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Letter: 19

June 15,1995

      DEAR KIDS: Here are some more recollections of some of the characters in and around Blunt. Since there was very little to do, visiting and hearing about what the other people were doing was interesting because we knew everybody. There were some very fine people and then there were the characters. The characters gave us some amusement.

      When I was a kid, the main highways in South Dakota were gravel roads that followed the sections lines and the turns were 90 degrees. If someone came to town and wanted directions to find a farmer northwest of Blunt you could tell him either of two ways to get there, "You go six miles north and two miles west and and you will see his place."or "You go two miles west and six miles north."Both roads followed the section lines. In fact, the driver could count the section lines and didn't even have to refer to his odometer for the mileage.

      Gravel roads were hard to keep smooth between rains and the road maintenance man would get out any day it rained so that he could smooth out washboards and fill in the hollows that sometimes made it hard to pass other cars and caused some disputes. If someone wanted to pass you, it was polite to get over on the right as far as you could because there was only one lane each way. Your car would be kicking up sand and gravel into the following car's windshield.

      Walt Halsey was quite short but his upper body was very tall. If his legs had been as proportionately long he would have been quite a tall man. Walt would sit very erect in his car and looked to be a very tall man. Eddie Welch was well over six feet tall, but when he drove his truck he slouched down in the seat and looked like a small man.

      One time a guy thought Eddie Welch "cut him off" and after he saw where Eddie turned off in Blunt, he got out of his car and walked up to Eddie's truck and wanted to fight. Eddie had been a professional wrestler and was not afraid of anything but was very good natured and said, "Well I don't think we should fight about it,"but the man still wanted to fight. Eddie said, "Well if you insist,"and got out of his truck standing very tall, and the guy — who was expecting to beat up on a small man — decided not to fight after all. That was a joke around town for a while.

      As I said before, Walt Halsey looked like a big man in his truck and one time a man, after passing Walt, signaled that he was going to stop. Walt stopped behind him and the man came out of his truck, spouting a lot of profanities as he walked toward Walt's truck. When he got up to the door he saw "great tall" Walt in the truck and said he would let it go this time and got in his car and drove off. That was another joke around town about how the size of Blunt drivers bluffed the other guys out of fighting.

      I have mentioned previously that one of Pa's activities was to grind grain for livestock. A customer was supposed to go by the public scales at the grain elevator on his way in with a load of grain and have the wagon and load weighed. Then he was supposed to drive the empty vehicle by and have it weighed. The difference was the weight of the grain that was ground. Joe Tumquist was a steady customer and always came in with a single set of sideboards on the wagon and the grain heaped as high as he could without spilling it. The man at the elevator called Pa and told him that Joe was cheating him because he weighed his empty wagon with two sets of side boards on it, making the wagon appear to weigh more, and then weighed the load with one set of sideboards on the wagon. This made the wagon appear to weigh more than it did and the grain less than it did. Pa said, "Joe is a steady customer and is going to quite a lot of trouble to get a little more for his money. I'll just consider it a discount to a steady customer."At 10 cents per hundred pounds it was probably only about 20 cents worth of grinding. Pa actually got a kick out of Joe's finagling the bargain. He actually had to take the sideboards off and leave them and then go back and pick them up. Pa told me Joe was earning the discount.

      The railroad running through Blunt was a source of some employment. The section hands would ride on a little gasoline car to the places on the track that needed repairs. Some of the Westlands worked on the section and this made them walk funny. It wasn't a disability, but was caused by the fact that when walking down the track the ties were too close together to walk on each one, so anyone walking down the track would take long enough steps to step on every other tie. This made a long step, and Ben & Albert Westland used to walk a little like Groucho Marx.

      My brother Harlow and one of my cousins, Ralph Howard, worked on the section for a while. Ben Westland was the section foreman. When the train would come by they would have the little flatcar on a platform beside the track. Sometimes there would be a railroad inspector on the train and Ben wanted to make a good impression. He wanted the section hands to stand beside the track while the train went by and look attentive and almost at attention, like in the military. Harlow and Ralph would lie down in the grass trying to make it look like they had been sleeping instead of working as the train went by. Ben didn't like this, but Harlow and Ralph weren't planning to make the section their life's work anyway.

      Ben Nasheim (pronounced nay-shum) ran the shoe shop as we called it. He sold shoes, but the biggest part of his business must have been repairing harnesses for the farmers work horses. The Nasheims were very sloppy and the shop looked like a disaster area — harnesses all over everywhere. I don't know why they weren't repaired and returned to the farmers so that Ben could get his money. Naturally, Ben wasn't very successful financially so he had a sideline — bootlegging. The law wanted to catch bootleggers and the way was to have someone act as a stool pigeon. Carl Reinhart bought some bootleg booze from Ben so that the Feds could observe the transaction and arrest Ben. After Ben got out of jail, he jumped Carl Reinhart with the intention of beating him up, but Carl was too much for him. He got Ben down and was beating up Ben instead. I guess someone stopped the fight before Ben got hurt too much. Someone asked, "Ben what did you do then?" Ben said "I bled all over the son of a bitch, that's what I did!"

      Bernard O'Donnell was a good Irish Catholic who farmed near Blunt. He had been a good butcher and that came in handy to Pa and Uncle Gus. They had a man named Leonard McMahon who ran the Meat Market they owned. Butch, as he was called, got to stealing too much from them and they fired him and hired Bun O'Donnell to come in and run it. In those days the meat butcher would slaughter and butcher the whole animal. Bun stipulated that he wanted to have a smoke house to smoke his own meats and Uncle Gus built him a small smoke house. Bun made smoked sausages, bacon, ham and a lot of good things. He was very good at it.The idea was that my Cousin Morrie Howard would work with him and learn the meat business. He later ran the meat market. Bun always had a very sour look on his face and had a sour out look about a lot of things. He wasn't unpleasant about things but if you crossed him he could more than hold his own. There were several ne'er-do-wells in town who were members of the Ku Klux Klan. The Klan wasn't something feared like in the south but was a small bunch of bigots. They were considered a joke by most people. The membership was supposed to be secret but everyone knew who the members were. Ben Nasheim was one of them. One day Ben met Bun O'Donnell on the street and asked him, "Bun, what makes you look so grouchy?"Bun's reply was, "I took grouchy because I am grouchy. I'm just like the Ku Klux Klan. They hate N— and Catholics. I hate everybody." That squelched Ben.

      Ferd Clatt was not a Blunt resident but was well known to Pa and others in town. Ferd was a blacksmith (Pa said a good one) and was known for his great big feet. He was a fairly goodsized man but his feet were much bigger in proportion than the should have been. Ferd owed some taxes to Sully County which was just north or Hughes County where Blunt was. The County Treasurer was talking to his office help and said, "You can expect Ferd Clatt in to pay his taxes."The lady assistant said she was trying to place who Ferd Clatt was and the Treasurer said, "When you see a man with the biggest feet you have ever seen, that will be Ferd Clatt."

      When Ferd came into the office, the secretary was sitting at her typewriter looking down at the form she was typing and she saw two huge feet beside the typewriter stand and before looking up she said, "Hello Mr. Clatt. Are you here to pay your taxes?" She had never seen him before but those feet had to be Ferd Clatt's. I had the privilege of seeing Ferd Clatt a time or two and of course I looked at his feet. They were BIG.

      There was an old sheep rancher whose name I have forgotten. His ranch was a short distance north of Blunt. We were in my dad's shop talking about replanting the lawn at home because we could water it with the new system Pa had built. I had hauled in top soil and Pa said we would need manure to top off the grass seed. The old rancher chewed tobacco and in order not to slobber juice down his chin, he pronounced some words funny. He said, "Why don't you come out to my place and get some sheep skit? Sheep skit is very good fertilizer and I got a lot of it that you can have for free. Yup sheep skit is real good. It'd make the grass grow real good."I went out and hauled in a truck load of sheep skit and the grass did come up nice and green.

      When I was a kid our electricity was furnished by a little direct current light plant run by Gid Babel. Gid Babel had a son-in-law named Howard Trask. Howard was a fellow who didn't believe in much work and pretty much lived off Gid. My brother Jim at the age of 14 helped Gid Babel run the light plant. Jim was eating supper and Howard was supposed to be tending the plant. The lights started to flicker and Jim said, "That damn Howard Trask is letting the engine run out of gas,"and lit out to run to the plant about a block and a half away. If he got there in time, he could keep the engine running. Sometimes Jim would get there in time and other times he would have to start the engine up again which was considerably more work. He would then investigate and find Howard in the pool hall. One time Howard was in our back yard visiting with Pa when Pa gave me 15 cents (like $2 today) to go to the movie. I carried it in my fist and fell down in the alley and lost it in the weeds. I went back and told Pa what had happened and he gave me another 15 cents. Howard said, "Isn't that the best old dad you ever had?"My reply was, "He's the only dad I ever had,"and ran off to the movie. Howard had no kids and he wouldn't have given a kid the second 15 cents. He felt he should be the only free loader.

      Howard later moved to Pierre and got himself elected County Commissioner which suited his temperament. He continued to live off someone else — the taxpayers.

      Ferd Alburtus was a big man. He was kind of sneaky and not very honest. Pete Parks, who had a service and auto repair station across the road from the machine shop, told Pa he should make sure that he locked the shop if he went up to the store (in a separate building) because "Old Ferd watches to see when you leave the shop unattended and pussyfoots over to your shop. I'll bet he's stealing tools from you."Pa never caught him sneaking any tools, but did miss a tool or two after Pete told him Ferd had sneaked over to the shop. Pa from then on referred to Ferd as Old Pussyfoot.

      I never did know what Ferd's occupation was to make a living, but he did get some income from trapping and catching skunks and maybe some other animals. His daughter, Dorothy, was in my class at school, and several times she came to school smelling of skunk, so we knew Ferd had been successful in catching a skunk.

      Vanskoik (spelling? last syllable rhymed with oink) was a nice old retired man who was very concerned about time. He had a new car that had an electric clock in it but like most electric clocks in cars in those days it quit running in the first week. He was trying to get someone to fix it but no one was able to including Pa. Pa said, "Van — time will go just the same,"and Van would be a little impatient and reply "I know that Leon, but I want it to run anyway."I don't think he ever got it to run.

      Being retired Van didn't have any pressing duties or appointments but was still very concerned with the time. It was almost an obsession with him, anyway. He would go around town visiting the various places of business including the hardware store. If my dad was in the store, he would get out his pocket watch and tell Pa that the eight-day clock on the wall was two minutes slow. Pa would tell him again, "Van, time will go on just the same."Van insisted that it was slow and should be reset two minutes ahead. The clock was up high on the wall and Pa didn't want to bother standing on something to set it until it was time to wind it again. Eight-day clocks were wound every seven days and that way never ran down. Van would continue to make the rounds stopping in some of the stores and the bank telling everybody the correct time. Then he would go down to the railroad depot and get the official railroad time which was telegraphed to the station every day and confirm that his watch was running on correct time. He would come back and announce, "Yes, that clock is two minutes show. I just checked with the railroad time.”

      Today the June gloom has returned. I like the cooler weather.

      Craig is not home yet. Walt Hall, Dave's dad, said he thought they were going to start home today and would probably stop in Las Vegas. Craig should be able to see Cindy and the two young bachelors as he calls his grandsons.

      The other day Dr. Buxbaum suggested that Grandma postpone her dental work because of the infection she had in her colon. We are going to the dentist at 4:30 to have the root canal completed. Her bridge is loose and he will probably consider fixing that extra. I have already paid for the root canal a large sum, but I bet he will want more.

      I just remembered another character, Clayton Gunsalus. Clayt ,as he was called, was a good friend of Uncle Gus and they thought it was fun to think of some terrible words to call each other. Clayt would come into the hardware store and stand just inside the front door. He would start out "Where is that blackhearted (and a lot of swear words) Gus Howard" and Uncle Gus would reply "If that's that slimy, no good, low down (and a lot of swear words) Clayt Gunsalus, I m right here." They would go back and forth trying to top the other with the things they called each other. Pa was in the basement one time and he heard it and thought "Gus is in trouble this time. He probably got a little too rough trying to collect some past due bill."He rushed upstairs and went in the store, only to find them standing at each end of the store grinning like fools, cussing at each other.

      We went to Grandma's dental appointment at 4:30 and it was raining some of the time pretty hard. It rained for about 4 hours. They say it doesn't rain in June in California I don't care if it rains a foot.

      When I send this letter you will be on your way to New Orleans. I hope you have a great time. The Mississippi River itself is quite a sight. I remember when I went to the Century of Progress (Worlds Fair) in Chicago in 1933 with a carload of boys. I was really impressed with the Mississippi when we crossed it to go from Iowa to Illinois.

      Consider yourself given all the usual good advice about being helpful to your parents, etc.

      Much Love,

      Grandpa

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