Digger

It seems that all men have a little larceny in their souls. The following incident occurred in 1954. My Dad whose nickname was “Digger” worked at BYU in the Physical Plant Department. He was in charge of all the campus roads, building appearance, Parking lots, etc. He had a crew of six full time men with an additional twenty part-time students. In the summer of 1954 due to a lot of expansion going on around the campus, the University purchased a truck mounted backhoe used mainly for digging trenches, etc. On the day of the purchase, Digger went to Salt Lake City to take delivery of the backhoe. By the time he returned to Provo it was after five o’clock in the evening. He drove the truck into the fenced area where the equipment was kept and went into his office before going home. While he was in his office, he noticed that the president of the University, Howard S McDonald had driven into the yard and was looking at the new backhoe. Digger didn’t pay him any attention and he, Pres. McDonald soon left, as did Digger, locking the yard gate. This was on Friday and when he went to work the next Monday, he noticed that a set of spot lights that came with the backhoe for night work but were not yet mounted and left in the cab of the backhoe were missing. He thought nothing about it thinking that one of his crew was playing a trick on him by hiding them. About four days later, he was digging a trench on the campus and noticed that Pres. McDonald was watching him. Digger stopped what he was doing and got down to talk to Pres. McDonald. During their conversation, Pres. McDonald said: “Aren’t there supposed to be some spot lights mounted on the machine for night work?” Whereupon, Digger jokingly said: “Yes, what did you do with them?” Digger said that Pres. McDonald had a blank look on his face and said: “I’ll go get them.” He got in his car, left and returned a few minutes later with the spot lights, gave them to Digger without a word, got in his car and left. Just goes to show you all men have a little larceny in their souls. This story was related to me by "Digger" who said "To this day, I'll never know what possessed me to ask Pres. McDonald that question. It just popped out."