Bryson City Secrets: Even More Tales of a Small-Town Doctor in the Smoky Mountains

by Walt Larimore, MD

  I turned to Bonnie. “Get O2 started stat. Five liters per minute.”

  I barked to the student, “Open up the IV. Let’s try to wash the epinephrine out of his system. And be sure to have some Inderal ready should we need it.” Inderal was a medication I could use to control his blood pressure and heart rate. But I didn’t want to give it unless it became absolutely necessary.

  The next few moments seemed like an eternity. But slowly and steadily the boy’s blood pressure, heart rate, and breathing all eased down to normal levels. And as his did, so did mine.

  Then the patient quickly woke up, shaking his head.

  “What happened?” he asked.

  The collective sigh of relief in the room gave way to smiles.

  When Don and Billy arrived, the patient was stable. As they prepared to transport the young patient-prisoner to the hospital, I talked to the boy. His name was Sam Tanager. He was fifteen years old and in jail awaiting a hearing for breaking and entering at a downtown store with another young man.

  “I made a big mistake, Doc,” Sam told me. “I won’t make another one, I’ll tell ya that.”

  “Is your daddy McCauley?” Don asked.

  Sam blushed. “Yeah.”

  “The same McCauley Tanager who’s a member of the school board and a deacon at Cold Springs Baptist Church,” Don commented to me. “Pretty important fella in the community.”

  I nodded, as Barb and I had come to know McCauley and his wife, Laura, fairly well. We often ran into them at community events or local restaurants.

  Sam’s head dropped to his chest. “Yep. Mom and Dad were pretty embarrassed by the whole thing — as were my two sisters. I just got in with the wrong type of friends.”

  Then he looked up at me. “But Doc, I’m goin’ clean. I made a mistake, but it won’t happen again. I’m goin’ back to my church and back to my spiritual roots.”

  “Well, Sam, I’m glad to hear that. I think one of the most important aspects of becoming a real man is to be able to admit our mistakes, to learn from them and then to try to avoid making the same mistake again.”

  Sam’s head dropped. “I hope the Lord’ll be willin’ to take me back.”

  “I can guarantee you that he will.”

  Sam looked quizzically at me. “You think so?”

  “I know so.”

  Sam furrowed his brows in a deeply skeptical stare. “Sam,” I explained, “he says so in his Word.”

  “Where’s the Bible say that?” Sam asked.

  “It’s in the book of 1 John. It says, ‘If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness.’ So, Sam, our job is admitting our mistakes. The Bible calls that ‘confession.’ Then God’s job is to forgive us and make us clean.”

  “Cool!” Sam exclaimed as the doubt on his face transformed to delight. “That’s really cool.”

  “I agree, Sam. It’s an incredible promise. So I’ll tell you what. You think about it a bit, and we can talk more later. In the meantime, the boys here are going to take you over to the hospital. I suspect you’ll be there a day or two. We need to be sure you’re not going to have a delayed reaction to the stings and the venom. OK?”

  Sam nodded. “Will someone call my parents?”

  “I suspect Dean’s already doing that. But I’ll make sure.”

  He smiled and extended his hand to me. “Thanks, Doc. I’ll never forget you savin’ my life. I know I’ll never be able to repay you.”

  As I shook his hand, Sam Tanager seemed truly grateful. I wondered if the kid had turned a corner — if he had turned away from the evil with which he had flirted. But I had no way of knowing for sure if he was sincere — or just acting.

  As I headed to my office, I asked Bonnie to invite the EMT student to come and see me. When Sandra arrived, I asked her to sit on the sofa and closed the door. I pulled my desk chair around the desk and took a seat by her as she blurted out, “Dr. Larimore, I’m so sorry!” Then she burst into tears.

  I let her cry for a moment and then reached to pull some tissue from a dispenser on my desk. She took it and blew her nose.

  “Sandra,” I began, “I appreciate your apology.”

  She blew her nose again and wiped the tears from her face.

  “I think learning to apologize for the mistakes we make is a critical skill to learn. And I’m afraid most doctors never learn it.”

  She smiled and sniffled.

  “You’re just beginning your career in health care. And I’m here to tell you that you’re going to make lots of mistakes. We all do. But the difference between those who are good and wise in practicing the art of medicine and those who are not is learning from our mistakes — and trying our best to never repeat them. Make sense?”

  She nodded, and I continued. “Those prisoners on the work crew — they’ve all made mistakes, eh?”

  She nodded again.

  “And so have I, Sandra. Lots of them!”

  Her eyes widened a bit. “You have?”

  It was my turn to smile. “You bet. Like the Bible says, ‘We have all fallen short. . . .’ The key is to learn to recognize and admit our mistakes and to learn from them. OK?”

  She smiled, nodded one last time, and said, “OK.”

  “See you tomorrow. It’s a new day.”

  Sandra left, and I turned to look out across the mountains. I sensed Sam and Sandra had both learned from their mistakes. And time would prove Sandra to be a competent and compassionate caregiver. As for Sam, only time would tell, but I was optimistic.

  chapter sixteen

  KING ARTHUR

  Are you on call this weekend?”

  The question wasn’t an unusual one from Ella Jo Shell. Often when she or her husband, John, came to the office, they’d inquire if Barb and I might be interested in joining them and their guests for a meal at their pleasant and popular inn. Our first night in Bryson City, when Barb and I first interviewed for a job here, had been spent at the Hemlock Inn, and we loved returning time after time to enjoy Ella Jo’s timeless recipes and the Shells’ effervescent hospitality and delightful guests.

  I’m sure my eyebrows lifted in anticipation as I replied, “Nope, I’m not on call. Rick’s towing the load this weekend. In fact, with Barb and the kids visiting her parents, I’ve even taken Friday off for some quiet time and to finish a ‘honey-do’ list Barb left for me.”

  Ella Jo fairly beamed. “Oh, goodie!”

  “Goodie? What’s so good about chores?”

  “No, no, no,” Ella Jo laughed. “It’s not the chores I’m excited about. I’ve got a great excuse for you to do something really fun on Friday afternoon.”

  I sat down on my rolling stool and looked curious.

  “Walt, you like hiking in the park, right?”

  “You know it,” I responded.

  “Did you know that it’s nearly impossible to take a walk in the national park without sensing the influence of Arthur Stupka?”

  “I did not. And just who is Arthur Stupka?”

  “John and I call him ‘the King of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.’ He was the first and probably the greatest naturalist the National Park Service ever hired — at least for this park. He’s retired now and is up in years, but every year he comes to the Hemlock Inn for a couple of weeks and leads our guests on tours. He’s arriving Friday morning, and I’ll bet he’d be happy to meet you and take you with him on a hike in the afternoon.”

  An excuse to postpone some chores, combined with the forecasters’ prediction of a stunningly beautiful spring weekend, was too tempting for me to turn down. “Wow, Ella Jo, thanks for thinking of me.”

  “You come up to the inn about two o’clock, OK?”

  “I’ll be there.”

  I later learned from Rick, an amateur ornithologist, that Arthur Stupka truly was considered a “king” to bird-watchers, biologists, and botanists alike. He had spent decades accumulating exhaustive observations in the Great
Smoky Mountains National Park. When I arrived at the inn on Friday afternoon, he was waiting on the porch, gazing across the valley at the Alarka Mountains in the distance. I expected him to invite me to sit a spell and chat, but he didn’t. Instead, after he greeted me with his hearty handshake and “Let’s take a walk!” he made a beeline toward the parking lot. Within minutes, I was driving toward the park.

  Mr. Stupka wore a crown of white hair, and his face was ingrained with the wrinkles that accompany years of sun exposure. He smiled easily but spoke infrequently as his alert and active eyes darted around the landscape we were passing. His few words were mostly in the form of questions as he inquired about my background, training, family, and practice. He seemed most interested in my triple majors at LSU in zoology, chemistry, and biochemistry.

  As we entered the park and my car slowly meandered down the steep, winding road, he pointed to a turnoff. “Park there, son!”

  A few minutes later, we were walking down a lovely, isolated trail. Every step took us deeper into the Smoky Mountains wilderness. At first my companion was silent. I sensed he was using every sense to size up the hills, the forest, and the wildlife. Arthur was more a walker than a hiker — his pace being an easy and leisurely saunter as opposed to the rather rapid and forced pace of the hikers I usually observed on the Appalachian Trail. I was wondering if this might just be because of his age when, appearing to read my mind, he spoke.

  “When I’m in my park, Walt, my steps are slow. Usually younger people are uncomfortable with that. They have to get used to it.”

  I smiled to myself as we stopped so my new friend could listen carefully to the sounds of the forest — the rustling of the wind and the chirping and singing of scores of unseen birds. As I would find out, he knew what made every single sound and what the sound meant.

  As he began to walk again, he explained, “My pace isn’t slow because of my age. And it’s not from having to adjust my step to match the many thousands of untrained trampers I’ve guided through the woods during my career here in the park. It comes from my reading of Thoreau. You ever read Thoreau, Walt?”

  “I think I did in my first year of college, but I can’t say as I remember all he had to say.”

  “Great writer. No educated man should avoid him is what I say. Thoreau wrote, ‘Walking is a blessing,’ and, my favorite, ‘It is a great art to saunter.’ When he was older, Thoreau wrote, ‘The really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure.’ I agree with the man. Webster said that sauntering was walking leisurely with no apparent aim. But that’s not how I like to saunter.

  “When I come into my forests here in the park,” he continued, “I just want to absorb the surroundings. The hiker is focused on the physical process of locomotion and arriving at the next point in his journey. I focus on the journey and what nature is telling me along the way. You go slow and listen, son, and you’ll even hear God speak out here.”

  Stupka paused, and then added, “This is really a hiker’s park. I’m proud to have been a part of making her that. And I’m proud to have done a little to protect her from evil.”

  “Evil?”

  “Indeed. Evil people who want to take this beautiful wilderness and rape her — clear-cut her, bulldoze her, develop her. They actually believe they can improve her. They are fools! They’re only interested in getting what they want when they want it. They don’t think of the future, and they don’t think of others — only themselves and their own selfish needs. Their sickness would destroy this park, son. Destroy her! And without good men to fight back, they would have.”

  The intensity of his voice and the strength of his conviction both surprised and intrigued me. “OK, enough history!” he stated. “Let’s go see what she wants to teach us today.”

  And with that we moved deeper into the woods.

  The further we walked, the more questions I had for this interesting man. I learned that Stupka first came to the Smokies in October, 1935.

  “I really had no idea what my assignment would be when I reported to J. Ross Eakin’s office,” Stupka explained. “He was the park superintendent. When I told him I’d been sent to be his park naturalist, he looked at me in shock and disbelief. ‘A park naturalist!’ he had exclaimed. ‘What in the devil would we do with a naturalist?’ ”

  Stupka paused to laugh. “I assured him that I had indeed been sent out for duty in the Smokies by the National Park Service and was eager to begin my service in the Smokies.”

  “Was this your first assignment with the Park Service?”

  “Oh, no! Four summers before that I worked as a naturalist ranger in Yosemite. Then I went back to finish my degree in zoology at Ohio State University. Graduated in 1932. My first appointment was as the first junior park naturalist at Acadia in Maine. In ’35 the NPS sent me here. I was the first full-fledged naturalist in any national park in the East.”

  “So what did you do when you started working here?”

  “Well, the superintendent looked at me and said, ‘Stupka, there’s nothing in this park that visitors can get to at this stage of the game and little to show except along the transmountain road.’ The park was so new then that his job was to concentrate on construction, not interpretation. He told me, ‘When the boys in our sixteen CCC camps get finished constructing hiking trails, fire control roads, and some facilities for visitors, maybe then you’ll have something to do. In the meantime, go build your collections. Get around the park. But please don’t bother me if you can help it.’ ”

  Stupka laughed again. “Without knowing it, son, the man gave me a great gift. For the first three years on the job I was able to concentrate on assembling basic information about the area that had never been assembled before. Not only was I able to collate the work of the scientific observers who had explored the Smokies before me; I could also catalogue this incredibly diverse part of the world. I found more than thirteen hundred kinds of flowering plants, almost 350 mosses and liverworts, 230 types of lichens, and more than two thousand types of fungi. Then there were the trees — I was able to document over a hundred different types. And about twenty of these, I found, had reached their world- or national-record size right here in the Smokies.”

  In a classroom, this type of lecture might have been boring, but with this animated man the words painted a picture that was framed by the natural beauty of the park herself.

  “Red spruce, eastern hemlock, mountain magnolia, cucumber tree, Fraser magnolia, yellow buckeye, and mountain silver-bell all have the largest members of their species right here. And plants that would normally be considered shrubs elsewhere grow and thrive here as large as trees. The staghorn sumac, witch hazel, rhododendron, and mountain laurel stand erect in many areas of the park with tall, woody stems at least nine or ten feet high. Fact is the rhododendron and laurel grow so tall and thick in some areas that it’s dark and cold in their interior. The old-timers tell stories of folks getting lost in the thickets and never finding their way out.

  “One old-timer, a mountaineer friend who called himself ‘Uncle Jim’ Shelton, first showed me what’s now been recognized as the world’s largest mountain laurel. That beauty measured a fantastic eighty-two inches in diameter. My guess is that the aggregate growth of the sprouts fused into a single trunk. I showed it to the late Dr. Harry M. Jennison of the University of Tennessee. He officially named it Shelton’s Ivy Stalk in honor of my friend.”

  Just then Arthur stopped and pointed. “Look there! There she is. The Queen.”

  I looked in the direction he was pointing. A massive tree soared toward the sky, clothed in a rough, deeply furrowed bark.

  “Most of the pioneers called that tree a weed tree,” Arthur explained. “She’s a black locust — the largest one in the park. Let’s go visit with her and take her measurements.”

  We walked over to the massive trunk, and I helped him measure the tree’s circumference. Then he pulled ou
t a small notebook and a pencil from his pocket and scribbled a bit as he figured. “Fifty-two inches in diameter, Walt. She’s put on nearly an inch since I last visited with her.”

  He stood back and gazed at the tree as an art connoisseur would admire a painting.

  “How old is she?” I asked.

  “I’m not certain, son. But she was here long before any settlers were, that’s for sure.” He pointed up to the branches of the tree, which were at least fifty feet above the ground. “See those white and sweet-pea-like clusters of flowers up there?”

  I nodded.

  “They have a sweet fragrance and will draw droves of bees all through April and May. Makes a mighty sweet honey, I’ll tell ya that.”

  He walked around the tree, gazing at her canopy. “Because the wood is so durable when it’s in contact with the ground, the pioneers used it for fence posts. You’ll see lots of them still standing today. I had black locust wood that was harvested in the park made into the numbered posts along every trail in the park.”

  “Is the locust your favorite tree?” I asked.

  “Nope. Not even close.”

  “Then what is?”

  “The chestnut. If the locust is the queen, the chestnut is the king of the park — at least when I began my career here. Lots of the old houses and barns were made from chestnut. It was as easily sawn and nailed as was the locust or the tulip poplar, but in one way it was better.”

  “Which was?”

  “It had the advantage of being decay resistant. In modern times, that made the rot-resistant logs from the tree very popular fence posts and utility poles. But for the pioneer it was ideal as split-rail fences. It had a straight grain that split easily, and it was much more available than the cedar or the black locust. The old-timers told me that one in every four trees in these mountains was once a chestnut.”