"Kentucky's Last Frontier" by Henry P. Scalf--Reflections On The Book

 

Henry P. Scalf was a newspaperman, genealogist, and Appalachian writer who lived from 1902 until 1979.  For many years, he worked for the "Floyd County Times" in Prestonsburg, Kentucky, and wrote on nearly every subject that a small courthouse town newspaper might cover.  He was also an avid student of the history of Eastern Kentucky and wrote and published several works which ranged from several pamphlet sized works including one about Jenny Wiley, an early Eastern Kentucky pioneer woman who was captured by and escaped from a band of native Americans, and about a half dozen genealogical books during his lifetime.  Much of his writing, documents, and books are in the Special Collections Department at the University Of Pikeville Library which I have used more than once in my research. I own one of his dozen or so self-published genealogical books about the Stepp-Stapp Families of America.  His best work was done in the fields of newspaper writing and genealogy.  Most of his books and pamphlets were self published in small editions and can be difficult to locate on the open market.  

I was able to purchase an autographed copy of the book we are discussing here, "Kentucky's Last Frontier" which was self published as a hardback in 1966 with a foreword by the eminent Kentucky historian Thomas D. Clark.  My copy of the book was part of the estate of another Kentucky newspaper writer, Helen Price Stacy and I was lucky enough to buy several works by other regional writers from her collections after they had passed into the hands of a friend who buys and sells antiques.  The book covers a "12-county area, centered by the Big Sandy, Licking, and North Fork Kentucky rivers...With a few southeastern counties of the state, it constituted "Kentucky's Last Frontier."  My copy is, sadly, not in great condition but due to the difficulty of finding a copy in any condition, I was glad to find it.  The book covers a large segment of the history of Eastern Kentucky from the times of early settlement to about 1955 or so.  It is possibly, at least partially, derived from earlier newspaper articles written by Scalf.  While the book is a wonderful resource for the student of Eastern Kentucky and Appalachian history, it does have several weaknesses including Scalf's unique style of documentation of sources and inclusion of notes.  Many times in the book, quotations are not clearly identified in the text and there is a section of notes which covers 109 pages in the back of the book and the notes are not cited in the text by any currently recognized system.  But these issues are offset by the fact that the Bibliography is 6 pages long and well documented.  Any reader with the desire to read all those documented sources would have a strong background in the history of the region up to the time this book was published.  

The book is composed of 25 chapters which are presented chronologically from an opening chapter about the geologic and prehistoric origins of the region to the final chapter about, in part, the widespread coal, oil, and gas extraction in the region which has served to greatly damage the beauty of the land.  There is a fine discussion of the consequences of the 1957 flood which devastated the region and, until the recent Eastern Kentucky flooding of the summer of 2022.  While the book can be a slow read, it is well worth the effort to find and read a copy if you are a student of either Eastern Kentucky or Appalachian History.  I know that there are copies in both the University of Pikeville library and at the library of Big Sandy Community and Technical College.  I suspect there might also be a copy in the collections of the Johnson County Library in Paintsville since they own a large, publicly available but non-circulating regional books.   I hope you can locate a copy if you are interested in the area which it covers. 

A Year To Be Moderately Thankful For!

 

Ever since June 16, 2015, America had little to be thankful for until the results of the November 2020 presidential election were finalized and President Biden was sworn in and the nation was once again in safe hands after four years of having a TRAITOR living illegally in the White House based on his TREASON with Putin and Russia.  But, after the election was settled, we were still due to face an act of Insurrection, Domestic Terrorism, and TREASON on January 6th, 2021.  The consequences of that act on January 6th are still playing themselves out both in the nations law enforcement and judicial communities and it will be at least 20 to 30 years before the end of the appeals, prison sentences, and further insurrections play themselves out.  America will continue to suffer for at least another generation due to the TREASON of TRAITOR Trump.  The moral, ethical, and legal damage which has been wrought on the psyche of the nation will continue to be serious damaging for at least a generation.  Many of the individuals who have been participants in all those acts of insurrection, sedition, domestic terrorism, and treason are currently raising children who have been exposed to the arcane, violent, and deeply destructive ideas of their parents, just as all parents deeply affect their children's thinking, and those children are likely to carry on their parents' traditions of ignorance and violence for years to come. 

But on November 8, 2022, this country and a majority of its voters delivered a message to TRAITOR Trump and his many co-conspirators that we will not accept that kind of insurrection, terrorism, and treason.  In the best electoral performance in about 40 years by the party of a sitting president, the Democratic party has held onto control of the US Senate, actually gaining one seat and possibly two based on the pending outcome of the runoff election in Georgia, and nearly held control of the US House.  But the House was lost by just a few seats and the Right Wing Radical Repugnicans and other co-conspirators of TRAITOR Trump will assume control of the US House in January 2023 and will do everything in their power to obstruct the positive works of President Biden and the Democratic party. They will end the incredibly important work of the January 6th Committee and do everything they can to destroy any evidence it has gathered on the insurrection and any other crimes of which the committee members have become aware.  They will bury the TRAITOR Trump tax returns which the US Supreme Court has finally just ordered to be released to the House Ways And Means Committee if TRAITOR Trump even delivers those tax returns before the new congress assumes control in early January.  I am betting that TRAITOR Trump will simply refuse to deliver the returns and will bet that the wheels of justice will run too slow for him to suffer the legal consequences of any criminal referral which the current chair of the House Ways And Means Committee might send to the justice department by the end of the year.  Both he and Kevin McCarthy, a proven co-conspirator, will do everything they can to prevent the truth from ever coming to light about the insurrection of January 6th. It is highly likely that several of the very members of congress who are suspected of assisting the terrorists of January 6th will now assume key positions in the very congress their previous efforts sought to obstruct and destroy. 

But, the newly appointed Special Counsel Jack Smith will also have a lot to say about the January 6th insurrection, the clearly treasonous attempts to overturn the 2020 election, the theft of highly classified documents from the White House and the high likelihood that they were passed on to Russia and/or other foreign actors who are opposed to the very existence of the United States.  The fact that the White House and the Department of Justice are in the hands of Democrats and Jack White is on the job are one of the major events of the past year that we have to be moderately thankful for.  It is no accident that when the FBI sought the warrants that  led to the discovery of hundreds of US government documents in the hands of TRAITOR Trump at Mar A Lago that the law cited in those warrants was the Espionage Act.  It is no accident that Jack Smith, the person chosen by Attorney General Merrick Garland is an experienced war crimes prosecutor who is accustomed to dealing with and successfully prosecuting rouge government officials all around the world.  The case against TRAITOR Trump has always been about TREASON and Russian Espionage.  Jack White and the team he is assembling to conduct this investigation and prosecution will track the story to its logical end.  They will indict TRAITOR Trump for every crime which they uncover and, at the very least, it will include the crime of mishandling and illegal possession of classified government secrets.  It is also highly likely to include TREASON and espionage for the sale or uncompensated transfer of those documents to Putin and Russia and is just as likely to include crimes committed during attempts to sell those documents to other foreign countries, especially those countries which either have or are seeking nuclear weapons and the technology related to them.  And no one should ever forget that the list of such countries includes Russia, North Korea, Iran, and Pakistan.  Thankfully, Jack White and the staff he is assembling, with the assistance of the entire US intelligence community, will pursue all possible crimes to the logical ends of the investigations and they will successfully prosecute all offenders.  

We are also incredibly blessed to have control of the US Senate which will stop many of the efforts of Kevin McCarthy and his co-conspirators to destroy the goals of President Biden.  A bicameral legislature is one of the greatest inventions of early political strategists and the American Founding Fathers in particular.  That concept has saved this country from many mistakes over the past two and a half centuries and there is no doubt it will save us from many as long as Kevin McCarthy is Speaker of the House and Democrats retain control of the White House and US Senate.  

We are also greatly blessed by the fact that, in general, voters all across the country had the wisdom to elect Democratic US Senators and Congress members,  state officials including governors, secretaries of state, and state attorneys general.  In Michigan and Arizona, in particular, we won nearly every office and that delivered a strong message to people such as the Right Wing Radicals who plotted to kidnap and assassinate Governor Whitmer.  We are blessed to have her in office in Michigan.  Nevada reelected US Senator Masto.  Arizona elected a Democratic governor, two US Senators, and most of the other officials in the election.  Now Georgia is faced with the decision to reelect Senator Warnock or to elect a markedly, terrifyingly incompetent and unqualified opponent.  In Georgia, the effort to elect Hershel Walker to the US Senate is a clear cut litmus test about just how deeply damaging the Right Wing Repugnican Party is willing to be in order to gain another vote in congress.  Walker is definitely the most unqualified candidate to ever be nominated for a senate office in this country.  

But two years ago, Georgia stepped up and did the right thing for the state and for America.  I believe they will do it again in the senate runoff election.  Yes, we have had a year for which we can be moderately thankful.  But we have also had a year in which the potential damage to America and American Democracy was as high as it has ever been since the times of Benedict Arnold.  We must continue to fight against TRAITOR Trump and his co-conspirators until they are all in prison where they should have been many years ago.  We must continue to fight to elect Democrats in every office in the country.  Literally, we are in the fight of our lives to save America and American Democracy.  Thank God, we won most of the important battles of the past year. 

Shrinkflation From Zesta Saltines Owned By Kellogs!

 

I was raised with Zesta Saltine Crackers, have eaten them all my life, and we always sold them in our country store when I was growing up.  I had always thought they were the best saltine crackers I had ever eaten and nearly always bought them unless a store I was in had none of that brand.  But this week, I got a serious surprise and another example of what is known as "Shrinkflation" and/or "Skimpflation" since major corporations began cutting back during and after the Covid pandemic on the goods and services they provide.  What happens is that packages get smaller, less comes in a container, prices go up, and the end stage customer is always the one who loses in the long run.  I have previously written about "Skimpflation" and "Shrinkflation" on this blog.  But I got a real surprise this week when I bought Zesta Saltine Crackers which are owned and produced by Kellog's.  

I brought home two boxes of the crackers and opened one last night to have a few as a snack before bedtime.  The boxes are the same size they have always been.  But when I opened the box, I was somewhere between surprised and shocked to see two and one half inches of free space between the ends of the sleeves of crackers and the end of the box.  Yes, I actually got out my tape measure and measured the empty space in the box.  I even opened the second box of crackers today to verify that it was also short on crackers and big on air.  It is!  The company didn't change the size of the box.  They just stopped filling it up to capacity with crackers.  The boxes are 9" x 4" x 4" for a total of 144 cubic inches of crackers.  When you multiply the missing 2 1/2" of free space at the end of 4 sleeves of crackers you find that you are paying for 40 cubic inches of crackers which you are not getting.  You are actually paying for 40 cubic inches of air which you can normally breath for free in most places in the world.  Believe it or not, that is 27.7% of a box of crackers which does not contain any crackers.  

This is, perhaps, the worst example of "Skimpflation" and "Shrinkflation" I have seen since the pandemic began.  It is definitely a shining example of what those two new aspects of corporate greed are all about.  Since the pandemic began, many major store chains, including Kroger, Wal Mart, Dollar General and others have decided to make their customers work for them without pay by installing self checkout lanes, getting rid of many of the employees who needed their  jobs the worst, and making record profits.  Gasoline companies and the store chains which sell their fuel have artificially driven up the price of gasoline products to rates never before seen in America.  And, you can bet your ass, they are already working on other ways to charge you more, give you less, and induce you to work for them for nothing while trying to convince you they are doing you a favor every time they use "Skimpflation" and "Shrinkflation" to steal money out of your pockets.  Anytime you see one of these things happening to you and every other customer in America, make a phone call, send an e-mail, tell your friends, confront corporate greed which is what all of this is about. 

Spot

During a major reorganization of my basement in preparation for the installation of a new heat pump, I discovered a large stash of old writing I had done many years ago, some of it actually from my days as an undergrad at Morehead State University.  Part of it good enough, in my opinion, to be used on this blog and one or two pieces, with some major edits or additional work, could probably be fit to submit to actual literary journals.  This is one of the pieces which I think fits into this blog. It is both about the first good dog I ever had and about my development as a human being. 

 

I always loved my dogs.  My youngest sibling was nearly nine years my elder.  Therefore, I grew up virtually as an only child and found much of my companionship with animals.  When I was about ten, my dog Spot was killed by a car driven by the local barber and magistrate.  Unlike most people who run over dogs, the individual who ran over Spot stopped.  

At the time, my mother and I were the only ones home.  The culprit came into our little country store, for his first visit since his last campaign, to inform me my dog was dead.  I ran to the corner of our property where Spot lay bleeding profusely under an apple tree.  The area surrounding my dog was covered with recently fallen apple blossoms, spattered with coagulating blood.  Even I could not deny that my dog was dying.  

Crying uncontrollably, I ran back to my mother for help.  But even she, who usually solved my problems, could not change the situations.  Before leaving, the man apologized and promised faithfully he would find me another puppy.  For reasons which I still cannot fathom, I chose to believe him.  

In an effort to help me deal with my grief, my mother suggested that we make fudge.  She insisted that I do much of the work.  Somehow during this process, I was able to ignore my pain.  I don't remember the taste of the candy.  But I do remember the experience and the lessons I learned from it.

I never became an inveterate candy maker and the man never returned with another dog.  His memories of the incident were probably short lived; mine are indelible.  I have never forgotten how a child feels when told a lie.  I will always remember the caring way my mother helped me deal with the loss.  On many subsequent occasions, I have been able to emulate her ability to heal.  At every opportunity, I strive to avoid repeating that man's mistake.  Without having known, he taught me a lesson for life.  

I am convinced he could never have made an equal impact on me through conscious effort.  I am equally convinced he would have never made that effort.  Yet he stands in my life as proof of the fact that many of our values are learned through experience not observation.  And many of our best teachers never intended to be.  Finally, after thirty-five  years, I am able to thank him for the experience. 

Some Thoughts On "Crossing The Bar" by Alfred Lord Tennyson

There was a clue on "Jeopardy" quite a while ago about the poem, "Crossing The Bar" by Alfred Lord Tennyson, which is one of the most well known poems about death other than possibly "Thanatopsis" by William Cullen Bryant. Because the language is a bit simpler and the poem much shorter than in "Thanatopsis", "Crossing The Bar" was for many years one of the most often printed pieces on the back of funeral memorial cards in Appalachia. I have a sizeable collection of such memorial cards and wrote about them in the blog post at the preceding link. I have probably seen it on the cards at a hundred or more funerals in my life. It is a great little poem and, in it's own way, a major part of Appalachian history and culture.

 

With the recent massive flooding in Eastern Kentucky and the still unfinished search for the likely dead, many more of those memorial cards in being printed in several of the most Appalachian counties in Kentucky.  One of those is my native Knott County and, luckily, so far I have not heard of anyone being among the dead from my relatives and acquaintances.  I also have deep ties to Floyd County which has had severe flooding especially in Wayland and Garrett on Right Beaver Creek and all up Left Beaver Creek, all of which lies in Floyd County.   I spent the first 6 years of my life on Steele's Creek in Floyd County just a mile from Wayland and still have many friends and relatives there.  The next 17 years of my life were spent on Right Beaver Creek at Dema in Knott County just about three miles from Wayland.  Most of my closest friends during my teenage years were from Wayland including my two cousins, more like brothers, Jack and Johnny Terry.  It is horrible to think of having anyone die in a flood and it is just as horrible to know that several thousand people in about 7 counties in Eastern Kentucky are now homeless because of this flood.  So, in memory of the dead from the Eastern Kentucky floods of July 29, 2022, here is the complete text of "Crossing The Bar".

 

Crossing the Bar

By Alfred, Lord Tennyson

 

Sunset and evening star,

And one clear call for me!

And may there be no moaning of the bar,

When I put out to sea,

But such a tide as moving seems asleep,

Too full for sound and foam,

When that which drew from out the boundless deep

Turns again home.

Twilight and evening bell,

And after that the dark!

And may there be no sadness of farewell,

When I embark;

For tho' from out our bourne of Time and Place

The flood may bear me far,

I hope to see my Pilot face to face

When I have crost the bar.

 

 

 

The Genius Of Joel Pett And The Inability Of Appalachians To Understand It

 

A few days ago, the Lexington Herald-Leader published this cartoon as part of their ongoing coverage of the Eastern Kentucky flooding and it literally caused a storm of strong, often totally irrational, comments about how horrible the cartoon was, how little Joel Pett understands Eastern Kentucky and Appalachia, and how "he done us wrong".  First of all, let me tell you about Joel Pett's resume as a political cartoonist and a little about my resume as an expert on Eastern Kentucky and Appalachia before I tell you what I think about Joel Pett, his work in general, and this cartoon in particular.  Joel Pett, after having done freelance cartoon work for about 15 years, following his graduation from Indiana University, began working as the staff cartoonist for the Lexington Herald-Leader in 1984.  His cartoons regularly appear in many of the best national newspapers including the Washington Post, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, and the Boston Globe.  He has won the 1995 Global Media Award and the 1999 Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award.  But those are not the greatest awards his work has earned.  Joel Pett has actually won the Pulitzer Prize, count them, ONE< TWO<THREE>FOUR times,  and was a finalist for the Pulitzer twice more.  That's not bad, folks!  He has also been chosen at times as a jurist for the Pulitzer Prize.  

Now, let me tell you a little about myself and my qualifications to speak on the subject of Appalachia, Appalachian Culture, poverty, and Eastern Kentucky.  First of all, since Knott County Kentucky is the worst hit of the counties being discussed in the news about the flooding, I was born and raised in Knott County.  I grew up in a country store where for many years my parents dealt, on a daily basis, with a broad selection of Knott Countians.  I grew up walking up to ten miles a week to sell Grit newspapers, garden seeds, Cloverine Salve, and Rosebud Salve to my neighbors.  I graduated from Knott County High School, not the new Knott County Central High School.  I grew up in the KCHS in the photo below which was built by the WPA in 1939 on Caney Creek which just a few years before was having mail delivered by mule back.  

I attended Upward Bound for one year on the Stuart Robinson Campus in Letcher County at Blackey.  I attended it another year at Alice Lloyd College on Caney Creek in Knott County.  I also attended, but did not graduate from Alice Lloyd College.  I also attended the Southern Appalachian Circuit of Antioch College in Beckley, West Virginia, but did not graduate from that institution which was primarily a training ground for young Appalachian writers, several of whom have gone on to become respected writers on the subject of Appalachia.  I received a Bachelor of Social Work degree from Morehead State University and a Master of Education Degree in Counseling and Human Development degree from Lindsey Wilson College and served as an adjunct instructor in the same program for about 3 years for LWC.  I have worked as a door to door salesman out of Logan, West Virginia, primarily in the counties of Logan, Mingo, Boone, Lincoln, Wayne, Wyoming,  and McDowell in West Virgina, and in the counties of Pike and Martin in Kentucky.  I have worked as a mental health and substance abuse therapist in Montgomery, Breathitt, Jackson, and Wolfe Counties.  I also  have a Kentucky auctioneer license and have held auctions, several hundred actually, in Floyd, Letcher, Johnson, Magoffin, Morgan, Fayette, and Kenton counties in Kentucky.  I am a regularly published writer on the subject of Appalachia including professional articles on the subject of Culturally Appropriate Counseling in Appalachia.  I tend to believe that most judges would accept me as an expert on Appalachia and Appalachian Culture.  

Now that you know who Joel Pett and I both are, let's talk about the cartoon above, which has caused so much ire in Eastern Kentucky.  The cartoon is very simply and directly worded and drawn as a cartoon version of several well known photographs of Eastern Kentucky residents clinging to roofs during the recent flooding. The language in the cartoon is simple, direct, and a bit unnerving I will admit.  It says just eight words and they are powerful words.  "When it rains, it pours on poor people."  Since the cartoon talks about poverty, let me add one more resume line for myself to prove I am also an expert on poverty.  I worked for 8 years at the Hope Center in Lexington, Kentucky, which is a large, inner city homeless shelter.  I know poverty, both in the city and in the country.  

To help us understand what poverty means in Eastern Kentucky let's look at the reality of poverty in the counties which have been involved in this disaster.  Floyd County has a 32.4% poverty rate.  Breathitt County has a 32.5% poverty rate.  Knott County has a 32.1% poverty rate.  Letcher County has a 31.1% poverty rate.  Perry County has a 28.9% poverty rate.  Johnson County has a 25.0% poverty rate.  Pike County has a 23.8% poverty rate and yet in the 1970's was often touted as having more millionaires per capita than any other county in the country due to the coal boom. These are some of the highest poverty rates in the entire nation.  Nearly a third of the population in all these counties are below the poverty level.  So now let's look at how poverty works and just how precise Joel Pett was in this cartoon in getting directly to the point of the consequences of a major disaster in an area where such a large percentage of the population is poor.  

Poor people have little or no resources, weak social support systems, and little recourse to supportive means when times get hard.  Times don't ever get any harder than when your living quarters and every thing you own have been washed down Troublesome Creek, Squabble Creek, or Beaver Creek and you and whatever is left of your family are clinging to a tree or a barn roof in a muddy flood.  Poor people never live in the best houses in the best locations in any community. They live in poorly built houses and trailers in low lying land where the better off locals didn't want to build a house but were perfectly happy to gain some side income by placing rental property in bottom land they no longer farm.  Poor people rarely own their own homes and almost never have renters insurance because, if at the first of the month, you have a choice to pay either your rent and utilities or your renter's insurance, you pay what keeps a roof over your head and some basic food necessities for the next month.  Poor people often have poor to no credit ratings.  When everything you own has been washed down a muddy stream, you can't run out to the Ford dealer and buy a new truck or car.  You can't run down to the local bank and borrow money for a new double wide on higher ground.  You do damn well to buy two changes of used clothes at Goodwill for each member of your family.  Poor people don't have large amounts of savings and often have none. Poor people often don't have computers or internet.  If they have a telephone, it is usually a prepaid phone and often out of minutes. When you live from paycheck to paycheck, you can't suddenly find a new place to rent, pay a deposit, buy a full replacement of clothing, food, utensils, and bed clothes for a family.  You can't just get up, dust yourself off, say "well, that was a pretty bad little storm", and trot off to another set of living quarters in new Levis.  Poor people rarely have life insurance, health insurance, car insurance, or any assurance that they can survive a blowout on the 20 year old car they are driving to a minimum wage job, or a new refrigerator if the old one dies. When a family member dies among the poor, they usually have no life insurance, no savings, and no way to pay for a funeral and this flood has caused far too many funerals.  I personally know several funeral home owners who often bury people on credit with little or no down payments and hope they will be paid someday and be able to survive in business by getting paid by other concerned contributors and the profits they earn on high dollar funerals for the well to do.  I also know one less compassionate undertaker who will not touch a body until he has enough money in hand to cover the cost of his materials or has a mortgage on a piece of hillside land.  That is how the poor get treated on many occasions. The reality of poverty is that when you are poor, you are poor 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year, and, if it's leap year February 29 is just another day of poverty.  

So that should bring us back to Joel Pett's cartoon and the reality of being poor in a major disaster.  Those eight words, "When it rains, it pours on poor people", have caused a great deal of ire in Eastern Kentucky and Appalachia.  I had one friend who, despite growing up poor in Floyd County attempted to compare Joel Pett to J. D. Vance, the worst enemy of Appalachian people since Harry Caudill.  That is like comparing Mahatma Gandhi to Adolph Hitler.  I saw another lengthy diatribe from a woman on social media who kept ranting about being a "proud hillbilly" and how ignorant Joel Pett is.  I am certain that woman has no idea that the word "hillbilly" is never a matter of pride.  It is just as defamatory, demeaning, and debilitating as the "N" word, the "K" word, the "Q" word, or the "C" word. It is a cultural and ethnic epithet and no member of any cultural or ethnic minority should ever resort to referring to themselves by the same misnomers their detractors use. When I confront people of any ethnic or minority group about their use of these cultural and ethnic epithets in reference to themselves, I frequently hear them say it is an appropriation of the words which empowers them.  By the same logic, which is deeply flawed, we could say that any suspect in a police interrogation should eventually confess whether or not they committed the crime in question. Using such a word about oneself with a note of pride in the voice is a sure sign the user is uninformed and unlikely to benefit from future enlightenment. What I have seen in the hundreds of comments about Joel Pett and his work falls into two categories.  The poorly educated, ill informed, and less fortunate commenters think Joel Pett made a personal attack on them, their families, and their pet dog.  The better educated, better informed, and more fortunate Appalachian commenters see the truth in Joel Pett's eight little words and are glad he is speaking out in defense of the poor of Eastern Kentucky as they try to pull themselves up by the boot straps one more time in the face of a horrible disaster.  The cartoon in question is another case of Joel Pett hitting the nail on the head with his art work and his words.  That cartoon is another example of why the best newspapers in the country regularly publish his work. That cartoon is another shining example of why Joel Pett has been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize six times and won it four. That cartoon is a masterpiece.  Those eight little words are right on point.  "When it rains, it pours on poor people."  That cartoon is proof, once again, that Joel Pett is a genius. 

"Something Wicked This Way Comes" by Ray Bradbury--Reflections On A Science Fiction Classic

 

When I was in my high school years, I used to read a lot of science fiction, and westerns, at least for a few years, and have read most of the early classics.  For some reason or other, I missed out on "Something Wicked This Way Comes" by Ray Bradbury but read and loved his other classic novel, "Fahrenheit 451" which is actually solidly in the field of dystopian literature and less of a pure science fiction novel.  In fact, I had reread "Fahrenheit 451" with my wife in April of 2019 and wrote about it in the post linked above.  At that time, I was reading a lot dystopian literature because of the terrible political disaster which had been unfolding in America since June 16, 2015, and which is still unfolding before our eyes.  But somehow, I never had taken up Bradbury's other classic, "Something Wicked...".  

 

A few weeks ago, I decided to correct that error in my reading and ordered a copy of the 2017 Special Edition whose cover is pictured above.  I am truly glad I did.  I also read this one with my wife in a practice we have carried on for several years now in which I read out loud to her each day as she washes the dishes.  In addition to the original text, this edition of the book also has a roughly 70 page section of "History, Context, and Criticism" at the back of the novel.  It is well worth reading, both for the classic work itself and for the section of "History, Context, and Criticism".  The book apparently took Bradbury several years to bring it to fruition, first as a short story, and then as a novel in which he greatly expanded the text, renamed key characters, merged at least one character into another already in the text, and turned what must have been a pretty nice short story into one of the best known and loved novels in all of science fiction.  The novel does have some detractors who primarily quibble about the style which is unique.  But, in my opinion, that style is one of the best aspects of the book.  Most of the chapters are very short with only a few exceptions, usually in the later sections of the book.  The writing style is very crisp, short sentences, rapid interchanges between characters, and little extraneous narration or description.  But it is a wonderful book.  I do remember in the first few chapters that I also questioned the style but as I began to fully understand what Bradbury was accomplishing with the style I came to love the book.  It is every bit as good as any other classic science fiction or fantasy novel I have ever read.  It is better than most.  In fact, I will go so far as to say this novel is better than many highly praised novels in the greater body of what we sometimes droolingly call "great literature".  

The three protagonists are two twelve year old boys and the father of one of those boys who is 53 or 54 years old and, to his son, seems to be incredibly old and unlikely to be understood.  I laughed when I saw the writing about this age difference in light of the fact that my own father, whom I loved dearly and still do, was 64 when I was born but saw me grown before he died and will always be a major influence on everything I do, or have ever done.  The boys, on a forbidden midnight jaunt in the neighborhood, see a carnival hauled by an ancient train, pull into and set up in a meadow near an abandoned railroad crossing at the edge of their sleepy little Midwestern town.  They become fascinated by the carnival and its owners Cooger and Dark, who are, naturally, the villains in the novel.  As the story progresses, the boys realize that the carnival is evil and on a mission to destroy them and anyone else with whom it comes into contact.  Finally, Will's somewhat aged father, Charles Halloway, joins the boys in their effort to save themselves and the town from the carnival and its evil proprietors.  Two mechanical portions of the carnival also play heavily into the suspense of the story.  The merry go round and the hall of mirrors are tools which the proprietors use to practice their evil on their unsuspecting victims.  Charles Halloway, his son Will, and Wills' best friend Jim learn the truth about the carnival and manage to snatch their collective bacon out of the fire just in time.  Bradbury builds the suspense throughout the novel in a way that is slow, methodical, relentless, and terrifying.  It is a masterful piece of work.  I won't spoil it for you by divulging too much of the plot.  But take my word for it, it is well worth your time and money.