“Once?”
“Yep. Most are gone now.”
“Lumbered out?”
He looked at me quizzically. “Haven’t you heard of the blight?”
I felt ignorant as I shook my head.
“It was a fungal disease that destroyed the bark tissue of the chestnut. It was first noticed in New York at the Bronx Zoo in 1904 but had probably been brought into the northeastern U.S. sometime in the 1800s on Asiatic chestnut trees. It spread like wildfire from the northeast southward, killing almost every American chestnut tree throughout the eastern U.S. Our native chestnuts had almost no resistance to this exotic fungus. Most of the trees died from the blight in the 1930s and practically all were gone by 1950, but the blight didn’t directly harm the roots. This king of trees continued to sprout back year after year with a vengeance. Some chestnuts have repeatedly died and sprouted again from their root collars for the past seventy years. But the vigor and number of these sprouts have been declining.”
I stood in amazement as this ancient professor lectured in words both illuminating and refreshing. His love for the forest and her inhabitants was contagious.
“I miss my friends,” he sighed. “But so does every creature in the park. The nuts were a dependable food for wildlife. When the acorn and hickory crops were lean, deer, raccoons, squirrels, chipmunks, mice, wild turkey, and other birds could rely on a chestnut crop. Since chestnut trees bloomed late, they escaped the spring frosts that often ruined other mast crops.”
His eyes were gazing into a different world as he continued. “Farmers often let their pigs run loose in the woods in the fall to fatten up on the freshly fallen chestnuts. Children loved to gather and eat the sweet-tasting nuts — fresh or roasted. Many of the mountain folks depended on chestnuts as a no- or low-maintenance cash crop. The nuts were free for the taking, and the only work was in the gathering and marketing.”
His eyes came back into focus as he looked up at the giant locust tree. “Son, this tree is a mere babe compared to the mature chestnut — which were the giants in this forest. In my early days here I’d see chestnut trees ten feet in diameter and over a hundred feet tall. As far as I was concerned, the chestnut was the redwood of the East. We lost a tree that I think would have become our national tree.”
Suddenly the naturalist turned and headed down the path, sauntering even more deeply into the forest. I followed close behind.
“Oh, here’s a beauty,” he commented as he stopped and pointed to a small tree I’d never seen before.
“She’s a yellowwood. The natives call her a gopherwood. This one’s rare in the park, but she’s hearty. In fact, one of her ancestors was the final survivor of all the specimens collected in these mountains by John Bartram and planted by him in his garden in Philadelphia.”
He pulled down a small branch with a cluster of white flowers. “Smell this.”
I took in the fragrance of the small flowers. “Sweet.”
“Yep. This actually smells just like the locust flower. Probably because they are related. Both are members of the bean family, or Leguminosae.”
I smiled to myself in enjoyment as we moved further down the trail.
Arthur pointed to a sloping field strewn with massive jumbled boulders. “Know what this field is telling us, Walt?”
I looked and thought carefully for a moment, but nothing came to mind.
He continued. “It tells us of an ancient age when the climate was bitterly cold in this region. Massive rocks were torn loose from the higher ridge by the process of freezing alternating with thawing. Then this bouldery debris field slowly began to march down the slope. The boulders were almost imperceptibly rolled and pushed down by frost and erosion and the pull of gravity. They continue their downward journey even today — slowly moving toward disintegration and dust. They age at an imperceptibly slow speed — but, like us, to dust they shall return.”
As our time together progressed, I sensed Arthur Stupka was not just a naturalist but, in his own way, a preacher. His sermon was couched in the language of biology and botany, but his lessons were even more timeless than the nature he admired — for he instinctively understood and admired not just nature but also her Creator — the One about whom all nature sang.
“Walt, the variety of plant life along this one little trail is incredible. Those gray-barked trees are the white ash. They aren’t so very big, but each of these trees was growing right here long before the white man arrived. Up there,” he pointed to a grove, “is a large grove of old sugar maples. Over there are silverbells, basswood, and yellow poplar. Those ferns at their bases are the evergreen walking fern. The Cherokee call it ‘sore eye.’ It’s a strange ancient plant that only grows on moist, mossy rocks. It has a peculiar habit of spawning offspring when the tips of its finely tapered fronds touch the ground.”
He took a deep breath and then slowly let it out. “Now isn’t this a spectacular site!” Arthur exclaimed, his eyes youthful and sparkling. “This is my favorite fern, and this is the most luxurious collection of them in the entire eastern United States. I’ve shown it to very few people.”
He turned to face me. “Son, I don’t want you to ever bring anyone here that you don’t trust with your life. I don’t want anyone in here collecting these beautiful plants. I’ll tell ya this, there are folks who would come and cut every one of them to sell to a florist shop somewhere.”
Stupka turned back toward the ferns and suddenly his eyes seemed to twinkle. “Do you see anything else, Walt?” His eyes roamed the slope as he almost whispered. “Do you see them?”
I looked across the ferns. I couldn’t see anything unusual — or anyone. “What? Who?” I asked.
He smiled. “The Master himself has sprinkled the whole slope with a variety of wildflowers. If you don’t look closely, you’ll miss them.”
Only then did I see them. A carpet of tiny little flowers of every imaginable color!
“They’re all at their peak right now,” Arthur explained. “Plants, flowers, and trees are to the Smokies what the grand granite domes are to Yosemite and the ancient geysers are to Yellowstone. As the wildflowers begin to fade in April and May, the rhododendrons will begin to paint the hills. The Master begins with purple rhododendron of the mountain slopes, followed by the densely flowered waist-high piedmont. Then it’s time for the towering catawba, or rose-pink, which blooms at different altitudes from June into July and sometimes into the rest of the summer. Last but not least is the Rhododendron maximum. Wherever they grow, they form a gigantic garden of waxy white to deep pink under the streamside hemlocks.”
He stopped talking long enough to drink in the sight and then almost whispered. “I love this park. I love what she does for me — what she does in me — what she does for every single person who makes the pilgrimage here. Many of them just come to visit here, but for me I’m not visiting when I’m here — I’m returning home.”
He took in a deep breath, enjoying the moist, pungent, earthy aromas, and then slowly exhaled. “You see the Star Wars movie?” he asked.
“I did.”
“You know how they say, ‘The force be with you’?”
I nodded.
He smiled as he looked across the hill. “I say, ‘The forest be with you!’ ”
He laughed and then headed back up the trail. “Come on now. It’s time for a lesson in medicine.”
On the walk back to the car, Arthur concentrated on showing me a plethora of medicinal plants. He showed me sweet bubby, used by the pioneers for making a perfume; touch-me-not, used for treating poison ivy or stinging nettle dermatitis; liver leaf, used, of course, for liver ailments; and squaw weed, which was chopped up, soaked in water, and used after childbirth. I enjoyed watching his excitement as he led me through the forest to point out the plants that settlers used for dyes: bloodroot, which was used for orange and red dye; butternut walnut, which was used for black dye; and black walnut, which, interestingly enough, was used for brown dye.
Pa
rt of the fun for me on our trip back to the car, at least for a while, was in pointing out plants he had not identified and asking him, “What is this plant used for?” or, “What did the settlers use that tree for?”
For a while he humored me. But then he suddenly became irritated, turned and marched up to me, and scolded, “I wish you would stop asking what this or that is or was good for! Walt, think about what you’re saying. Do you mean good for you or me? Or do you mean good just in terms of this wonderful place where they grow?” Then he turned and stalked away.
After the shock of the moment wore off, I realized his point had been very well made, and he was, as he always seemed to be, right. As Arthur would tell me another time, quoting Aldo Leopold, a pioneer scholar on wildlife management and the wilderness of the earlier twentieth century, “The last word in ignorance is the man who says of a plant or animal, ‘What good is it?’ If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not.”
His view of stewardship of the creation was instructive, and I’ve never forgotten it. Arthur Stupka introduced me to a different way of looking at the park — which he called “my park.” He believed that all of the herbs, trees, shrubs, flowers, insects, birds, and mammals were invaluable components of the whole. Each was created to have little true meaning without the other. Each was created for our enjoyment and deserving of our care.
Some find God through the Bible, some through the church, some through preaching, and many find him through friends and loved ones. But to Arthur Stupka there was no better way to meet the Creator than to spend time in and with his creation.
Ever since that magical day with the famous naturalist, I’ve viewed a favorite passage in the New Testament just a bit differently: “ . . .what may be known about God is plain . . . , because God has made it plain. . . . For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities — his eternal power and divine nature — have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse.”
That day I could sense the park herself saying, “Amen!”
chapter seventeen
WOMANLESS
WEDDING
Having grown up in the city and in what the mountain folks called “the flatlands,” I was unaware of many of the recurring traditions in small rural communities — especially in the Smoky Mountains.
One that was common after the 1950s was for local organizations to raise money by holding donkey basketball games in the fall and winter and donkey softball games in the spring and summer. Traveling outfits would bring a small herd of well-trained donkeys to the community and local “celebrities” or sports stars would be recruited to ride the donkeys during the contest.
Some donkeys were trained to run, seemingly out of control, while others were trained to not budge. Some would buck, and others knew how to stop fast enough to toss riders over their heads. The games were invariably a source of much enjoyment and laughter — and unending embarrassment to the riders.
However, the more popular fund-raiser in the less affluent rural communities was what was called, in a wide variety of renditions, the “Womanless Wedding.” Its popularity stemmed from the fact that there were relatively few costs involved in putting it on and the results were uniformly and consistently hilarious. The womanless wedding was just what the name implied: everyone in the wedding party was a male. And this particular year the organization hosting the event in Bryson City was the Swain County Youth Athletic Association.
I should have known something was up when Dean asked if her husband, Preston, and his best friend, Joe Benny Shuler, could talk to me when my workday ended. Neither man would darken the door of a doctor’s office unless a life was on the line — or they needed something.
When I entered my private office, the two men, who had been sitting on the sofa, jumped to their feet. Both were avid, longtime fans of Swain County High School football; both had sons who played football; and both coached the young men in the Swain County Youth Athletic League — the teams that taught the young boys the offense, defense, and philosophy of Coach Boyce Dietz, head football coach at Swain County High School. It was an amazing “farm system,” preparing the future members of the Maroon Devil football team, which would capture at least five state 1-A football championships under Dietz’s leadership over the coming decade.
“What’s up, guys?” I asked, highly suspicious of their reason for being there.
“Doc,” Joe Benny started, “we was wonderin’ if you’d be willin’ to help us raise a little money for the boys?”
Rick and I responded to just about every person who came by asking for a donation to a decent cause, and we were particularly prone to support the local athletic teams. Just as I was ready to pull out the checkbook, Preston added, “Doc, you made quite a hit last summer as the winner of the Miss Flame contest for the volunteer fire department.”
Now I was more than suspicious.
Preston continued. “So we was wonderin’ if you’d dress up as a flower girl in our fund-raiser?”
I’m sure my jaw fell open. “Flower girl?”
Joe Benny and Preston smiled at each other and then looked back at me. Joe Benny answered, “Yep. We want you and Deputy Bob Ogle to be the flower girls. The bridesmaids are gonna be us two; Bob Thomas, who teaches up at the high school; Coach Steve Maennle; and Coach Dietz. The maid of honor’s gonna be Coach Dick Ensley, the best man Coach Jerry McKinney, and the groom’ll be Lambert Wilson, principal of the elementary school. For the bride, we’ve chosen big ole hairy David Rowland, ya know, who works for the state’s department of transportation. And the minister’s gonna be the superintendent of schools, James Coggins.”
“You can’t be serious?” I exclaimed.
“As a heart attack!” Joe Benny replied, a big smile on his face.
Preston explained. “The wives are gonna find ugly old dresses and wigs for us, and Barbara Ogle is in charge of the rehearsals. On the night before the program, a dress rehearsal’s gonna be held.”
“And,” Joe Benny added, as if to reassure me, “you don’t gotta look purty for this one, like you did for the Miss Flame contest. We’re askin’ the ladies to make everyone look awful ugly. And for most of these guys, that’s not gonna take much in the way of makeup.”
I sat down slowly, not believing what I was hearing. I had vowed that I’d never dress as a woman again — not for any reason. The two men gazed intently at me.
“Doc, if we can do it and the football coaches can do it, then you can do it.”
“Why don’t you ask Dr. Pyeritz? It’s his turn to make a fool of himself, don’t you think?”
“We have, Doc. It turns out he’s on call for the emergency room that night. We really need you, Doc. The kids need our help.”
I finally gave up. It was clear they weren’t leaving without an agreeable victim. And, I thought to myself, if Boyce Dietz can do it, so can I!
“Well, at least I won’t have to worry about anyone outside of this community knowing about my cross-dressing, gentlemen!” I commented.
Preston smiled. “No way, Doc! No way we’d ever tell anyone.”
“’Sides,” Joe Benny added, “no one would believe us anyhow.”
Preston nodded.
Our usual babysitter was Dorinda Monteith. However, as Dorinda’s interest in young men escalated, Barb was in the market for other sitters when Dorinda wasn’t available.
Since his initial run-in with the law (and the hornets), Sam Tanager seemed to have turned his life in the right direction. He was a handsome, curly-headed boy known both for his athletic skills and his academic prowess, and he seemed to have a delightful disposition as well.
We were becoming good friends with McCauley and Laura Tanager, and Laura told Barb that Sam wanted to babysit for us, free of charge. She said that her son loved little children and had been very impressed by the fact that I was the team physician for the high school athletes. He had also told
his mom that he viewed my treatment as having saved his life. Even though he had told her he could never repay that debt, he wanted to show his gratitude. So Barb asked him to sit for Kate and Scott on the day we participated in the womanless wedding. And we insisted on paying him.
As Barb explained to Sam where we would be and how he could reach us if needed, Sam began to giggle.
“What is it?” Barb asked.
“Aw, I’d jest like to see Doc in a dress. That would be funny.”
“Not nearly as funny as seeing all the football coaches in dresses,” I quickly added.
“You’re probably right!” Sam exclaimed — laughing as Barb and I walked out the door. “Y’all don’t worry now. Have a good time!”
The room where all the men were being dressed as women was the scene of continuous guffaws as each of the guys watched the others being fitted with unattractive wigs and dresses. The men were in various stages of dress. All of the participants except the other flower girl, the bride, and me had shaved their chest and leg hair. It was a sight to behold.
The wives were working under the supervision of Mrs. Ogle to help dress each of the various characters and apply the hideous makeup. I couldn’t help but smile as I noticed how ugly David Rowland looked in his wedding gown. Underneath he sported white lingerie and white stockings with garters.
The time for the ceremony finally arrived. We were told that the theater was completely sold out and had standing room only. All of the men were dressed, and we were ready to start the show.
As Bob and I entered to the sounds from a poorly played organ, dropping kudzu leaves in the aisle, the crowd began to snicker. Then came the bridesmaids, who marched to the front and stood next to us flower girls. I couldn’t help but smile as I watched Coach Dietz walk up in his dress. “That’s one ugly woman!” Bob whispered to me as we laughed.
When the bride, whose stage name was Tiny Oats, walked in, leaning on the arm of her “father,” the crowd couldn’t contain its laugher.
Bryson City Secrets: Even More Tales of a Small-Town Doctor in the Smoky Mountains Page 12