| when we got as far as I lived we
went in a huddle. We decided to have a chicken
roast. We were not to take more than one
chicken from any one chicken roost. We split up and made our rounds.
We wound up with eight chickens. Our spokesman said, "Boys,
you know Uncle Jim Tyner will be hurt if we don't go and get a nice
fryer or one of his young turkeys." We all knew how
Uncle Jim pinched pennies. So we sent two boys to Uncle Jim's turkey
roost and got a half grown turkey to go with our eight chickens. My
sis was away for the night, so we cooked chickens and turkeys just
about all night!
I am writing this just to show that boys back then were not altogether what you would call good boys although we never had any gang wars, and never tried to break in and rob anyone. Now days we hear of young men taking young girls and older women out and murdering them. We never heard of such things when I was a young man. We never tried to damage anyone's properties. I can't call to my mind but one case of anyone going and damaging anyone's property. My Uncle John Bobbitt had someone come to his house barn and cut the throats of three of his fine horses. They never found any sure clue to who did it. It was a sight to see those three horses laying stretched out with their throats cut from ear to ear. PRANKS People were bad to play pranks on one another. One bad winter night, two men decided to play a trick on John Clements and old Preacher Williams. The ground had been frozen and had warmed up and thawed. The mud was half knee deep. One man, I'll call him "A", went to John Clements and told him that A.A. Ryan was bad sick and about to cramp to death, and for him to come quick and bring his hot liniment. Mr. "B" went to preacher Williams and told him the same story. So those two men were on the way to give aid to their neighbor, A.A. Ryan. Old Brother Williams bumped into John Clements and wanted to know where he was going this dark and muddy night. "I am going to see my 27 |