by Mary Salyers
Just then Bud Summers came up the steps. “Oh, hi, Maggie. Neat haircut.” He held the door for the girls to go inside.
When they had taken a seat in Civics class, Mary Ann leaned over and asked, “Who was that guy, and how does he know you?”
“He’s a friend of JD’s. I met him a couple of weeks ago when I was out with JD.”
“He’s cute. Did you see how he looked at you?”
Maggie smiled and ran her hands through her short hair.
CHAPTER 4
Campbell Holler–September 29, 1886 Johnny and Jimmy–6 and 4–quite a pair. Bought reader and speller from traveling salesman. No school here. Must teach them myself.
(Diary of Mary Louise Campbell)
October 1949
Maggie set the cool flatiron on the cook stove and picked up the hot one, careful to keep the hot handle covered with the thick pad. She licked her finger and quickly touched the surface of the iron, listening for the sizzle. Sighing, she returned to the ironing board where she had worked since finishing the supper dishes but had hardly made a dent in the basket of clothes her mother had sprinkled earlier.
Betty Lou sat in a nearby chair with a lap full of dried beans. “Hurry and finish your homework, Jeannie, and you can help me hull these shellies. I’ve got homework to do, too.”
“Okay, I’m almost finished.” Jeannie sat at the kitchen table. “You can give me my spelling words while we shell beans.”
Maggie reached for the list Jeannie had placed on the table. “I’ll say them for you while I iron. Let me know when you’re ready.”
Everyone worked quietly for several minutes. They could hear Corie Mae in the front room rocking Jay and singing “We’ll Understand It Better By and By.” Then Betty Lou said, “Mrs. Lewis asked me today, when I practiced piano at her house, if I would play all the hymns for the church service Sunday after next. She’s going to Nashville for a convention. She felt sure I could play all the music for the whole service.”
“Wow, Betty Lou, do you think you can learn them well enough in only a week?” Maggie pressed a crease in the sleeve of Johnny Ray’s shirt.
“Actually, I already know all but one. I think I can do it.” Betty Lou’s brown eyes sparkled. “I’ll practice really hard this week.” Since the Martins had no piano, every day after school Betty Lou got off the bus at the Lewises to practice before walking home.
While Maggie had the fair complexion and blue eyes of her father, Betty Lou had their mother’s dark eyes and hair and petite figure. Her ready smile made dimples in her cheeks. She’s got me beat on looks. Maggie set the iron down and stretched her shoulders and back.
“Mrs. Lewis also gave me a new piece to learn for the school talent show next month.” Betty Lou stifled a sneeze. “These bean hulls give me the sniffles.” She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and blew her nose. “Mrs. Lewis said I can become a music teacher if I work hard.”
“You mean like giving piano lessons?” Jeannie chewed her pencil eraser.
“I think she meant a music teacher in school like Mrs. Jones.”
“Wouldn’t you have to go to college to do that?”
“Probably. She said she thought I could get a scholarship if I keep my grades up and keep practicing. You can get a teaching certificate after only two years at teachers college.”
Maggie returned to the ironing board after swapping irons. “Miss Erickson told our class today if we do real good in all our business classes, we could probably get a secretarial job as soon as we finish high school.” Maggie unfurled a shirt for Stuart and smoothed it on the ironing board. “She told us about a student who graduated two years ago and got a job in Nashville, and now she’s going to college at night. I think that’s what I’d like to do.”
“Think you can learn that shorthand? Looks awful hard to me.”
“Actually I’m making good grades in shorthand, and Miss Erickson gave me extra practice exercises so I can learn faster.”
“Now girls.” Corie Mae walked into the kitchen with her hands on her hips. “You can’t fill your heads with these wild day dreams.” Maggie hadn’t realized their mother had heard their conversation. “Get this foolishness out of your heads right now.” She shook her finger at the girls. “Women don’t need college. The Bible says God made woman to be a helpmeet for man. That’s what a woman’s supposed to do.” She pulled up a chair, sat down, and filled her apron with beans from the basket on the floor. “Too much education ain’t good for nobody. It makes you think you’re better’n others. I quit school in sixth grade, and I’ve got along just fine. Besides families needs to stay together and help each other.” Maggie rolled her eyes at Betty Lou.
Maggie shook the grate on the stove, opened the lid, and put in two sticks of wood. Ever since the brouhaha over getting her hair cut, she had taken great pains to do everything the way her mother wanted. She liked her new look. It took time–pin curls every night and time each morning to comb and style–but the approval from her peers made it worth the effort.
As Maggie returned to the ironing board, Corie Mae looked up. “By the way, Maggie, I’m glad you told me Judy Ryan’s mother was sick. This morning I filled the little red wagon with food and spent several hours down there getting the kids cleaned up and straightening up the house. When I got there Leroy had melted lard and poured it over a piece of bread for Judy’s breakfast.”
“Oooooh Yuk! That makes me want to puke!”
Corie Mae gave Jeannie a warning look. “Not a bite of food in the house.”
“Don’t they have a root cellar?”
“No, Jeannie. Minnie wasn’t able to make garden this year.”
“What about Mr. Ryan? Why can’t he take care of the kids?” Betty Lou took more beans from the basket.
“I’ll tell you why not,” Maggie spoke up. “He went down to the sawmill where Mary Ann’s daddy works trying to keep the millers from going to work.”
“Why?” Jeannie closed her notebook and stacked up her books.
“The miners went on strike several months ago, and Herbert hasn’t worked for a long time. That’s why his family ain’t got no food.” Corie Mae reached into the basket for more beans.
“But I don’t see why he’d try to keep somebody else from working. That don’t make a lick of sense.” Jeannie moved her chair closer to the basket, filled her lap, and began shelling beans.
Maggie carefully folded Stuart’s shirt. “Mary Ann told me Herbert Ryan and some other miners have picketed the mill every day for weeks, trying to get the sawmillers to form a union. Her daddy’s afraid they will hurt somebody, because they try to stop the mill workers from going through the gate.” Maggie took another shirt from the clothes basket. ”I guess he thinks it’s more important to keep honest men from going to work than to take care of his own wife and kids.”
“Now, Maggie, “Corie Mae scolded. “Don’t be badmouthing our neighbor.”
“Mary Ann’s really worried her father might get hurt. Herbert Ryan’s even threatened Mr. Collins to his face.”
“I’d be embarrassed to see my kids going to school as dirty as Judy and Leroy was yesterday. Looked like they hadn’t had a bath for weeks.” Betty Lou frowned. “I think he should get the kids cleaned up for school instead of keeping other men from going to work.”
Corie Mae frowned at Betty Lou, but before she could say anything, Maggie asked, “How was Mrs. Ryan, Mama?”
“Minnie’s real bad off. She was so weak she couldn’t hardly sit up in bed. I guess she’s been in bed for over two weeks and ain’t eat nothing hardly. I finally got her to drink a little chicken broth. She told me her sister lives in Hamby, so when Ray come home for dinner, I had him go tell Reverend Lewis to go get her sister.” Corie Mae took the last beans from the basket. “Betty Lou, get started on that homework you said you had to do. I’ll finish up these beans. Maggie, do a couple more pieces and put the rest on the back porch where they’ll stay cool. I’ll try to finish up what’s left tomorrow
.”
“Okay, Mama.” Maggie sighed with relief. The heavy irons made her shoulders and back ache, and her knees hurt from standing so long. “I have some homework to finish, too.” She picked up the spelling list. “Jeannie, ready for your first word?” Jeannie spelled all the words in the list correctly. Although reluctant to admit it, Maggie thought Jeannie the smartest in the whole family. She set the basket of unironed clothes on the back porch. After closing the damper on the stove so the fire would die out, she retrieved her books from the front room and joined Betty Lou at the kitchen table.
Corie Mae worked at the other end of the table picking the pieces of dried bean hulls from the shelled beans. After a bit, she paused and watched Maggie practice her shorthand characters. She said nothing–just shook her head, her lips compressed into a disapproving frown.
Despite her mother’s objection, Maggie liked high school. She had made new friends, and she liked most of her teachers. Miss Erickson had encouraged her to do well in the business courses and had given her a tattered copy of the Harbrace Handbook. In addition to doing the usual homework for her classes, Maggie tried to find time each day to do extra practices for shorthand and to complete at least one exercise from the handbook. Best of all, most every day Bud Summers made a point of speaking to her when they passed in the hallway.
She had not gone anywhere with JD since school started. He no longer rode the school bus, but drove his car and went directly from school to the filling station where he worked until closing. Any free time he spent with Wanda Smith. But he did make a point of checking in with Maggie at school. He told her Mr. Sexton had taught him how to change spark plugs and oil and do a grease job. He repaired punctured inner tubes and changed tires as well as pumping gas and cleaning windshields. He also had said the lady Aunt Opal took care of in Honey Valley might die. He guessed his mother would move back home soon, much to his disappointment.
By the time Maggie finished her homework, the house was quiet. She got a small jelly glass and filled it with water from the faucet in the kitchen. How wonderful to have water in the house–no more walking to the well and toting it inside. She dipped her comb in the water and combed through each strand of hair before putting it into a pin curl and then tied a cloth around her head to hold the bobby pins in place. She turned out the kitchen light, and as she passed through the dark front room, she saw her father’s face illuminated by the flame as he lit his pipe while sitting in the porch swing. She picked up a small quilt her mother had used when she rocked Jay, wrapped it around her shoulders, and slipped out the front door.
“Hi, Daddy.”
“What’re you doing up so late, Sunshine? It’s time you was fast asleep.”
“I had homework to do. On my way to bed I saw you out here. Did you have a good day?”
Ray took the pipe out of his mouth. “ I helped Bob Jones put up a fence all day. We worked till it got so dark we couldn’t see. Then he invited me to eat supper, and after that we worked in his shop making the new gates. I got home just a few minutes ago and thought I’d take a little smoke before I come in to bed.”
Maggie pulled the quilt tighter against the chill of the fall night. “Daddy, did you know Mrs. Lewis asked Betty Lou to play all the songs for church on Sunday after next?”
“My little Lou playing the piano for church? I can’t believe it.” Ray puffed on his pipe. “I love to watch her when she plays. Just seems so natural to her.”
“Mrs. Lewis thinks she can be a music teacher someday.”
“ That’d be so wonderful. I hope all my kids can make something of theirselves. If I’d had the chance, I’d got more schooling myself.”
They rocked silently in the swing for a few minutes. “Daddy, did you know the striking miners are picketing the sawmill where Mr. Collins works?”
“Larry talked about it at church Sunday. It’s looking bad.”
“Mary Ann’s real scared. Mr. Ryan and his buddies keep trying to stop the workers at the gate. They even slashed one man’s tires, and Mary Ann told me today her father’s taking his shotgun to work in his pickup. She’s afraid her daddy’s going to get hurt, or maybe hurt someone else.”
“Well, I think she has a right to be afraid.” Ray smoked quietly for a few minutes. Then he tapped his pipe on the porch rail to empty out the ashes. “When I was a kid growing up in Harlan, we had more ‘n one man killed during union disputes. That’s one reason it’s called ‘Bloody Harlan.’”
“I don’t see why Mr. Ryan is so mean.”
“I guess the miners think the union’s helped them get better working conditions, and they think if the sawmillers would organize a union, it would help them, too.”
“But how is it helping when the miners are out of work because of the strike, and their families don’t have enough to eat?”
“Honey, I remember when it was very dangerous to work in the mines. My Uncle Henry died because the exhaust fans was broke, and the mine boss made the men go to work anyway. The gas built up till it exploded, and it took them three days to move all the coal to reach the trapped men. Course, by that time they was all dead. When the union men come in and organized, they was able to force the owners to make the mines safer. So unions ain’t all bad.”
“If that’s true, why do the sawmillers not want a union?”
Ray chuckled. “Well, I guess it’s just the stubbornness of mountain people. If you belong to a union, the union bosses can tell you what to do. You have to give some of your paycheck to the union. And if the company is unionized, they won’t hire anyone who don’t belong to the union. It feels like we don’t have any choices, and us mountain men don’t like that. That’s the main reason I decided to be a farmer.” Ray stood up and stretched. “It’s really late. We better get ourselves in the bed or we won’t get up in the morning.” When Maggie stood, he put his arm around her shoulders and gave her a hug. “Don’t worry too much about Mr. Collins.”
“Okay, Daddy. I hope you sleep well.”
“Good night, Sunshine.”
Maggie could barely see by the moonlight to find her way to the stairs. As she reached the top and felt her way carefully to her bed, she could hear Johnny Ray coughing in the next room. I hope he’s not getting sick again.
* * *
Mary Ann met Maggie the next day on the school steps where they often ate their lunches. “Well, it finally happened.”
“What’s that?” Maggie unwrapped her lunch.
“Herbert Ryan and a bunch of thugs stopped Daddy’s pickup on the way home from work yesterday. Before Daddy could get out his shotgun, they pulled him out of the truck, drug him down the bank, and dumped him in the creek. They said they was baptizing him in the name of John L. Lewis.”
“Oh my gosh! Did he get hurt?” Maggie took a bite of her biscuit and peanut butter sandwich.
“No, but I never saw him so upset. He told Mama as soon as he got some dry clothes he was going to find those guys and teach them a lesson.”
“Do you think he would shoot them?”
“That’s what had Mama scared. She told me to jump on my brother’s bike and go get Preacher Lewis. When I rode up, Reverend Lewis was fixing to go somewhere in his car. I was so out of breath I couldn’t hardly talk, but when I told him, he took off real fast. He got to our house just in time to block our driveway with his car so Daddy couldn’t get his pickup out.”
“Then what happened?”
“Daddy grabbed his shotgun and took off running down the road, and the preacher went running after him. They was gone for over a hour.” Mary Ann stopped to take a bite of her bologna sandwich.
“So, did your daddy go to work today?”
“Yeah, but he let Preacher Lewis take his shotgun. He promised he wouldn’t fight back unless they attacked him again. Reverend Lewis planned to talk to the sheriff to see if they can put a deputy at the gate, and Daddy’s going to ride to work with Lester Phillips and Tom Lamance so he won’t be by hisself anymore.” Mary Ann paused for seve
ral seconds. “I’m really scared. Daddy’s still awful mad. It’s untelling what could happen.”
Maggie nodded. “Mama went down to Ryan’s house yesterday, and Minnie Ryan was real bad sick. The kids had no clean clothes and hadn’t had a bath since no telling when.” Maggie brushed the crumbs off her lap. “I can’t understand how Herbert Ryan would run around the country throwing people in the creek and trying to keep them from going to work when his kids are dirty and hungry and his wife’s about to die. And he’s supposed to be a Christian and a church member.”
“My daddy says he’ll never go back to that church again as long as Herbert Ryan’s a member. And I don’t blame him. Oops, there’s the bell.”
Maggie took the last bite of her sandwich, folded the newspaper wrapping, and stood to go back inside.
* * *
On Thursday morning, Maggie gathered her stack of books and opened the front door. “Hey, kids, it’s time to catch the bus.” Betty Lou joined Maggie on the front porch, arms loaded with books. “Come on, Stuart, we’ll miss the bus if you don’t hurry.”
Stuart rushed out the door, pulling on his jacket, and Corie Mae called from the kitchen, “Got your lunch?” As he turned to go back inside, Corie Mae met him and handed him his lunch and math book. “You’d lose your head if it wasn’t fastened on.”
“I don’t see Kenny. Reckon he’s already started on?” Jeannie waited at the bottom of the steps.
“He ain’t going to school today.” Stuart turned up his jacket collar against the cool fall air.
“Why not?”
“When I took the milk to Aunt Opal’s this morning, he had his foot propped on the kitchen table with a big bandage on it. He was chopping wood for Grandpa last night, and the ax slipped and cut his foot real bad right through his shoe.”
“Did Aunt Opal take him to the doctor?”
“Aunt Opal ain’t home, so Grandma doctored it. He said it bled a lot, and it still hurt. That’s why he had it on the table. If he kept it raised up, it didn’t hurt so much.”