Professional Documents
Culture Documents
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Now I hear tell that Paul Bunyan was born in Bangor, Maine. It took five giant storks to deliver
Paul to his parents. His first bed was a lumber wagon pulled by a team of horses. His father had
to drive the wagon up to the top of Maine and back whenever he wanted to rock the baby to
sleep.
As a newborn, Paul Bunyan could hollar so loud he scared all the fish out of the rivers and
streams. All the local frogs started wearing earmuffs so they wouldn't go deaf when Paul
screamed for his breakfast. His parents had to milk two dozen cows morning and night to keep
his milk bottle full and his mother had to feed him ten barrels of porridge every two hours to
keep his stomach from rumbling and knocking the house down.
Within a week of his birth, Paul Bunyan could fit into his father's clothes. After three weeks,
Paul rolled around so much during his nap that he destroyed four square miles of prime
timberland. His parents were at their wits' end! They decided to build him a raft and floated it off
the coast of Maine. When Paul turned over, it caused a 75 foot tidal wave in the Bay of Fundy.
They had to send the British Navy over to Maine to wake him up. The sailors fired every canon
they had in the fleet for seven hours straight before Paul Bunyan woke from his nap! When he
stepped off the raft, Paul accidentally sank four war ships and he had to scramble around
scooping sailors out of the water before they drowned.
After this incident, Paul's parents decided the East was just too plumb small for him, and so the
family moved to Minnesota.
Babe the Blue Ox
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Well now, one winter it was so cold that all the geese flew backward and all the fish moved
south and even the snow turned blue. Late at night, it got so frigid that all spoken words froze
solid afore they could be heard. People had to wait until sunup to find out what folks were
talking about the night before.
Paul Bunyan went out walking in the woods one day during that Winter of the Blue Snow. He
was knee-deep in blue snow when he heard a funny sound between a bleat and a snort. Looking
down, he saw a teeny-tiny baby blue ox just a hopping about in the snow and snorting with rage
on account of he was too short to see over the drifts.
Paul Bunyan laughed when he saw the spunky little critter and took the little blue mite home
with him. He warmed the little ox up by the fire and the little fellow fluffed up and dried out, but
he remained as blue as the snow that had stained him in the first place. So Paul named him Babe
the Blue Ox.
Well, any creature raised in Paul Bunyan's camp tended to grow to massive proportions, and
Babe was no exception. Folks that stared at him for five minutes could see him growing right
before their eyes. He grew so big that 42 axe handles plus a plug of tobacco could fit between his
eyes and it took a murder of crows a whole day to fly from one horn to the other. The
laundryman used his horns to hang up all the camp laundry, which would dry lickety-split
because of all the wind blowing around at that height.
Whenever he got an itch, Babe the Blue Ox had to find a cliff to rub against, 'cause whenever he
tried to rub against a tree it fell over and begged for mercy. To whet his appetite, Babe would
chew up thirty bales of hay, wire and all. It took six men with picaroons to get all the wire out of
Babe's teeth after his morning snack. Right after that he'd eat a ton of grain for lunch and then
come pestering around the cook - Sourdough Sam - begging for another snack.
Babe the Blue Ox was a great help around Paul Bunyan's logging camp. He could pull anything
that had two ends, so Paul often used him to straighten out the pesky, twisted logging roads. By
the time Babe had pulled the twists and kinks out of all the roads leading to the lumber camp,
there were twenty miles of extra road left flopping about with nowhere to go. So Paul rolled
them up and used them to lay a new road into new timberland.
Paul also used Babe the Blue Ox to pull the heavy tank wagon, which was used to coat the
newly-straightened lumber roads with ice in the winter, until one day the tank sprang a leak that
trickled south and became the Mississippi River. After that, Babe stuck to hauling logs. Only he
hated working in the summertime, so Paul had to paint the logging roads white after the spring
thaw so that Babe would keep working through the summer.
One summer, as Babe the Blue Ox was hauling a load of logs down the white-washed road and
dreaming of the days when the winter would feel cold again and the logs would slide easier on
the "ice", he glanced over the top of the mountain and caught a glimpse of a pretty yeller calf
grazing in a field. Well, he twisted out of his harness lickety-split and stepped over the mountain
to introduce himself. It was love at first sight, and Paul had to abandon his load and buy Bessie
the Yeller Cow from the farmer before Babe would do any more hauling.
Bessie the Yeller Cow grew to the massive, yet dainty proportions that were suitable for the mate
of Babe the Blue Ox. She had long yellow eyelashes that tickled the lumberjacks standing on the
other end of camp each time she blinked. She produced all the dairy products for the lumber
camp. Each day, Sourdough Sam made enough butter from her cream to grease the giant pancake
griddle and sometimes there was enough left over to butter the toast!
The only bone of contention between Bessie and Babe was the weather. Babe loved the ice and
snow and Bessie loved warm summer days. One winter, Bessie grew so thin and pale that Paul
Bunyan asked his clerk Johnny Inkslinger to make her a pair of green goggles so she would think
it was summer. After that, Bessie grew happy and fat again, and produced so much butter that
Paul Bunyan used the leftovers to grease the whitewashed lumber roads in summer. With the
roads so slick all year round, hauling logs became much easier for Babe the Blue Ox, and so
Babe eventually came to like summer almost as much as Bessie.
Paul Bunyan Tames the Whistling River
The Whistling River - so named because twice a day, it reared up to a height of two hundred feet
and let loose a whistle that could be heard for over six hundred miles - was the most ornery river
in the U.S. of A. It took a fiendish delight in plaguing the life out of the loggers who worked it. It
would tie their logs into knots, flip men into the water then toss them back out onto the banks,
and break apart whole rafts of logs as soon as the loggers put them together.
This fact by itself might not have been enough by itself to get Paul Bunyan involved. But one
day Paul was sitting on a hill by the river combing his beard with a large pine tree when without
warning the river reared up and spat four hundred and nineteen gallons of muddy water onto his
beard. This startled Paul somewhat, but he figured if he ignored the river, it would go away and
leave him alone. But that ornery river jest reared up again and spat five thousand and nineteen
gallons of muddy water onto his beard, adding a batch of mud turtles, several large fish and a
muskrat into the mix. Paul Bunyan was so mad he jumped up and let out a yell that caused a
landslide all the way out in Pike's Peak.
"By jingo, I am gonna tame that river or bust a gut trying!" he cried.
So Paul sat for four days eating popcorn and trying to figure out how to tame that river. He ate so
much popcorn that the air was soon filled with white bits and the ground for three miles around
was covered with eighteen inches of popcorn scraps. This caused several hundred small animals
and a few dozen birds to conclude that they were in a blizzard and so they froze to death. This
furnished the loggers at the camp with pot pies for several days.
Just as he ran out of popcorn, Paul decided that the way to tame the river was to pull out the
kinks. He would hitch the river to Babe the Blue Ox and let him yank it straight. Of course, Paul
knew that an ordinary log chain and the skid hook wouldn't work with water. So he and Babe
took a short walk up to the North Pole. There, Paul made a box trap baited with icicles that he set
near a blizzard trail. Then he and Babe wandered away. Paul started to throw icebergs out into
the ocean so Babe could play fetch. But he had to stop the game since each time Babe jumped
into the water a tidal wave threatened to swamp the coast of Florida. After lunch, Paul went back
to check the trap. He had caught six young blizzards and an old nor'wester. He put two of the
young blizzards in his sack and released the rest. Then he and Babe went back to their camp.
As he walked into camp, Paul yelled to Ole, the Big Swede to build him the largest log chain
that's ever been built. Then he staked out the two blizzards, one on each side of the river. Right
away, the river began to freeze. By morning, the river had a tough time rearing up to whistle
because it was frozen solid for more than seventeen miles. When Paul Bunyan finished his
breakfast, he harnessed Babe and wrapped the chain seventy-two times around the foot of the
frozen Whistle River. Yelling to the men to stand clear, he shouted at Babe to pull. Babe pulled
that chain into a solid bar and sank knee deep into solid rock, but that ornery river refused to
budge. So Paul grabbed the chain and he and Babe gave such a yank that the river jerked loose
from its banks and they dragged it across the prairie so fast it smoked. After a while, Paul looked
back and saw the river was as straight as a gun barrel. But the river was much shorter with the
kinks out, and all the extra lengths that used to be in the kinks were running wild out on the
prairie. So Paul got his big cross-cut saw and a lot of baling wire and sawed the extra lengths of
river into nine-mile pieces, rolled them up and tied them off with the baling wire. He later used
them to float his logs when he logged out the desert.
But now that it was straight, the Whistling River lost its gimp and refused to whistle. Which
made everyone mad at Paul Bunyan, because now they didn't know when to wake up in the
morning. Paul might have been in real trouble if Squeaky Swanson hadn't showed up right about
then. Squeaky's speaking voice was no louder than a whisper. But when he yelled, you could
hear him clean out in Kansas. So each morning Squeaky got up at the crack of dawn and yelled
the blankets off of every bed in camp. Naturally, the men found it hard to sleep in the cold
without their blankets, so they got up. Squeaky was a great success, and for the rest of his life he
did nothing but get up at dawn and let out one really loud yell.
Paul Bunyan and the Frozen Flames
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
One winter, shortly after Paul Bunyan dug Lake Michigan as a drinking hole for his blue ox,
Babe, he decided to camp out in the Upper Peninsula. It was so cold in their logging camp that
one evening the temperature dropped to 68 degrees below zero. Each degree in the camp
thermometer measured sixteen inches long and the flames in the lanterns froze solid. No one, not
even Paul Bunyan, could blow them out.
The lumberjacks didn't want the bunkhouse lit at night, because they wouldn't get any sleep. So
they put the lanterns way outside of camp where they wouldn't disturb anyone. But they forgot
about the lanterns, so that when thaw came in the early spring, the lanterns flared up again and
set all of northern Michigan on fire! They had to wake Paul Bunyan up so he could stamp out the
fire with his boots.
retold by S. E. Schlosser
One spring day, the loggers on the Wisconsin River discovered a huge log jam, the biggest they'd
ever seen. The logs were piled about two hundred feet high and the jam went upriver for a mile
or more. Those loggers chopped and hauled at the jam, but it wouldn't budge an inch. So they
called for Paul Bunyan to give them a hand.
Paul Bunyan and Babe the Blue Ox sized up the log jam. Then Paul told the loggers to stand
back. He put Babe in the river in front of the log jam and began shooting his rifle, peppering the
Blue Ox with shot. Babe thought he was being bothered by a particularly nasty breed of fly, so
he began swishing his tail back and forth.
Well, that stirred things up a bit in the river. It got so agitated that the water began to flow
upstream, taking the logs with it. Bit by bit, the log jam broke apart. Finally, Paul pulled Babe
out of the water, and the river and logs began to float downstream again the way they should.
John Henry: The Steel Driving Man
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
Now John Henry was a mighty man, yes sir. He was born a slave in the 1840's but was freed
after the war. He went to work as a steel-driver for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, don't ya
know. And John Henry was the strongest, the most powerful man working the rails.
John Henry, he would spend his day's drilling holes by hitting thick steel spikes into rocks with
his faithful shaker crouching close to the hole, turning the drill after each mighty blow. There
was no one who could match him, though many tried.
Well, the new railroad was moving along right quick, thanks in no little part to the mighty John
Henry. But looming right smack in its path was a mighty enemy - the Big Bend Mountain. Now
the big bosses at the C&O Railroad decided that they couldn't go around the mile and a quarter
thick mountain. No sir, the men of the C&O were going to go through it - drilling right into the
heart of the mountain.
A thousand men would lose their lives before the great enemy was conquered. It took three long
years, and before it was done the ground outside the mountain was filled with makeshift, sandy
graves. The new tunnels were filled with smoke and dust. Ya couldn't see no-how and could
hardly breathe. But John Henry, he worked tirelessly, drilling with a 14-pound hammer, and
going 10 to 12 feet in one workday. No one else could match him.
Then one day a salesman came along to the camp. He had a steam-powered drill and claimed it
could out-drill any man. Well, they set up a contest then and there between John Henry and that
there drill. The foreman ran that newfangled steam-drill. John Henry, he just pulled out two 20-
pound hammers, one in each hand. They drilled and drilled, dust rising everywhere. The men
were howling and cheering. At the end of 35 minutes, John Henry had drilled two seven foot
holes - a total of fourteen feet, while the steam drill had only drilled one nine-foot hole.
John Henry held up his hammers in triumph! The men shouted and cheered. The noise was so
loud, it took a moment for the men to realize that John Henry was tottering. Exhausted, the
mighty man crashed to the ground, the hammer's rolling from his grasp. The crowd went silent as
the foreman rushed to his side. But it was too late. A blood vessel had burst in his brain. The
greatest driller in the C&O Railroad was dead.
Some folks say that John Henry's likeness is carved right into the rock inside the Big Bend
Tunnel. And if you walk to the edge of the blackness of the tunnel, sometimes you can hear the
sound of two 20-pound hammers drilling their way to victory over the machine.
Pecos Bill Rides a Tornado
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
Now everyone in the West knows that Pecos Bill could ride anything. No bronco could throw
him, no sir! Fact is, I only heard of Bill getting' throwed once in his whole career as a cowboy.
Yep, it was that time he was up Kansas way and decided to ride him a tornado.
Now Bill wasn't gonna ride jest any tornado, no ma'am. He waited for the biggest gol-durned
tornado you ever saw. It was turning the sky black and green, and roaring so loud it woke up the
farmers away over in China. Well, Bill jest grabbed that there tornado, pushed it to the ground
and jumped on its back. The tornado whipped and whirled and sidewinded and generally cussed
its bad luck all the way down to Texas. Tied the rivers into knots, flattened all the forests so bad
they had to rename one place the Staked Plains. But Bill jest rode along all calm-like, give it an
occasional jab with his spurs.
Finally, that tornado decided it wasn't getting this cowboy off its back no-how. So it headed west
to California and jest rained itself out. Made so much water it washed out the Grand Canyon.
That tornado was down to practically nothing when Bill finally fell off. He hit the ground so hard
it sank below sea level. Folks call the spot Death Valley.
Anyway, that's how rodeo got started. Though most cowboys stick to broncos these days.
Pecos Bill and Slue-foot Sue
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Now, Pecos Bill had a way with wimmen. No doubt. He had dozens of wives during his time.
But his one true love was Slue-foot Sue. She was his first wife - and she could ride almost as
good as Bill himself.
Bill first saw Slue-foot Sue ridin' a catfish down the Rio Grande. She was riding standing up and
holdin' on with only one hand sose she could take pot-shots at the clouds with her six-shooter.
Was making a right pretty pattern too. Bill jest went head over heels for her. Proposed on the
spot. They was married the next day too.
Sue was dressed in one of them white jobs with the large hoops. Looked plumb beautiful. Right
after they was married, Sue insisted Bill prove how much he loved her by letting her ride his
horse, Widow-maker. Bill couldn't talk her out of it, so Sue climbed on that great devil of a
horse.
Well, Widow-Maker bucked like a maniac, jest as you'd expect. Sue was thrown off - clear up to
the clouds. Luckily, Sue was still wearing her springy hoop. When she hit the ground, she
bounced up again. But we all soon realized Sue couldn't stop bouncing. She bounced so high she
kept hitting her head on the moon. She was crying and crying buckets of tears, and throwin'
kisses to her new husband. But even he couldn't stop her bouncing.
We waited three days and four nights. Finally, even Bill realized that she was gonna starve to
death before she stopped bouncing, so he had to shoot her. It was a cryin' shame. Well, time
heals wounds, and Bill finally got married again. And again. And again. But I'm tellin' you, he
never felt the same about another woman as he felt for his first wife, Slue-foot Sue.
Pecos Bill finds a Hard Outfit
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Well now, Texas jest became too tame for Pecos Bill once he killed off all the bad men, so he
struck out for New Mexico, looking for a hard outfit. He asked an old trapper he met on the way
where he could find a hard outfit, and the trapper directed Bill to a place where the fellers bit
nails in half for fun. It sounded like a promisin' place to Bill, so he set off. But his durned fool
hoss got its neck broke on the way, and Bill found himself afoot.
Bill went a walkin' with his saddle on his back. Suddenly, he come face to face with a rattlesnake
'round about fifteen feet long and lookin' fer trouble. Now Bill wanted to be fair to the rattler, so
he let it get in a few jabs before he beat the stuffin' out of it. Being a kind man, when the snake
was beat, he picked it up, wrapped it around his neck and carried it along with him.
They was a headin' through a narrow canyon when a cougar thought he'd have a bit of fun and
jumped them. Bill never turned a hair. He jest put down his saddle and then whipped the
tarnation out of the cougar. Hair flew everywhere, blocking the light sose the jackrabbits thought
it was night and went to bed. Finally that cat were so beat he cried like a lost kitten and jest
licked Bill's hand.
So Bill saddles him up and they tear off across them hills like forked lightening. Whenever Bill
wanted to calm that cougar down, he'd just give him a tap with the rattlesnake. They set such a
pace that they soon rolled into the hard outfit the trapper'd told Bill about. Quick as a wink, Bill
jumps off the cougar, helps himself to some beans and coffee, wipes his mouth with a prickly
pear and turns to look at the toughs sittin' around the fire.
"I was," said a big mountain of a feller about seven foot tall and wide, "but you are now,
stranger!"
Jack and the Corn Stalk
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Once, a Kansas farmer sent his son Jack to check on the growth of the corn in the field. Now
Jack was not a tall lad, so he decided to take a ladder with him. When he found a nice big stalk of
corn, he leaned the ladder against it and climbed up until he could reach the first joint. From
there, he proceeded to the top of the cornstalk, and looked out over the field. There was enough
corn there for a rich harvest.
Excited by his discovery, Jack started back down the corn stalk. He realized suddenly that it had
kept growing while he was at the top. He stepped from joint to joint, but it grew so fast he never
reached the ground.
Meanwhile, Jack's father wondered what was taking the boy so long. He knew there was no use
in hunting for him in the forest of corn, so he climbed to the top of the windmill. He saw Jack's
predicament soon enough, and gathered the neighborhood men. They tried to chop down the
cornstalk, but the cornstalk was growing so fast there were eighteen inches separating every
chop. Finally, they gave up, and Jack was forced to stay on the corn stalk until a drought came
and it finally stopped growing.
Davy Crockett and the Frozen Dawn
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
One winter, it was so cold that the dawn froze solid. The sun got caught between two ice blocks,
and the earth iced up so much that it couldn't turn. The first rays of sunlight froze halfway over
the mountain tops. They looked like yellow icicles dripping towards the ground.
Now Davy Crockett was headed home after a successful night hunting when the dawn froze up
so solid. Being a smart man, he knew he had to do something quick or the earth was a goner. He
had a freshly killed bear on his back, so he whipped it off, climbed right up on those rays of
sunlight and began beating the hot bear carcass against the ice blocks which were squashing the
sun. Soon a gush of hot oil burst out of the bear and it melted the ice. Davy gave the sun a good
hard kick to get it started, and the sun's heat unfroze the earth and started it spinning again. So
Davy lit his pipe on the sun, shouldered the bear, slid himself down the sun rays before they
melted and took a bit of sunrise home in his pocket.
Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett Bests Mike Fink
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
Davy Crockett done married the prettiest, the sassiest, the toughest gal in the West, don't ya
know! Her name was Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind and she was all that and then some!
She was tougher than a grumpy she-bear and faster than a wildcat with his tail on fire and
sweeter than honey, so that even hornets would let her use their nest for a Sunday-go-to-Meeting
hat.
Naturally, Davy Crockett was proud of his wife and liked to boast about her skills. "Yes sir, she
can wrestle an alligator until it gets down on its knees and begs for mercy," he told everyone.
Well, Mike Fink, that tough old Mississippi roarer, snag-lifter, and flatboat skuller, took a dislike
to Davy Crockett's boasting about his wife (maybe on account of his wife weren't half so tough),
and he tried seven ways to Sunday to scare her good and proper. 'Course, Sally Ann Thunder
Ann Whirlwind Crockett didn't pay any attention to his antics, and Davy Crockett about laughed
'til he busted to see Mike Fink trying to pull a fast one on her.
Finally, Mike Fink bet Davy Crockett a dozen wild-cats that he could scare Miz Crockett until
her teeth came loose and her toe nails went out-of-joint. Davy Crockett figure this was an easy
win, so he took the bet.
Well, Mike Fink took the skin of a mighty big alligator and wrapped it around himself. Then he
crept into the bushes and waited until Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett came
strolling by for her evening walk. Mike Fink leapt out of the brush and started a growling and a
howling and roaring so loud he about scared himself out of his wits. But not Miz Crockett; no
sir! She put her hands on her hips and smirked at that raging critter like it was a misbehavin'
child.
That made Mike Fink pretty mad. He was determined to scare the wits outta Sally Ann Thunder
Ann Whirlwind Crockett if it was the last thing he did. He stretched out the claws on that 'gater
skin and started walking toward Miz Crockett, reaching to pull her into its deadly embrace. Now
it was Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett's turn to get mad.
"Don't you be fresh!" she told that crazy critter. She gave his a glare so full of lightning that it
light up the sky from here to California, but Mike Fink kept a-coming 'cause he was determined
to win the bet.
Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett took out a small toothpick that she carried with her
to keep her smile all clean and pretty after she ate. She jest lit out with that toothpick and
knocked the head right off that alligator skin. It whirled up and away about fifty-feet into the air,
and it took all the hair on top of Mike Fink's head right along with it. So now Mike Fink was left
standing in front of Miz Crockett with a half-bald head and the remains of an alligator skin
clutched around him.
Sally Ann Thunder Ann Whirlwind Crockett was not amused when she realized the famous
Mississippi roarer was trying to scare the dickens out of her. She put away the toothpick, since
she figured it gave her an unfair advantage, and proceeded to knock the stuffing out of Mike Fink
until he fainted away in his alligator skin. Dusting off her hands, she glared down at his still form
and said: "Good riddance!" and marched off to tell her husband the story. Davy Crockett laughed
so hard he nearly split a gusset!
When folks asked Mike Fink how he got so busted up the next day, he told them he'd been
chewed up and swallowed whole by an alligator. But he didn't fool Davy Crockett none with this
story, so he had to give him a dozen wild cats to pay off his bet.
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
Michigan winds are fiercest in the spring. Why, just last year, the wind knocked one of our
mountains over into a valley. Folks woke up the next day to find themselves living on a plain.
But we Michigan folk just take these happenings as a matter of course. Take my friend Joe, for
example. One March, Joe went out onto his porch to eat dessert. He had barely taken a bite out of
his fresh apple pie when a wind blew his house over. Keeping his presence of mind, Joe grabbed
hold of the branch of a tree to keep from being blown away. Once he had secured himself on the
branch, he nabbed one of the boards floating away from his house, and used it to shield him from
the wind so he could finish eating his apple pie.
'Course, I've heard they also get a pretty mean wind when you cross the border into Canada.
There's a story I know about a British Columbia chap named Jake whose dog was blown up
against his garage wall one day. That wind blew so hard and so strong that the hound dog starved
to death before it quit. Jake had to scrape the poor old dog off the wall with a shovel. And what
did he find but that the wind had pushed the hound's shadow right into the surface of the wall. So
Jake buried the poor dog under the shadow and wrote his epitaph on it: Doggone.
Mississippi Mosquitoes
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
A visitor to Mississippi decided to take a walk along the river in the cool of the evening. His host
warned him that the mosquitoes in the area had been acting up lately, tormenting the alligators
until they moved down the river. But the visitor just laughed and told his host he wasn't to be put
off from his evening constitutional by a few mosquitoes.
As he promenaded beside the flowing Mississippi, he heard the whirling sound of a tornado.
Looking up, he saw two mosquitoes descend upon him. They lifted him straight up in the air and
carried him out over the river.
"Shall we eat him on the bank or in the swamp?" he heard one ask the other.
"We'd better eat him on the bank," said the other. "Or else the big mosquitoes in the swamp will
take him away from us."
Frightened near to death, the man lashed out at the mosquitoes until they lost their grip and
dropped him into the river. He was carried two miles downstream before he was fished out by a
riverboat pilot. The man left Mississippi the next day, and has never gone for another walk from
that day to this.
Oklahoma Weather
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
To say that the weather in Oklahoma is subject to extremes is an understatement. Instead of rain
storms, we get dust storms. On the same day, one man can die of sunstroke at noon while his
neighbor freezes to death that night.
Now, as you may well suspect, this finicky weather has an adverse effect upon our frogs. I've
known the temperature to drop so fast that our frogs are stuck with their heads above the ice. One
bull frog I seen musta been caught in the middle of a leap, because he was sprawled across the
ice with the tip of one foot caught inside!
But the temperature is not our only weather phenomenon. No sir. The winds in Oklahoma are
noteworthy too. We natives have a crowbar hole drilled through an outside wall. We use it to test
the wind. You stick a crowbar through the hole, and if it bends, then the wind is normal. But if
the crowbar breaks, well, then best to stay in until the wind dies down some.
White House Ghosts
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
It is said that Lincoln's ghost haunts the White House. He appears in the room where the Lincoln
bed is kept. Harry Truman once responded to a 3 o'clock knock on his door and found no one
there. He attributed the knock to Lincoln.
Lincoln is said to return to the White House when the security of the country is at risk. He strides
up and down the second floor hallway, raps at doors, and stands by certain windows with his
hands clasped behind his back. One staff member claimed to have seen Lincoln sitting on his bed
pulling on his boots.
A bodyguard to President Harrison was kept awake many nights trying to protect the president
from mysterious footsteps he heard in the hall. He grew so tired and worried; he finally attended
a séance to beg President Lincoln to stop so he could get enough sleep to properly protect the
president!
Abigail Adam's ghost was seen drifting through the closed doors of the East Room to hang the
laundry during the Taft administration.
A gardener claims to have spoken to the ghost of Dolly Madison, who reproved him for trying to
remove the rose bushes she had planted over a hundred years ago.
In the 1930's Andrew Jackson's ghost could be heard laughing in the Rose room.
In 1952, extensive repairs were done to the second floor of the White House. Since then, the
ghosts have not walked so actively.
Attack of the Mammoth
retold by
S.E. Schlosser
A man and his family were constantly on the move, hunting for beaver. They traveled from lake
to lake, stream to stream, never staying any place long enough for it to become a home. The
woman sometimes silently wished that they would find a village and settle down somewhere
with their little baby, but her husband was restless, and so they kept moving.
One evening, after setting up camp on a large lake, the young mother went out to net some
beaver, carrying her baby upon her back. When she had a toboggan full of beaver meat, she
started back to camp. As she walked through the darkening evening, she heard the thump-thump-
thump of mighty footsteps coming from somewhere behind her. She stopped; her heart
pounding. She was being followed by something very large. Her hands trembled as she thought
of the meat she was dragging behind her. The creature must have smelled the meat and was
stalking the smell.
Afraid to turn around and alert the beast, she bent over as if to pick something off the snowy path
and glanced quickly past her legs. Striding boldly through the snowy landscape was a tall, barrel-
shaped, long-haired creature with huge tusks and a very long trunk. It was a tix - a mammoth -
and it looked hungry. She straightened quickly and hurriedly threw the meat into the snow. Then
she ran as fast as she could back to camp, dragging the toboggan behind her. Her little baby cried
out fearfully, frightened by all the jostling, but she did not stop to comfort him until she was safe
inside their shelter.
She told her husband at once about the terrible mammoth that had stalked her and taken the
beaver meat. Her husband shook his head and told her she was dreaming. Everyone knew that
the mammoth had all died away. Then he light-heartedly accused her of giving the meat away to
a handsome sweetheart. She denied it resentfully, knowing that he really believed that she had
carelessly overturned the toboggan and had let the meat sink beneath the icy waters of the lake.
After her husband went to set more beaver nets, she prepared the evening meal. While it was
cooking over the fire, she walked all around the camp, making sure that there was an escape
route through the willow-brush just in case the hungry mammoth attacked them in the night.
The husband and wife lay down to sleep next to the fire after they finished the evening meal. The
husband chuckled when he saw that his wife kept her moccasins on and the baby clutched in her
arms. "Expecting the mammoth to attack us?" he asked jovially. She nodded, and he laughed
aloud at her. Soon he was asleep, but the woman lay awake for a long time, listening.
The wife was awakened from a light doze around midnight by the harsh sounds of the mammoth
approaching. "Husband," she shouted, shaking him. He opened his eyes grumpily and demanded
an explanation. She tried to tell him that the hungry mammoth was coming to eat them, but he
told her she was having a nightmare and would not listen. The wife begged and pleaded and tried
to drag him away with her, but he resisted and finally shouted at her to begone if she was afraid.
In despair, she clutched her little child to her chest and ran away from the camp.
As she fled, she heard the harsh roar of the giant creature and the sudden shout of her husband as
he came face to face with the creature. Then there was silence, and the woman knew her husband
was dead. Weeping, she fled with her child, seeking a village that she had heard was nearby.
Sometime in the early hours of the morning, she heard the thump-thump-thump of the creature's
massive feet stomping through the snow-fields, following her trail. Occasionally, it made a
wailing sound like that of a baby crying.
The woman kept jogging along, comforting her little baby as best she could. As light dawned,
she saw a camp full of people who were living on the shores of an island on the lake. She crossed
the icy expanse as quickly as possible and warned the people of the fierce mammoth that had
killed her husband. The warriors quickly went out onto the ice and made many holes around the
edges of their village, weakening the ice so that the mammoth would fall through and drown.
As evening approached, the people saw the mammoth coming toward them across the ice. When
it neared their camp on the island, the creature plunged through the weakened ice. Everyone
cheered, thinking that the animal had drowned. Then its large hairy head emerged out of the
water and it shook its long tusks and bellowed in rage. The mammoth started walking along the
bottom of the lake, brushing aside the ice with his large tusks.
The people panicked. They screamed and ran in circles, and some of them stood frozen in place,
staring as the mammoth emerged from the ice and walked up onto the banks of the island. The
wife of the eaten man fled with her baby, urging as many of her new-found friends as she could
reach, to flee with her. But many remained behind, paralyzed with fear.
Then a boy emerged from one of the shelters, curious to know what was causing everyone to
scream in fear. He wore the bladder of a moose over his head, covering his hair so that he looked
bald. He was a strange lad, and was shunned by the locals. Only his grandmother knew that he
was a mighty shaman with magic trousers and magic arrows that could kill any living beast.
When the boy saw the hungry, angry mammoth, he called out to his grandmother to fetch the
magic trousers and the magic arrows. Donning his clothing, he shook his head until the bladder
burst and his long hair fell down to his waist. Then he took his magic bow and arrows and leapt
in front of the frightened people and began peppering the beast with arrows, first from one side
and then the other. The mammoth roared and weaved and tried to attack the boy, but the
shaman's magic was powerful, and soon the beast lay dead upon the ground.
Then those who fled from the mammoth returned to the camp, led by the poor widow and her
baby. The people whose lives had been saved by the bladder-headed boy gave a cheer and
gathered in excitement around the boy. In gratitude, the people made the shaman their chief and
offered him two beautiful girls to be his wives, though he accepted only one of them. The widow
and her baby were welcomed into the tribe, and a few months later she married a brave warrior
who became close friends with the shaman-become-chief.
And from that day to this, the people have always had chiefs to lead them, and no mammoths
have troubled them again.
Crow Brings the Daylight
An Inuit Myth
retold by
S. E. Schlosser
Story featured in Land of the Midnight Sun, a concert band piece composed by Vince Gassi!
Long, long ago, when the world was still new, the Inuit lived in darkness in their home in the
fastness of the north. They had never heard of daylight, and when it was first explained to them
by Crow, who traveled back and forth between the northlands and the south, they did not believe
him.
Yet many of the younger folk were fascinated by the story of the light that gilded the lands to the
south. They made Crow repeat his tales until they knew them by heart.
"Imagine how far and how long we could hunt," they told one another.
"Yes, and see the polar bear before it attacks," others agreed.
Soon the yearning for daylight was so strong that the Inuit people begged Crow to bring it to
them. Crow shook his head. "I am too old," he told them. "The daylight is very far away. I can no
longer go so far." But the pleadings of the people made him reconsider, and finally he agreed to
make the long journey to the south.
Crow flew for many miles through the endless dark of the north. He grew weary many times, and
almost turned back. But at last he saw a rim of light at the very edge of horizon and knew that the
daylight was close.
Crow strained his wings and flew with all his might. Suddenly, the daylight world burst upon
him with all its glory and brilliance. The endless shades of color and the many shapes and forms
surrounding him made Crow stare and stare. He flapped down to a tree and rested himself,
exhausted by his long journey. Above him, the sky was an endless blue, the clouds fluffy and
white. Crow could not get enough of the wonderful scene.
Eventually Crow lowered his gaze and realized that he was near a village that lay beside a wide
river. As he watched, a beautiful girl came to the river near the tree in which he perched. She
dipped a large bucket into the icy waters of the river and then turned to make her way back to the
village. Crow turned himself into a tiny speck of dust and drifted down towards the girl as she
passed beneath his tree. He settled into her fur cloak and watched carefully as she returned to the
snow lodge of her father, who was the chief of the village people.
It was warm and cozy inside the lodge. Crow looked around him and spotted a box that glowed
around the edges. Daylight, he thought. On the floor, a little boy was playing contentedly. The
speck of dust that was Crow drifted away from the girl and floated into the ear of the little boy.
Immediately the child sat up and rubbed at his ear, which was irritated by the strange speck. He
started to cry, and the chief, who was a doting grandfather, came running into the snow lodge to
see what was wrong.
"Why are you crying?" the chief asked, kneeling beside the child.
Inside the little boy's ear, Crow whispered: "You want to play with a ball of daylight." The little
boy rubbed at his ear and then repeated Crow's words.
The chief sent his daughter to the glowing box in the corner. She brought it to her father, who
removed a glowing ball, tied it with a string, and gave it to the little boy. He rubbed his ear
thoughtfully before taking the ball. It was full of light and shadow, color and form. The child
laughed happily, tugging at the string and watching the ball bounce.
Then Crow scratched the inside of his ear again and the little boy gasped and cried.
"Don't cry, little one," said the doting grandfather anxiously. "Tell me what is wrong."
Inside the boy's ear, Crow whispered: "You want to go outside to play." The boy rubbed at his
ear and then repeated Crow's words to his grandfather. Immediately, the chief lifted up the small
child and carried him outside, followed by his worried mother.
As soon as they were free of the snow lodge, Crow swooped out of the child's ear and resumed
his natural form. He dove toward the little boy's hand and grabbed the string from him. Then he
rose up and up into the endless blue sky, the ball of daylight sailing along behind him.
In the far north, the Inuit saw a spark of light coming toward them through the darkness. It grew
brighter and brighter, until they could see Crow flapping his wings as he flew toward them. The
people gasped and pointed and called in delight.
The Crow dropped the ball, and it shattered upon the ground, releasing the daylight so that it
exploded up and out, illuminating every dark place and chasing away every shadow. The sky
grew bright and turned blue. The dark mountains took on color and light and form. The snow and
ice sparkled so brightly that the Inuit had to shade their eyes.
The people laughed and cried and exclaimed over their good fortune. But Crow told them that
the daylight would not last forever. He had only obtained one ball of daylight from the people of
the south, and it would need to rest for six months every year to regain its strength. During that
six month period, the darkness would return.
The people said: "Half a year of daylight is enough. Before you brought the daylight, we lived
our whole life in darkness!" Then they thanked Crow over and over again.
To this day, the Inuit live for half a year in darkness and half a year in daylight. And they are
always kind to Crow, for it was he who brought them the light.
Guardian of Yosemite
For many nights and many days, the guardian spirit of Tisayac watched over the beautiful valley
of Yosemite. Often, the gentle spirit would drift invisibly among the good folk of the valley, and
it was during one of these visits that she noticed a tall, proud man named Tutokanula. He was a
strong leader who greatly enhanced the lot of his people, and Tisayac came more often to the
valley so that she could watch him.
One day, Tutokanula was hunting near the place where Tisayac had laid down to rest. When she
realized the proud leader was close by, the shy spirit peered out at him from among the trees.
Seeing the beautiful woman with her golden hair and ethereal appearance, Tutokanula fell in
love. Realizing it was the guardian of the valley, he reached out his hands to her, calling her by
name. Confused by the rush of feelings inside her, Tisayac flew away, leaving a brokenhearted
warrior behind. Tutokanula spent many days searching for Tisayac. Finally he left the valley and
his people in despair. Without his wise guidance, the valley fell into ruin and most of the good
folk left to find a new home.
When Tisayac returned again to her valley, she was horrified to find it barren and her people
gone. When she learned that Tutokanula had forgotten his people, had left them to fend for
themselves without the benefit of his great wisdom, and had spent many days and nights
searching and longing for her, she cried out in despair. Kneeling upon a mighty dome of rock,
Tisayac prayed with all her heart that the Great Spirit would undo this wrong and would restore
to this land the virtue which had been lost.
Hearing her prayer, the Great Spirit took pity on the plight of her people. Stooping down from on
high, he spread his hands over the valley. The green of new life poured forth over the land; trees
blossomed, flowers bloomed, birds sang. Then he struck a mighty blow against the mountains
and they broke apart, leaving a pathway for the melting snow to flow through. The water swirled
and washed down upon the land, spilling over rocks, pooling into a lake and then wandering afar
to spread life to other places. In the valley, the corn grew tall again, and the people came back to
their home.
Then Tutokanula himself came to the valley when he heard that Tisayac had come home. Upon
his return, he spent many hours carving his likeness into the stone so his people would remember
him when he departed from this earth. When the carving was finished, Tutokanula sat down
wearily at the foot of the beautiful Bridal Veil Falls the Great Spirit had created. Tisayac drifted
into the spray of the falls, watching him. He was ready to depart from his people, from his valley.
Would he go with her? She moved forward through the falling water and made herself visible.
When Tutokanula saw Tisayac, he sprang to his feet with a cry of joy and she held out her arms
to him. The brave warrior leapt into the falls and took his love into his arms at last. For a
moment, there were two rainbows arching over the water. Then Tisayac drew him up and up into
the clouds and away as the sun sank over Yosemite.
Pele's Revenge
Ohi'a and Lehua loved each other from the moment they first saw each other at a village dance.
Ohi'a was a tall strong man with a handsome face and lithe form. He was something of a trickster
and was first in all the sports played by all the young men. Lehua was gentle and sweet and as
fragile as a flower. Her beauty was the talk of the island, and her father was quite protective of
his only child.
When Lehua saw the handsome, bold Ohi'a speaking with her father beside the bonfire, she
blushed crimson, unable to take her eyes from the young man. At the same moment, Ohi'a
glanced up from his conversation and his mouth dropped open at the sight of the beautiful
maiden. He was not even aware that he had stopped speaking right in the middle of his sentence,
so overwhelmed was he by the sight of the fair maiden across the fire from him.
Lehua's father nudged the young man, recalling him to his duties as a guest. Ohi'a stuttered and
stammered apologies, trying to continue his conversation while keeping one eye on the fair
Lehua. Lehua's father was amused by the young man's obvious infatuation with his daughter. He
quite liked this bold trickster, and so he offered to introduce Ohi'a to his daughter. The young
man almost fell over in his haste as they walked across the clearing to where Lehua stood with
her friends.
From that moment, there was no other woman for Ohi'a but Lehua. He had eyes only for her, and
courted her with a passion and zeal that swiftly won her heart. Her father gave his only daughter
gladly into the keeping of the strong young man, and the young couple lived quite happily for
several months in a new home Ohi'a built for his bride.
Then one day the goddess Pele was walking in the forest near the home of the handsome Ohi'a
and spied the young man at work. Pele was smitten by him, and went at once to engage him in
conversation. Ohi'a spoke politely to the beautiful woman, but did not respond to her advances,
which infuriated Pele. She was determined to have this young man for herself, but before she
could renew her efforts, Lehua came to the place her young husband was working to bring him
his midday meal.
When he saw his lovely wife, Ohi'a's face lit up with love. He dropped everything at once and
went to her side, leaving a fuming Pele to stare in jealous rage at the young couple. Dropping her
human disguise, the goddess transformed into a raging column of fire and struck Ohi'a down,
transforming him into a twisted ugly tree in revenge for spurning her advances.
Lehua fell to her knees beside the twisted tree that had once been her husband. Tears streaming
down her lovely face, she begged Pele to turn him back into a man or else turn her into a tree, as
she could not bear to be separated from her beloved. But Pele ignored the girl, taking herself up
to the cool heights, her anger satisfied. But the gods saw what Pele had done to the innocent
lovers and were angry. As Lehua lay weeping in despair, the gods reached down and transformed
the girl into a beautiful red flower, which they placed upon the twisted Ohi'a tree, so that she and
her beloved husband would never more be apart.
From that day to this, the Ohi'a tree has blossomed with the beautiful red Lehua flowers. While
the flowers remain on the tree, the weather remains sunny and fair. But when a flower is plucked
from the tree, then heavy rain falls upon the land like tears, for Lehua still cannot bear to be
separated from her beloved husband Ohi'a.
lived out their long lives nobly, but in poverty. Jupiter, the Roman king of the gods, had heard of
the virtuous couple, but based on all his previous experiences with humans, he had serious
Jupiter was about to destroy mankind, but was willing to give it one final chance before starting
over again. So, in the company of his grandson Mercury, the wing-footed messenger god, Jupiter
went about, disguised as a worn and weary traveler, from house to house among the neighbors of
Philemon and Baucis. As Jupiter feared and expected, the neighbors turned him and Mercury
away rudely. Then the two gods went to the last house, the cottage of Philemon and Baucis,
where the couple had lived all their long married lives.
Philemon and Baucis were pleased to have visitors, and insisted that their guests rest before their
little hearth fire. They even lugged in more of their precious firewood to make a greater blaze.
Unasked, Philemon and Baucis then served their presumably starving guests, fresh fruits, olives,
eggs, and wine.
Soon the old couple noticed that no matter how often they poured from it, the wine pitcher was
never empty. They began to suspect that their guests might be more than mere mortals. Just in
case, Philemon and Baucis decided to provide the closest they could come to a meal that was fit
for a god. They would slaughter their only goose in their guests' honor. Unfortunately, the legs of
the goose were faster then those of Philemon or Baucis. Even though the humans were not as
fast, they were smarter, and so they cornered the goose inside the cottage, where they were just
about to catch it.... At the last moment, the goose sought the shelter of the divine guests. To save
the life of the goose, Jupiter and Mercury revealed themselves and immediately expressed their
pleasure in meeting an honorable human pair.
Asked what divine favor they wanted, the couple said that they wished to become temple priests
and die together. Their wish was granted and when they died they were turned into intertwining
trees.