supposed to do. But find joy in that. There's gotta be some joy. And find out, if you don't find joy, do something else, go somewhere else, you know. And the other thing is that, like Maasai dad told me, Maasai dad worked real hard and he had, you know, dreams. He liked to do this or that. And. And he. He was a wonderful dad. Maasai mom was a wonderful mom. But later on in life, he said, when you. When you want to do something, do it then. Because when you can do it, you want to or you won't be able to. And so a lot of times the stuff we did was. Because that was what I wanted or we wanted to do. And, you know, in spite of what, you know, we didn't wait till we could afford kids, and we haven't waited.

[44:47] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: You didn't wait till you retired to play? I mean. I mean, that's. That's awesome. So. And with that, the traveling we did growing up, Maasai mother is a saint because she would take Maasai two brothers and me and in the motorhome, and Maasai mom's a little person, she's a little shorter than me. She's small, little woman. And she would take this family and drive out a week, and then we pick you up at some airport so you could be with us. And then we drop you off in an airport and we take another week to get home.

[45:16] ROBERT HAMMOND: That way you could have a good long vacation and I wouldn't be out of the office more than two weeks at a time. The first time that you did in the motorhome, first time you went out west, your mother had trouble backing out of the driveway.

[45:35] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: That was scary.

[45:37] ROBERT HAMMOND: And so I was thinking, I don't know what's going to happen. So I got to Denver, I flew into Denver, and Denver, there's a circular drive comes up, arriving, right? And she pulls up in the motor home, and I go, get in as you want me to drive, and she says, get in, sit down.

[46:00] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: And she was able to take it from there. Yeah.

[46:02] ROBERT HAMMOND: And so she drove out through the airport and slammed.

[46:07] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: I do remember that.

[46:08] ROBERT HAMMOND: It's funny. Were you getting the same one?

[46:12] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: So thank you for sharing. Thank you so much. And thank you for sharing all that you share.

[46:18] ROBERT HAMMOND: It's fun. The whole thing has been fun. You guys have made me so proud. So it's just exciting.

[46:24] ELIZABETH HAMMOND: Thank you.