Chapter 04 - A Place to Live; About Town

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Or, how, in the winter time, even with a fire in the heating stove all night, water in buckets and basins in the kitchen would be frozen over. Or,the rain barrel behind the kitchen under the eaves. This fifty gallon barrel usually remained full from the rains and melting snow, and the soft water was used for laundry and bathing. But in the winter, it would become frozen almost solid, so wash water was obtained by melting snow in a tub on the kitchen cook stove. And, sometimes, in the summer, the water in the rain barrel would become stale and filled with mosquito wigglers'.

And there were the short dull dark winter days with snow banked high outside, when his mother tried to entertain him with a sewing machine drawer full of odd and fancy buttons. It seems that in the 1890's, gaudy unique and fancy buttons were in high fashion. She would encourage him to write "letters", consisting mostly of "am well, how are you" to unknown cousins. She even tried teaching him cross - stitching and real embroidery with silk thread on linen cloth. In these first years, she had caused to be shipped in by freight wagon a magnificent organ which had been a gift from her father, Jacob Hull, just before she was married. The top half of this instrument was a beautiful piece of furniture handiwork, with intricate cut - outs, carvings, and lathe turned rounds supporting various sized shelves for vases, pictures and other ornaments. The whole thing seemed to reach near the ceiling. This helped to pass many winter days, but Junior got little use of it, since he couldn't pump the foot bellows and reach the keys at the same time.

And, how water for drinking and cooking had to be carried in buckets from a crystal clear bubbling spring some two hundred yards away. It was a community spring and had been cleaned out to some depth and covered with a small wooden shed against the snow and rain. In the winter it would freeze over, but its daily patrons would continue to break through the ice and maintain a hole large enough to dip a bucket. It was on this trail through the pine woods to the spring and back that neighbors frequently met and stopped for conversations.

And, how, at dusk on a late summer evening, the cry of a cougar was occasionally heard. And how, while on the trail to the spring with his mother on one such evening, such an agonizing cougar cry rang through the timber. The youngster was almost paralyzed with fright: the mother, whether frightened or not, continued to the spring and back home, though perhaps with somewhat quickened step.

Or how, on a cold quiet winter night a pack of coyotes could set up a chattering din, leaving the impression that ten or fifteen animals were in the vicinity, whereas, perhaps only two or three of them were causing all the uproar.

Impressions remained of the placer ditch which wound around the side of the hill back of the cabin. It was only some two feet wide and carried about a foot of water around the hills for some placer operation. But it was a constant cause of worry to mothers, whose youngsters might fall into it.

And there were the tall black-pine trees in the yard, Seemingly reaching into the blue of the sky. To one of these a rope swing was attached, and to two others a "monkey pole" was nailed. From these two contrivances the boy managed to fall flat on his back on occasion, knocking the wind out of him and sending him screaming into the cabin. And there was the shake covered wood shed. In one corner of it some poles had been nailed up for roosts, and a dozen or so chickens were maintained to eat up the table scraps and to provide eggs now and then. On two or three consecutive nights a disturbance had been heard in the wood shed among the chickens. but by the time Lee had donned some warm clothing and shoes, and had lighted a lantern and made his way to the shed, no coyote or other disturber of the peace was in sight. So, the next night he had prepared by loading a shot gun, leaving a kerosene lantern already lighted in the cabin and some loose clothing ready to jump into. As on previous nights the disturbance was repeated; Lee donned his clothes, grabbed the shotgun and lantern and proceeded out to the wood shed. At the door, in the very dim light he saw a moving object, which was sure to be the culprit. So, he quickly put down the lantern, and with the shot gun he fired, point blank at close range. The culprit was a skunk. The animal was blown to bits, and the smell was well scattered over the stove wood, the chickens and the wood shed walls, not to be abated for weeks.

And, there was Box Sing the, jovial little Chinaman. Box Sing supplied a part of the pork for the settlement by maintaining a pig pen full of porkers down in the little meadow south of town. To do this, he regularly visited everyone's house several times a week to gather up the garbage and left - overs, if any, to feed to his hogs. To transport this hog feed, he had attached balls to two five gallon kerosene cans, These, by the use of short cords, were hung on the ends of a short pole which he had fashioned to fit his shoulders. He often carried water about town in the same manner. Ten gallons of water is a fair load for a small man; but as he assumed the characteristic dog-trot shuffle, the load would move along so smoothly as to scarcely create a ripple on the water. Box Sing always expressed his appreciation to his "patrons" on China New Year with a load of gifts. And what small boy could ever forget the oriental taste and odor of the chinese candy and nuts, and the packs of firecrackers, and the pure silk handkerchiefs for the old folks?