Bob Read
docbob@jayco.net

Table of Contents

Every one called him Spindle, Spindle Sparks. I think his name was Herman, but with those long skinny legs and a name like Herman, its no wonder every one in Franklin knew him as Spindle. My clearest recollection of Spindle is from the middle 1930s. He and his sister, Nan Kidd lived next door to us on the East side of Chicken Row, the dusty, half paved main street into Franklin off the new highway 104. We were only a stone’s throw from the CB&Q tracks. Our homes were four room frame houses supported by sheds for firewood and occasionally some coal. Gardens separated the back doors from the worn, gray out-houses.

Spindle moved in with Nan after her husband, Bert, was killed in a car accident. Spindle was a bachelor and needed a place to sleep, and Nan needed all the help she could get to make ends meet. Spindle was a good worker and a skilled digger of ditches for farm field tile drainage. His tools were a tile spade with a curved blade twelve inches long tapered to a six-inch nose shaped to fit a six-inch diameter terra-cotta tile, and a shovel to clean dirt crumbs from the ditch. Spindle could dig a ditch and install tile so sloped that water was drained perfectly across the quarter mile length of a forty-acre field. His other tools, a pair of rubber boots, should also be mentioned. No professional ditch digger could be without them. Spindle wore them everywhere. I can still picture him, dragging one rubber boot after the other as he trudged home, covered with mud or dust depending on the weather, eyes glued only on the place to put the next foot.

Memories of Spindle are in bits and pieces. I knew him so long ago, and I was busy with a boy’s entertainments and with school. But many images keep me company. Spindle had memorable characteristics aside from skinny legs and hard work. He was kind and most folks liked him for his gentle behavior. He was addicted to alcohol, in the language of the times he was a drunk. And he was a thief. Most folks forgave him for being a drunken thief because, like Robin Hood, he stole from our village "royalty". However the combination of Spindle’s addiction and stealing produced memories at once funny and sad.

Like the time he was caught in the wee hours trying to steal a pump, pipe and all, out of a well behind Uncle Ory’s grocery. Sober, he might have succeeded, but he made so much racket banging the long length of pipe against buckets and pump assembly that he roused the neighborhood. Next day he was hustled before Granddad, W.C. Hart, who was Justice of the Peace. Franklin had no police except for Granddad who doubled as Village Constable and President of the Anti Horse Thief Association. Spindle had been admonished to show up at W.C. Hart’s residence and he did. There he sat on the porch with W.C., the mayor, and several others that took it upon themselves to be important. It was summer and school not being in session, the soft maple tree at the porch corner was full of boys looking to see some fun. Brother Jim and I occupied the best limb, which reached out toward the porch roof.

It was hard to make sense of what was going on. Granddad was reading a lot of whereas and wherefore from a black book. Spindle was subdued, said nothing until Granddad said in a loud voice that they ought to sentence him to hard labor at the county farm. I doubt that the thought of work was of great concern, but the thought of weeks of enforced sobriety brought Spindle to his feet with a howl of protest.

"Now you sit down," demanded Granddad. "You sit right there and pay attention!"

A tree full of boys leaned forward in unison, some slipping as though to fall.

"Spindle Sparks, we’ve overlooked the coal you’ve been stealing from Calhoun’s shed. We know that you’ve got to keep your sister Nan warm next winter. We’ve overlooked a lot Spindle, but taking a pump out of a downtown well is going too far. It would be a shame to lock up Nan’s only means of support, so here’s what we’ve decided."

At this critical point Granddad paused, leaned over the edge of the porch and spit a thick brown stream of "Horseshoe" tobacco juice. Four village elders quickly slid over and followed with the same. Spindle was quiet and appeared to me a little sick.

"Now Spindle, if you will put the pump back in as good condition as you found it, and if you will mow the village park - twice - this summer, we won’t summon the county sheriff to look into this matter. Agreed?"

Spindle’s head bobbed ever so slightly and he mumbled something we couldn’t make out. That sure didn’t satisfy Granddad and his scowl showed it. Just then a boy, I think little Bobby Evans, slipped, grabbed a limb, and let out a little yelp. Granddad looked up sharply, quieting the whole gallery, rose, spit off the porch, and stood over poor Spindle menacingly.

"Do you agree?"

His voice was all the more threatening because it was now controlled and soft.

Now Spindle’s head bobbed a vigorous, silent, agreement.

"Furthermore, if we catch anyone in this town getting whiskey for you, we’ll run ‘em in for violation of our village ordinance. Now you behave yourself and get!"

The tree and the porch unloaded chattering men and boys each headed their own way. Spindle led the crowd, hurrying toward Chicken Row with his head down in embarrassment. No doubt he completed the tasks assigned.

A few weeks later Uncle Ory discovered that his entire inventory of lemon and other flavored extracts had been stolen. No amount of inspection or village detective work revealed the culprit though some suspected that the high alcohol content might have attracted Spindle’s attention. It was recalled that he spent more time than expected in fixing the pump behind the store. The back door did indeed stand open and customers easily distracted Uncle Ory.

Jim and I had no doubt at all. We knew. We had been watching Spindle from the roof of our wood shed. He spent several pleasant summer afternoons in his out-house sitting on the throne dressed only in his rubber boots and a pair of old-fashioned button-up shorts which graced his ankles. He had a jug that appeared to have some water in it and he carefully poured liquid from a collection of small bottles into the jug. Occasionally he would pause and pull a long swig from the jug.

Spindle was happy and he sang. He did not sing well, but from the heart. "O my darling Nelly Gray, they have taken you away, and I’ll never see my darling any more." We clapped and yelled for more until Mother heard the ruckus and shooed us off the roof. She yelled at Spindle to either shut the outhouse door or go in the house. Drunkenly he tried to hide his special alcohol supply and dragged his shorts up to his waist. Try as he would he could not button them. Resigned, he grasped the top of his shorts in one hand and reached with the other for the wire clothesline, which ran from the outhouse to the house. It was clear that he needed the support of that clothesline to stay on his feet. Here he came, swaying dangerously, dragging his rubber boots toward the back door of the house. All the time he was calling, "Nan, O Nan!" He was anticipating a major problem.

Jim and I anticipated it as we peeked around the wood shed. Mother anticipated it as she watched through her back screen door. Nan probably anticipated it, but was far too embarrassed to respond.

Spindle could not open the screen door without letting go either his shorts or the clothesline. When he arrived at the door. He stood quite still for what seemed to be several minutes. Then with a yelp he released both the clothesline and his shorts, fell forward and thrust his head right through the screen. Now he grasped the doorframe with both hands tangled his boots in his fallen shorts and yelled pitifully for help. Nan did not appear. Finally Mother could stand no more. She rushed out the back door of our house, motioned for Jim and I to get in the house "right now", and somehow helped Spindle into his house.

There are many more memories of Spindle; the afternoon he took an unscheduled nap on Nan’s front lawn clad in his long underwear and his rubber boots, the night he got tangled in a discarded bed-spring while stealing fire-wood from Henry Matlock and another occasion while in a fit of sobriety he cut off the tail of an offensive neighborhood cat. Spindle was kind to Brother Jim and me and would never steal from our family. I think of him as the Robin Hood of Franklin and hope that somewhere he is in the company of Friar Tuck, Will Scarlet and all the other good guys. 

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