TBT: Allen Bird in about 1960 posing for the yearbook on the Century High School football field. Hopefully he’ll forgive me for dredging this up!

For several years, beginning in 1957, Allen Bird’s daddy worked with my daddy at the Alger-Sullivan Sawmill Company in Century, FL (at the time, the largest sawmill east of the Mississippi River). My mama taught Allen how to type at Century High School and Daddy taught him to play tennis. His mama sat next to me in the church choir with her delicious contralto voice, and they lived right across the street from us for all that time. After graduation, Allen served in the Navy, then got a law degree from the University of Arkansas before getting his LLM from New York University about 1973. In other words, as my sainted Great Aunt Mary Belle would have said (however judgmentally), Allen Bird is quality folk.

And, as fate would have it, after graduation from law school, he joined a small Little Rock practice called the Rose Law Firm, where he and another freshly minted attorney, Hillary Clinton, struggled in tandem for more than a decade to build the firm and their careers.

In other words, as fate would have it, I am

Ed and Mabel Bird and their three sons, Eddie, Allen and Sam (with Sam’s wife, LeAnne) back in the days when we were all great friends.

blessed to have a childhood friend who is the perfect antidote to all the hype and bluster on the 24-hour news. A real, solid friend from way back when who actually knew Hillary Clinton during her salad days, and who, for fifteen years, worked as closely with her as pretty much anyone else on the planet. Until now, both he and I have remained very circumspect regarding this election. After all, there has been more than enough sturm und drang to go around. But, just the other day, Allen finally threw in his two cents about the bright young attorney he knew from the inside-out during those years, and as I found his words both refreshing and informative, I asked and gained permission from him to repost them here in the hope that they will also be instructive for you. That said, wherever you fall on the spectrum, I’m wishing you all a marvelous fall weekend!

From Allen Bird:

About Hillary.

Although I normally try to keep my comments on Facebook apolitical, I think I have some personal insight into her character and personality, and I have been thinking for some time about posting something about Hillary.

For over 15 years I saw her almost every day and had at least some casual conversation with her. She and I, and other partners, helped run a small business together, the Rose Law Firm. I saw first hand her creative and practical solutions to our challenges.
I was with her during the good times when things went well, and the bad times—when her husband was defeated in his run for re-election as governor. I was with her and Bill when they had disagreements, and when they celebrated.