An Alternative Education, Part 1

(Detail from “General Highway Map Butler County Kentucky” [1970] prepared by the Kentucky Dept. of Highways. The Lonesome Pine is marked by the little square above the “u” in Huldeville.)

In January 1974 I began a second stint of volunteer work for Glenmary Home Missioners in Butler County, Kentucky. (I’d worked with this small Catholic order the previous year in McConnellsburg, Pennsylvania.) I had just finished my first semester at Ohio University, enjoyed my time there and made friends, but I’d run out of money and held no thoughts of asking for help. (As the oldest of ten kids, I’d simply concluded I was on my own.) A high school classmate, Bill Kirk, was interested in volunteering with Glenmary and looking for a wingman, someone who’d join him on this venture. A West Akron kid, Bill had come a long way from the freckle-faced, sandy-haired imp I’d known as a freshman. Coming of age in the late sixties under the guidance of the Jesuits, we had all grown. I told Bill, in the words of Leonard Cohen, “I’m your man.”

Butler County is located in what is known as the Western Coal Field region (on the land of the Yuchi, Shawnee, Cherokee, and Osage peoples), a dry county just north of Bowling Green, home of Western Kentucky University. Some farming, some strip mining, some small industry and small businesses, lots of rural poverty. The population of the entire county at that time was a bit under 10,000, and about 1,400 people lived in Morgantown, the county seat. The Catholic church in Morgantown was not much more than a missionary lifeboat adrift in a sea of Baptists. Glenmary had stationed a priest and a nun there. The priest was forgettable; the Irish-born nun, Sister Nora, was a holy terror whom I learned to steer clear of, as no-nonsense and severe as her grey habit and the silver crucifix she wore around her neck. 

When Bill and I arrived, we were met by another Glenmary volunteer, Kent, who was coincidentally from Hudson, the town just north of my hometown in northeast Ohio. He welcomed us and helped us settle into the house he’d been renting. We called it The Lonesome Pine for the big cedar beside the front porch. It was located on a single-lane dirt road about seven miles northwest of Morgantown and a little more than a mile off the blacktop, near the unincorporated community of Huldeville. The house had a front room, a middle room, and a kitchen. There was a full-length front porch and a back porch that provided access to the well from which we drew water by letting down a galvanized bucket and hauling it up. The other backdoor off the kitchen led to the outhouse. We had electricity and a coal stove for heating. We all slept in the front room, our de facto dormitory. It was all thrillingly rustic.

Our mission was rather vague. Brother Al had given me the names of a couple of teenage boys in Morgantown whom I should try to befriend. They played basketball, pretty much the state sport of Kentucky, so I started scouting the outdoor hoops located beside most any free slab of blacktop, looking for opportunities to join pick-up games. We attended Mass on Sundays and visited afterward with the priest and Sister Nora and the handful of parishioners. The Phelps family were among the most active members – Walt and Betty Phelps and their five children lived about a half mile from us. Walt was a gruff, taciturn ex-Army mechanic from Brooklyn, New York, who had been stationed at Fort Knox, where he met Betty. A Butler County girl, Betty was the emotional backbone of the family, warm-hearted and quick to laugh but also solid and unflappable. After Walt left the service, they moved back here. We visited with them often and played with their kids. I wish I could remember their names – the oldest daughter was thirteen or so, the youngest boy was three or four. Walt had a Volkswagen repair shop located in the drive-in basement of a friend’s house. We often hung out with him while he was working on a car. The family surely lived well below the poverty line, but they somehow got by. For all that they didn't have, they did have a wealth of joy and happiness. Seeing this in action was a meaningful discovery for me.

Morgantown has never been served by a railroad line, but the Green River flows through it and was an important means of transportation until the 1920s. There were two main restaurants in town, the Farm Boy and the Kuntry Kitchen. They both featured Green River catfish and hush puppies on their menu. I composed a poem about this, using all the local color and dialect I could muster. In retrospect, the poem’s commentary on the role of women is a bit cringey, but it was what it was. The Phelps kids loved the poem – I think because it celebrated a place and way of life they knew – and almost any time I saw them, they’d ask me to recite it: 

Green River catfish 

got the best taste –

when ya feed ’em to the kids, 

ain’t none left to waste.

Sittin’ on the banks

of the ol’ Green River,

sippin’ from a fruit jar, 

messin’ up your liver.

Catch a couple cat – 

they gonna give ya a fight.

If you can’t fish a lick, 

you might be there all night.

Take ’em on home, 

give ’em to your ol’ lady,

say: “Make ’em taste right, 

I’m gettin’ hungry, Sadie.

Fix me up some home fries, 

a mess of collard greens,

and to wash it all down, 

a pot of sassafras tea.”

Take a chaw off your plug, 

sit right where you’re at,

stay a spell and brag 

about Green River cat.