Another in my series, "Little Known Cats Who Have Helped Humankind." I wrote these to relieve the darkness of writing my dark novel, Shadows Walking, about a Nazi doctor...
Somewhere west of Brokenstraw Creek and south of Warren, Pennsylvania , early one August morning over 200 years ago now, for no especial reason other than he could, “Hooey,” a spicy-red, short-haired tomcat, just followed “Johnny Appleseed” out of the Homer Miller family’s barn where they both had been sleeping in the hay.
The young tom hadn’t planned to go past the Miller barnyard, but when Johnny picked him up and put him in his sack with apple seeds, he got comfortable, snuggled down and fell asleep again. By the time “Hooey” awoke and looked out of Johnny’s sack, they were in the next state, somewhere in eastern Indiana.
Hooey’s natural curiosity and his need to be useful, not to mention that he had no sense of direction, doubted his ability to get back to the Miller’s barnyard, and had a great fear of being eaten by a bear, gave him an idea: he would stay with this traveling man and help him do whatever he was doing. But what did he do?
Johnny Appleseed, of course, grew apple trees! That was Johnny Appleseed’s calling: helping homesteading farmers and dairymen to settle and thrive. And it became Hooey’s, too.
Theirs was a traveling life. Winters as well as springs, summers and fall. It was sometimes hard. Rarely did they stay anywhere for long. When they did, though, Hooey was invaluable. He was a clever mouser. He kept mice and other varmints out of Johnny’s storage bins and away from his tender seedlings. And Johnny, for his part, welcomed the help. When asked how he did what he did, he was always quick to give credit to Hooey. “I didn’t know “hooey” about apples and how to grow ‘em when I started, but I soon learned! I tell you, I didn’t know “hooey!” And then, hearing his name, the tomcat would appear, with a shimmer of pride in his green-gold eyes, a flick of his spice-red tail, and a loud purr.
Point well taken, Ron. I agree, even though the next county west of Warren County, PA is in Indiana, I will change it to read "state". Thanks, Doug Skopp
A great little story. Not a lot of hooey. I hope you would change the part about going into the "next county" from Pennsylvania to Indiana, because young people are not learning geography very well. And even though, in cat terms, a whole state may be like a county, young children learn from stories.
Raised on Black and White TV is Carol Denise Mitchell’s intimate, unflinching memoir of growing up in a world where television became both a refuge and a mirror. Through the glow of classic black‑and‑white programs, she learned about fami
