When we first moved to Caney our house was a block north of the Missouri Pacific Railroad tracks.  Just south of the tracks there were two grocery stores.   Ferguson’s, on the east side of Wood Street, also sold gasoline and motor oil, and served as the office for what was then called a “Tourist Court” or “Cabins.”   Their grocery inventory was similar to that carried by the “C” stores that came fifty years later except that Fuqua's sold some dry goods and Ferguson’s also sold lunch meat, hamburger, and a few other common cuts of meat.  Across the street from Fergusons was a small, full-line grocery and dry goods store.  The sign in front of that store troubled me for a long time.  It read:

FUQUA’S
GROCERIES AND DRY GOODS

I had been taught phonics and could readily figure out how to pronounce new words but I also had heard too much adult conversation much too young.  I had never seen a word with a “Q” in the middle, so falling back on what I knew of phonics I assumed that the “u” in “Fuqua’s” would be pronounced as in “fudge”, and I knew that “Q” made sort of a “K sound.  I waited until I heard someone talking about that store before I said its name.  I was greatly relieved to hear them say “Few Kways.”   It seemed like a dangerous last name to carry through life.

My family chose to deal with Ferguson’s when they needed an occasional quart of milk, loaf of bread, or some bologna.   At that time milk was available in three different forms.   For the purists who disdained the improvements of science, there was “raw” milk.   It came straight from the cow to the consumer.  For people who knew what great breeding ground milk is for bacteria, there was “pasteurized” milk.  All milk, of course, consists of cream and the thin white liquid we now call “skim” or “fat-free” milk.   Untreated, the cream in a container of milk will rise to the top where it can be skimmed off and used for coffee, whipping cream, or making butter.

In the late 1930's scientists determined that milk would better serve its purpose if the cream could be kept from rising to the top.   This was long before doctors discovered the evils of fat and cholesterol.    They developed a method to distribute the cream and fat molecules so thoroughly among the milk that they could never come together and rise to the top.   The resulting product was called “homogenized” milk.

Customers in stores in the forties were “waited upon.”   That is, they told a clerk what they wanted; the clerk then fetched the goods and laid them on the counter in front of the customer.    If the customer wanted milk the clerk would ask whether she wanted “raw,” “pasteurized,” or “homogenized” milk. 
One day when Rudy was home from Illinois for a visit, Mother sent him to Ferguson’s to buy milk.   As I often did when Rudy went somewhere I followed right behind, shadowing him.   He was my big brother, I enjoyed being with him and unlike my other three big brothers, he seemed to enjoy my tagging along.   When we pulled into Ferguson’s driveway Rudy handed me a quarter, then gave me these instructions:

“Bud,” that was his pet name for me, “when they ask you whether you want pasteurized or homogenized milk, just tell them pasteurized, homogenized, or circumcised, makes no difference to me.”

He was my mentor and my hero whom I trusted and loved beyond all measure.  I went into the store lay the quarter on the counter and told the lady behind the counter I wanted a quart of milk.  True to her instructions, she asked the question.  I gave her the answer Rudy had programmed into my head.   Completely baffled by her laughing reaction I took my change and hurried back to the car.   Rudy had watched the transaction through the plate glass windows.  He took the milk, patted me on the shoulder and told me I’d done a great job.   I was still puzzled, but happy that I had pleased him.  It was a long time before the clerks in Ferguson’s quit asking me if I’d ever found where I could get some of that circumcised milk.

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(There is a sad postscript to this story.  "Rudy," my favorite brother, joined the Army Air Corps in 1942.  He was Killed in Action, over France. on April 1, 1944 while serving as Flight Engineer/Top Turret Gunner on a B-24 heavy bomber. This story is a legacy for the best big brother a kid could ever have.)