My Father and Fred Ward

My Father and Fred Ward

The following is a true story as best I know it. Some of the dialogue was embellished for storytelling purposes. Any mistakes are unintentional.

It was early May 2022. I was at Six Flags over Texas as a chaperone-teacher for the high school field trip. Instead of being stuck in the classroom for that day, I was out having fun with the kids– one of the perks of having a license to drive the school bus. The May sunshine was in full force, but luckily, the heat hadn’t reached the one o’clock peak for the day, but it was slowly getting there.

The month of May in Texas doesn’t usually imply furnace blast intensity heat. That distinction is usually reserved for June and July, but for all the Texas heat-lovers, and they do exist, sometimes they get lucky in May. This was turning out to be one of those days. I, myself, was bowing out of the heat and made my way to some shade at one of the circular tables underneath an expansive, green patio umbrella. I found a vacant one, but the table was besmirched with a heap of potato fry crumbs and used up ketchup packets. I propped my elbows expediently away from the plentiful mess some thoughtless person had left.

The cluster of tables and patio umbrellas were located next to one of the many concession stands placed throughout the theme park. The tables were crowded save for that one spot. Even for a weekday, lines were long. Temperatures were baking, and people seemed carefree enough with just the slightest hint of looking miserable under the sun. I was surfing online on my phone trying to take my mind off how broiling hot it was outside when I paused. A piece of news immediately caught my eye. Fred Ward, the actor, dies at age 79.

The first thing I did was call my dad. I wanted to be the one to tell him. I didn’t know how he would take it, but I knew he would want to know as soon as I did. Fred Ward was his old pal from Valley Mills High School. Though my father, John Campbell, had known Fred Ward probably only two years of his life, and they had lost touch since Fred graduated in 1960 and left Valley Mills for greener pastures out in Hollywood, he had always considered him and would always consider him to be an old friend. He was a great admirer of his– as an actor and as a person– and a fan of his movies as many people are and will continue to be.

To be honest, my dad John couldn’t tell you more than a handful of the titles of the movies Fred Ward starred in. John was never much of a movie person. He never could sit still for very long. He hadn’t always been like that, especially not in his youth. Maybe after high school and college, movies seemed more and more like a perfectly good waste of time to John, but nevertheless, if it had Fred in it, and the title caught his eye or the movie cover piqued his interest, he’d bedazzle those closest to him by sitting through it and watching it until the very end. A rare occurrence in the Campbell household if there ever was one.

Without thinking twice, if you ever were to ask John Campbell what his favorite Fred Ward movie is, he’d say without missing a beat, “Escape from Alcatraz– that one that’s got Clint Eastwood in it.” You could always hear the pride in his voice. It was as if Fred Ward’s success in life, in the movies, in Hollywood, that reflected well on John and on the people of Valley Mills– those who had grown up in the small town in the 1950s.

There is no shortage of small towns in the vast rural areas of Texas. They’re all pretty much the same, but somehow they’re all different. They all have a unique character. Valley Mills is named after a flour mill that was founded there shortly after the Civil War ended. It straddles two counties. That’s right, it’s a town smack dab situated in the middle of the county line that separates Bosque from McLennan. It’s about twenty miles west of Waco– the biggest city in that central part of Texas though Waco is not what one would call a big city. Geography aside, for John, Valley Mills was always synonymous with the word home.

It must have been the summer of 1956 that John first met Fred. John’s father, my grandfather, was James Howard Campbell, but everyone called him Doc. Doc Campbell lived with his wife, Faye, and only son, John, in a big two-story house built in the 1890s when Valley Mills was still but a clutter of stores and small goods warehouses near the railroad tracks and some cow farms here and there.

Anyhow, it was 1956. Around this time, it had been almost twenty years since the worst of the Great Depression in the 1930s. The Depression would always be a painful albeit distant memory for Doc and the townsfolk. Fortunately, the 1950s supplanted the psychological malaise of the 1930’s and the anxiety of the 1940’s. 1956 was the year the new dance movement rock and roll would spread throughout the entire world compliments of Elvis Presley.

The year 1956 was even the year the King made his way to perform at a concert in Waco, Texas. The news articles had observed that Elvis never performed in front of a more lackluster audience than he did in Waco, Texas. Contrary to journalistic myth, however, my dad John heard the real skinny from girls in the high school at the time– the ones whose parents could be goaded into taking them. The concert was more of a revival affair in reverence to the messiah of swinging hips. Hallelujah to the King of Rock and Roll dancing on stage, his real kingdom far away in Heartbreak Hotel, he came riding into the streets of the cowboy Jerusalem on nothing but a Hound Dog, and the girls in attendance comprised an endless chorus of deafening screams, adolescent angels without trumpets and no need for trumpets. Their shrieking voices would have sufficed not just to herald the coming of Elvis but could have shattered Buddy Holly’s glasses as well had the kid from Lubbock been in attendance. Lackluster the reception was not. The audience wouldn't be cruel to a heart that was true. According to rumor, some of the girls even peed their pants at the sight of the dark-haired Adonis with the sultry, supernatural voice and blue suede shoes. That could have been just a joke though told amongst my dad and his friends.

I asked my dad one time, “Why didn’t you go to the Elvis concert in Waco, Dad. It would have made a great story.” John Campbell just shook his head and said, “Well, shoot, I don’t know. Maybe Doc didn’t want to take me. I liked to listen to Perry Como anyway.” Como or no Como, I know I heard my dad sing a couple Elvis songs in his day when I was a kid. It’s not like he didn’t appreciate the King.

Anyway, the point was by 1956, the local economy of Valley Mills was humming again, and the population was increasing. People were moving to Valley Mills rather than walking away from it. Doc Campbell owned a small, quaint grocery store near his home. It was one of those old-timey places that could also double as a miniature cafe because it had one or two dining booths near the cash register counter where also sat the big jar of livers encased like pickles from which customers could pick and choose. People could buy what they needed on the shelves, check livers for spots or they could sit down and sip on fresh coffee or soda and catch up on the latest news, local or otherwise, with Doc. Doc was the kind of man whose opinion was valued. He was honest, but he never talked too much. Those are dual traits that are sometimes hard to find.

Next to Doc’s house was also the Valley Mills Church of Christ where John would be married one day to his wife, Iva, and to the side in front of the church was the town baseball field. That’s where John first met Fred Ward. John and one of his buddies were headed out to the field that morning toting some gloves, a baseball, and a bat to play catch when they saw this young boy running around the baseball field. He must have been about fourteen years old, but he was small for his age. Valley Mills didn’t have a track so if you wanted to jog to get into shape, you’d have to do it around the baseball field.

“Who is that new guy? Looks like he’s trying to get into shape the day before yesterday,” John said to his friend Benny.

“Him? Oh that’s Fred. He’s going to be a freshman this year. He just moved to Valley Mills. He’s living with his aunt and uncle, Mr. and Mrs. Martin. His cousins are Sherry and Perry.”

“Really? Cousins with Sherry and Perry. I wonder what brought him to this dot on the map,” John said.

“Someone told me his step-dad works with a traveling carnival or something so he moved in with his Uncle Jack, that’s Mr. Martin. I don’t know anything about his mom.”

“A carnival. Sounds like fun. I don’t know if I would want to give that up for Valley Mills. Then again, I love Valley Mills,” John said.

Just then as Fred was hustling forward, he was making his way near John and Benny’s direction. John’s first thought was that he was a little guy just like him, and he had a sharp haircut. He was related to Sherry Martin, and she was known at Valley Mills High School for being easy on the eyes, so it made sense that her cousin would have a clean-cut, athletic appearance. As he was about to pass them, Fred slowed down and started to catch his breath. He was breathing in and out hard but looked satisfied as if cleansed from a good morning run. Benny motioned to him.

“Hey Fred, I want you to meet Valley Mills’ star basketball player. This is Humpy John.”

“Humpy John?” Fred said. “What kind of name is that? Are you good with the ladies or something?”

“Oh shoot,” John said, a smile breaking out on his dimpled face.

“No, they call him Humpy John because his last name is Campbell. Get it? Campbell. It sounds like camel. Humpy John Camel.”

If only Fred Ward had replied “You got a funny, friggin name, kid” to mirror the scene in Escape from Alcatraz when the character of Charley Butts, played by Larry Hankin, is introduced to the character played by actor Frank Ronzio. If only Fred had said that.

“Well, Humpy John Camel. I wish you could get me some of them Humpy John cigarettes.”

“Oh shoot, my old man, Doc, would tan my hide if he caught me smoking,” John said. John was speaking from experience.

“I’m just kidding,” Fred said. “What I’m really trying to do is get into shape so I can play for the football team. I want to play football and basketball.”

“Well, we could always use you,” John said. “Valley Mills High is a small school.”

“Yeah, I noticed. Are y’all any good?”

Benny stepped in to answer that one. “You have never seen a better basketball player than Humpy John. The ball doesn’t even hit the backboard. It just flies through the net. We win district games here all on account of him.”

“Well this, I gotta see.”

“Don’t worry, once the coach gets back from vacation, he’ll open up the gym, and we’ll shoot some hoops. He’s up in Dallas right now with his wife.”

“Oh the Big D?” Fred said as Dallas was referred to in the 1950s. It owed to the popularity of a song about Dallas from the musical Most Happy Fella. Supposedly even Sinatra did a cover of the song “Big D” for the radio.

“Say,” John said. “Where are you originally from?”

“Me,” Fred Ward said. “I was born in San Diego, but I was living in Jacksboro.” Jacksboro was another town in Texas.

“Cali-forn-i-ay,” whistled John. “My gosh. What a ways away. That’s where all those westerns are made with them actors and actresses I like. Roy Rodgers, Gene Autry, Dale Evans.”

“Dale Evans? Never heard of him.”

“It’s a woman actually. She was born in West Texas,” John said. John for some reason knew the birthplace of most every actor and actress or any sports celebrity or famous person for that matter. It was like his adolescent obsession aside from sports and the occasional cute cheerleader in Valley Mills or from a nearby school. Still to this day, if you mention a famous person’s name, John’s first question is always “Where were they born?”

“Dale Evans is a woman. You don’t say.” Fred said, “Say, speaking of that, where does a feller watch a good picture show around here?”

“We go to the Valley Mills Ritz and there’s another theater. I don’t remember the other one’s name. I go to the Ritz. Have you seen Lights of Santa Fe? Man, that’s a good one,” John said.

“Humpy John loves westerns,” Benny said.

“Well, I like them too,” Fred said.

“You gotta love westerns if you live in Texas. It’s the law, I think.” Benny said with a smile.

“You know President Ike Eisenhower was born in Texas?” John said.

“Bullspit,” Benny said. “He’s from Kansas.”

“He grew up in Kansas, but he was born in Denison,” John said.

“Where the heck is Denison?”

“It’s a town in Texas right next to Oklahoma.”

“You’re sure it ain’t in Oklahoma?” Benny said. As the amicable argument unfolded, Fred wiped sweat from his brow and started to look in the other direction.

“Well ok guys, I’ll let y’all discuss your morning politics. I better get back to running. Nice meeting you Humpy John.”

“Same here,” John said. He shook John’s hand and with that, he took off around the baseball field with the morning sun still hovering and blazing high in the sky.

“Fred is a cool guy. He’s quiet, but he’s cool,” Benny said. “Do you think he’ll make the football team, a guy that size?”

“Oh, I don’t know. Probably. I did.” John said as he headed towards the home plate of the baseball field not to give it a second thought.

* * *

It was an amusing coincidence or wink from the smiling face of fate that when John first met Fred Ward, his first memory of him would be watching him run. When John would see him again many years later, not in person, but on the television screen, he would be watching him sprinting again opposite Kevin Bacon. This time it wouldn’t be to get into shape but to escape the clutches of underground worm monsters called graboids in the horror-comedy film Tremors. It was probably destined to be Fred’s most recognizable role to the mainstream. I’ve often wondered how much that small town in Nevada in the film must have reminded Fred of growing up in Valley Mills and did Fred draw inspiration from anybody or a composite of people to add to his character?

Like I said, John was not much of a movie person, and I don’t think he saw Tremors on TV until about ten years after it had already come out. I asked my dad what he could remember about Fred Ward and growing up in Valley Mills. My dad is almost 82 years old, and it turned out he could remember precious little– just an avalanche of hazy memories– names, faces, brief moments here and there. My dad was two years older than Fred. Whereas John graduated Valley Mills High School Class of 1958, Fred Ward graduated Class of 1960. Fred Ward was voted Most Handsome for his senior superlative whereas my dad was voted Best Athlete. Though John remembered Fred as being a small guy when he was a freshman, Fred hit his growth spurt eventually in high school, my dad not so much. To be sure, it was a paradox that John was shorter than average but still the best basketball player in Valley Mills– a testament to his talent, I guess.

There wasn’t any memory other than meeting him that really stood out after all those years, according to my dad. He did say he remembered the high school pep rallies downtown in front of the drugstore in the middle of the main street. He remembers Fred being there. He remembers the times the guys he hung out with went to the Bosque River to fish and swim in the summers. Fred was there too. He remembered playing basketball with him. He remembers the time the school took a field trip to the Valley Mills theater to watch a re-release of Gone with the Wind. Imagine high schoolers going on a school field trip nowadays to the movies. That’s my kind of field trip.

I’m not sure why John and Fred lost touch after high school. With social media nowadays, such a thing is unlikely but in the early 1960s, I guess it’s understandable. I often lamented the fact that they didn’t remain close friends. I would have relished the thought of visiting Fred Ward in Hollywood as a kid one summer. I did meet his uncle, Jack Martin, in Valley Mills one time at one of my grandparent’s funerals, Doc or Faye, I can’t remember which one. I remember Mr. Jack Martin was standing outside the Valley Mills Church of Christ, and we talked about the movies he liked that Fred starred in. He said he loved The Right Stuff.

I loved that movie too. When I was in sixth grade and went through my love of all things space and astronauts phase, I had to rent it on VHS when I learned of its existence. Fred Ward played real-life astronaut Gus Grissom, one of the Original Mercury 7 astronauts. There’s a notable scene in the film where astronaut Gus Grissom’s Mercury 4 capsule splashes down in the Atlantic, and the hatch prematurely explodes. Gus Grissom tumbles out of the capsule and nearly drowns before the helicopter can send the horse-collar to fetch him out. What follows is an investigation from NASA, and the implication is that Gus Grissom had actually panicked and pressed the emergency hatch release switch on purpose. Grissom has to defend himself to prove he is psychologically fit to remain in the space program. Even to his emotionally perturbed and skeptical spouse, he has to make his case. It’s a powerful scene in which Fred Ward playing opposite actress Veronica Cartwright as Betty Grissom breaks down in their kitchen. At the end of his emotional rope, Fred’s character, Gus, tells his wife, “Why doesn’t anyone believe me?” Fred Ward did have undeniable acting talent. It’s an unforgettable and underrated scene from the film.

After Fred Ward graduated in 1960, he joined the US Air Force, he did boxing, he went to acting school in New York where my dad told me that he ran out of money. Legend has it, Fred and his friend Craig Burch had to abandon New York and only made it as far as Memphis before Fred had to phone his Uncle Jack for money to get back to Valley Mills. That’s the story I heard anyway. Fred worked as a lumberjack in Alaska, he worked as a short-order cook, and he eventually made his way to Rome, Italy of all places and dubbed Italian films in English. In 1979, his breakout supporting role in Escape from Alcatraz premiered. He was 37 years old when those Hollywood dreams started to come true, and the rest is history. Thirty-seven years old seems a long time to wait for your dreams to come true, but once you make it to the big time, you’ve made it.

Where was my dad in 1979? John had moved to Fort Worth in 1964 and started working as a teacher and basketball and tennis coach at Trimble Tech High School. He got married in 1974 and in 1979, his wife, Iva, my mother, became pregnant with their first child, my older brother William who would be born the following summer. My dad went to see Escape from Alcatraz in the theater, and he loved it. It would be seventeen years before he would go to the theater to see another Fred Ward film which meant it would be seventeen years before he saw his old friend again.

I’ll never forget his reaction when he did. We were taking a family road trip that summer 1996 to Colorado, and my older brother and I really wanted to see the Keanu Reeves movie, Chain Reaction, but it was impossible to go to the movies on a family vacation. My parents just didn’t do that. We had breakfast that morning at the hotel buffet, and the hotel had a daily newspaper. I flipped to the entertainment section and read the movie review of Chain Reaction. I saw who was starring in it other than Keanu Reeves and Morgan Freeman and said to myself bingo. I handed the newspaper to my brother, William, and pointed at the name. He didn’t say anything. He knew what to do.

“Hey Mom,” William said. “Are you sure we can’t go see that movie, Chain Reaction while we’re here?”

“No, William, don’t ask me that. We don’t go to movies on vacation.”

“But I just thought Dad would have wanted to go see it because it has his friend from Valley Mills in it, Fred Ward.” As if he even needed to say the name. What other friend from Valley Mills would have been in a Hollywood action movie.

“Oh.” My mother paused. “OK, let me tell him.” John was sitting right there at the table but not paying attention.

“John, your friend, Fred Ward, is in that new movie the kids want to go see?”

“Really?” John perked right up. “Let’s go see it then.” No more discussion was needed.

We went that evening to go see Chain Reaction, and after all these years, I don’t remember much about the film itself other than that I enjoyed it, but I do remember when Fred Ward’s face popped up on-screen, there was a voice from behind me in the theater.

“Fred! That’s Fred.” It was my dad, followed by my mom saying, “John, not too loud.” My dad was overcome with joy. Seeing Fred on the big screen was the next best thing to seeing him in person again after all those years. After that brief outpouring of emotion, I knew my dad’s story was true. He really had been friends with Fred Ward in Valley Mills. Why would he have been so glad to see him otherwise?

I wish my dad John had tried to reach out to Fred sometime between the time they parted ways until the year he died. I’m not really sure what deterred him. Maybe it was that sentiment of, “Oh well, he made it all the way to Hollywood, and I’m still here in Texas. He lives in another world now, and I’m just John Campbell. He may not even remember me.” I have no idea. All I know is if I had ever seen them re-united, I’m sure they would have embraced as old friends, and I know the sight of seeing actor Fred Ward talking to my dad, John, would have been surreal and overwhelming. Imagine one day, you find out your own father was friends in high school with somebody famous. It’s one thing to know it, it’s quite another to actually see it.

My father retired in 2009 from teaching at the age of 69. He taught with Fort Worth ISD for 46 years and received a standing ovation at his retirement celebration. The next year, Fort Worth honored him by putting his name on the Trimble Tech High School tennis courts. It will be John’s lasting claim to fame. The 2010 John B. Campbell Tennis Courts naming ceremony was John’s touchdown moment in life– the moment where you know you have accomplished something great or noteworthy and people love you. Though I know very little about Fred Ward the person versus the actor, I’m sure he would have been pleased to know John became a legend in his own right in Fort Worth as an educator.

John likes to start conversations with strangers wherever he goes, especially waiters and waitresses. One of his favorite starters is “Do you know Fred Ward the actor? I went to high school with him.” Pride never dies. When John would ask someone that question, rarely would people recognize the name, but if you say, “He was that guy in Tremors. The guy who wasn’t Kevin Bacon,” then they would have an immediate moment of recall. “Oh, right, I know that actor, I’ve seen his films.” Some even say, “Oh, I love that movie he’s in– Remo Williams.”

As truth gets stranger than fiction as it tends to do, a couple weeks after we learned about Fred Ward’s passing, my dad and I were eating at a restaurant when John opened with his famous starter to the waitress, and wouldn’t you know it? For the first time in all the years I have heard him mention Fred Ward to strangers, we actually met someone who had met Fred Ward. The waitress who was in her mid-50s said, “Oh yes, I met Fred Ward. I used to live in Los Angeles, and I was an extra in that movie Short Cuts. I met Huey Lewis and Lily Tomlin also. He was a great actor. So sad to hear your friend passed.” Believe me, there was a smile on John’s heart as well as his face that day.

Fred Ward did so much in his acting career. He inspired, he entertained, and he became a familiar face people loved to see again. He could do drama or comedy. If you look at the sheer diversity of roles and films he played, you know he was a versatile actor. Looking at his films, you see that he helped Clint Eastwood escape from prison, he rode the rocket into outer space and nearly drowned doing it. He nearly plummeted to his death from the Statue of Liberty, and he was chased by underground monsters twice. He even collaborated with Leslie Nielsen to crash a Hollywood awards ceremony in the last Naked Gun sequel. That movie still makes me laugh to this day.

Lest anyone ever forget Fred– and that’s highly unlikely– or for the youth who have yet to discover his filmography, there will always be the next generation born of the Valley Mills boys and girls of the 1950s to remind us.

“Yes, that’s right,” I’ll start by saying, “My dad knew Fred Ward, the actor…”