Texas & The Halloween Tale

There's an old Irish legend that came to Texas with some of its earliest settlers about a certain kind of squash that sells by the ton every fall. We’re talking about pumpkins, of course. Or, to native Texans like myself, punkins.

Before I tell you about that old legend though, there's an interesting puzzle of geographic names to consider. We'll call it "The Punkin Center Phenomenon." If anyone ever informs you they’re from Punkin Center, you'll need to ask them to be more specific. Unique as that name might seem, Texas has four different communities called Punkin Center. There’s Punkin Center in Dawson County, Punkin Center in Eastland County, Punkin Center in Hardeman County and Punkin Center in Parker County. And in Wichita County, the community of Haynesville is locally known as Punkin Center even though Haynesville is the official name.

Across the United States, four other communities call themselves Punkin Center. But unlike Texas,  each of those Punkin Centers is in a different state – Arizona, Kansas, Louisiana and Missouri. Strange as the name Punkin Center may seem, it is the 4,438th most popular town name in the U.S.

Texas singer David Allen Coe likes the name. In 1976, he recorded a song called “The Punkin Center Barn Dance.”

But there’s a weird thing about Punkin Centers in Texas. None of them are in counties known for their bountiful pumpkin crops. Floyd County has an annual Punkin Festival but no community named Punkin Center and it is the top pumpkin-producing county in Texas. Other bountiful producers of pumpkins are Bailey, Hale, Lamb and Lubbock counties. Texas, number 1 in terms of number of Punkin Centers, only ranks in the Top 10 of pumpkin-producing states. The estimated value of Texas’ annual pumpkin harvest is $4.6 million. That's a lot of punkins. And it brings us back to that old Irish folktale. 

Back in the 18th century, an Irishman named Jack had an unfortunate propensity for strong, adult beverage. But he didn't let his drinking get in the way of his hatred of the Devil. One dark night after his usual visitation of the local pub, Jack was staggering his way home when the Devil approached him and tried to trick him into giving away his soul. But old Jack was wise to the tricks of that demon and used his own trick into getting the devil to climb up an apple tree. 

Once Jack had the Devil treed, he quickly drew his knife and carved a cross on the trunk, an action he knew would prevent the Devil from climbing down. The Devil pleaded for his freedom and he and Jack finally struck a deal. If Jack would let him down, the Devil promised to never come after Jack's soul again. That seemed like a good trade so Jack covered the cross and the Devil was free to return to his normal level of devilment.

Unfortunately for Jack, his deal with the Devil did not include immortality. When Jack died, his hard drinking, skirt chasing, lie telling and other issues we won't mention sent his spirit down instead of up.

The Devil proved true to his word and refused to allow Jack into the nether regions. But Jack didn't qualify for Heaven either so his spirit was doomed to wander forever between Heaven and Hell.

It's dark between Heaven and Hell so the Devil graciously threw a glowing coal to Jack so he could find his way around. Jack placed the red hot coal in a hollowed gourd to make himself a lantern. And to this very day, Jack wanders to and fro, neither in Heaven nor Hell, his way lighted by that enduring symbol of Halloween, the Jack-O-Lantern.

This Little Piggy Went To Market



Some of these fruits & vegetables went into 
our bags.

I love going to a good Farmer's Market so last Saturday morning, I made Youngest daughter and the Mamma-woman get out of bed, packed them in BFT (Big Ford Truck) and off we went to the Little Rock Farmer's Market. We were not disappointed. Fresh tomatoes, purple hull peas, potatoes, peppers, squash, beans, apples, oranges, and on and on the list of fruits and vegetables went. The colors, the smells, the free samples! It's the little things that make life good.

We carried home some of these big 
 gleaming tomatoes too!

We distributed a bit of our money to a couple of area farmers and they kindly let us leave with a few pounds of purple hull peas, tomatoes, potatoes, and several jars of home-made salsa. That evening, the Mamma-woman cooked up a big batch of those peas with some little pieces of ham, sliced up some of the tomatoes and a big purple onion for eating on the side and added her oh-so-delicious cornbread. Oh my goodness, it was Southern cooking at its finest! That night, home contained one very contented Daddy-man.

It was a bit late for the pears, but the oranges
 and apples were good.

Jars of homemade jam standing in the sun.

Honey with honeycomb from local bee hives - 
yummy! And yes a couple came home with us.







Elvis Slept Here - Part Deaux

(continued from previous post.)

We expected to see a guard shack or at least an "Entering Ft. Chaffee" sign to indicate we had found our destination, but from the way we came in, the only indication was a large commercial sign touting a haunted house up ahead. To our left we saw a couple of old barracks buildings in an advanced state of decay with peeling paint and broken windows. They were surrounded by a weed-infested fence with rolls of barbed wire topping it. To a couple of military vets like Chip and myself, we knew right away it must be some kind of old military prison complex. Spying more old buildings on down the road, we took a left turn and straight away found what we were looking for, the Barber Shop Museum in Building 803, the place where Elvis had his locks shorn. I'm not sure if my old Elvis-fanatic female friends would have broken down weeping at the thought of a peeled-onion-headed Elvis or if they would have just been beyond themselves to be in the same place he had walked.

Entrance to the Barber Shop Museum
 - building 803

The building was well maintained and a sign was out front, but I noticed there were no cars in the parking lot. It was 3:55pm on a Saturday so we figured it was either closed on weekends or we had missed the hours it was open. Deciding we would get out, look in the windows and walk around taking a few pictures, we walked up to the entrance and saw a small sign saying it was open until 4:00. Without much hope, I turned the knob and was surprised to find it still open.

The barber chair Elvis sat in.

We were greeted by Gina and William, volunteer docents. I asked if I could just take a picture of where Elvis got his haircut before they closed and was told, "Sure, no problem. Take your time and look around. We'll keep it open for you." Very nice folks and very knowledgeable as well. The museum was a bit on the small side, but in addition to the chair where Elvis sat, there were a number of memorabilia and historical pictures of the base. While walking around looking at all of the items and reading the informational plaques that went along with them, our two wonderful hosts told us about some of the interesting history of Ft. Chaffee, a history we were totally unaware of. We came simply to see where Elvis got his haircut and, like most good road trips if you let them, we ended up in a more interesting place than we had set out for.

One of the interesting stories Gina and William told us was about the time back in 2010 when they accompanied the TV show Ghost Adventures' crew one night trying to find ghosts at the old hospital. According to Gina, it was dark, it was eerie, it was a little bit scary, but as the night wore on, it was boring. When the show aired, they played up a couple of "unexplained" sounds and something banged on a wall. Gina didn't say the sounds were faked, but did say the building had been abandoned for a number of years and had many broken windows. Rats or other animals? The wind? Before it was over, they were just ready to get back to their room and get some sleep. Pretty cool to be able to say you've done that though!

The building where Elvis lived for a time.

We could have stayed and listened to Gina and William stories on into the evening, but it was way past closing time so we made our goodbyes and headed out to take some pictures of the old barracks. As I was getting a different camera from the truck, Gina and William walked out, stopped and said, "There was a bowling alley over there" and then pointed over to barracks number 823, just a few feet from where we stood and casually said, "That's where Elvis bunked while he was here." Say what? Elvis slept there? There was no sign proclaiming so, but Gina and William said so and they seemed to have a storehouse of factual information so I had no reason to doubt them. I gave Gina a business card and told them I would write about this. So if you guys are reading this, thanks for a wonderful time, thanks for sharing your stories, and thanks for being so nice. And by the way, I researched it later and you were absolutely correct, Elvis slept there.

Row of barracks - Elvis lived in the 1st on the left.

After walking around the locked barracks and looking in a few windows we headed back to the what we now knew, thanks to Gina & William, were the POW barracks which housed German POWs in WWII. We didn't go in to the buildings as they were surrounded by that barbed-wire-topped fence, but mostly because we would have had to tramp through a good distance of chigger infested weeds. Everyone in the southern United States knows about chiggers, but for other folks who might not, trust me, chiggers are little bitty mean, nasty buggers that you can't see, but will make your life miserable for a few days. They live in grass and especially weeds and wait until you walk along and brush up against them whereupon they get on your clothes, make their way onto your skin and bite you and make you itch until you are ready to scream. And they are not easy to kill. You usually just have to endure for a few days until daily bathing finally washes them off. Us southerners are very familiar with the little beasts, but that doesn't mean any of us want to have an encounter with them. I put on my long camera lens and took pictures from afar.

One of the POW barracks which held
Germans in WWII.

We tried to find the remains of the hospital which had burned just 2 months before, but it's a big base with lots of roads and we never were able to find it. We did find another old, abandoned building, but were unable to determine what it was in the past. Apparently, at one point, it had been used as a nursery as there were a number of planting pots, dead plants, and wooden pallets strewn around, but it appeared to be completely abandoned now.

Except for 3 or 4 guys we saw working next to one of the old barracks, we had the base to ourselves. We didn't see anyone else except a couple at the still open golf course and the Janet Huckabee Nature Center. We were free to roam around, take our time and see what we wanted to see. As the sun was sinking, we headed back on Hwy 22 to Ft. Smith for the steak dinner I had to buy Chip because my beloved Longhorns had lost to those dang Sooners.

Fence & barbed wire around the POW 
barracks - & chiggers in the weeds!

If you happen to visit Ft. Chaffee, as always, bring your curiosity, take time to enjoy; bring your camera and take nothing away but pictures. Do no damage and leave things as they are so the next person can enjoy. And if you are fortunate enough to meet Gina & William, tell them I said hi and have them show you where Elvis slept.

One of the old, abandoned barracks building.