Does my thinking in 2008 seem so crazy, today?

No, it seems arguably reasonable. I have always wondered why WB is so resistant to a split. It got so bad that he was forced to create the B shares. He didn't do it for the small stockholders, he did it because he was effectively forced to.

BRK was high back when I first thought of investing in it. $2000 a share when the IRA contribution limit was $2000. I just couldn't see investing my entire contribution in just one stock. (I didn't care that it was just one share.)

Paying a nominal dividend of $0.25 - $0.50 would not hurt anything. Would not hurt anybody. Whoever trades the $685,000 A shares is not going to do anything different. Nor, really, are people who trade the B shares going to do anything different.
Heck, just have the dividend only on the B shares and not the A shares.

What it will do is open up BRK to more small investors.

I doubt that WB will change. I strongly suspect that it will change after he is out of the picture.

On the balance sheet, Total Cash Per Share: $192,762.58 (I think this is for the A shares. Yahoo gives the same numbers for A & B).

BRK-A Shares Outstanding: 553.23k
BRK-A Shares Outstanding: 1.33B
BRK Cash And Cash Equivalents: $42B