Kentucky Folktales

by Mary Hamilton

  The man sized up the log and thought: “I’m skinny. I can scoot into this log and get it myself.” So he sent his dog down to guard the small end of the log. The man leaned his gun up against a tree, got down on all fours, and crawled into the log.

  He could hear the possum up ahead of him. The scurrying grew louder, so he knew he was gaining on it. But the log became a bit smaller, so he had to hunker down more, moving along on his elbows, but he could tell he was gaining on the possum, so he kept right on going. Then he stretched one arm out, and he grabbed the possum’s tail.

  But just as he grabbed the possum’s tail, the possum scrunched up and pulled his tail right out of the man’s grasp. The man thought: “Oh no, you are not getting away from me that easy.” He pushed with his feet and pulled with his fingers, inched himself forward, and again he grabbed the possum’s tail.

  This time he got a firm hold on that possum. “Gotcha! You’re not getting away from me now,” and the man started to back out of the log. It was then he made an important discovery: “I’m stuck. I am stuck.”

  And sure enough, the man was indeed stuck. No matter how hard he tried, he could not back out of that log. All he could do was lay there thinking: “I am in big trouble. My wife always told me not to go hunting alone, but I’ve always told her hunting alone is the best way to make sure you won’t get shot. Now, here I am.

  “No one knows I’m in here but my dog. That dog’s no Lassie dog; he’ll just go on home when he gets hungry.

  “Even if someone happens to find my gun, they won’t think to look inside this log.

  “My wife is going to be so mad at me. She’s going to think I’ve run off. But I’m going to die here. This is pitiful.

  “Someday this log will disintegrate and here I’ll be, the skeleton of a man hanging on to the skeleton of a possum. It’s pathetic.”

  He thought about all he had done during his life. Then he remembered how he had voted in the last presidential election, and that memory made him feel so small he just stood up and walked right out of that log.

  COMMENTARY

  My telling is retold from the story “Half Pint,”1 collected by Leonard Roberts from Walton T. Saylor of Whitley County, Kentucky, in 1956. Saylor reports that it was told by Uncle Charlie Day of Lida, Laurel County, Kentucky. “Half Pint” includes another incident establishing the intelligence of Charlie Day’s dog Old Trail (able to smell the trail of a rabbit from a year before and track it down) before the incident with the possum in the hollow log. In the collected story, Uncle Charlie thinks of the benefits of catching the possum before entering the log. Once stuck he recalls all the mean things he had done, with the topper being “he had crossed over and voted the democrat ticket.” Another version of the tale, collected by Lena Ratliff from Wrigley, Kentucky, in 1960 from Boon Hall, also from Wrigley, does not include politics. Instead the fellow simply thinks of all the little things he had done in his life, and those little things make him feel small so he shrinks.2

  In my retelling, the hunter thinks about various aspects of his life, makes a reference to Lassie that baby boomers in my audience react to, and simply remembers how he voted in the last presidential election. As a life-long McGovern-style Democrat, I just could not have him feel bad about voting for the Democratic ticket, but I also wanted the story to be enjoyed by all, so not mentioning the specifics of his vote gives everyone in the audience room to interpret his actions their own way. Of course, I can also vary the election mentioned from presidential to gubernatorial, depending on the place and time of the telling. One of the most fun parts of telling the story in person is the time spent holding one arm outstretched beside my head, mimicking the position of the man in the log while recounting his past memories. Just holding that position also adds to the humor for the listeners.

  A few years ago, I told this tale in Florida3 and met a former Kentuckian, Alson Adkins. Adkins was born in 1942 and grew up in McKee, Jackson County, Kentucky. He had heard a version of the story about 1953, when he spent some time traveling with his grandfather, visiting his grandfather’s customers. Alson said it was his grandfather’s farewell tour, but as a youngster he had not realized that his grandfather knew he was near death at the time. In the version Alson heard on that journey, a raccoon ran up inside a hollow tree and the person got stuck climbing up after it. When the man recalled voting for Adlai Stevenson for president, he felt so little he fell out.

  OTIS AYERS HAD A DOG—TWO STORIES

  1

  Folks say Otis Ayers had the best quail-hunting dog around. One day Otis and his dog were out hunting when a covey of quail fluttered up and took shelter in an old hollow stump. His dog ran over, jumped up, put his paws over the exit of that stump to block the quail in, and then looked up at Otis and grinned.

  Otis was delighted, “Oh, Dog, we’re going to have us a fancy hunt! When I say, ‘Pull!’ you let one loose.”

  The dog woofed in agreement.

  “Pull!” yelled Otis. His dog let one quail loose, and Otis shot it.

  “Pull!” Again the dog let a single quail go.

  Over and over, “Pull!”

  Bang!

  “Pull!”

  Bang!

  “Pull!” But the dog didn’t move. Otis was surprised. He knew there were more quail in the stump. So he said, “Oh, come on Dog. We’ve been having a good time. I said Pull.” Still the dog would not move.

  Then Otis noticed his dog was not looking at him, but seemed to be looking at something just behind him. Otis turned around and standing there was the game warden. Sure enough, Otis had shot the legally allowed limit of quail, and that dog of his was not about to let Otis get himself in trouble with the law! Now, that’s a good dog.

  2

  Folks say one time Otis Ayers had a real good bird dog, but he lost it. It seems he and his prize bird dog were out hunting, when the dog disappeared. Otis looked and looked for his dog, but could not find it. Finally, he had to give up and head on home. He figured the dog would surely come home when it got hungry, but it didn’t.

  The next year, Otis went out hunting in that same area. He was making his way through some tall weeds when he came upon his dog. Or, at least, he came upon the skeleton of his dog, bones still standing, still holding a point. Otis followed his dog’s point, and sure enough, he found the skeletons of a whole covey of quail.

  COMMENTARY

  Both stories related to ATU Tale Type 1920F* Skillful Hounds

  Tale 2 also related to ATU Tale Type 1889N The Long Hunt

  I heard both of these tales from Butch Thompson, who was working the sound at an event at Doe Run Inn, in Meade County, Kentucky, in 1992. He heard these stories from Otis Ayers, who was a retired river boat captain who had worked for American Barge Lines.

  Otis and his wife, Susie, were good friends of Butch’s parents. Otis and Susie had no children, but they always did lots of things for Butch. Susie even gave Butch his nickname. Both families had houseboats, camped on weekends together, and liked to pull practical jokes in a respectful way. As a teenager, Butch reports, he enjoyed being around them. Butch heard Otis tell these stories many times over the years. Butch also heard stories about Otis’s adventures on the river and other hunting escapades. While all the stories were tall tales, Otis always told them with an absolutely straight face, as if reporting facts.

  I could tell from talking with Butch that Otis Ayers must have been a fine storyteller. When I asked about variations in the telling, Butch acknowledged that Otis always kept the gist of the story, but naturally varied the words some from telling to telling.1

  Another version of the first “Otis Ayers Had a Dog” story can be found in The Harvest and the Reapers: Oral Traditions in Kentucky, by Kenneth and Mary Clarke. The story is recounted as an example of a tale told “in the big lie tradition.” In this version, a beagle herds quail into a groundhog hole and lets them out one at a time. There is no mention of the game warden episode. According to the book notes, this narrativ
e would have come “from the Western Kentucky University Folklore and Folklife Collection or from the authors’ manuscripts of Kentucky folktales.”2

  Another version of the second “Otis Ayers Had a Dog” story was reported to Leonard Roberts by Cleadia Hall, of Knox County, Kentucky, in 1956.3

  Before working on this book I would have told you that I retell these stories pretty much the way Butch told them to me. However, when I interviewed Butch, I learned the person who owned the dogs was Otis Ayers, not Otis Haynes—the name I had mistakenly been giving him. I’ve now changed back to the real name because, as Butch observed, it would be wonderful for these stories and Otis Ayers, the man who delighted in telling them, to be remembered. I agree.4

  SOME DOG

  When I was a child growing up on the farm in Meade County, it seemed to us that city folks were all the time taking kittens and puppies they didn’t want and dropping them off at the end of farmers’ driveways. We couldn’t imagine why city folks thought we wanted their pets if they didn’t want them, but boxes and bags of kittens and puppies showed up so often we just thought: must be how city folks’ minds work.

  So, it’s not surprising that one day, when my daddy and my four brothers, Steve, Alan, David, and Jeff, were on their way in from the fields, there at the bottom of the driveway was a cardboard box. My brothers started begging right off, “Oh, Daddy, can we keep it? Can we keep it?”

  Daddy said, “Boys, let’s see what’s in the box first. Then we can decide.”

  On this particular day, the box held four pups. My daddy looked them over, and he could see those pups had paws that were extra large for their bodies. He knew that meant those pups were part hound dog, and that meant that at least one of them might grow up to be a halfway decent hunting dog. So he said, “All right, boys, if you can divide them up without fighting over them, they’re yours.”

  My four brothers were as pleased as any four boys have ever been. Each one of them had his very own pup. Then tragedy struck. First, my oldest brother Steve’s pup disappeared without a trace. Next, Alan’s. Then David’s. Gone. My youngest brother, Jeff, was panic-stricken. He went to my folks saying, “Please, please let me bring my pup inside. I’ve got to sleep with it. I’ve got to be with it every moment of every day or something’s going to happen to it. Please? Please, let me bring it inside.”

  Daddy said, “Jeff, you are growing up on a farm. And you know how it is here on the farm. Animals are not allowed inside this house. Well, maybe a sick calf or a little runt pig could move into the basement to be bottle fed until it’s well enough to go back out, but cats and dogs are not allowed inside this house.”

  Jeff knew that was true, but he couldn’t give up. He started in begging and pleading, pleading and begging, begging and pleading, pleading and begging, begging and pleading, pleading and begging, begging, pleading, pleading, begging, begging, pleading, pleading, begging—are you getting tired of reading1 this? Then you know why this works on some parents. Finally, it even worked on my daddy.

  “Jeff, if you are willing to take one of Mama’s throw rugs, throw it down there on the basement floor, and sleep on that rug with your pup, it can come inside. But Jeff, if that pup so much as whimpers and keeps any of the rest of us awake, back out it goes.”

  Jeff was pleased. He got himself one of Mama’s throw rugs, threw it down on the basement floor, and slept on that floor with his pup. Those first few nights Jeff just patted his pup, and patted it, and patted it, until it drifted off to sleep without making a sound. Then Jeff remembered how he liked to read to help himself go to sleep, so he started reading to his pup. It didn’t take long for Jeff to figure out his pup’s favorite books were books about dogs. So Jeff started going to the library and checking out every dog story he could find. He read dog story after dog story to his pup, and when the dogs in the books were doing brave exciting things, that little pup’s tail would just wag, wag, wag, and he would drift off to sleep, dreaming all kinds of brave, puppy dog dreams.

  One night, our whole family was awakened by “Arooo, aroo, aroo, aroo!”

  My daddy jumped out of bed. He headed downstairs, “Jeff, I told you—” and he stopped. There on that rug was my little brother, Jeff, tears just streaming down his cheeks. Sitting right there beside him was the pup, looking equally pitiful. Daddy saw the book Jeff had been reading to his pup that night was none other than Old Yeller. He shook his head, “I tell you. That pup is going to grow up to be some dog.” Then he went on back upstairs.

  Jeff said, “Pup, did you hear that? Daddy says you’re going to grow up to be some dog. I believe that’s a name you could grow into. What do you think?” The pup stuck out his tongue, licked a tear off my little brother’s cheek, and that is how Some Dog got his name.

  Some Dog really was some dog. Jeff and Some Dog stayed together all day every day. One day they were playing in the tall weeds on the hill between the barn and the pond down below, when Jeff lost sight of Some Dog. And then he heard, “Aar! Aar, aar, aar!” Jeff came running, and there was Some Dog, his toenails dug into the bank of the pond trying to hold himself on shore. Hanging on to the other end of Some Dog, pulling hard on Some Dog’s tail, was a gigantic turtle.

  Jeff ran down there, grabbed hold of Some Dog, and started pulling against that gigantic turtle, yelling, “Help! Help, help, help. Help!” David ran down and grabbed a leg of the gigantic turtle to keep it on shore. Alan ran down and he, too, grabbed a leg to keep the gigantic turtle on shore.

  Steve ran down, sized up the situation, and yelled, “Hang on boys. I’ll get the tractor. We’re going to need chains.” Steve drove the tractor down to the pond. They wrapped chains around the legs of the gigantic turtle and pulled with the whole weight of the tractor to try to keep the gigantic turtle from making off with Some Dog. Now, my brothers did everything they could think of to try to make that gigantic turtle let go of Some Dog, and it is a disgusting thing to have to tell you, but finally they had to take an axe and behead the turtle. Yes, it was messy, but Some Dog was saved. Oh, his tail was a bit mangled, but he was going to be all right.

  Now, I don’t know what kind of family you grew up in, but I did not grow up in a wasteful family. With that gigantic turtle we had one huge harvesting and eating problem. You might think eating up a gigantic turtle would be sort of like trying to use up all the leftover turkey after Thanksgiving, but it’s worse. It’s more like dealing with zucchini in August. But we were up to the task.

  My mom, my sister, and I got out our recipe books and we started cooking and eating our way through the gigantic turtle. We ate turtle à la king, broiled turtle, turtle croquettes, turtle dip, turtle étouffée, fricasseed turtle, turtle gumbo, turtle hash, turtle ice cream. We put up about a half-dozen jars of turtle’s foot jelly. We’ve been kind of afraid to taste that jelly, but we weren’t wasteful; we’ve still got all six jars. One day, we took sticks, sharpened up the ends of them, slid on a chunk of turtle meat, green pepper, onion, turtle meat, green pepper, onion, turtle meat, green pepper, onion, and put one of those little cherry tomatoes on the end. Then we fired up the grill and grilled ourselves turtle kabobs. They were delicious. My mama made several recipes of turtle loaf, and she put them in the freezer so we could eat them come winter. We ate Mornay turtle and turtle noodle bake. Many a morning, we sat down to turtle omelets. At suppertime, we ate turtle pot pies. When company came over, we fed them all turtle quiche—they did not know the difference. We ate roast turtle, turtle soup, turtle turtles. One night we got real fancy—put tablecloths on the table, lit candles, and sat down to turtle under glass. We preceded that with some kind of cold, soupy looking stuff called turtle vichyssoise. We didn’t like it, but we tried.

  My daddy, a near genius, harvested out of that turtle a lifetime supply of Turtle Wax. My mama, another near genius, harvested out of the turtle a lifetime supply of turtle extract. It’s one tiny bottle, no taller than three inches, but since we have yet to locate a recipe calling for turtle extract, we rema
in confident that one tiny bottle does indeed constitute a lifetime supply. On the mornings we didn’t sit down to turtle omelets, we got out the blender and whirled up turtle yogurt breakfast shakes. They were delicious. And we contributed to the demise of our second greatest harvesting problem by devising a recipe for turtle-stuffed zucchini.

  The shell of the gigantic turtle was recycled into a boat. When their chores were done my four brothers and Some Dog would float on various ponds on the property in their turtle shell boat. One day, they were floating on the very pond where Some Dog almost met his maker, when all of a sudden their whole turtle shell boat started to lift up out of the water. Alan was the first to assess the gravity of the situation. He yelled, “Boys, we best abandon ship!” They all headed for shore, Jeff hanging on to Some Dog for all he was worth. They climbed out on the bank and looked back just in time to see the head of an even larger turtle grab their turtle shell boat in its mouth and pull it underneath the water.

  My brothers went up to the house. They told my daddy what they had seen. Daddy studied on it a bit. “Boys, sounds to me like the turtle that grabbed your turtle shell boat must have been the mama of the turtle that almost made off with Some Dog. I reckon that mama had been looking for her child. And when you all were out there today, she must have looked up and thought: ‘There’s my child. Just got itself turned over and can’t flip back. I’ll go help it.’ And I reckon now she’s taken that child of hers down to the nest to be with its brothers and sisters.”