John Kolars

Growing Up Walla Walla John Kolars

The Walla Walla O knew when he was young was a wheat and cow town in the remote southeastern corner of a remote northwestern state. Or at least the town and the state were remote when he grew up there. Perhaps Whitman college and its Conservatory made a difference, but its campus was only a place he pedaled by on his fly home from work, its museum a place to Visit once or twice a year, an auditorium where his mother sometimes sang. The men who influenced Oliver were a different breed. Those were the men fatherless Oliver grew up around. Weathered men, ready to drink up their week's wages, ready for a fight, men who took off their hats in the presence of a lady, and who would do business on a hand shake, they were part of Oliver's Walla Walla. That's why he wants to tell about them and about the two Walla Wallas.