School Days

by Ed Nelson

Mrs. Rupert showed me what to look for. We basically just had to check the mud chinking to see if it looked loose. if it did I was to pry a little with my pocket knife. She hadn’t told me to bring one or ask if I had one, it was just a given in those days that I would have a pocket knife. Of course I did. If any of the mud came loose from my prying that indicated repair. I told her I thought I could do that.

  I started outside while she started inside. After an hour we switched places. It looked like we could get it done in another hour. Inside I took up where she had left off. I had worked my way around to the fireplace when I noticed some mud that looked loose. I pried at it with my knife and if fell away. When it did it revealed an unnatural looking straight line, so I dug at the line with my knife.

  When I did, part of the wood came off in my hand. It was the cover to a compartment. Using my light I looked into the compartment. There was a long narrow box inside. I pulled the box out. It was about two inches high, five inches wide and a foot long. The lid was hinged across the width rather than length. It had no lock so I raised the lid.

  It was tarnished, but there was no question that I was looking at a picture of Thomas Jefferson. I picked up the silver medal and turned it over. Engraved on the back was two hands shaking with a crossed peace pipe and tomahawk above the hands.

  It had to be Blackhoof’s peace medal which had disappeared with or before his death. There were no records of a presentation just Jefferson’s order that he be awarded one. There were no portraits of him wearing it, so it was never certain that he had actually received one.

  Underneath the medal was a bundle of letters. They were tied with a faded blue ribbon. I was able to life the edge of one of the letters and see that it was signed, “General Benjamin Harrison.” There was no question in my mind these belonged to Blackhoof. My first urge was to yell and scream, my second to call Mrs. Rupert.

  I did none of these. I stopped and thought. It was only recently that I had learned that when you had the chance to think about an action you should do so. There would be many times you would have to act without thinking, so take advantage of the times you can.

  I closed the box and returned it and its contents to its niche in the wall. I was able to place the mud back in position to cover signs of disturbance. Unless someone brushed against it to knock the mud off they would never know it was there.

  Doing this was almost instinctual. I had to gain time to figure out the right thing to do. If I revealed the find to the world now I would lose all control. Did I even have the right to try to control this find? I needed to think.

  I finished my part of the job and found that Mrs. Rupert had done hers. We both concluded that the entire Blockhouse needed re-chinking. She locked up. On the way back to town I told her,

  “While checking the place out I daydreamed about finding a treasure like Blackhoof’s medal. Who would it belong to?”

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  “Rick we don’t even know that the medal ever existed. If it did it would be a big mess. Anyone who had any family connection with Blackhoof would make a claim. Then there are the Shawnee tribes. Right now there are three recognized by the United States.”

  “The ones that are closest to Blackhoof would be the ones in Oklahoma, which is where his people ended up. For a while they were part of the Cherokee Nation. The Indians from Lewistown went to Kansas. There are also other tribes that would feel they have a claim.”

  “Then there is the Federal Government, every state that has hosted any of the tribes, just within Ohio the Logan County Historical Society would probably be at war with the Auglaize County Historical Society. When treasure like that becomes known everyone possible would have a handout for it.”

  “The present owner of the Manary Blockhouse Mrs. Radford would feel like it was hers. The property it is sitting on belongs to Russells Point so they would have a claim. The legal battles would probably take one hundred years.”

  “The really nasty battles wouldn’t be the legal ones, it would be the scholars. Every professor of Native American History in the world would want in on it.”

  “There would be a small footnote that we were present at the find. The implication would be we were sweeping the floor or something when the PhD made the find. When we found it we would fall to our knees and worship him or her.”

  “Now that is cynical!”

  “No, that is how it works. Actually I would want nothing to do with such a find.”

  “From everything you just told me it sounds like the Shawnee Tribe would have naturally ended up with Blackhoof’s papers and valuables.”

  “If they hadn’t been buried with him that is where they would have gone.”

  “Thanks that was interesting.”

  She dropped me off. It was only three o’clock. As usual there was coffee on. Dad was at the kitchen table doing one of his usual projects, this time he was making duck decoys. He was at the stage of painting them. Mum was sitting with him and embroidering a table cloth.

  I poured a cup of coffee and joined them.

  “I need to talk.”

  They both looked up quickly. Who knows what went through their minds.

  I joked, “No you are not going to be grandparents.”

  If looks could kill I would’ve been done for.

  I went on to explain the whole situation starting with, “I have found a treasure.”

  Then I told them of my trip to the library in which I met Mrs. Rupert, how she led me to the Bellefontaine Gazette which in turn told about Blackhoof’s mythical medal. Then how I read about a robbery at Blackhoof’s shortly before he died. This all followed today’s discovery.

  Actually there were many interruptions during the story as my parents gained understanding.

  When I was done, Dad started with, “Well Rick you certainly know how to throw the cat amongst the pigeons. What do you plan to do?”

  “Well the first thing I have done is bought some time to figure out the right thing to do.”

  “That is good, and it isn’t an irrevocable step. You can always ‘discover’ it at a later date.”

  ‘I did get that far in my thinking.”

  “Are you looking to benefit from this?” Mum asked.

  “No, I just want it to go to the rightful owners.”

  “And who would that be?” Mum continued.

  “From my conversation with Mrs. Rupert it really belongs to the Shawnee Tribe. But we can’t just call them and tell them where it is. There would be claims of theft all over the place.”

  ‘Hmm,” Dad went. “Didn’t Janet Rupert say that Della Radford would like to sell the building?

  “She did, it would make it easier if we owned the building when we ‘discovered’ it.”

  “Della and I never got along that well, but let me call her and see what she would want for the building.”

  Dad called information at United Telephone. As luck would have it my Aunt Minnie, Ross’s wife was working the switchboard, so they talked for a minute then she put him through.

  Dad talked for the longest time and from the conversation there was more involved than the Blockhouse.

  Before he hung up he told her, “I will give you six thousand dollars for the whole shooting match and pay for the removal of the cabin from Russells Point and cleanup of the boathouse. I will bring the check over tomorrow if you have the titles… Okay good I will see you after lunch.”

  Dad turned and said, “I will probably have to use the bank line of credit against the rentals, but I just bought the Blockhouse, Radford’s boathouse and all its contents.”

  “Why did you do that,” Mum inquired?

  “It was the only way that she would deal and if I am right we just got the better of her.”

  “How’s that,” I asked.

  “Rick you remember the boathouse. The business operated ten speedboats. There is an overhead crane for moving full size automobile engines. That has to have considerable value.”

  “The fuel tanks could hold ov
er a thousand gallons. At twenty five cents a gallon that is some money. There will also be the hulls of the any boats, but most of them will be rotten.”

  “Most of them,” I enquired.

  “I have no idea if it is still there, but there was one hull still in its crate from the factory. But that is not the best thing. Up on the overhead if they are still there will be ten crated Chris Craft Model K inboard engines. They alone are worth more than the entire purchase.”

  “Jack wouldn’t that be taking advantage of Della Radford?”

  “She thinks she is taking advantage of me and that old witch was never nice to any of us!”

  “Well true, she would talk about foreign tramps taking advantage of American G.I.’s, just close enough that I could hear her, but far enough that I could be accused of eavesdropping.”

  “Besides she may have had the place emptied out and I would really be overpaying.”

  “We will have the building and its contents, so now what?” asked Mum.

  “We move into the blockhouse,” I remarked as innocently as possible.

  “Maybe YOU should,” Mum said.

  “Seriously what are we going to do with the darn thing once we have it,” Dad asked.

  “Mrs. Rupert indicated that the Logan County Historical Society would love to have it. We could donate it to them and maybe pay for the moving and needed repairs.”

  I also explained about the newspaper microfiche project.

  “That would work it would be a good tax deduction. We could use the Blockhouse, boathouse purchase and newspaper project as a charitable donation and not give Eisenhower the tax money.”

  Once again Dad let us know how he felt about Ike and hated giving him any money.

  “We can let the Historical Society know that it was Janet Rupert’s influence that got them the Blockhouse and microfiche donation. That would be her reward.”

  “You said earlier that you think the Shawnee Tribe is the rightful owner, how would you get the items to them without raising a fuss.”

  “Send them pictures of the medal and letters and ask if they want them free of charge. They later can ‘discover’ them in their archives so there would be no questions that they belong to them.”

  “That works, now what do you get out of it.”

  “Nothing, I’m not looking for anything. If we can break even on this I will be happy. I guess that depends on what is in the boathouse.”

  “We will break even with the value of the property that the boathouse sits on. The cottages on Bellefontaine Island are being either torn down and replaced or renovated. It might take a while, but we will make a profit on the deal just by holding the land. The building itself was in good shape so should have some value.”

  “Now what evidence do we send the Shawnee after we have official possession,” asked Mum.

  “As I said I thought photographs would work,” I replied.

  Mum said nothing left the room and came back with a little package. She opened it up to revealing the smallest camera I had ever seen.

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  “This is a Minox I had during the war. This will take good pictures of the documents. I have two rolls of film still sealed in the original package and I have kept them in the freezer as instructed.

  They will be good pictures. We will have your Uncle Jimmy develop them.” Dad’s brother Jim is an amateur photographer and has his own darkroom.

  We talked for another hour but it always came back to the same conclusions. The Logan County Historical Society and Janet Rupert should get something out of this. The Shawnee Tribe in Oklahoma should get the medal and letters.

  We were asking for nothing directly, if the boathouse turned out to be a positive purchase that would be good, but we wouldn’t cry if it wasn’t.

  I read some of Scheherazade’s stories that night. She certainly could come up with cliffhangers. My version was an illustrated one by the English explorer.

  Sunday had Dad and me up at Radford’s near Lewistown at two o’clock. She was a short stout woman with dark hair which highlighted her moustache. We didn’t stay very long, just long enough, for him to write a check and her to sign over the deeds and give Dad the keys to the buildings.

  Even during that short of a visit she managed to be nasty. She was nice to Dad, but wanted to know if I was that Englishwoman’s child. He told her yes and let it go. She gave me a glare as though I were the snake in the Garden of Eden.

  As we were leaving she said, “Jack don’t even bother to look, I had the fuel tank drained.”

  After that pleasant remark we headed to the Indian Lake Marina. Dad had arranged for a local fisherman who ran a water taxi service for locals to run us over to Bellefontaine Island.

  I asked Dad, “What is her problem. Did you dump her daughter or something?”

  I was only kidding so was very surprised when he responded,

  “Her daughter dumped me, but she can never remember that. I had dated Doris before I joined the service. We had even talked a little about getting married. Before we could get serious I was sent to England. We wrote back and forth for almost a year when she wrote that she had met another guy and was going to marry him.”

  “Oh,” was all I could say.

  Dad continued, “Luckiest thing that ever happened to me. I ended up meeting your mother. If you ever want to know what a woman will look like when she is older look at her mother. Doris looks just like Della today. When she was young her figure was what we called svelte. Today she is just plain fat.”

  This all came under the heading of information that I didn’t need.

  Fortunately the trip to the boathouse was only fifteen minutes to the dock where the waterman was waiting for us. We had on rough old clothes and brought flashlights. We didn’t think we would be very long so Dick Meyers agreed to wait for us. He accompanied us to the boathouse.

  Dad now had all the keys so we were able to get in with no problems. There were wooden Chris Craft boats up on cradles, but as Dad had thought all had some degree of rot and none of them looked salvageable.

  Dad and Dick made an arrangement right then and there that they would come back and examine the boats in greater detail and that Dick would salvage the controls and bright work. The engines had all been removed and were gone.

  After setting aside what seemed like a ton of empty cardboard boxes we found a large wooden crate. It was stenciled 1947 17’ Chris Craft deluxe runabout. Dick rummaged around and found a crowbar.

  He pried the boards off one end enough that we could see a gleaming varnished hull which had never touched the water. At Dads direction Dick hammered the boards back in place the best he could.

  We then went upstairs. In the back row of a set of racks were ten containers. All were labeled, “Contents one Chris Craft model K 95hp six cylinder marine engine.” Dad had hit the jackpot. The whole purchase was paid for. After meeting her I didn’t feel sorry for Mrs. Radford at all.

  We then headed back to land and stopped by our Blockhouse on the way. I retrieved the box from its hiding place and we returned home.

  Dinner was waiting when we got home. The stops took a lot longer than I thought they would.

  After dinner I even replaced Eddie on dish washing duty to hurry the process up. Denny didn’t complain because he could tell something was going on. When everything was put away we opened the box. Denny had been told that this was very important and would have to remain a secret within the family.

  The box contained the medal and upon closer examination it could be nothing but the Jefferson Peace Medal. There was also a series of heavier silver and bronze ones from England and even one from France.

  The letters were from every President from Washington to Harrison (General at the time). Some of the early ones were from British agents I would have to look up but one seemed to be signed by King George the third. Old Chief Blackhoof had some high level acquaintances.

  Mum laid everything out on a table cloth except the medal. She used
a piece of black fabric for contrast with the medal. She had on a pair of light cotton gardening gloves while she handled all the items. She didn’t mess around and was done taking pictures with that Minox in ten minutes. I would have to ask her where she gained that experience one of these days.

  Sunday was a quiet day. After calling we went to Uncle Jim’s as a family. He was single still but was dating one lady, Wanda, fairly steady. Mum and Wanda talked while Dad and I watched Jim develop the film. He commented that he had read about film like this, but never had seen any. He had to look up the chemicals and developing times in a book, but the pictures all came out okay.

  Dad slipped him ten bucks for his time and asked him to not talk about the pictures. Of course Jim promised to keep things quiet, but wanted to know the whole story someday. We promised him as soon as we could talk about it we would. I felt comfortable that Jim would keep his promise, but wondered if he would tell Wanda and she tell the world. I realized that there was only so much I could control.

  Now all we had to do was find the address of the Shawnee Tribe in Oklahoma and make the donations to the Logan County Historical Society. We all agreed that Dad should take care of the donations. My making them would raise all sorts of questions. For Dad the Blockhouse would just be part of a business transaction that he didn’t need and the donation a tax write off to get rid of them.

  Authors Note: The Shawnee Tribe didn’t separate from the Cherokee until 1980. Even that issue is complex with multiple groups emerging. Rather than drive myself crazier than usual I separated the Shawnee much earlier and ignored the multiple groups. That is the story; give or take a lie or two.

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  Monday was clear and cold. Most of the snow was gone. There would be ice skating again before too long. I did my indoor exercises, but no way was I going to run outside.

  At breakfast I had two bowls of porridge, orange juice, and toast with strawberry jam and about three cups of coffee. To think a month ago I couldn’t stand coffee, but now I couldn’t live without it.