Free Americans a endangered species

Civilized freedom to the point of freedom lost! What is the cost of the false feeling of security? I have been following this latest government intrusion of our lives in the news the last few days. People are subjecting themselves and children to being groped by a stranger in the name of security. What happens next when a terrorist hides an explosive in a body cavity or is implanted under the skin? Do we then subject everyone to a complete body cavity search? Even worse I heard Sean Hannity say everyone should carry a security card to be scanned. Does that sound familiar is not that what Nazi Germany did? I believe we have already lost to the terrorist as we are disrupting are lives as well as giving up are freedom.And as usual the government closes the barn door after the cow has gotten out. I for one will not give up the fight for I fear not as much as myself but for my son and grandchildren as the only freedom they will know may be from reading about it in a history book. Or will the government rewrite that book or will they have security clearance to even read it?

Stories of Kinzer holler and the Hickory grove

I have hunted the ridge in front of uncle Ken’s house for many years and many more to come.
the ridge as been clear cut at different time thru the years and it changes the animal patterns each time as it is ever evolving. It is out on the point that it never seems to change, as well as the Hickory grove as the timber cutters have no real value in the Hickory’s so it has remained fairly constant.
I got my first squirrel out on the point one fine September afternoon with Uncle Ken. We were sitting and talking quietly when a fox squirrel ran up a maple. we must of startled him on his journey somewhere and when he stopped on the body of the little maple to check us out. I shouldered my gun and fired. The squirrel fell but when we walked over to fetch him up I could not find him. My Uncle came over and looked the ground over and said there he is Beach look at the end of that hollow Sassafras there, see his tail. He had enough energy to crawl part of they in just his was all that was hanging out.
I was deer hunting out on the point one very cold morning in December. I had positioned my self behind a huge old oak and sat down with my back to the point as the wind was howling that morning. I was trying to keep out the cold wind and every few minutes I would take a peek around the tree to see if any deer were moving up the point. I had seen them doing it almost every week thru squirrel season. I peeked a few times and nothing. The time between peeks got longer and longer as the colder I got. After about and hour and half I thought I heard something. I raised my head and turned toward my right and when I did I was eye to eye with a doe. Her eyes got as big as saucers we were so close I could have kissed her. I thought well here we go as I moved she leaped and in mid air turned her body the opposite direction. I started to shoulder my gun as I was turning and seen five more deer right behind her. it was a covey of deer. And all were flying over the point I did not know which to shoot at and never got off one shot. I made the mistake of telling My Uncle Ken that story he told everyone that the deer ate the hat right off of my head while I was sleeping
The eight point that did not get away was on the point almost the same spot as the deer that ate my hat.
It was another cold December day and I had positioned my self behind another large oak and this time I was facing the point and I did go to sleep. I put myself there because I had seen a big buck for the last two weeks that I squirrel hunted and seen him traveling thru the green briar thicket just below me. I had been a sleep about 45 minutes when a crunching noise disturbed my sleep. I slowly raised my head to find this huge buck about 18 to yards away and looking down the point , he had no ideal I was there. I took my time and shoulder my gun and fired and he fell. I was very happy to say the least as I stood up so did the buck. I was not so happy now. I had not killed the buck just hit his spine and he was now crawling away from at a good pace for just having his to front legs as he was dragging his hind legs . Just as he was going over the point I got off another shot which finished the job. Now the other deer that I had killed up to that time were small and I had help dragging them out. It took me the better part of two hours to drag this brute down the mountain. But when the job was finished I lit up a big cigar and reveled in my prize. He hangs in my family room still and reminded of the excitement of those first few minutes that I laid my eyes on him.
I was entering the Hickory grove very slowly one October morning slowly as the squirrel’s were now on the ground a lot. I thought I seen some movement to my left on the ground . I slowly started my gun up when I seen is was a little six point buck moving slowly toward me. I let my gun down slowly and started watching the buck, the wind was hitting me in the face. .He kept getting closer and closer I stood there not moving a muscle and thought how close would he come before he seem or smelled me. After about forty minutes I found out he came with 20 feet of me and laid down. I could not believe it and by now my muscle were aching. And to make it worse I looked down the deer path and there was two fox squirrel’s chasing each other and they were starting to get into gun range. When the squirrel’s got into range I slowly started to move my gun back up and the minute I moved the buck launched from his spot and down the deer trail. I shot at the squirrel but the deer had scared them so bad their first leap must have been twenty feet and I missed the biggest one in front. I had no game but was one of my most exciting hunts.
My nephew Matthew took his first deer there in the grove when he was eleven years old . We found a well used trail thru the grove and sat down about forty yards away , just above the trail. About twenty minutes passed and I seen a young deer heading right toward us . I elbowed Matthew and pointed and he slowly raised his gun. The first shot missed and the deer turned and Matthew fired again and the deer fell over grave yard dead. I congratulated him and as we walked up to the deer I seen that Matthew had got a lucky shot off and hit the deer in the eye with the slug. I said that was lucky as hell and he quickly said what do you mean lucky. that is where I aiming. I asked him you were what aiming for his eye. Yes he said with a smile he winked at me so I shot him in the eye. I still say it was a lucky shot.
The days the turkey’s scared me was on the point. I started that morning before daylight as I always did in those days of my youth. It was just beginning to get a daylight as I neared the top of the point. I acme around a different direction this morning as to try and get a better angle on a big scaly bark hickory that the squirrel’s were working on. I ha stopped to rest and listen for the squirrel’s cutting on hickory nuts. I was leaning against a big chestnut oak when all of a sudden a roar like noise and debris starting falling on me from the top of the tree. It startled me pretty bad. I thought what the hell is the tree falling on me or what? I finally gained my composure and seen the three big turkeys flying I thought all the racket would scare the squirrel’s into the next county.
I have taken a lot of game off that point and out of the hickory grove thru the years. From some very memorable and some not. these are just a few I am sure as I read thru my journals and talk with my uncle and cousin Lester I will have more to add to the adventure’s of the point and Hickory grove

Pheasant for supper

Kenny Ray sharpshooter

The Little boy limited out Saturday with two pheasants at the youth hunt put on by Greene county fish and game. Lester went out with me to see the club and watch Kenny Ray. I have to say that the Little boy is a very good shot a chip off the old block. He comes from a long line of excellent shooters. Although he should be a good shot he has been shooting since he was two years old. I had took a day off from work I on November nineteen of 1999 and as I was leaving the house in all of my camo, I went to kiss him good-bye he asked “daddy where are you going”? I said son daddy is going to go deer hunting today.
He then asked “ daddy can I go with you”? I said yes if you want to, and his mother started crying. I said Tari what is wrong and she said I knew you would get him someday but I did not think it would be this soon. She wiped away the tears and helped get him dressed in his camo we kissed her good bye.
It was a beautiful fall day the temperature was in the seventies and when I got down to Uncle Kens, dad and Ken where surprised to see us. And they asked what are planning on doing and Kenny Ray said we are going deer hunting. Dad looked at me I told him I think we will just get in the woods and walk around for a while and just enjoy the day. Dad then told me to go in and get the Slip O {uncle Kens twenty gauge shotgun} and we will let Kenny Ray shot some. I hesitantly said ok So the three of us started into the wood s and up the ridge when we got on this little bench we stopped to rest and Kenny Ray put is toy binoculars to his eyes and looked around. Dad said son lets him shoot. I loaded the Slip O and asked Kenny Ray “do you want to shoot”? He quickly answered yes. So I bent down and held the gun and showed him how to hold where the trigger was. And with that he squeezed the trigger and the gun went off. I was nervous as he did not like loud noises but as soon as the gun went off his little blonde head swung around to me and asked shoot again daddy. He shot the Slip O three time’s that afternoon and the tree of us walked around the woods just talking. It was one of the best hunts I have ever had.
I have a picture in a shadow box frame in my trophy room of Dad and Kenny Ray holding the Slip O and the three spent shotgun shells at the bottom of the frame.

Sweet Appalachia

Appalachian remote control and jumper cables

I was sharing some memories about my grandpa Patton with you the other day. And as I was sitting by the heating stove at the cabin this morning watching the sun come with a cup of coffee and my thoughts about the past, I decided to share a few more. The house I remember was a four-room house with a porch across the front and down one side, the porch step was a large rock, and the well was on the side porch. You had to lower the this tube about three or four feet long and it was about four inches in diameter and when it was done to the water you pulled a cord that opened a trap door and the water would enter the tube, you released the cord and the lid closed you then pulled up the tube by the chain and pulley. You then swung the tube over your bucket pulled the cord and the water was released. If you where doing laundry or dishes you the put the water on the stove to heat it. Drinking water was in a bucket on the counter and a schoolhouse dipper was in it you simply got a drink and put the dipper back in the bucket for the next person. Tari cannot comprehend that everyone drank from the same container, as she is a city person. Anyway the house set in a little bottom in a narrow holler the garden was out in front of the house, as wells a couple of coon hounds tied to fifty five gallon drum dog house’s, and the tobacco field behind the house a small creek with a plank foot bridge ran down one side for about seventy five or eighty yards and then joined by a small creek that ran from the hillside and the outhouse sat on this creek. The inside of the house was very simple all the rooms had linoleum floors the kitchen had a table and chair that sat next to a window and the chest freezer sat at the end of the table next to the wall, and of course a refrigerator, stove and a Hoosier type cabinet and the ringer washer sat in a corner. In the center of the house was a coal burning pot belly stove, I can still hear the shaking of the grate in my mind still today just as if I had done it this morning and is has been thirty years.
Two bedrooms one small with a bed and the wardrobe, one large with to big beds. Each bed had a feather mattress and on big feather pillow that went across the bed and each with homemade quilts on them, and under the one big bed by the door that led out onto the front porch had a chamber pot under it. The living room had to couches a TV and a gun rack. The TV got two channels and the antenna sat up on the mountain, which brings me the story. Grandpa Uncle Bob and I wanted to watch the UK Basketball game but the signal was not very good so we had to adjust the antenna. With my grandpa on the couch locking at the TV my aunt Evelyn on the porch me about half up the mountain and Uncle Bob at the antenna. He moved it one-way and hollered at me how; that I then hollered how’s that to Evelyn she asked grandpa how’s that. He would a little more then Evelyn hollered a little more to me and then I hollered a little more to Bob. And this continued till the picture came in better, and this all was done in the dark of night, and there you have Appalachian remote control.
My grandpa had a couple of heart attachs before he passed away, on the first one he had I to laugh as the ambulance drivers told my uncle Bob and mom that the whole time they were taking him to hospital and working all he kept asking was he much he owed them for the ride. When he was in the hospital in intensive care mom and I was allowed to go in and visit for a few minutes. And in the room was this mountain of a man in this bed with all of these wire hooked to him they had to shave parts of his chest to attach them. And at some time during our visit he looked over at me with sorrow in eyes and said “ Branson what ever you do don’t let them hook those jumper cables to you”. I will never forget that day.