Root Jumper

by Justine Felix Rutherford

  She invited Preacher Smith and Dad for supper, apologizing for her burned beans. Preacher Smith said, “Oh, that’s the way I liked my beans—slightly scorched.” We were all pulled up to the table. Dad asked Preacher Smith to say grace. He prayed, “Thank you for our many blessings. Bless this food to the use of our bodies.” Mom sat there with her hands folded and her head bent in prayer. For, as she used to say, “Cleanliness is next to Godliness, and many hands make work into play.”

  The Old Paths

  Spurlock Creek was interlaced with wagon roads or haul roads as they were called. There were footpaths that wound and sprangled across the fields and into the hills. The pasture fields were covered with cow trails that were used for foot paths. The paths intersected farm fields along fence rows and along the winding creek. All up and down the dirt roads and paths were our kin folk. We were kin to nearly everybody. We all clung together like a bunch of cockleburs. Along these paths grew the wild plum, the papaw, and the persimmon, pear, and nut trees. Every day during the summer we kids spent time under these trees.

  Along the creek paths grew the wild plum trees. I can still taste the sweet juicy flavor of a wild plum. In the early dewy mornings, the ground would be covered with these beautiful plums. They were pink with a soft coat of blue covered by a whitish film. When you first bit into it, it would pop. Juice would then run down both sides of your face. After we had eaten our fill, we always had plum battles. During one of our famous battles, Cousin Doc got hit with a plum that got lodged in his ear. We tried to get it out, but we kept pushing it deeper into his ear. After much discussion and consultation among ourselves, we finally dragged him to the creek and pried it out with a piece of wire we had found along the creek. I guess it didn’t hurt him since I never heard him complain about his ears.

  We buried Doc (Grandville Spurlock) four years ago. There was a huge crowd at his funeral. Among his many accolades, his pastor told how Doc was always early for church. He said he was always the first to arrive. This brought back memories of us kids who always came early for church. Even then, Doc was always the first one there. I don’t think there were many religious thoughts at this time. We came early to play in the creek that ran by Sunrise Methodist Church. We were a bedraggled bunch by the time services started at 10:00 am. No one wanted to own us, and so we sat in the back. Our parents always threatened us, but they never did anything to punish us. Perhaps at times they would rather have been playing in the creek too!

  The persimmon tree grew along the paths in the pasture field. At first before ripening, the persimmons were green-colored shaped like a tiny apple with brown ruffling around the top. If you tried to eat them before they ripened, they would pucker your mouth like a hex. When they were ripe, they were orange colored and shriveled. We sucked the inside pulp out of the skin and spit out the black seeds. I was interested in the little piles of black seeds under the persimmon trees. My brother Werner told me they were opossum poop. When the boys went “possum” hunting, they always visited the persimmon tree.

  The pawpaw trees with their beautiful green shiny leaves grew along the cow trails. We put our milk weed babies to sleep wrapped in pawpaw leaves. The pawpaw fruit, before it ripened, grew in green clumps. It grew in size from three to six inches in length and about one and a half to two inches in diameter. Upon ripening, it turned dark on the outside and became soft. This fruit was filled with a yellow filling with black seeds. It tasted somewhat like a banana. I loved to hear the sound of a pawpaw falling. It is heavy and falls with a thud. These fruits never rolled like an apple, and they were easy to grab. I can still see Mom coming home with an apron full of pawpaws.

  All of our many paths eventually led to what we called the big road. This road was built by the WPA. Truckloads of rocks were brought in, dumped on the old road, and broken and pounded up by men using sledge hammers. People used to call them the “we piddle around bunch.” The big road ran the length of the valley and then across Golf Hill. There it passed the old mound builders mounds at the bottom of the hill, and then it went to Route 2. This is a place called Clover, which is just above Greenbottom. Several side roads branched out from this road. This road was not hard- topped until 1971.

  The Root Jumper Plow

  The farm I was raised on was up a hollow. It was old, very old. It had been owned by other families before us. The farm was surrounded by hills, but there was flat land at the bottom of the hills. The bottoms were divided by water running from the hills at different places. It looked like a hopscotch diagram with a pointed end at the very tip of the hollow. I think there were about sixty-five acres including the hills. My dad and mother raised seven children on and from this land.

  Dad rotated the crops and used anything to make fertilizer. The fields were always covered with corn stalks, tobacco stalks, and the cane stalks from the sorghum molasses. All of these made excellent fertilizer. All the manure from the farm animals was put on the garden and on the tobacco fields. Dad was always looking for a new way to expand the farm. He said that new ground raised the best crops but that it was the most difficult to prepare.

  After breakfast one morning, Dad turned to me and said, “Sis, you want to go with me this morning? We will take a walk up the hill.” I was always happy to be with my dad. Dad, who was usually silent, was very talkative on this day. He said, “Sis, this is a fine day to locate some new ground.” I agreed with him. As we walked along, he said, “Up here on the flat should be some good dirt.” When we reached a large part of the hill that was flat, he stopped and stooping over, he began to look at the dirt.

  I looked over the hill and could see our church. Peeling off my jacket, I set out to explore. Up and down the valley people were moving about. There was my uncle’s farm. My cousins Jenny and Ramona were outside. They waved to me. In my mind I can still hear my dad calling to me saying, “Come see the ground.” As I ran back around the hill, there was Dad down on his knees in the ground sifting the loose loamy dirt between his fingers. Kneeling down beside him, the pungent odor of new ground wafted up toward me. I smelled dirt that had lain for many, many years beneath rotting leaves, worms, and insects. He looked up at me, and the pale blue eyes that before had a weary, tired look now were twinkling at me. Excitedly he held up the dirt in his hands. He said, “Sis, I can clear this land of the small trees and saplings, and it will grow a good crop of tobacco. Or I could grow beans and corn on this flat land and have the flat land in the hollow for tobacco. I can get out the old root jumper plow and plow this up in a few days.” Dad worked for a few days clearing out some small trees and saplings.

  The root jumper plow was a necessary evil. No one wanted to use this plow, but if you needed more land, there was no other choice. The plow handles were mostly made from oak. There was a plow blade in front, and in behind the blade was a sharp cutter blade that cut the roots. The plow was rough to handle.

  One evening after supper, Werner and I were playing with our old sock ball when Dad said, “You kids get to bed early. I’m “ hitten” the flat tomorrow morning. It’s going to be a nice day.” We were up early. After breakfast, Dad finished harnessing the horses. He stuck a short pole in the plow to make it easy to drag. It was a short distance to the flat. I grabbed a jug of water, and off we went. Werner and I were plodding along behind Dad and the plow. I stuck my foot ever so slightly into Werner’s foot to make him stumble. He had stumbled a couple of times before he knew what I was doing. I was mad at him because he had eaten all the sugar molasses. We very seldom had sugar to spare. We used mostly sorghum, and I was tired of sorghum. I sat the water jug down and said, “Just for that you can carry the water jug.”

  When we got to the flat, Dad took the pole out of the plow, got everything situated, and placed the reins around his body. He spoke softly to the horses, and the plow slid into the dirt. We took our drinking water and put it in the shade along with our fish worm box. We thought we could catch some fish worms from the
turned ground and could lie on the bank and fish in the evening after supper.

  Dad had made a couple of rounds of plowing. I watched as the horses came down the row. When they hit some roots, they pulled mightily together every step. Their great shoulders were straining and their necks were outstretched. The plow was jerking from side to side as Dad labored to control the handles. The roots made a loud popping sound as they were jerked from the ground. Some were more reluctant to let loose from the dirt than others. When the horses came closer, I could see great rolls of white sweat covering their chests and shoulders like froth from the sea.

  When Dad reached the end of the row, he brought the horses, as well as himself, under the shade tree to rest. He could make only about two rows before resting the horses. Dad removed his hat and took out a red bandana handkerchief to wipe the sweat from his face. Sweat trickled down his arms and dripped onto the ground. The wind that was blowing through the trees and through the weeds moved the thinning grey hair on Dad’s head. The wind carried the smells of sassafras roots, sourwood sprouts, and the loamy new ground. I took a deep breath and thought, “Oh, how good the wind feels – just like a breath from Heaven.”

  We all took a drink of water. Dad pulled out his case knife to have a little chew. A little Brown’s Mule mixed with home-made tobacco gave me a life time smell of my dad. He spit and spat and smiled to himself.

  In a few minutes, we went back to work. Werner and I were picking up roots and carrying them to the end of the field. We had a large pile. I asked Dad if there were any mandrake roots from the Bible. He laughed and said, “If it was, we would be rich.” We had a nice box of big, fat fish worms anyway.

  Dad had about a third of the field plowed when I heard him yell “whoa” at the horses. We ran to see what had happened. Dad was holding his side. He said to Werner, “You take the horses home. The plow just kicked me in the side.” We helped him down the hill to the house. He was laid up for several weeks, but the boys finished the plowing that Dad had started.

  Dad felt so bad because of all the work that needed to be done and that he wasn’t able to do it. But we managed. That summer we had the greatest pole beans, tomatoes, and corn you ever did see.

  The Old Barn

  “We must not cease from exploration and the end of our exploring will be to arrive where we began, and to know the place for the first time.”

  T. S. Eliot

  Old barns are living monuments of home. In the fall and spring, I always get the urge to go home. I am so thankful that I can still go home and roam around over the old farm. There is nothing left at the home place except the tie house (where we tied tobacco), the corn crib, and the barn. The barn is what draws me back.

  When Dad bought the farm, there was an old log barn that stood across the creek. This is the first barn that I remember. There was where the low gap was for the cows to feed and be milked. On the other side of the barn was a corn crib. Nothing remains there today—just a small plot of land. When I look at this tiny piece of ground, I think that there is no way a barn could have stood there. The creek runs past this land, and, after about a hundred years, it has just given up to the creek.

  I remember this old barn so well. It was always a favorite place for kids to play. The boys always sneaked around back of the barn to smoke. This barn was made from hand-hewn logs. We stuck our bare toes between the logs to climb to the loft. There was where the hay was kept. It wasn’t one of these big fancy rolls of today. We pitched the hay up into the loft, and pitched it down for the livestock. I heard my cousins say, “Hey, Teen, race you to the top.” We stuck our toes between the cracks and raced like squirrels to the top. Once or twice a year, my parents got ice somewhere and stored it in the hay. We would stick our toes through the cracks, and it felt so good on our bare toes. Of course, my parents didn’t know we did that.

  I got kicked by Barney the horse in this barn, but only on the palm of my hand. I came in behind her, startled her, and then she kicked me. I started screaming. Dad came running, and he was yelling, “Are you hurt?” I wasn’t, but it stung a little. I was just scared. After he saw that I wasn’t hurt, he was sort of mad. He said, “How could you do a dumb thing like coming in behind a horse. You always come along side of the horse and speak to him!” I just stood and looked at him.

  One crisp fall morning, I left the car parked at the big road and walked across the creek. I found the path that followed the creek. The goldenrod was in full bloom. The yellow blooms were leaning over and they seemed to beckon to me. I was too early to strip the seeds from the stems. The beautiful, wild, white morning glories with their pale green faces nodded to me as I passed. I saw the brown stems of the dock plants. They were curled and twisted into many shapes. I stopped to look closer. A spider had interwoven his web with the brown stems to catch his next meal. This plant looked completely dead. However, as I looked closer at the bottom of the dead stem, there was tiny, green growth.

  Our barns grew up with us, rising in the wilderness from the soil of the hills and mountains and from the great hardwood trees. They are symbols of America’s best, of all its glory and hardships. Now so many of our barns, the symbols of all that’s good and beautiful, are slowly returning from whence they came.

  Our barn was built back in the 1930s. The men went out into the woods and were able to look at a great oak and tell if it would work as a corner of a great building to hold horses and hay and the numerous things stored in a barn for a century or maybe two. They had to think how to cut it, haul it, and make it square. They did this by hand; sometimes using four horses to move these great trees. The corner stones for these great buildings were huge. Our barn was close to the creek. I watched the men as they used pry bars and horses to raise these large stones and move them to where they would be placed for corners. No machines did their work for them; they used only “heart and muscle.” My grandfather, William Spurlock, was a stone mason and a carpenter. These men had to know how to cut, mortise, and peg the logs tight. Chisel and axe marks on wooden beams are the signs of these long ago carpenters. Now these craftsmen are all gone, but the barn is still here, a testament to their skills and knowledge.

  The barn comes into view. My heart skips a beat. It looks about as usual on the outside. I walk inside. I am assailed by the age-old smells, by the faint odor of horseflesh, leather, clover hay, and tobacco. I don’t really smell these odors except in my memory. On the ground there is a pile of tobacco sticks. I pick one up. I’m going to take it home with me and put it in the corner of my kitchen. When I need a cane, it will be handy. There’ll be no fancy cane for me! I look at the huge stones in the corner of the barn. Tears sting my eyes. I spend more than a few minutes just sitting and thinking. This is a very special time to me. As I leave, my hands trail across the outside of the old barn.

  The West Virginia I Knew

  “This is the forest, primeval. The murmuring pines and the hemlocks, bearded with moss and in garments green, indistinct in the twilight, stand like Druids of eld, with voices sad and prophetic, stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest on their bosoms….”

  Longfellow

  Our pride never has been disturbed by digs of those who shrugged us off as “Hillbillies,” which we really were. We always have felt a little closer to heaven than the other states. Ours was the state of milk and honey, not to mention an endless supply of refreshing “mountain dew.” The air was purer, the sparkling water cleaner, the sky bluer, the moon bigger, the sun brighter, the fishing better, and the people the most friendly on earth. I remember going to the mountains with my father-in-law. The first thing we did was to go to the spring with a dipper and drink of the mountain water.

  The West Virginia I knew was a land of magnificent forests. We had the mighty oaks, the great poplars, and the huge pines. How beautiful were the magnificent hemlocks with their soft, waving branches. My father-in-law had several hemlocks on his farm. They to
ok some kind of blight. My son Gordon, who now lives at the home place, had to remove them last year. It was terrible watching them fall. They had been there so many years. The lawn looked so empty and bare. The shade they had made for decade to protect the house was gone.

  There were also the great chestnut trees. They were simply indescribable, not only for their size but for the nuts they produced. Hogs were fattened on the chestnuts, and all wild game lived off them. There was also the good chestnut dressing the families made. We roasted these nuts and ate them by the gallons. When the chestnut tree blight appeared, it first struck the leaves and branches. Then the bark all peeled away, leaving their limbs like great white ghosts in the forest. It is sad to think that these magnificent forests will never rise again.

  There were also the great elms. In my grandfather’s yard was a huge elm. It had very a big limb from which was attached a rope swing with a board for a seat. All the neighborhood kids, including myself, swung on this swing. I swung in that swing until I left Spurlock Creek. I remember one day swinging so high that the seat folded under me. If I hadn’t been very strong, I wouldn’t have made it to the ground.

  The forests were filled with all kinds of game including turkeys. There were grouse, squirrel, and a large population of deer and bear for hunting. The fishing was great also. Every little stream had the native brook trout. The brook trout was “king of the mountain,” and West Virginia was his home state.

  The people who inhabit these hills have always been a friendly, neighborly sort. Until modern times, the hill people have always been self-sufficient. During sickness or death, people went about helping each other by milking the cows, working the crops, and thrashing the grain.