A conversation with Shorty Adamson

Shorty Adamson has been a Creston fixture for many years. When it is warm, he’ll be sitting outside Adams Street Espresso waving and talking to the people that pass by. For now, he’s usually inside sitting in a comfy chair, drinking coffee and heckling the staff.

Although he no longer lives in Creston, Adamson has many memories of the past 50 years in Creston. He likes to talk about the pictures that line the back walls at Adams Street Espresso. He’ll point out the Strand Theater and talk all about “Beer Bottle Avenue” – 15 taverns on Pine Street in 1959 – where he didn’t get carded at 18, but his 21-year-old brother did.

He can talk about where the drive-in movie theater used to be and how, at one point, there were three places to see movies – or “shows” as he calls them – in Creston. He might draw a map to the liquor store on Pine Street – it’s not there anymore – and explain how the stockyards weren’t too far from where they are now.

There was a Corn Palace, made of ears of corn, in 1945 or ‘46 where Creston Community High School sits now. The site of the old Fareway building, which is now Iowa Focus, used to hold a restaurant.

Shorty recalled a time a hobo came off the train and asked him if he needed any money. Apparently, hobos still ride trains. He talks of one that came by, then went to sit over across the tracks at the concrete shelter and disappeared the next time a train went through.

He remembers being told about being born in between the house and the barn in 1941 when mom and dad waited just a little too long to head home from Kelley’s when mom said it was time.

The story Adamson continues to circle back to was of the bluegrass yards that used to be around Creston. There were four of them: one where the old Walmart is now, one at the Bill Sears Complex, one by the co-op and one east of the railroad tracks. He said, “cut bluegrass would be brought in from all around to be stacked at these yards.” He can’t explain what the bluegrass was used for, but he recalls how much he enjoyed riding his horse, Dolly, up to the yards and jumping the stacks.

Adamson lived and worked in the Creston area for 50 years. He started out working for his brother, selling farm equipment – Massey Ferguson and International, red tractors ... no green ones. Later, he worked as a self-employed roofer, built green sand moldings at Wellman’s, rode the handicapped school bus, helping children, for 11 years and still works as a substitute.

For awhile, he traveled out of town to Des Moines to play drums with Chet and the Roadrunners. What began as three nights a week became four nights a week, and when it got to seven nights a week, his wife, Glenda, said, “We’re gonna quit that or else.”

Adamson and Glenda (Belgard) have been married for 60 years. They met in high school in Adel after Adamson’s dad decided to move to there for a job.

Adamson and Glenda moved to Creston because Adel was “too close to ... the big city.” They had five children, lost one twin, and raised six kids. The extras were ones who didn’t get along with their folks; the Adamsons would take them in.

Glenda worked for a day care for 20 years and then worked for MATURA for 20 years after that until she had a heart attack. He said he almost lost her two years ago, but the tech who took her blood at the hospital told him she needed to stay at the hospital. It took three tries to get him to say anything specific about his wife, but his voice changed and became quieter and almost tender when he spoke of her. He said Glenda is a good woman, a good cook, can bake anything and can make a meal out of nothing.