I
look forward to coming to Texas County in Mid-September to meet with folks from
the surrounding area at the old Melba Theatre on Main Street in Houston. I am supposed
to speak there at 6 p.m. to a group of people who wish to be published writers.
I am not sure what they want to hear. Some of them might be much better writers
than me. But I will do my best to answer questions and act like I know
what I am doing.
As
most of you know, I grew up in Texas County and went to school in Houston,
where I wrote my first newspaper columns at the age of eighteen for editor Lane
Davis and the Houston Herald. But I intend to get there early on that
Saturday just to talk with folks about the outdoors and the conservation
problems we face today in the Ozarks and find leaders who are fed up with what
is happening and would like to see something done to change it.
For
that meeting, I will be there at 5 p.m. hoping that some folks from this Ozark
region will show up to talk about making those changes. The MDC has become, with the influx of
so much money, an increasingly corrupt organization, and they do a heck of a
job of keeping it hidden from the public.
We can change that, and start to protect many of the innocent Ozark
hunters and fishermen who their target of some rogue agents. But we have to get started, and I hope
if you are concerned about what is happening you will show up on that Saturday
afternoon to learn some things about the MDC, which will absolutely astound
you.
Perhaps
we can eventually change their mismanagement of our public lands, where making
money from logging contracts seems to be the only goal, as wildlife becomes
unimportant. If you think you
could be a leader in such a conservation movement, come and meet with me at 5
p.m. on September 15 at that old Melba Theatre. I have a letter which everyone needs to see, sent to me by
someone who has worked for many years in the MDC’s enforcement division. He
outlines how the telecheck system helps the MDC to target those who use it to
check deer and turkeys. You need
to see that letter if you intend to hunt this fall. You will not believe what he reveals about how today’s
agents are ignoring the laws which protect you and using that telecheck system
to do it.
Some
readers have told me they have purchased books I wrote in past years and would
like for me to sign and inscribe them, as my autograph makes them perhaps worth
a nickel more. But if you would like to show up early and aren’t
interested in what little I know about writing, just come between 5 and 6 that evening
and I will sign books for you. I
will also give you a free Lightnin’ Ridge Magazine and while you are there you
can see the old photos and artifacts from the Texas County and Big Piney River
past. One thing I think folks will find really fascinating is my collection of
bluff-dweller artifacts from caves along the river, from the upper Big Piney to
its mouth at the confluence of the Gasconade, and many of its tributaries.
When I was only 13 or 14, wandering the river in the footsteps of my
grandfather, I found perhaps the only ivory artifact known to have been
discovered in the Ozarks, and prehistoric axes, carved bones, bone tools, etc.
Some of what I have is different than anything you’ve ever seen before. And the old photos I am bringing taken a
hundred years or more ago, with the antiques used by Ozarkians of that area in that
time, might also interest you.
Several years back I wrote a book of short stories called, ‘Dogs
and Ducks and Hatrack Bucks’ which has 28 outdoor stories about boys,
illustrated with great pen and pencil art. The idea was to get boys whom
teachers could not get interested in reading… to get interested in
reading. Anyone who has a
youngster who likes the outdoors and hunting and fishing and nature and ghosts,
can get one of those books for free if they want. I have given away a
bunch of them, dozens going to schools that have kids with reading
difficulties.
There
is a certain amount of sadness in going back home to talk about the good old
days. The Piney River is a poor example today of the wonderful free-flowing
clean stream I remember. Many of my classmates from the 50’s and 60’s have
passed on and others have moved far away. But I still have cousins around
Houston, and a few people I remember with fondness from boyhood times. It will
be quite a pleasure to meet with many of them and gather on a stage where I
once saw Lash Larue and the Red Raider and Gene Autry in person, and longed to
be like the cowboys in the old movies shown on that big silver screen behind
it.
I also hope that at 6:00 that evening I can be of some help to
those of you who want to write and have your work published.
You can reach me by calling the Lightnin’ Ridge
office, 417 777 5227
Or writing to me at Box22, Bolivar, Mo.
65613. The email address is
lightninridge47@gmail.com
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