Footloose in America: Dixie to New England

by Bud Kenny

  When we were at Jonas Miller’s house, I mentioned how happy all of the Amish children seemed to be. He said, “Most of them are. That doesn’t mean we don’t have problem kids. But they either straighten up or they move on.”

  Excommunication and shunning wasn’t just reserved for those who choose the outside world. Habitually disrupting the family, or the community, could get you kicked out too. But that’s not to say the Amish were quick to give up on their own.

  Bennie and Ester were members of the same district as Jonas. So they wouldn’t be going to services that Sunday either. Bennie said, “But I’ve got plenty of church business to take care of today.”

  A member of their district committed suicide last October. He left a wife and seven children behind. A few years earlier, he had been diagnosed as paranoid schizophrenic and was institutionalized for a while. That was when the Bishop appointed Bennie as the family’s guardian, and he set up a committee to oversee their finances.

  “They never really had anything,” Bennie said. “He and his boys worked at a dairy, so they had money coming in, but he was always complaining that his wife wasted it. She said he never brought it home and no one knows what he did with it. We had to take over so the family could pay their rent and have food to eat.”

  Soon after his release from the mental hospital, the man hung himself in a calf barn at the dairy farm where he worked. He left a note that said he was dying so Jesus would take care of his family. Bennie shook his head. “That’s crazy talk.”

  So the church used some of its money and solicited donations from area businesses to set up a trust fund for the family. Someone in the community donated five acres. So, on the weekends, the community got together and worked on building them a new house.

  “It’s important to keep that family together. That’s all they have now. If they fail, we all lose. That’s how it is with Amish.”

  Amish Brotherhood Publications puts out a newspaper that goes to Amish homes around the world. It doesn’t have news of war, politics or world affairs. It publishes stories about things that happen to Amish families–like the one Bennie was guardian of. That’s how the Amish find out where to funnel money and other resources to those in need.

  Isn’t that crazy? Instead of tithing the church to build a better house of worship, they send it to those who are down on their luck. Instead of spending it on religious tracts, missionaries and other forms of evangelism, they invest in their brethren in need. Are the Amish wack-o or what?

  Because all the shops and tourist traps were closed on Sunday, the highway had very little motorized traffic. Most it was horse drawn, and we met lots of Amish people that afternoon.

  One was a lanky twenty-year-old man, named Eli. He was clean shaven, wore a straw hat and suspenders, and he was riding a twenty-one speed mountain bicycle with wire baskets on the back. Eli was on his way to hit a few balls at the batting cages west of Winesburg. After I answered his questions about us, Eli started talking about what it was like to be Amish at his age.

  “There’s a lot of pressure to go out and run around. Nearly everyone I know, who’s my age, wants to go out and party. You know, get a car, drink and do drugs–the whole bit. But I’m just not into it. I was just a little kid when my brothers were in rumspringa, but I remember it. And it didn’t seem to me that they were very happy then.”

  Rumspringa is a period of Amish adolescence, beginning at the age of sixteen, that worldly behavior is tolerated. They’re allowed to own cars, be a part of modern society and still live on the farm. But then comes a time, usually by the mid-twenties, when they have to decide between their family or the rest of the world. If they don’t choose the Amish faith, they are shunned by the family and the rest of the community.

  “Both of my brothers had cars, but my father wouldn’t let them keep them at the farm. They rented a parking space behind a gas station that had hitching-rails. That way they could leave the horse and buggy there when they were out partying.”

  Coasting beside me on his bike, Eli had a bit of a chuckle in his voice. “I remember when they’d come racing into the yard with the buggy in the middle of the night whooping and hollering, you’d thought they was having the best time. But the next morning they’d be hurting. I mean, in real pain. Sometimes, it’d be so bad they couldn’t get up and do chores. My father would say, ‘If you want to burn the candle at both ends, that’s your business. But don’t be burning my end up!’ Then he’d pull them out of bed and make them go to work–whether they wanted to or not.”

  I stopped Della on the highway shoulder, and Eli held her lead rope as I took the lid off her water bucket. While she drank he said, “My oldest brother got into drugs.”

  “What kind?”

  “I’m not sure what all he took. I know he was on Meth when he wrecked his car. They found some on him when they took him to the hospital. He went to jail for that one.”

  I snapped the lid back onto the water bucket. “So what became of him?”

  “When he got out of jail, he came back to the family, repented and got baptized. Both of my brothers did.” Eli’s voice had a bit of a lilt to it when he said, “They’re both married and my oldest brother has a new baby boy.”

  Patricia had been in the cab working the brake on the down-hills. Now she was at the kitchen compartment, spreading honey on a piece of bread for Della. She screwed the lid back on the honey jar as she asked, “So the community didn’t hold his going to jail against him?”

  “No. He repented. Now he has a family and they’re part of our community.”

  Eli laughed at Della as she lapped her tongue around her honey coated mule lips. He rubbed her neck, as he said, “Drugs and cars, to me, it just doesn’t seem like they’re worth the trouble.” Then he patted his bicycle seat. “Bikes and baseball, that’s more my speed.”

  We camped that night on the west side of Winesburg in a vacant lot that had once been the site of a grocery store. Most of the traffic was horse-drawn, and there were lots of Amish walking along the highway too. Several stopped to visit.

  The sun was about to touch the horizon when two white haired men, one Amish the other Mennonite, walked into our camp and welcomed us to Winesburg. I was showing them our cart when a carriage pulled by a high-stepping black horse approached from the west. Della was grazing less than twenty feet from the pavement, and the horse’s eyes were fixated on her. His trot became erratic and his nostrils flared as he got closer. He was almost adjacent to Della when he abruptly side-stepped into the eastbound lane. The carriage, which was packed with a family of six, swerved across the double yellow line. Frantically, the man pulled on the right rein. The horse’s head turned that way, but the rest of him kept moving further into the wrong lane.

  A pickup truck in that lane screeched to a stop about fifty feet ahead of the horse. Suddenly the horse reared up and began to paw the air with his front feet. The carriage shook violently as the horse, up on his hind legs, twisted from side to side and squealed. The driver’s face was fraught with horror as he yelled, “Whoa!”

  The Amish man in our camp calmly turned to the Mennonite and said, “Do you suppose we should do something?”

  Equally as calm, the Mennonite replied, “I don’t know. Maybe we should.”

  Right then the horse came down on all four feet, then lunged forward. The driver yanked back on both reins and the horse reared up again. When he did, a young teenaged girl tumbled out the back of the carriage onto the pavement, as her father desperately screamed, “Whoa!”

  When she got to her feet, the girl’s bonnet was dangling on her back from the ribbon that had been tied under her chin. She pulled up the front of her skirt as she scurried around to the front of the carriage. Her father yelled, “Grab his bridle!”

  The horse was back down on all fours, but he was getting crazier by the moment. He thrashed around in the shafts, as the girl’s panicked face turned back and forth from her father to the horse. Her father hollered, “Grab the bridle!�
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  She took a timid step toward the horse; he squealed and reared up again. The girl screamed, jumped back, tripped over her skirt and fell backwards onto the road.

  The Mennonite standing next to me calmly said, “I think they need a hand.”

  When I turned toward them, neither he nor his Amish friend moved. So I dashed out onto the highway and got the horse just as his front feet landed on the pavement again. When I grabbed his bridle, he tried to strike me with his right front hoof. I jumped out of the way, then kicked him in the knee. He stumbled, and for an instant, I thought he was going fall down. But he recovered and stood there shaking.

  With a hand on both sides of his bit, I stood in front of him and said, “Whoa, big boy. It’s okay.”

  A mighty snort exploded from his flaring nostrils, and with it came a spray of horse snot in my face. It was gross, but I couldn’t let go to wipe it off. I had to ignore it. Then, in as soothing a voice as I could muster, I said, “It’s okay, big boy. Settle down. You’re going to be all right.”

  It worked. Although he was still shaking, he let me take control. I stroked his neck as I looked over at the girl who was getting to her feet. I asked her, “Are you okay?”

  She was pulling the bonnet back up onto her head. “Yes sir. I’m fine. Thank you.”

  I turned to her father, whose face was void of color, and I said, “Let me lead him up the road a ways past our camp.”

  He nodded. Then I told the girl, “I’ll wait till you get back in.”

  By the time I had led him fifty yards down the highway the horse had settled down. When I looked back at the family in the carriage, I could see they were all still in a state of shock, but the color had returned to the father’s face.

  I asked, “Do you think you can handle him now?”

  He nodded. “I think so. Thank you, sir.”

  I let go of the horse’s bridle, and when the carriage pulled up beside me I said, “I’m sorry my mule scared your horse.”

  “It’s not your fault. Thank you, sir. God bless you!”

  The girl was facing out the back of carriage as the horse began to trot down the road. Her face beamed as she waved and called out, “God bless you!”

  That spot where we were camped was up on a ridge. After sunset, I walked to the other side of the road with my tape recorder and sat on the ground to work on my journal. In the valley below I could see the lights of several carriages as they wound along the back roads. The evening air was filled with the clip-clopping of homebound horses. Soon they would be unharnessed, fed and bedded down. And before long their owners would say their evening prayers, and they too would retire for the night. No late night TV, or internet chat, nor video or online games. Just simple prayers of thanksgiving, wishes of “Good night” and then, sweet slumber.

  Tomorrow we would walk out of Holmes County–out of the land of the Plain Folk. Away from these people of quiet grace. The thought made me a bit sad.

  CHAPTER 12

  IN THE LAND OF OLD KING OIL

  OUR FIRST CAMPSITE IN PENNSYLVANIA was a wide spot beside US 62, west of Mercer. It had been eighteen grueling up-and-down miles that day. The Allegheny foothills were beginning to feel like mountains. When we crawled in the tent, I was so tired Patricia had to undress me. It was fun, but it wasn’t a lengthy a affair. We were both too beat–she soon fell asleep. But it was past midnight before I did.

  On the other side of the hills, not far away, was a race track. It was Saturday night, so the stock cars were running. The sky over the hill tops glowed from the lights around the track. We were so close, that most of the time I could understand what the announcer was saying. And when the cars weren’t too loud, I could hear the applause and cheers of the fans in the stands.

  While the hours rumbled by, I was drawn back to the days following my 1970’s cross-country trek with the pack pony and dog. After I finished that journey, for more than a year I lived in the woods near Bismark, Arkansas. It was a peaceful little place–except on Saturday night. A few miles away was a stock car track, and every weekend through the spring, summer and fall, Saturday night would be wild with the roar of the races. Motors grumbled, growled and roared for hours as they propelled cars and drivers around a circle.

  Back then the buzz words were “conserve energy.” “Turn down your thermostat!” Ever since then, for more than three decades, every winter has been ushered in with warnings of home heating oil shortages. And yet, in the past thirty years NASCAR has grown to be the second biggest spectator sport in America.

  Petroleum truly is black gold! When you think of all the things we use it for, oil is actually more important than gold. Besides its use as fuel, consider what’s made out of it. Plastics, chemicals and medicines are derivatives of petroleum. The keys I’m typing on, the lenses of my glasses, the fabric of our tent, Della’s harness: it’s all made out of oil.

  In western Pennsylvania, among the Allegheny foothills, was where the world’s first successful oil well was drilled. It was in 1859 near Oil Creek, and Col. Edwin L Drake only had to go down 69 ½ feet to strike it rich. A year later, and fifteen miles down stream, where the creek flowed into the Allegheny River, Oil City began to boom. Distilleries, refineries, and wharfs for shipping sprang up along the river.

  Eight miles down river from Oil City was Franklin. It was a timber town long before oil was found in those hills. In the early 1800s timber barons built magnificent homes on the hillsides overlooking the Allegheny River. Then, as petroleum took over as king, oil tycoons moved in. They made their fortunes in Oil City, but made their beds in Franklin.

  We had heard a lot about how beautifully the old homes and buildings in Franklin had been preserved. Like Madison, Indiana, it sounded like our kind of town. So we looked forward to exploring it, but as we walked into town our interest began to wane. By the time we reached downtown, we felt down-right unwelcome.

  It all started on Highway 62 where it began to descend into Franklin. The road was narrow and it had little–and sometimes–no shoulder. So we had no choice but to be in the lane of traffic. It was early Thursday afternoon, the road was busy and every time we came to a place where we could pull over and let traffic get by us, we did. Usually it was a wide gravel spot, with a guard rail on the right and traffic to our left. Beyond the guardrail was a drop off into the Allegheny River Valley. Sometimes we stood in those spots for ten minutes before we could get back on the road. But that wasn’t good enough for those motorists. Twice when we pulled over, the first car to pass us honked their horn and gave us the finger. Then there was the man in a primer gray Datsun pickup. He was in the other lane going uphill when he stopped at the yellow line and yelled out his window, “Who the fuck do you think you are? You got no business being on this road! Get that Goddam animal off the highway!”

  Black smoke belched out of his tailpipe when the man stomped his accelerator.

  Patricia was in the cab working the brake, and as the truck sputtered up the hill, she yelled, “What’s his problem? We’re not in his way.”

  “Got me.”

  She yelled back, “This is the most unfriendly road we’ve been on so far!”

  We were walking into downtown Franklin when we passed an auto repair shop. In the open garage doorway stood five men dressed in matching green mechanic shirts–all with their arms folded across their chests. Obviously they had assembled to watch us walk by. So I waved and yelled, “Howdy!” But they all just stood and stared, except the man at the end of the row. He glanced to see if the others were watching before he quickly uncrossed his right arm and waved at us twice. Then he immediately recrossed it.

  Franklin was indeed a pretty little city–very Victorian. Downtown was mostly two and three story redbrick buildings that had either been restored or well cared for down through the years. It was the kind of town that we liked to explore. So when I spotted an open parking space, I guided Della into it. I was tying her to a sign post when Patricia climbed out of the cart and walked up to me.
“Why are we stopping?”

  “This sure is a pretty town. Isn’t it?”

  She shrugged her shoulders. “I guess so. But there seems to be a rash of broken arms around here.”

  “Huh?”

  Patricia waved at me, then let her arm go limp and grimaced.

  “Oh, yeah. Folks aren’t too friendly,” I said. “Do you want to explore?”

  For a few moments my wife didn’t say anything as she turned around and surveyed our surroundings. Then she looked at me with a frown on her face. “I don’t feel welcome here. Let’s move on.”

  On the northeast edge of Franklin, we pulled into the parking lot of the Giant Eagle supermarket. The last three times we stopped to get groceries, I ended up selling a poetry book or few. Patricia said, “You aren’t going to make anything here.”

  Just as my wife walked into the store, a bent old woman with a huge purse hanging from her shoulder shuffled off the sidewalk and up to me. With a scowl she mumbled, “This is for the donkey.”

  From the purse she pulled two red and white striped peppermint candies. Then, without looking up, she handed them to me.

  I said, “Thank you.”

  She grunted, then turned back toward the street as she grumbled, “Make sure you give those to the donkey.” Then she shuffled down the sidewalk headed for town.

  Jerry said, “Yeah, well, that’s the way it is around here”.

  He was a reporter for two local newspapers–Franklin’s The News Herald, and Oil City’s The Derrick. Jerry was in his early twenties, blond and immediately likeable. When he got out of his car, he had two cameras dangling from his neck, a note-pad in his left hand and a smile on his face. “Welcome to Franklin.”