Daddy, Is He Dead?
It was just breaking day as Daddy and I started the half mile walk down to Mr. Stunkard’s barn to do the morning chores. That’s all the work Daddy ever did on Sunday, just a couple of hours each morning and evening milking and feeding the livestock.
We were both is high spirits; Daddy singing ‘I’ll Fly Away’ while I searched alongside the road for minor adventures; perhaps a horned toad to play with for a while, or a still sleeping ant hill to kick into disarray.
Suddenly the morning calm was shattered with a loud crash. Out here in the hills of Oklahoma in 1935 there was very little automobile traffic anytime and almost never any this early in the day, so it was a real shock to see the two cars careening off each other. They were stirring up so much dust and dirt we really couldn’t get a good look right away.
We both ran toward the accident, Daddy with real purpose and I curious and excited.
“This one’s dead”, Daddy exclaimed, peering into the nearest car. I was more interested in the bloody man sprawled across the road. He was dirty and his clothes were badly torn, but I was sure he was just knocked out; until I saw his dust filled open eyes.
I had never seen a dead person before under any circumstances. Being a country boy I was quite familiar with all sorts of dead animals; both from natural causes, injuries, and plain butchering for food. But this sight brought cold chills down my spine as I stood transfixed at the gruesome sight.
By now Daddy was issuing instructions that had to be repeated before I could grasp the full extent of the situation.
I did as I was told, running about a quarter mile to the Stunkard’s home. It was further than ours but we had no telephone.
Mrs. Stunkard came to the door, not too happy to see me at daylight on Sunday morning. But she quickly deciphered my incoherent babbling and hurried to the phone, cranking if furiously to summon the Sheriff.
For me the adventure ended abruptly, as she gave me strict orders to stay here until Daddy came.
I almost disobeyed those orders; that’s how much I wanted to see the dead man again.
We had never owned an automobile. When I started to school that fall, I walked to the highway and then rode a school bus to school. Those first few days were quite anxious times for me, having seen the havoc that could result in case of an accident. My fears were unfounded of course and soon forgotten but the memory of the accident has faded very little with the years.
Copyright © 2009 by Henry Custer. All rights reserved.
