A good friend just reminded me of how, Johnny Walker, Bobby Vaughn and I along with others sometimes, would climb isolated trees to catch young squirrels. It would not work with older ones who had perfected their jump. One or two of us would wear leather gloves and stay still, low in the tree, and the other two or three would climb higher. If the squirrel did not go to the top we could get above him and he would run down the tree to hopefully be caught. If it was a little big the gloves were not full protection as they are designed to cut pecans and even hickory nuts. It is funny how after you hold one softly for a little while, petting and talking softly, they usually get quite tame. Most snakes will do the same thing. Several of us worked at the Strand Theater for Rodolph and Becky Bryan. At one time Harold “Moe” Stephens and Johnny Walker were the projectionists and I was a substitute. We would really catch it if the film broke or burned into and the film was halted for a couple of minutes. If it broke or burned into we had to cut it back and after the reel run we would have to splice it while the next reel was running. Sometimes other theaters would forward it without splicing, as they were required, and we would check it before hand if we had time. If it was a difficult repair people would scream and stomp their feet until it was returned. The projectors used two carbon electrodes to make the bright light. I have camped at Columbus and been outside when a tow boat carbon spotlight would sweep the campground and I could feel the heat from it that far away so you can imagine how hot it was. Moe Stephens was probably their best projectionist.
As I think back probably the thing that had the most effect on me was family. The door was usually not locked at all and if they were it was not locked until the last family member got home. This was usually me.
We ate three home cooked meals a day, consisting of the things I loved like, juicy bread pudding (with biscuits), potato cakes, hominy, turnip greens, poke salad, squirrel, scratch pancakes with hot syrup, fresh hot scratch made biscuit with hot black strap molasses and butter, all kinds of pies and cakes. The list could go on and on. These may not be gourmet at the fanciest restaurants but as far as the taste it was better.
A trip to my grandmothers, near Bardwell, meant adventure in her kitchen, first thing, where she had a monster wood burning cook stove with hot water compartment and who knows how many warm storage compartments. It had two ovens and the warming compartments ran all across the overhead and all way down the left side. It was always treasure found. I went to the pies and cakes first. Usually finding some homemade fried pies with fruit she dried on a stretched screen in the back yard. While drying she had some kind on netting over it to keep out flies. After that I was off to the barn or the fields. There were a few kids on her road to explore the fields, Mayfield creek and Polivick Slough. That is where I met, my friend, to this day, Jimmy Lemons.
After dinner at home we would all move to the living room for there was no den. We would all gather around the Motorola or RCA radio and listen to such as, Gildersleeve, Inner Sanctum with it`s hallmark squeaking door, The Lone Ranger and Tonto, The Shadow and Amos and Andy. While the shows would be playing we would discuss what had happened or what might happen next as if it were real.
Now with AC in home and car I complain of heat but then I often woke in a sweat. There were no fans for a while and we thought what a wonder when we got them to circulate hot air. When they came out with window fans I thought I had died and gone to heaven but that did not last too long and I was hot again. I spent many hot nights sleeping on the front porch to be a little cooler. Funny that being no more than five or six I was perfectly safe there or camping in the back yard with neighborhood friends.
When we were about twelve we would load our bicycles with a blanket roll, utensils and a little food and head to the railroad trestle at Moscow, Carnival Pond or the Grinnell Hole for a campout. There was a nice deep hole underneath the Moscow railroad bridge and a timber sticking out to dive from. There was a nice grassy area there to set up camp. If we got a bit hot we took a cool dip. Fishing was always on the menu. We would usually clean a fish and cover it with mud and place it in hot coals then build fire over that and when it burned down we break open the hard dirt ball and the meat would be much more white and tastier than frying. My cooking was limited to that, skillet bacon, spit cooking and PB n J.
One Saturday when watching the checker game at Bill Berry`s store the conversation drifted to watermelons and people stealing them. One old dude, who shall remain nameless, meaning I forgot it, bragged that no one ever managed to find, let alone steal one of his melons. It just happened that one of our number worked for him some and knew where they were and was friendly with the man`s big, blackish, German Shepherd, known to have a bad attitude. That night we let the part time employee out at the drive and we went down the road to near the patch. While he entertained the dog we helped ourselves. We also took three extra melons.
When we were back to the fence where we had parked the car we handed them across the fence to be placed in the trunk. I was last to cross the fence and as I crossed my leg over the top barbwire I heard a yell from the front door of the house. This startled me and I managed to rip my pants on the barbs. Now this was the pair of paints I was to wear to church at Oakton Baptist the next morning. I wore jeans to church instead. Back then jeans were not standard church fare. I never could explain to my mom how I ripped them open.
We left the three big melons on the porch at the store and placed them end to end The old fellow really caught it from the other checker players for a while about his bad dog and the melons.
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