More Tellable Cracker Tales

by Annette J. Bruce

  During construction, there had been much advertising and lots of ballyhoo. It paid off! The official opening of the highway was at Okeechobee on July 4, 1924. A motorcade of two thousand cars drove up from West Palm Beach, and every blessed one paid the $1.50 toll. Counting all the big shots and officials and all the cow hunters, cat fishers, and Seminoles, it was estimated that fifteen thousand people heard Governor Gary Hardee proclaim Fingy Conners to be a “great developer,” comparable to Henry Flagler and Henry Plant. His highway was a “masterpiece of engineering,” and Okeechobee, they all predicted, would now become the “Chicago of the South.”

  It was a grand celebration, but a torrential rain scattered the multitude, and Okeechobee lapsed into what it had been before, a cow town. When I checked last, it still had not become the “Chicago of the South.” But, you know, it might have outshined Chicago if Fingy had lived to have gotten it done, but he died on October 5, 1929.

  Telling time: 7–8 minutes

  Audience: 4th grade–adult

  Peggy O’Neale

  Margaret O’Neale Eaton was the wife of Florida’s territorial governor, John H. Eaton (1834–1836), a handsome man known for his integrity, ability, and congeniality. Gene Burnett, in the first volume of his Florida’s Past series, gave an excellent thumbnail sketch of Margaret’s most-eventful life: “As first lady, she reigned over Florida with the same sprightly zest and informality that had won her the admiration (and the unmerited censure) of the nation’s capital city.… For Mrs. Eaton was none other than the attractive, witty, vivacious, former Peggy O’Neale, a vibrant figure in Washington circles before she was thirty; she had also been the object of gossip so scandalous that it caused a vice president to fall, a dark horse to succeed him, a national party to split, and an entire cabinet to resign. Disconcerting affairs, to say the least.”

  Margaret (Peggy) O’Neale was born December 3, 1799, in the first brick house built in Washington, D.C., which was much of a wilderness city at the time. Her mother, Rhoda, was a devout Methodist, and her father, William, a shrewd businessman whose Franklin House, offering rooms, food, and drink, became almost a second home for members of Congress and other dignitaries. At O’Neale’s, they had the refuge of a cozy parlor, a genial host, a pretty, well-bred woman, and a charming child. That the family attracted many fastidious Congressmen was evident within a few seasons, when O’Neale had profited sufficiently to build an annex to his house.

  Peggy was educated far beyond the station of an innkeeper’s daughter. She went to the best school in the city, which the daughters of the most influential attended. The course of study embraced not only reading, writing, and arithmetic, but eleven other scholastic subjects as well as drawing, painting, and twenty-five different kinds of needlework. And to the young ladies who mastered these with dexterity, French, music, and dancing were taught.

  Music and dancing were Peg’s favorite studies. She so soon exhausted the dance teacher’s repertoire that her father allowed her to have additional lessons with the expert dancing master, Mr. Generes. It was at the famous Union Tavern, the social center of the growing city, on March 16, 1812, that Mr. Generes gave his students’ final ball for the season. Dolly Madison, the president’s wife, accepted the invitation to judge the prestigious event and crown the Carnival Queen.

  Peggy drove out with her parents and was in high feather. While others were nervously biting their nails, Peggy was eager to show her parents that they had not wasted money on her dance lessons. In her flounced white muslin dress, Miss Peggy O’Neale, with her clustering, rich brown curls, fair skin, and violet-blue eyes that fairly danced in time to her toes, was by far the prettiest girl present.

  She seemed almost professional in the confidence of her movements; her dainty figure flew lightly through space; her pink-bowed satin slippers seemed barely to touch the floor. With each step, it was evident that she was leaving all her competitors far behind. With undisguised admiration, Mrs. Madison watched the precise patterns and the pleasing gestures of the child. As for pretty Peg—why, with Dad looking on, dance became all that was dear in life, and music the only language to hear. Unconsciously, she commanded attention; consciously, she held it. The judge saw her marshal an audience with a toss of her curls and dash like a dervish into a Highland Fling with a nicety that was a tribute to the trouble she took as well as to her talents. Unhesitatingly, Dolly Madison, the popular first lady, placed the Carnival Queen crown on Peggy’s pretty head. Thus, at thirteen, Peggy O’Neal, by expended effort, natural ability, and inherent beauty, wrested from those who looked down on her as an innkeeper’s daughter her first official social triumph.

  Before she was fifteen, the trail of romances in her wake gave Peggy a certain distinction. On her account, the nephew of an acting secretary of the Navy had killed himself; two young army officers had passed a challenge to a duel; an elderly general was in a dither; and elopement with a major was prevented by her father, who then took Peggy to New York and enrolled her in a finishing school.

  On her return to Franklin House, she could and would argue politics with the keenest wits, for she had developed a sharp, incisive mind. She knew by name every man of consequence in Washington and soon became a confidante of senators, congressmen, and Cabinet officers. Thus Peggy grew up in an atmosphere of political intrigue. She was beautiful, vivacious, and, against all the rules, intelligent. She was ultra-feminine yet preferred the company of men, which, along with her presence in a public house (even though it was her legitimate home), arched eyebrows and gave rise to every manner of bawdy speculation in a town where gossip and politics were almost synonymous.

  At the age of sixteen, Peggy met John Timberlake, a handsome young purser in the U.S. Navy. Her parents approved of John, and after a whirlwind courtship, they were married. Maybe Timberlake, who was bothered with a pulmonary ailment, felt better when at sea. For whatever reason, he kept returning to sea, leaving Peggy and their children in Washington. Meanwhile, Andrew Jackson and John Henry Eaton, two O’Neale house visitors, became good friends of the family.

  Eaton, Jackson’s closest political confidante and friend, was one of the country’s most distinguished senators. He was financially independent and an unfettered widower at twenty-eight. The youngest senator in the country had light auburn hair and large, expressive hazel eyes that were compassionate and steady. His figure was commanding, his countenance serene and dignified.

  While Timberlake was at sea, Eaton escorted Margaret to official functions and took the entire family on carriage rides. Although the relationship was strictly proper, it fueled more town gossip. A year after Timberlake’s death at sea, and just before Andrew Jackson took office as President, Margaret and John Eaton were married. That is when the rumor mill exploded. Gossip was spread by both men and women, from servants to the elite, bootblacks to clergymen, editors, and especially those holding political office. Her enemies wrote elaborate accounts of Peggy’s transgressions and, in their attempts to damn her, often praised her. A lesser woman would have been unable to rise above such an all-out attack on her character. But Margaret Eaton kept a buoyant spirit and a good sense of humor.

  Be it ever so hostile, there was no place like home for Peggy. She was a fighter, not a joiner, and Washington was her home. But she admitted that the Florida sunshine and flowers were a welcome reprieve from Washington’s political thorns. Although Peggy was not pleased with the turn of events that sent her husband to Florida, she made the most of her reign as Florida’s first lady. She cast aside social taboos and enjoyed lively political and social discussions with male guests. She spent much time and effort tutoring her two daughters. The climate was good for her health, and, breaking another taboo for the nineteenth-century woman, she often took her daughters swimming in the lake adjoining the governor’s mansion. By accident, she discovered that a suntan enhanced her natural beauty and, thereafter, took daily sun baths at a time when no lady of quality went out without her parasol.

  In 1836, Preside
nt Jackson appointed Eaton ambassador to Spain. If Margaret Eaton was a fallen woman, she landed in a soft spot—as the beautiful wife of the much-admired ambassador to Spain. John Eaton’s fine manners made an impression even on the Spanish Court, the most formal in Europe, and Peggy’s radiant beauty captured the show wherever she went.

  Margaret O. Eaton died on November 9, 1879, less than a month before her eightieth birthday. Among her last words were, “I am not afraid to die, but this is such a beautiful world to leave.”

  Telling time: 10–12 minutes

  Audience: 4th grade–adult

  Margaret Eaton’s autobiography, which she dictated and proofread in 1873 with an understanding that it be published at a suitable time (Charles Scribner’s Sons published it in 1932) closes with this statement: “I wish to leave this protest against the employment of slander for political purposes. I wish to beseech men and women, especially all who call and profess themselves to be Christians, to be careful how they repeat what they do not know to be true against men and especially against women. The men that started the slanders against me, which not yet have died out, have themselves died. They have gone to God. With God I leave them, quieting the bitterness of my heart with the remembrance of the solemn saying, ‘Vengeance is mine. I will repay, sayeth the Lord.’ It is hard to have suffered as I have, but if my blighted life can only warn men and women away from committing the crime of slander, if it can only lead men to cultivate that charity which I so sadly needed, then I shall not have lived in vain.”

  The three volumes of Gene Burnett’s Florida’s Past (Pineapple Press) were used extensively in this story and are an excellent source of interesting tidbits to whet one’s appetite for Florida’s history.

  Smoking the Pipe of Peace

  While John H. Eaton was Secretary of War (1829–1831), he was appointed, together with General Coffee, to a commission to make a treaty with the Indians. The Indians were so satisfied with the treaty and felt themselves so much indebted to Mr. Eaton, that they determined to make some exhibition of their gratitude. They offered him a tract of land in Florida, which it was said was worth $10,000. He steadfastly refused to accept it. But his grateful red brethren, determined not to let the business remain unfinished, arranged that they should call and pay their respects to Eaton and his wife, Margaret.

  It was three o’clock one afternoon and Margaret was resting on the bed. Mr. Eaton entered and said, “Margaret, I want you to get up and send out and buy all the lemons there are in the District and make the largest quantity of lemonade that ever was made by hand.”

  Margaret looked at him and said, “Why, darling, are you beside yourself? What do you want all that for?”

  Mr. Eaton said, “The Indians are coming to see us this evening, and I want you to entertain them.”

  Now, the Eatons’ home was elegantly furnished, and Margaret took special pride in keeping it in perfect order. “I want no dirty, old, tobacco-smoking Indians in my parlors,” she said.

  “But, Margaret, this thing won’t do you any harm. I have been making a treaty with them, and they are coming to our home, and we must treat our red brethren civilly.”

  “Oh, plague! Take your red brethren. Carry them off somewhere and take care of them yourself.”

  But Eaton coaxed his wife and pacified her so that she rose, sent out, and bought a quantity of lemons and two of the largest washtubs for sale in Washington. The washtubs were brought into the parlors and, when it was time for the red brethren to arrive, filled with enough lemonade to drown one or two of them.

  Still Margaret was not happy about their visit. Just before they arrived, Eaton said, “Now, Margaret, you must be good and treat them nicely. And there is one thing more you will have to do—you will have to smoke the pipe of peace with them”

  “What? No, never will I put one of their nasty pipes in my mouth!”

  “Oh, you will have to do it. Because if you, the wife of the Secretary of War, refuse to smoke the pipe of peace, it will be construed as a declaration of hostilities, and we will have a terrible piece of work on hand.”

  Again, she vowed that not to save an all-out Indian war would she smoke their filthy pipes with them. But, as was his manner, her husband smoothed her feathers. At last, she said, “If I must, I’ll carefully wipe the mouthpiece of the pipe with my handkerchief and take one whiff.”

  But Eaton solemnly assured her, “Unless you really want to bring on a bloody war, you must do no such indiscreet thing.”

  The Indians arrived. They were dressed in the most fantastic style of the forest and brought with them a little Indian boy. Margaret endured the salutations though she felt anything but cordial.

  Colonel Reynolds, who was interpreter and in charge of the visit, stated that the Indians had brought the seven-year-old along as a gift. Margaret was quick to tell him that she certainly did not want an Indian child. She had children of her own. But Colonel Reynolds informed her that the Indians expected her to accept the boy, that he was a relative of John Ross, that the Eatons must provide for him. He concluded by saying, “He is a perfect Indian.”

  When it was made clear that they must accept the charge, Eaton graciously crossed his hands over the head of the boy and gave him the name John Henry Eaton Ross.

  Margaret was really out of sorts now.

  By and by, a servant came in with a great bundle in his arms wrapped in paper. It was received by Colonel Reynolds, who mounted a chair. The bundle was uncovered, and—lo and behold! —there was an elegant silver set, which in the name of the Indians Colonel Reynolds presented to Margaret, saying, “The chiefs have sought to make some expression of gratitude to Mr. Eaton for his kindness, and, as he will accept nothing at their hands, they have determined to bestow this upon his wife.”

  Eaton, who was standing by Margaret, whispered over her shoulder, “How about the red brethren now?”

  To answer him, Margaret took two great silver pitchers from the hands of Colonel Reynolds, dipped them in the lemonade, and, lifting them as high as she could, saluted the red brethren and wished them all possible happiness. The gift pleased Margaret so much that she found the stomach not only to take one whiff of the pipe of peace but, in her enthusiasm, actually went around the circle and took the pipe out of each hand and gave it a whiff, as if she had been used to smoking all the days of her life.

  The little fellow took to his new parents with all his affection, and, in spite of the fact that he often betrayed traces of his early forest training, Mr. Eaton, Margaret, and her daughters became very fond of John Henry. He stayed with his adoptive parents three years. During a family trip to Nashville, as they were crossing a river, John jumped into the river with a splash and struck out for shore. It was a simple feat for him because he had been accustomed to swimming across the Potomac River.

  When Mr. Eaton saw the boy swimming away from them, he refused to recover him. Whether from an Indian or a white man, ingratitude was not acceptable to him, and he said, “Let him go. Let him go!”

  Mr. Eaton contacted nearby residents and asked them to take care of the boy’s needs, but John found his people and made good his escape. He was a handsome boy and, as Colonel Reynolds had said, a perfect Indian.

  Telling time: 5–6 minutes

  Audience: 4th grade–adult

  Introduction

  Tall Tales and Nonsense Stories

  The primary purpose for telling a story should always be to entertain. The art of storytelling is first, last, and always an art of entertainment. If there is anything this world needs, it is more laughter. And the stories here are guaranteed to produce a belly laugh. These are the stories that are the most entertaining when they’re told rather than read.

  And, remember, the successful teller of tall tales and nonsense stories not only needs to learn the story line but also to control his own laughter. The teller who tells a riotous story with a poker face makes his tale all the more hilarious!

  Do Tell!

  Book-Learnt
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br />   If terrorists had not bombed the imperial dining room of the winter palace in St. Petersburg, Russia, the city of St. Petersburg, Florida, might never have been born. For it was this act of violence in 1880 that caused Peter W. Demens, a prince from an old aristocratic Russian family, to leave his homeland and bring his family to settle in Longwood, Florida. Evidently, Peter bought acreage there, for about a year later, in lieu of payment for $9,400 worth of cross-ties, Demens was given the financially defunct Orange Belt Railroad, which ran from Sanford to Apopka. With a railroad and no money, Demens used the railroad as collateral and formed the Orange Belt Investment Company with the express purpose of building a railroad from the St. Johns River near Sanford to Pinellas Point on the Gulf. Here, Peter Demens named the terminal St. Petersburg, after his hometown in Russia. By November 1886, the Orange Belt Investment Company had its first train rolling into the town of Oakland, west of Orlando.

  Speaking of Oakland, let me tell you about Henry and MaryBeth Perkins, who lived out that way. They had one boy, Henry Jr.—everyone called him Hank. Before he was dry behind the ears, Henry and MaryBeth started selling off their virgin timber so they could send him all the way to Virginia to school. After seven years, he schooled out and came home. Now Henry and MaryBeth were powerful proud of him, they wus, and they had every right to be. After all, they had the only boy ’round that was book-learnt, and furthermore he had outdone all his classmates in somethin’ called al-gee-bra, whatever that be. They stayed up till nearly nine o’clock the night that Hank got home, listening to him tell the amazing stories of college life, and they invited all their kith and kin, friends and neighbors from near and far, for dinner on Sunday to show off Hank and to share all this wonderment with them.