Who, What, When, Where & Wiandt

John Warren was a great guy. I met him only about five years ago, but on our first meeting he treated me like he knew me my whole life. John, who lived on Vine Street in Alliance, grew up in Waynesburg with my dad and uncles. John had been trying to get a hold of me since my wedding appeared in the Alliance Review. I was working at the Review, and John stopped by and called several times, trying to reach me. We finally connected by phone. He talked to me like I was an old friend. I was impressed by his booming, happy voice.

I went to his house to see him. What a reception. When I stepped out of my vehicle he, John hollered, “I knew you were a Wiandt by that big head!” John laughed and gave me a bear hug like he hadn’t seen me in a while. We talked in his living room. I think he gave me a piece of cake and a pop. He loved to play host to guests. The next time I stopped, we sat on his patio in back and I interviewed him for a feature in the Review’s Senior Living tab.

Not long after I changed jobs last year, John called me at home. I’ll never forget that big, laughing, friendly voice. John’s voice was like his bear hug, it just surrounded you and made you feel appreciated and special and loved. I told John about how I had begun working in Stow, but I’d stop over to see him and his wife some day.

Some day would never come. John died of cancer Jan. 11 at the age of 73. I felt bad that I would never get to see him again, or hear his booming voice say, “Steve! How you doin’?” I called his wife about a month later and talked to her. She said it happened fast. He was diagnosed on Nov. 1 and gone a little more than two months later. She said he was ready to go, and he died peacefully. I knew he was ready to go. John was a strong Christian who knew what it meant to be “saved.”

But, as I’m sure a lot of people felt, I wasn’t ready for him go.

Yes, Charlton Heston, lived for a short time in Alliance. That was mentioned here before. Since writing that post April 9 I was able to find a file I made while working  at The Alliance Review.  The folder contained several photocopies of articles and photos, some notes, a letter and a clipping of  the final story I wrote on Heston’s local ties.

The project started when I received a handwritten letter from Blanche Oyster in August 2001. She wrote that she went to school with Heston at Freedom School. “We were in the fifth grade together,” she said, “and I have a school picture to prove it.” Oyster said the photo was taken by Dimit Bros. Studios in 1935, but the note board in the picture is dated May 18, 1934. Of the picture, Mrs. Oyster wrote, “Needless to day it’s a keepsake.”

I went to Mrs. Oyster’s house in Alliance and she showed me the photo. There standing in the back row, fourth from the right, was little Chuck Heston. The handwritten identification on the back of the photo read “Charleton ‘Charles’ Heston.” On a side note, Saturday I watched an interview with Heston who told his interviewer, Robert Osborne, who addressed him as “Mr. Heston,”  to call him “Chuck.” He added that he should not call him Charlie. “Only my wife calls me Charlie,” he said.

Heston was born Charles Carter. His parents divorced, and when he was 10 his mother married Charles “Chet” Heston, an Alliance native. Although the actor  had  used the name Heston since he was a child, it is not know if he was ever adopted by his stepfather.

For my story which ran Nov. 15, 2001, I also talked to Don Flitcraft, a relative of the Hestons who has since passed away. In researching Heston’s Alliance connection, I found some information in his autobiography, “In the Arena.” I also went to Rodman Public Library and looked at a couple articles that came out in the Review in 1960 when Heston won the best-actor Oscar for “Ben Hur.” The first article was on his acting debut as a fourth-grader in Alliance. It included a 1933 photo of the fourth-grade class at Freedom School, and a close-up of a young Charlton Heston. Or so it seemed.

The second article included portions of a letter Heston sent to the Review seeking to make a clarification that the boy pictured in the paper was not him. It seems the photo was taken in 1933, a year before Heston arrived in Alliance (my story says he came in 1935, but that has to be an error). Although the boy who was thought to be Heston, later identified as Merle Roose, resembled him somewhat in the face, the clothing was very different. Roose had bib-top overalls on and Heston was wearing a suit and tie.

Heston looked like a leading man even back then.