June 2013 Newsletter
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One of the few times I did wear shoes in the boyhoods of my early summers, other than on Sundays, came with trips to the local library. However, I do remember going to federal court unshod on more than one occasion. Federal court sessions were often occasions for first-rate entertainment. Whenever you got an old-time mountain defense lawyer with fine oratorical skills wound up, there was sure to be some merriment. That held doubly true for a couple of local characters who were courthouse “regulars” thanks to their propensity for turning their corn crops into liquid form. They were unashamed of their behavior and proud of their product, much like the late “Popcorn” Sutton, who grew up in the county adjacent to the one of my boyhood. The same holds true for one of the characters seen regularly on the “Moonshiners” program on today’s television, Jim Tom Hedrick. Sutton was from Haywood County, NC, while Hedrick calls Graham County, NC home. Incidentally, if I can be permitted a side trip down a literary rabbit trail (and since the newsletter is mine and you as readers aren’t paying anything for it, I reckon I’m entitled), I have to share a Popcorn Sutton tale. I knew him in his later years, and on one occasion I was helping host a group of writers in Maggie Valley, where he lived, and the local tourism folks arranged for the group to meet him. We chatted a while, and in a moment of mischief, I decided to ask Popcorn if he had ever met a fellow by the name of Colin Flack. Flack was the local ATF agent and a man well known for being pure poison when it came to his pursuit of moonshining. “Know him?” Popcorn spluttered. “That son of a bitch cost me four thousand, seven hundred and eighty-two dollars and forty-two cents!” (That may not have been the amount he mentioned, but he did name it down to the last cent). Realizing I had broached a decidedly touchy subject, I quickly changed topics and asked the grizzled old moonshiner (he looked every bit of 90 years old although I subsequently learned he was my junior by several years) if he would like to join us for breakfast. “Eat breakfast?” he snorted. If I so much as looked at a plate of scrambled eggs I’d puke from here to the highway.” At that point the eyes of some of those in the group were rolling a bit, and I decided we had best cut our exchange short. However, once breakfast was over, I did manage to acquire multiple jars of his “cherries” (white lightning poured over maraschino cherries stuffed into a quart jar). Of course not all of my hours in the good old summer time were spent in carefree barefooted wanderings. Sure, I fished a great deal, both for river/lake species and trout, and I spent a goodly amount of time in various bait-gathering pursuits. In part these focused on my personal plans (for river fish such as bream and catfish—I was always a fly fisherman when it came to trout), but mostly time devoted to collecting bait was a money-making activity. Salamanders (we called ‘em spring lizards) brought from three cents to a nickel each, depending on size and color, and night crawlers fetched a penny apiece. There was also a market for minnows of the right kind. One of the great things about bait pursuits was that they combined ample fun with some welcome pocket change. Then too there was work. I had some lawns which provided regular income, and I did a great deal of caddying at the local nine-hole golf course. Once I reached my teens I also worked on the golf course, and I’d love to have a $100 bill for every hour I rode an old tractor pulling gang mowers as I kept the fairways in proper shape. Most of the real work, however, was of the unpaid type. Mowing our lawn, weeding, hoeing (both in our garden and in Grandpa Joe’s), using a mowing scythe to keep weeds at bay, helping Mom with all sorts of things associated with the hundreds of quarts of fruit and vegetables she canned every year, and myriad other chores were an integral part of life in the summer. Maybe memory of some of that work (it is the kind of stuff I still do on a daily basis as I look after a large garden; all sorts of other foodstuffs such as blueberries, thornless blackberries, raspberries, muscadines, and scuppernongs; tend to a sizeable flower bed, and generally try to maintain a semblance of order on three acres (not to mention another 100 where I do much of my hunting) is why I found myself somewhere between bemused and irate when I attempted, a few months back, to volunteer for what I considered a good deed. The bureaucrats who run the Great Smoky Mountains National Park are, in my view, a pretty sorry lot. Mind you, I’m not talking about the rangers, trail maintenance crews, biologists, and others of their ilk. I’m referring to the grand Pooh-Bahs at the top of the bureaucratic list. They do a flat-out miserable job of maintaining the dozens of cemeteries scattered throughout the Park. In fact, as best I can tell, they clean the trails to them and do some basic maintenance (very basic) in the actual grave site areas once a year. Accordingly, I volunteered to look after two or three of them on my own, never mind that I live 150 miles away. After the passage of more time than it should have taken to get a response, I received a reply thanking me for the gesture BUT informing me that I would have to have training on how to use hand tools such as a rake, hoe, and swing blade; that I would need to go through general instructional sessions; that I would need to use Park tools; and that I would need to have oversight whenever I did work. After more than six decades of handling tools, and possessed of at least a modicum of common sense, I let the individual with whom I was in contact know just what I thought of this idiocy. To me it is a microcosm of what is wrong with our government and our world in general. There are far too many bureaucrats sucking at the taxpayer teat while seemingly thinking up ways to impeded common sense and good intentions. Incidentally, unless I was terribly unaware of the world in which I lived, that kind of nonsense was pretty much nonexistent in my youth. Well, that’s two rabbit trails which have sidetracked me, so let’s get back to the sweet of summer. While the outdoors loomed large in my boyhood summers, there was another important feature of them through my pre-teens and teens. For that matter, it remains a key factor in my life even now. That’s the inexpressible joy I find in reading. By great good fortune, and I am serious in stating this, I grew up in a home where there was no television. As a result, on the occasional gloomy, grey day of rain, as well as times when the heat was withering or falling darkness meant staying in the house, I often turned to books for entertainment. I read, and continue to read, almost anything and everything—labels on cans and boxes, anything which happens to be at hand when I don’t have a book within reach, magazines, newspapers, and most of all, books. So it has always been with me. My parents were keen readers, although paradoxically there was relatively little reading material in their household—several Bibles, recent issues of the Saturday Evening Post and Reader’s Digest (the two magazines to which they subscribed), the area’s daily newspaper (Asheville Citizen-Times), the local weekly newspaper (Smoky Mountain Times-I contribute a weekly column to it), and a few books. However, they took advantage of the local library, which had been founded by our next-door neighbor, utilized “pass around” paperbacks, and encouraged their children to read. I didn’t need a lot of encouragement. By the time I had reached high school I had devoured everything the Marianna Black Library had to offer on the outdoors; consumed the nature writings of folks like John Burroughs, Theodore Roosevelt, and Archibald Rutledge; and made serious inroads into various types of fiction. In the latter context, Westerns by the likes of Zane Grey Max Brand were among my favorites; as were mysteries by Adrian Conan Doyle, Erle Stanley Gardner, and Agatha Christie; adventure tales (true as well as fictional) by H. Rider Haggard, Thor Heyerdahl, and Sax Rohmer; and much more. I haunted to poorly lit, dusty, disheveled aisles of the understaffed and underfunded library, thinking it was a portal to paradise. Much later, when all of us were gone from home, my mother would serve as librarian for a decade and oversee a move into an expansive, modern building. Mom had no training in librarianship, but she had two qualities which serve any small-town librarian wonderfully well—she loved to read and was a splendid “people person.” In her memory, along with that of Marianna Black (our neighbor who founded the library, and in gratitude to a whole bunch of teachers who endowed me with a love of reading, I am now grateful to be able to give something back in memory of those joyous boyhood days of reading. A hundred or so books at a time, as the folks at the Marianna Black Library can process and catalog them, I am making sure that never again will there be a mountain youngster who exhausts the available outdoor literature available to them in Bryson City or Swain County. Maybe that’s as good a point to conclude as any. If you care about something deeply—whether it’s the Second Amendment, conservation, the future of this country, or something as simple as my love of books—make a point to give back a bit. You’ll feel better about yourself and you will have an impact whether it is obvious or not. Those teachers who helped give me a love of reading are prime examples. My only regret is that I didn’t personally thank each and every one of them, when they were alive, for the gift they helped give me. Recent Reading Last month I forgot to include a list of some of the books I had been reading, but I’ll get back on track here.
SUMMERTIME EATING To me, thoughts of food connected with summer mean grilling, picnics, family reunions, celebration of Independence Day, church revivals, class reunions, and the like. It means watermelon eaten the way it should be, in big crescent slices which leave you dripping from the chin. It’s home-grown tomatoes atop two slices of bread or a cathead biscuit, with salt and pepper and a slather of mayonnaise. It’s children chasing lightning bugs in the gloaming while older folks, full of fine food, sit talking in gentle breezes. It’s a division of delicious desserts aligned across a table top. It’s extended members of a family vying with one another in a friendly competition to see whose pickles, fried chicken, ham biscuits, or relishes look and taste the best. It’s a time to loosen belts, momentarily forget waist lines and cholesterol, and dig in or, to use the words with Grandpa Joe invariably ended prayers when the family had gathered for a meal, “You’uns see what’s before you; eat hearty.” One approach to eating hearty is the time-honored and distinctly American tradition of enjoying hamburgers with all the trimmings. If the burgers happen to be made from venison, so much the better. Here are some recipes using deer meat which ought to tickle your fancy and that of others. VENISON BURGERS WITH HORSERADISH SAUCE
1 pound ground venison Gently mix ground venison with seasonings and shape into patties. Be sure to chill patties well before cooking. Lightly oil grill top and grill over medium coals about 10 minutes, turning over once. Serve on warm buns with horseradish sauce (see below) and your choice of condiments. HORSERADISH SAUCE
½ cup plain yoghurt or sour cream Blend yoghurt, horseradish, and mustard in a bowl. Use as spread just as you would do with mayonnaise. TOMATO TOPPER FOR VENISON BURGERS If you aren’t fond of the pore opening, sweat raising taste of horseradish (I am), try this as a substitute.
2 tablespoons olive oil Mix ingredients with a wire whisk and then pour in diced fresh tomatoes and, if desired, onions. Toss gently and serve atop burgers or as a side dish. CAROLINA STYLE VENISON BURGERS
1 pound ground venison Mix these ingredients lightly and shape into four patties (recipe can be doubled or tripled). Grill, broil or pan fry burgers. Do not overcook and turn only once. About seven minutes should be long enough. Serve on buns with chili, cole slaw, mustard and raw onions. Napkins are a necessity. I suspect this recipe originally evolved as a way to extend the meat. I know that my mother regular made relatively little meat go a long way by use of oats in burgers and in meat loaf. Thank you for subscribing to the
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