re: DandyDon Website

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Back in 1996, I presented Dad with a website I had designed for him as a birthday gift, along with a very basic used computer for him to type his reports. Dad didn’t really know what to make of it as he had never even used a typewriter, much less a computer. And he didn’t know what to make of the name “Dandy Don” either.

I had chosen that name, not because of anything to do with the legendary Dandy Don Meredith, but because Dad had contributed information for a couple of articles that were published in his brother Bill’s weekly newspaper (I believe it was called the Red River Journal) under the name Dandy Don Long, and I thought it was pretty catchy. Dad also questioned showing his photo (now an illustration) in the header, but I convinced him it would help to give the site a personal touch. It wasn’t really hard to convince him because he didn’t think very many people would ever see it anyway.

Dad went ahead and painstakingly typed out a message on that very first day, and I taught him how to email it to me for posting. At that time, we didn’t have the domain name DandyDon.com and I simply posted his reports to a server I was managing for the advertising agency that employed me. Dad enjoyed seeing his Tiger News out there on the internet, as did the few friends and family members who had internet access back in 1996, and he committed himself to publishing a report every day.

What you have to understand about my Dad is that once he committed to something he stuck to it. For example, some 30 years earlier my Dad was an avid smoker who would sometimes go through a half a pack of cigarettes, a cigar or two, and a few chews of tobacco during each LSU game he would nervously listen to on the radio. Once while driving back home from a trip to Winnfield, Dad rolled down the window and started to light a cigarette. My oldest sister, Karen, who was in fourth grade and had just learned about the dangers of smoking, asked him about it and pleaded with him to stop. Dad pulled the car over at the Turkey Creek bridge, tossed out all of his cigarettes, and told her he would quit. And he did. Cold turkey. That’s just the kind of man he was.

For roughly 15 years after posting that first Dandy Don report, Dad continued to send me a report to publish each and every day, with only three or four exceptions in the very early years when a fishing trip or family reunion prevented him for writing.

When Dad’s battle with colon cancer weakened him to the point where he could no longer invest the time required for his daily writings, I took over the task. Although it hasn’t been easy to do on a daily basis, it really means a lot to me to carry on Dad’s legacy, and I thank you for allowing me to do so through your continued readership and support.

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