RUNNIN' FOR SHERIFF

© 2000 James David Pearce

This story was related to me by Stanley Lodge, of South Carolina, Ohio, Murfreesboro, Scotland Neck, Durham and ~ lately ~ Sparta NC. At the time of the telling, Stanley was about 90 years old and was relaying what he said was told to him by an older relative when he was a child.

In trying to put it on paper, I had a hard time remembering all the smaller details and also had to clean up some of the old-time language that even today might get a double-X rating. The cleaner language detracts somewhat from the story, and the names and locations might not be exactly as Stanley had them. Anyone desiring to get the straights on this could go directly to Stanley in the little mountain town of Sparta.

The story:

A good while back, the first narrow bridge was built across the river. At that time, just like today since it's a wide river, the bridge was the only way within 35 miles in either direction to get to the other side without loading yourself and your equippage onto a flatboat-ferry.

Since the river was fairly deep in the channel, the bridge quickly became the much-preferred means of crossing and had a good bit of wheeled traffic even though this was before the days of cars and trucks.

The river also had quite a bit of up-and-downstream traffic in its channel, in the form of barges and steam-powered tugboats and sailboats. At this time, the floating traffic on the river was much more important to the region's economy than the dirt-road traffic that passed over the bridge.

This required the installation on the bridge, at mid-river, a contraption that would break the bridge in the middle and raise the two ends at the break into the air, so the boats could proceed. The contraption required the constant services of a tender, who had a little house at the middle of the bridge and was meagerly compensated by the county for his long hours at the duty post.

Emmet got the job at the little bridge near the little river town, and over the years developed an outstanding reputation for competence and diligence.

His duties consisted of listening for the long blasts from the foghorns on the tugboats and sailboats, running to his windlass and raising the breaks in the bridge so the vessels could pass. As soon thereafter as humanly possible, he would lower the breaks back into position to re-connect the roadway.

Emmet performed faithfully for a number of years. But it was hard work, the hours were long, and the pay wasn't the best. So one day when the county sheriff announced that he felt he was getting a little old and stale in his job and wasn't going to run again in the next election, Emmet got the idea of promoting himself for that position ~ which paid quite a bit more than the job he had.

The county let Emmet open the bridge and leave his post for half the daylight hours ~ one day a week. This of course temporarily trapped would-be travelers on both sides of the river but it gave him the opportunity to move around the town and county a little and promote his new hope of becoming sheriff.

~~~~~~~~~

Pursuing this pastime, he ran across old Zeb when that local farmer was at the water mill getting some corn ground. He told Zeb ~ with whom he wasn't too well acquainted ~ that he was running for sheriff and since the current officeholder didn't want the job any longer, he would appreciate it if Zeb would see fit to vote for him, and tell his friends to vote for him.

Well, Zeb told Emmet he would certainly think about it, but since he didn't know anything about him, he thought it would be fitting if Emmet would render a little resume of his qualifications ~ including such things as where he lived and what kind of work he had been doing for a living up until the present.

Emmet told Zeb that he had been faithfully fulfilling the job of draw-tender at the river bridge for a number of years, and he was preparing to continue filling the farmer in on other details. But he couldn't proceed because Zeb exploded.

"The bridge-tender!" he thundered. "Why, I wouldn't vote for you for county manure-spreader! I wouldn't ~ I ought to thrash you right here and now, fellow," and he raised his mule-whip menacingly in his hand in such a fashion that Emmet was taken aback and retreated some several feet away.

"No ~ I'll never vote for an idiot like you ~ and not only that, I'm going to tell everybody I know not to vote for you, and not only that, I'm also going to tell them all not only to not vote for you, but to vote for whoever runs against you, no matter even if it's a republican or a yellow-dog democrat."

He showed no signs of calming down, but he did slow down somewhat with his swear-words, and when he did Emmet took the opportunity to try to learn what caused the outburst and to try to make amends.

"Well, sir," he offered tentatively, "I am certainly sorry to learn that my calling could be the cause of such anguish on your part, and I certainly would like to know ~ if you don't mind telling me ~ what I might have done to stir up such opposition."

The exchange between Emmet and Zeb had drawn a small crowd, and Zeb was the star attraction. Seeing this, he calmed down a little more and began to relieve himself of his arguments and some of his anger.

~~~~~~~~~

Zeb had a grown son who farmed with him, and between them they had a hefty and healthy herd of cows that they tended in the big pastures out near the cleared fields of their place.

While they had a lot of cows, they only had one bull that they depended on to do what bulls had to do around such pastures, and one day while out in the fields the boy Joe noticed that the bull was looking kind of poorly and told his father about it.

Zeb and the boy watched the bull for several days and decided they were going to have to get a vet to come look at him. He just was no longer his bully self and the herd was beginning to suffer.

But before they could get the vet out there, the bull dropped dead, and there was nothing to do then but for Zeb and Joe to go to the auction lot over in the next county and buy another bull.

In those days, bulls were much more costly than the pasture acreage where they roamed and plied their trade. Since the father-son farm team didn't have a lot of ready money, they were forced to auction off some of the acreage in order to buy themselves a new bull.

This they did, to the tune of around $200, a small fortune.

But they were mighty pleased when they brought their new bull home, because he quickly demonstrated that he was only too happy to be in their pasture among a completely different herd of cows.

Zeb and Joe noticed in a hurry that this probably was one of the most bullish bulls they had ever possessed, and they marveled every day at the enthusiasm he displayed.

But all this began to have a darker side, because after some months the bull was still so enthusiastic that the poor cows became spooked whenever he came into view and started trying to avoid him. They began to look like they were worn to a frazzle, while the bull was only getting started.

And then the farmers noticed that when the bull wasn't able to corner a cow, he would go after heifers, trees and split-rail fences until everything around was becoming somewhat the worse for wear.

One day Joe came back from the pasture where he had been repairing damaged split-rail fences to tell Zeb that something seemed to have suddenly happened to their prized animal. He had collapsed and was lying on his side, and there was a field full of contented cows who had become aware of his newly debilitated condition and now were grazing quietly and happily all around him.

Zeb and Joe were very afraid the bull was going to die, and hating to lose this new investment so quickly after its predecessor, rushed to get the county vet on the job.

~~~~~~~~~

The vet sized things up pretty quickly.

"Zeb," he said, "don't you worry no more. Ain't nothing really wrong with your bull. Believe it or not, he's just constipated, and he's got to have an enema.

"Now, you listen carefully, and do just like I say. You and Joe go get your wife to fire up her wash-pot (back then soap was made and clothes were washed in a big iron pot over a wood-fire in the back yard near the kitchen) and tell her to put all the mixin's in just like she was making lye soap at hog-killing time. You might even want to help her stoke up the fire, 'cause you need this one to be extra hot. When you get this stuff comin' to a good boil, you figure some way to use it to give your bull an enema, and you won't have no more problems."

Zeb and Joe were happy to get this bit of good news, and proceeded with the fire under the wash-pot.

When the concoction was near readiness, it dawned on them that giving that big old bull an enema might not be an easy job even in his current condition.

Zeb looked around the barn. He had had an uncle who once played in the county marching band for July 4th celebrations and also for Confederate Memorial Day, and Zeb's eyes fell on his older relative's old tuba, lying up in the hayloft.

As a musical instrument, it was a whole lot the worse for wear, but for the purposes Zeb had in mind it was in fine condition. As a matter of fact, since rust had done a job on most of the insides between the big end and the twisted mouthpiece, it was in almost exactly the right condition.

Zeb and Joe wrestled the bull up near the wash-pot, drove some stakes into the ground and got most of the loose plow-line out of the barn. They used the line to hog-tie the bull and stake him down, and they took the old leaky tuba and used it as a funnel.

They had made a hot fire, and Zeb's wife had brewed a hot mixture. And when they proceeded to pour the contents of the wash-pot into the big end of the tuba, the bull quickly began showing signs of rejuvenation.

And in just another minute or so ~ when the full measure of the medicine began to show its effects ~ the bull, trailing the plow-line and stakes and with the tuba still in place, went on a wild rampage and disappeared from sight down the road to the river.

~~~~~~~~~

Here Zeb halted his story.

"Heck, no, mister," he said to the wide-eyed candidate for sheriff. "Heck no, I ain't going to vote for you, and my friends ain't going to vote for you, and nobody I can get word to ain't going to vote for you.

"No idiot that don't have enough sense to know the difference between a tugboat comin' up a river blowin' a foghorn ~ and a mad bull runnin' down a dirt road blowin' a tuba ~ ain't got no business bein' promoted to no higher job in this county."