JlM AND KRISTINE PEDDICORD
by Jim

I was born in Des Moines, Iowa, on February 8, 1956, to Clifford and Mary Ellen McNair Peddicord. I was the only child born to this union, although both parents had been married previously and each had three children, two boys and a girl. My father's children were considerably older than I and I never really felt a kinship with them, or they with me. One son was in the Marines and served in Korea; the other went to the University of Iowa and is now a lawyer — Roland Dale Peddicord, who has his own large law firm in Des Moines.

My mother's children were a little closer in age and relationship. For a short period when I was young and we lived in Des Moines, several of them lived with us, but they were gone by 1964, when we moved to Peru, Iowa. John came back home about 1970. He was a jet mechanic in the Navy, based in Texas, and I don't know if he served anywhere outside the country. Nobody knows quite what happened one night when he was on leave, but he was stabbed multiple times. He went to his motel room and laid on the bed, bleeding. Mom got a call telling her he was in the hospital in critical condition. She went, of course, and took pictures showing him hooked up with tubes and looking like warmed over death. He lived, however, and continued his duty in the Navy until he had completed his commitment and was discharged. He worked in Des Moines on construction in the early 1960s, and came down to help us when we lived on a ranch in Missouri. We had 125 or 130 head of cattle on 1100 acres of pasture. John went with us when we moved next to Minnesota, but when we moved to Clarksville, Iowa, he went back to Des Moines to work in construction.

In the late 1970s, John lived with us in the Leon area. It was then I got to know him a lot better than I had previously. I remember distinctly the night of October 13, 1979. I was working at Underwood Auto Supply in Osceola. It was an NAPA (National Auto Parts Association) store and all of us associated with the store went to a function they held in Des Moines. We car-pooled and when we came back, they dropped me off to pick up my car. I drove home to Leon and stopped at a bar to see John for a little while, then I went on home.

Combining two newspaper reports of what happened next, "Early Saturday morning, John McNair, 32, of Leon, was killed in the near head-on crash that demolished his pick-up truck and (the other car)." A reason the accident attracted more publicity than simply another auto fatality was the other person involved was Osceola's popular mayor, Jack Jeffreys. We lived east of Leon, Jack had been visiting friends and was returning home driving west on Highway 2. It was determined both were traveling at excessive speeds and collided. John was killed at the scene. Jack suffered internal and head injuries, and a broken leg.  He was life-flighted to Iowa Methodist Hospital in Des Moines, where he lived in a comatose state until Tuesday, October 23.

My other brother, Stanley lived in Florida and came home after he had been hit by a car and his leg was broken, so he wasn't able to work. This was when we lived in Clarksville and he stayed with us when we moved from there to Afton, but I don't remember him being with us when we moved from Afton to Peru in 1977, for a second time. When we moved to Leon in 1978, Stanley came home to help on the farm and was still at home at the time of John's accident. My sister was living in Leon at that time as well.

All that is an introduction to the family. My personal life was begun in Des Moines and we were there until I was eight years old, when we moved to the farm near Peru. It is obvious we moved around quite a lot. I thought it through one time, and discovered we had moved 16 times before we finally settled in Leon, in 1978. My education was affected, of course.

I started kindergarten in Des Moines, then we moved to Durant in eastern Iowa near Iowa City. At the time Dad was driving semis hauling meat from the processing plant at Fort Dodge to Chicago. The terminal was in Durant and they thought it would be a good place to live. I was in school there until we moved back to Des Moines and we were there until 1964, when we bought the farm in Peru. I went to school in Winterset from 1964 to 1970, when we moved to Missouri. I went to a school there until we moved to Minnesota, where I went to high school and graduated.

In the fall I went to school in Waterloo for Diesel Truck Mechanics. It was a two-year course. I took the first year, and when the folks moved in March to Afton in 1975, I found a place to stay with a classmate at Hawkeye Tech to finish the school year. When I had completed the school, I moved to Afton and began working in Osceola at Underwood Auto Supply.

I met Kris Coulson through mutual friends. Our first date was in January, 1980, and we were married in September of that year. Kris had been born, raised, and educated in Leon and as a young adult, was a Candy Striper in the Leon Hospital. She was persuaded to go to nursing school, became an RN (Registered Nurse) and went to work at the same hospital. She continued until February 1983.

At that time Kris had enough of nursing, it didn't appear my job was going anywhere, so we moved to Council Bluffs. She didn't look for a job for awhile, but then we met a couple at church and the wife helped Kris get a job at Creighton University, where she did medical transcription. Her education acquainted her with all the medical terms so it was a natural for her to step into this job, which she really enjoyed. Her bosses were doctors and she was particularly fond of the one in oncology. He was a Nebraska farm boy, very common, and his education and position hadn't changed him as happens so often. He had a dinner party for his employees and their spouses. It was an elaborate dinner with wine and fancy food, which he had cooked. We had a good time.

I went to work for Harley Davidson, which I actually had always wanted to do, and eventually have my own motorcycle shop. I worked on them at home after hours besides working on cars and tractors and whatever else. That was the most fun I had in my whole life, meeting a lot of different people, the whole spectrum — from very wealthy people down to the poorest who spent their last nickle to keep their motorcycle running.

In 1984, our first child, John, was born. We were living in a trailer house in Carter Lake at that point. We liked it out there and intended to stay in the Council Bluffs area. We sold the trailer house and bought a house in Council Bluffs.

In February 1986, Jamie was born and in December of the same year, Joanna was born. We decided that was enough kids. We spent the rest of the time in Council Bluffs taking care of children and working. Kris worked at Creighton, I worked at the Harley Shop and did some part time jobs. I also went to school at Creighton. There were very good benefits. I could go to school at Creighton, earn a Bachelor's Degree and the only expense would have been for the course — I think it was $60 for a semester.

I went to night school working toward an MIS degree (Management Information Systems). It is the best of both sides of business because I would have had a business degree plus a computer degree. Most people have one or the other, but I took both of those courses and got enough education to operate my own business. I learned computer programming and how to do spread sheets — all the business side of things. An MIS person is able to see over the whole business. One of my instructors was an MIS guy at UP (Union Pacific) Railroad and we really hit if off. Of course, I was older than most of the college students — nearer his age. At that time an MIS with UP Railroad resulted in a triple digit income.

I finally burned out, having three little kids, a job, school, trying to work at another part-time job, I met myself coming and going. It was too much. I eliminated other things and stayed with motorcycles.

In 1991, my partner and I decided we were going to start our own shop and dealership. We got everything organized, and along about July we told the owner we were both quitting to have our own shop, which was actually right next door. It was really funny because the customers didn't like our former boss. He really wasn't a very nice person. His attitude toward customers was not very good, and when we left, they all went with us and where we had worked turned into a "ghost town." They had hardly anybody coming in except to buy new bikes. Both of us had been in the service department, and without us it died. From next door, they could see all the bikes coming and going, which really irritated them. We continued through the winter and the next year.

That fall, John started to school, Jamie would soon have been starting, and I was at the point where I wanted to get them out of the big city. There was a lot of stuff going on — drugs, gun shootings, and such stuff. It was not a good situation. We talked about getting a Harley Davidson dealership in Iowa City. We went over there to talk to a banker and financing seemed to be no problem. I talked to the shop owner in Iowa City and we pretty much had things lined up, but when we talked to Harley Davidson Company people, we were told the store couldn't stay where it was. There had to be a new shop in Iowa City, built to specifications with a designer show room. By the time we figured what it was going to cost to do this, and with the cost of bikes, we would be looking at a million dollars. I also had noted Harley Davidson historically went in cycles and the time for it to start dying off was coming quickly. It didn't happen but I got nervous about spending that much money. We decided we weren't going to take that step.

About that time, Rod Harger called to ask if I would be interested in coming back and running the shop again. By this time, Andrews had bought the store from Underwoods. Actually, Rod had called a year earlier and asked if I wanted to come back. This time I said, "God must be doing something. I know God opens doors and closes them. God had closed the door on the dealership and now He's opened this door. I guess this is what I am supposed to do."

We moved back to Osceola. I came back and stayed with my in-laws in Lamoni in December 1992, and in January 1993, we found a house and purchased it here. Kris and the kids stayed in Council Bluffs until mid-term in school and then they moved back and started school in Osceola in January 1993. Kris started as Clarke County Public Health Nurse and worked at it for several years, then went to work at B & B Guest Home, followed by a cashier's job at the boat. She quit that and went to work as transcriptionist again.

I stayed here working for Andrews for a year. I became kind of dissatisfied. I could see things weren't going the way I expected. When I saw an ad in the Des Moines paper for a machinist at Central Tractor in Des Moines, I went for an interview. They told me I was one of three candidates for the job. "Your qualifications are good. We'll let you know."

I came back to work at the shop and got a phone call saying they would like me to come up and work, so I gave Andrews my two-weeks notice, but I told them I would get off work up there at 5:00, so I could come in and help if they needed me. They hired Garry Davison for the shop and I helped a bit. He had worked at Underwoods while he was in school — I believe through the summer. He took over the shop and I went to Des Moines.

After awhile CT went bankrupt, it was sold, and the new owners moved it to Indianola. It wasn't a happy place and things weren't going well. I began thinking of what else I could do, and I started having back problems. I knew I couldn't keep on with shop work. I ended up buying this business from Andrews with 401K money, and Kris had some, too. That made enough down payment to buy the business on Feb. 1, 2003.

John graduated in 2002, and is currently going to (ISU) Iowa State University in Ames studying to be a psychologist. Jamie graduated in 2004, worked at the boat in the laundry department but left there and came to work for me. She is my "right hand man." Jamie was married six years ago to Cody Hutzell.and they have a son, Zeke, who is four years old.

Joanne graduated in 2005, and she also went to work at the boat as a waitress and made really good money. She went to SWICC (Southwest Iowa Community College) and got her associates' degree. She took all the preliminary courses she needed and with the money she had, grants, continuing to work at the boat through the summers, she paid for those two years of schooling. She went to ISU the next year and made good grades in all of her classes but ran out of money. However, she is studying to be a Mechanical Engineer and will graduate in May, but she has already been accepted into post-graduate to get her Masters' degree. One of the professors has taken her under his wing and it is already set up that her Master's degree will all be paid and she will have money on top of it. I don't know what her plans are beyond that. A mechanical engineer might design parts, buildings, pretty much anything mechanical. She has also had some electrical engineering classes, and a little bit of chemical engineering. This is unusual for a female. Female engineers are very rare — she is the only girl in the class, so her chances for success are good..

Zeke: My name is Zeke spelled Z-e-k-e. I go to school and come back. Some days I go to school and some days I don't go to school. At school I play toys. I have a good friend at school. His name is Buddy.

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