Last Friday, one of the best “retail campaigners” of the last century, David Hampton Pryor, at age 89, entered into eternal rest.
He was, without a doubt, one of the most effective, beloved and hardest working one-on-one elected officials who ever shook a hand in our midst.
It always made me smile to hear him say he was “so glad to be in Warren and go to Wayne’s Drug Store,” to campaign.
By Maylon Rice
Saline River Chronicle Feature Contributor
He meant, of course, Wayne’s Confectionary, which had by the way, old wooden display cases, emblazoned with Rexall painted glass inside the old recycled and used display cases.
But once, in Wayne’s, he was on a quick table-hopping handshaking round, never missing a hand in the entire place, always telling people “stay seated,” I’ll get to you in a bit.”
David Pryor was at his absolute best, shaking hands, dipping his head in absolute attention to the man or woman, boy or girl, he was talking to, listening attentively to their questions or concerns.
In a large crowd, he would give that right hand a polite wave, but then just as quickly, he would flip that right wrist around and point his index finger into the crowd and call out someone’s name.
And he would laugh that infections laugh that lit up any room, a restaurant, a sale bar, outdoor tomato shed or college classroom.
I recall as a college student covering the ‘Pink Tomato Festival’ Parade when the politicians would all line up in cars ready to proceed up Main. The younger, more aggressive and lesser-known politicians would jockey for positions – NOT to be right behind or too close AHEAD of any open air car carrying David Pryor.
One wanna-be state senator once told me, “Following, David Pryor in a parade was a terrible logistical mistake.”
It seemed all the other cars in the parade route crept along quickly, but when David Pryor’s vehicle was in a parade, it all slowed down – and everything behind him slowed down. People, who were standing stoically on the curb, were called out by name, by Pryor, and the parade goers immediately called back to him and often on impulse, ran out into the parade route, to grasp his hand and thank him for all he had done for them or their family.
Following him, the politician said, was “even worse,” everyone was talking about David Pryor, no matter how much you were trying to catch the voter’s eye – he already had ALL the voter’s attention.
One of the first campaigns, I can remember, was when Pryor was running for 4th District Congress in a virtual scrum of four politicians to succeed long time Congressman Oren Harris of El Dorado, who had been appointed a federal judge in mid-term.
Pryor, new to the district political scene, and his wife Barbara, pregnant with one of their three sons, walked the streets of Warren, searching for votes.
Barbara, in a simple shift dress wearing sensible sandals, always carried a small wooden basket, adorned with a fabric trim called “Ric-rack,” a funny little zig zag pattern used to provide decoration to dresses in the 1960s.
She was passing out plastic thimbles with the Pryor for Congress logo on them.
And she engaged women all along the street, asking for their voter for her husband.
Barbara was a native of Fayetteville and knew few of these dusty southeast Arkansas streets (even as they lived in nearby Camden at the time) as she was a new bride, and soon to be mother of three small boys. She was such a disarming, sweet and likeable person, along with David’s genuine manner – the couple was dynamite at campaigning.
Lesser known, but found out in later campaigns, was Pryor’s ability to have empathy for others, even in political defeat.
The only political loss Pryor ever suffered, that of a run against long-time Congressman and powerful U.S. Senator John L. McClellan, divided most communities in two that political season.
Bradley County was no different than any other locale.
I knew powerful men on both sides of that battle.
The established political system was indeed split right down the middle and that race went into a run off with McClellan, who was elderly and ill, going back to Washington D.C. and for the first time in quite a while, David Pryor was out of office.
But even as he campaigned quickly for the governor’s seat, a chair he proudly held, Pryor was mending the fences from the hard-fought battle against McClellan. He held no ill will to those who had supported the sitting senator and in fact encouraged them to once again, join his political friends and supporters and never, ever, again brought up how they were once for one of his opponents.
That’s the David Pryor I remember.
He once gave me a front-page photo for the Pine Bluff Commercial by chowing down on a fist-sized Bradley County tomato, as a spur of the moment exercise outside the local Chamber offices and City Hall. The late Harry Lee “Buddy” McCaskill laughed and told Pryor: “Maybe we need to have a political tomato eating contest?” as Pryor wiped the juices off his lips and face with a white handkerchief.
“That might be fun,” Pryor said.
He never, to my knowledge, missed a Pink Tomato Luncheon.
David Pryor was also on the scene the morning after the 1974 tornado in Warren. He arrived that grey, rainy cold spring day, the Saturday before Easter, at the National Guard Armory, met Mayor John Frazer and others vowing to help Warren recover.
He was somber and shocked at the tornado damage. He promised help.
And he delivered that help in so many ways. Some seen and most unseen, but all felt by this community he loved so much.
Almost a decade ago I stood in the pulpit of one of Warren’s churches packed to capacity to deliver a eulogy for a dear friend and mentor, there sat David and Barbara Pryor, proud friends of my friend. True friends, ever-lasting friends, paying tribute to those experiences both the good and the not-so-good.
Rest well David Hampton Pryor.
You did well by every standard from those in Camden to Bradley County and the Fourth District to being Governor in Little Rock onto the halls of the United States Senate.
Rest Well my friend.