The phrase “The Best of Times” carries multiple thoughts and meanings for me. It’s the title of one of my favorite movies where Jack Dundee (Robin Williams) helps revive his hometown by convincing his friend, Reno Hightower (Kurt Russell) to replay a football game from their senior year in school where Jack dropped the winning touchdown pass. The idea is that one event sent their town on a path of mediocrity.
That phrase also makes me think of my childhood here in Hooks, TX. It’s a shame that I had to get into my 40’s before realizing just how good things were around here as a kid. Not just Hooks, but how good things were just in general. I can remember my dad telling me stories about growing up here and I remember thinking “Geez, I’m glad that we’re not in the 50’s anymore. We have so many cool things here in the 80’s!” And here I am, writing about how great those times were.
But, I also believe that this phrase can be about today. It can describe what we can be and do in this town TODAY. It doesn’t take much to form an opinion about Hooks if you read Facebook for just a few minutes. It’s easy to sit back and take shot after shot at the roads, water bill situation, or abandoned homes. I’ve done it before.
But this town has been and is made up of some of the absolute best people that God ever created. Many of them were born and raised here, but many of them moved here. If you’re willing to look, there are so many more things to be proud of than there are negative things to post about.
In 1994 Danny Crumpton opened Danny’s Repair just across the tracks in Downtown Hooks. From 1994 until 2015 my dad was a loyal Danny’s Repair customer. He didn’t drive his little Nissa truck enough to have too much wrong with it, but when it needed to be looked at, to Danny’s it went. As a 17 year old in 1994 I didn’t quite understand why he was so committed to this one shop. Texarkana had bigger shops with way nicer equipment.
I understood at the end of my dad’s life why he was committed to Danny and his little repair shop. I moved away from Hooks in 2017 because of grief over losing my parents, BUT God brought me home in 2021 to find that Danny’s son Heath had taken over the family business. I met Heath Crumpton at a Hooks Hornet football game while he was still at Leary School. We were in the same grade, but didn’t go to school together until our 9th grade year at HHS.
We didn’t graduate together because he transferred to Redwater, but he was always a Hornet to me. I met Heath in the late 80’s, but we became real friends in 2021. We became friends because I like my Ford trucks even though they literally kept Heath in business. Heath went the extra mile to do the best job he could for us while always doing whatever he could to keep our cost as low as possible.
I went to see him on Wednesday, June 4th to take him a trophy plate that we had engraved for him. He wanted it to be a certain size so many more could be added (with his name of course) over the coming years. We talked about seeing each other at our upcoming 30 year class reunion. Again, he didn’t graduate from Hooks, but Heath Crumpton was a Hooks Hornet, PERIOD. We left the conversation with me not letting him pay me for the plate. The last thing he said was, “Don’t worry, you’ll bring one of those Fords by pretty soon and I’ll cut some of the bill off”. I laughed and left.
Heath had a heart attack the next day, June 5th and passed away. He is proof that even in 2025, we can be in “the best of times” if we’re willing to turn off Facebook and choose to make a difference where we are. I’ll miss you friend, and I’ll think about you every time I have one of my Ford trucks worked on.
