The Deerflat Water Tower Attack

In ‘71 when I was a junior in high school the county decided Deerflat was in great need of a water tower.  I don’t believe anyone ever determined what that great need was but in less than eight months we had a water tower.  I’ll admit it was quite impressive even though the majority of Deerflat’s 212 citizens hadn’t a clue as to what purpose it was gonna serve.  We knew it held water, even though we’re country we could figure that much, but other than that, who knew or even cared. They put the tower up towards the top of Germantown Hill (I know what you’re thinkin’.  Why is it called Germantown Hill?  I ain’t got an idea.  There ain’t a German within 50 miles and to the best of my recollection there ain’t never been.) just at the openin’ of Collins Hollow so’s everyone drivin’ up or down Highway 41A goin’ to or from Kentucky could get a good look.  The county painted the thing bright blue and put ‘DEERFLATS’ in four foot letters on the side facin’ the road and I’ll be dang if they didn’t add an unneeded ‘S’.  Deerflats in big ol’ letters.  Most folks near bouts didn’t pay no mind to the water tower but that ‘S’ got ‘em riled up everytime they saw it.  The ‘S’ is gone now as well as most of the other letters.  Old timers in these parts always claim time’ll take care of most problems so I guess they was right.  In time the letters just wore off.

At the risk of offendin’ any animal lover I gotta tell ya we eat deer.  Every year most families try to get at least three to process and freeze for the comin’ year, four if we can cause you always want a little meat you can share with your neighbors if they happen to run out.  Gun season opens on Thanksgiving Day so come 5:00 that mornin’, Dinnie Russell, Poke Paramore and myself was already on our way up along Collin’s Ridge, our favorite huntin’ spot.  We’d picked out some prime spots for blinds a couple a weeks before but as these things usually go we didn’t see hide nor hoof for the next four hours.  Long bout 9:30 I made my way over to Dinnie and informed him I’d had enough and as how we could come on back that evenin’ and try again.  Dinnie agreed so we gathered up Poke and started back to the house.  At the end of the ridge, before we started downhill into the hollow, we had to stop so’s Poke could have a smoke.  Poke’s been smokin’ since he was about 8 years old.  Nasty habit but he seems to enjoy it some.  Anyways, as we was sittin’ there we had a good view of that new water tower across the valley.  Poke was a sittin’ there smokin’ and starin’ at that tower ‘till he finally offered as how he hated that danged ‘S’ and how we should climb that danged tower and paint over it.  Dinnie and I offered right back that we weren’t climbin’ no towers.  Period. 

After a few more minutes of considerin’ Poke wondered aloud if we thought he could hit that dang tower from here with his 30/30.  Dinnie eyeballed the distance and allowed as if he was to raise his sights ‘bout a foot he more’n likely could.  I had to agree.  Dinnie and I then started discussin’ whether or not a bullet might punch a hole in the side and right ‘bout the time we decided it very well might Poke fired off a round which startled us some to say the least.  Weren’t but a second or two and we all heard the ping as the bullet hit the tower.  Now our first mistake was in thinkin’ that since we’d heard a ping the bullet must have bounced off and done no harm more’n a dent.  Our second mistake comes a little later but I’ll be getting’ to that.  Since Poke had hit the tower Dinnie and I had to give it a try as well so for the next 20 or 30 minutes we blasted away at that despised water tower.  After 4 or 5 shots apiece we’d had enough and decided to head home, ‘sides, Dinnie only had two shells left and wanted to save ‘em for huntin’ later.  We didn’t give that tower another thought and since my Dad put us to work that evenin’ splittin’ more firewood we didn’t go huntin’ again that day after all.

Next mornin’ when I came down for breakfast my Dad was drinkin’ coffee and readin’ the Deerflat Messenger as he always does.  I’d no more’n sat down when he flips the front page to me and says look at what some fool’s gone and done.  I picked up the paper and on the front page in bold black letters was, ‘Deerflat Water Tower Attacked by Vandals’.  I guess I don’t need to tell ya my heart stopped for nigh on to a full minute.  Poke, Dinnie and I have pulled our share of stunts and I’d say on about 75% of ‘em we’d got caught and took the punishment but those were just stunts.  This little episode was gonna turn out to be a law enforcement issue.  Seems all those rounds we’d fired at the water tower hadn’t pinged off like we thought.  We’d put about 14 or 15 bullet holes in the county’s new tower and it was leakin’ something fierce resulting in the county’s vow to apprehend the perpetrators, that’d be us.  We’d done graduated from prankster to perpetrator in one day which in my book is not a good thing.  After a desperate search for Dinnie and Poke and a rather brief meeting, we decided to keep our mouths shut as we hadn’t seen anybody while we was huntin and nobody’d seen us.  To us it seemed silence on the subject was just about our only key to continued freedom so we vowed then and there to keep that silence.

Weren’t but an hour or so later we was out by the wood pile just a sittin’ and watchin’ Poke try to throw his buck knife and stick it in a section of hickory log all the while braggin’ on how he was gonna ask Rita Sizemore, my neighbor Haskell Sizemore’s middle girl, to the Christmas dance.  Dinnie and I was spendin’ our time informin’ Poke that we was pretty sure Rita hated his guts and it weren’t gonna happen when Calvin Clement came strollin’ up the drive. Calvin’s a good boy and a friend.  Me an Poke an Dinnie’s all juniors and even though Calvin’s our age he’s only in the 6^th grade.  Now there ain’t nothing wrong with Calvin ‘cept he can’t learn or at least learn like the rest of us but we ain’t never held that against him.  We don’t poke fun at him and we don’t let nobody else either.  First thing Calvin did was question whether we’d heard ‘bout the water tower shootin’ or not.  Oh yeah, we’d heard but we let that vow of silence kick in.  Next Calvin offered up as how since we always hunted up that way every openin’ day seems like we’d have heard shots or something.  For our part we didn’t offer a single comment.  Calvin may be slow but he ain’t a moron.  He just sorta smiled at us and asked what’s up.  Before I could stop him Poke spills the whole story right then and there.  This was mistake number two I mentioned earlier.  Thinkin’ back now I should have shot Poke when I had the chance up on the ridge.  Our only hope now was to convince Calvin to keep his mouth shut no matter what.  Dinnie pointed out how Calvin tended to let things slip now and again.  Weren’t Calvin’s fault, he just wasn’t bright enough to know what not to say when.  I don’t recollect what we did the rest of that day but I do know we spent most of it reminded Calvin to keep his mouth shut regardless.

Time past, as it usually does, and we assumed, Poke, Dinnie and me, that the water tower attack had been forgotten or at least wasn’t in the forefront of folks’ minds.  This assumption held true until Easter Sunday of ’72.  In Deerflat, even the most unreligious attend services at the First Church of the Resurrection of Our Lord and Savior twice a year.  Christmas and Easter.  The habit is so common here ‘bouts that the Pastor took to baptizing all the mice in the church building figurin’ that if they was Christian mice he’d only see ‘em twice a year.  The Easter of ’72 the Pastor decided to bring us a sermon on the fun of the past and that yet to come.  At one point he asked if any in the congregation would like to elaborate on an experience they’d like to share.  I don’ remember who but someone stood and asked if we all remembered that time Harlon Stubach claimed a bear ate his watermelons.  Of course Harlon had to jump right up and claim it weren’t fun or funny, it was the truth.  Then someone wanted us to remember Haskell Sizemore’s boy suin’ the dogfood company.  Everyone was a smilin’ and laughin’ and carryin’ on when Calvin just stood up and said out load how ‘bout that time Poke, Dinnie and Tobey shot up the new water tower.  You’ve heard that expression you could hear a pin drop?  It was quieter than that I want ya to know.  Course Calvin was sorry he’d let it slip out and, of course the law got involved in the whole matter and of course, as you can imagine, our Daddies weren’t too happy with us either.  Final out come was that we weren’t arrested as we feared we’d be.  We wouldn’t even have a record.  We did have to pay something called restitution to the tune of $2,000 each to cover repairs to the water tower which neither Dinnie, Poke or I had.  Poke’s Daddy paid his out of Poke’s college fund which weren’t no great loss as Poke wasn’t gonna get into no college anyways.  Dinnie had to sell 4 of the Herford cows his granddaddy had give him and throw in a good part of the money he’d saved balin’ hay last fall.  My Dad made me sell my truck, which was only worth about $500, and he paid the other $1,500 hisself.  To this day nearly 40 years later my Dad still like to point out now and then that I still owe him.  I can’t do much but agree.

I’d like to be able to say we, Poke, Dinnie and I, learned our lesson but I can’t.  We went on to engage in several other notable stunts and paid the price for most of ‘em.  Calvin’s still a good friend as we couldn’t find it in us to hold what happened against him, matter of fact, he works for Dinnie now and has for the past 12 years.  We did learn one lesson we still hold to even now, years later.  We don’t tell Calvin nothin’.  What Calvin don’t know won’t get us in trouble.