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Found: the Shroud of Bear

As much as I enjoyed reporting RJYH, there were some frustrations along the way, chief among them: my failed search for the Shroud of Bear.

I'd heard that there was a man in Tuscaloosa who actually had possession of the hospital gown Bryant was wearing at the Druid City Hospital when he died on Jan. 26, 1983. I wanted to find him.

Needless to say, I remember that day well. I was in 8th grade, walking in the lower hallway of my school, fully aware that Bryant was in the hospital, when Eric Fine came bounding down the stairs with the news: Bear Bryant was dead of a heart attack. Imagine getting that crushing news from an Oklahoma fan. I skipped school to go to his funeral a few days later. I have my own memento mori of that day: an index card affixed to the awning over Bryant's grave with a paper clip, that indicated the funeral time and plot number of the grave in Elmwood Cemetery.

So when I heard that a man in or near Tuscaloosa had his own relic of those dark days -- the hospital gown -- I wasn't particularly surprised. We all find our own strange ways to deal with loss, our own odd expressions of a longing to connect with the past. A photograph, an index card, a lock of hair, a cotton gown...

I got word to the possessor of the shroud through an intermediary that I wanted an audience, but he wouldn't agree to meet me. Too sensitive, I was told. The possessor didn't want to get anyone in trouble -- the hospital or funeral home employee who'd given it to him, perhaps. He didn't want a line at the front door every January 26th. I sent numerous messages, but the answer was always the same. I shipped out of Tuscaloosa at season's end certain that the Shroud existed, but doubtful I would ever see it.

Cut to: last weekend. After the LSU game, I'm at a party with the Bices, John Ed, when I get a tap on the shoulder. The host wants to show me something. We trudge up a hill, into the house, towards a dark room away from the crowd. I'm not sure what to expect - an autographed picture, a scrap of an old tear-away jersey? You never know; a few weeks back a woman gave me Yellow Hammer feather she'd kept for 35 years, after watching it float down from a fleeing bird in the trees above.

I'm not sure where it came from exactly, but suddenly, the host has a small, faux leather fanny pack, of the sort an unstylish Southern tourist might have worn on a visit to New York, ten, fifteen years ago. He unzips it, and pulls out a white cotton gown flecked with hospital logos. He allowed me to take this photo with my cell phone camera:

He gave its provenance, which seemed credible. (I agreed not to divulge his name or how he came to possess the gown.) He said has had it for 22 years. It seems well taken care of, though the owner did confess to having taken it once to a game in Knoxville, where he waved it around like a Terrible Towel in order, he said, "to get some of it on 'em."

It was strangely moving to hold the Shroud. There are no mysterious images of houndstooth hats in the cloth, no ghostly shades of the old coach leaning on a goal post. It's just a cotton gown -- interestingly, actual cotton, soft and pilled, the kind that was actually laundered, as opposed to the scratchy, polyester, disposable gowns of today. Maybe because the gown wasn't synthetic, it was possible to hold it and to register some humanity still lingering in its threads, like smoke or perfume.

I gave it back to the possessor, who stuffed it in the leather fanny pack, and the party resumed.

November 17, 2005 11:42 AM | Link

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