Sheriff Billy Meeker decided to retire from sheriffin' and nobody stepped up to run for the office. One evening, Joe, Jimmy and me was talkin' on the porch and Jimmy said, "Isaac, why don't you run for County Sheriff?"
I told him, "NO WAY!" I then looked at Joe and he immediate throw up his hands. I asked him, "Why not, it needs a good man and you sure are that!"
Joe finally agreed and went up to Redding Town and filed his papers. One other man filed just before the election, Caleb Mills. Caleb Mills musta wanted the job pure bad, he stumped all over the county, shakin' hands and meetin' folk. When the election come around, Joe were sure Caleb Mills would be Sheriff, but when the results was posted, it were Joe by a rockslide!
I told him Sheriff Joe Blount do sound mighty fine! It were a big county, but not many folks lived in it. He made Kelly his Deputy and give him a big star to wear when he were on "Official Business"! Carley were none too pleased about it, but she never said much to me. Mr. Meecham were elected as County Judge and he kept Joe and Kelly busy one week a month when court were in session.
Joe's big excitement came in the middle of the night, the Town Constable of Marysville Town, Hank Little, come pounding on Joe's door, hollerin' that the Bank had been robbed! Joe grabbed Kelly and deputized some of the hands and me, then we raced off to Marysville Town hell bent! We was gone four days chasin' those no-goods, we chased them near to Sacramento Town before we caught up to them. We knowed they was the bandits, they had Poppa's metal box with our gold in it tied to one of the horses! We hauled them back to Redding Town for Judge Meecham to hold court over.
The State were building a new prison down in Folsom, near Sacramento Town. He give them 30 years for bank robbin'! Joe and me decided to put that box of gold back in the ground under the barn. That were to prove a good thing very soon!
Between bein' Sheriff and farming, Joe were as busy as a three legged dog! Spring opened to wonderful weather, just right for planting. We cut the winter wheat and got a near record price for it! As we was planting the red wheat, corn and rice, we read in the weekly that things wasn't good in New York!
News of something they was calling a "CRASH" were reported. The article said that some big companies in New York failed and when the banks called in their loans, there was no money! New York was a far piece from us, so's we didn't worry much about it. Jeff was taking some cash into Marysville Town to deposit in the bank, he come racing back, his horse all lathered up and heaving, "Isaac, the bank is closed!" He screamed to me.
I replied, "OK, make the deposit next week."
He hollered back, "Closed as in OUT OF BUSINESS!"
That were just the beginning, there were hardly no buyers for our grain and orders dried up for the cheese and fruits! Folks up in Redding Town was asking for credit at the store, we decided to give as much credit as we could. We wasn't gonna starve no folks!
By Christmas, things was grim and Joe were serving eviction notices to folk, makin' them leave their farms! He were ready to throw that durned badge away! We kept the store open, using Poppa's box of gold coins, folks was even promisin' theys farms for food!
Tim and me were in Redding Town and we went to check on the store. Out front was a gaggle of children and Carter Evans were doling out some food. The children was crying and so were Carter! He looked up and saw us, He said, "Mr. Blount, I am so sorry, but I just can't turn hungry children away! You can take it out of my pay!"
I said to him, "FEED THEM!"
Tim were crying, "Isaac, we gotta help these children, look, they are so skinny!"
It took me all of an eye-flash to decide, "Tim, go get Jimmy's freight wagon and horses, we will take them home with us!" While Tim ran to Jimmie's shop for the wagon and team, I gathered up the children. There were eight little girls and sixteen boys, some as little as three years old. I sat on the store steps and broke open a box of apples and a tin of cookies, making sure that each child got some. I said, "Children go tell your parents that we are taking you to Blount Farm for a spell."
More than half the children cried and told me that their parents was gone or that they didn't have any parents! One boy, he told me his name were Carl Blevins, said, "I's been keeping these children safe but we's out of food and the Constable run us out of the old house we was sleeping in."
I hugged him and asked, "Son, how old are you?"
He looked down at the ground and mumbled, "I's fourteen, sir."
I thought, "Heavenly Father, a fourteen year old boy is trying to parent twenty-four children!" I told him that they all could come to Blount Farm and then we would see what needed to be done! Carl hung on my necked and sobbed.
Tim arrived with Jimmie's wagon and we loaded up the children and headed for home. Tim rode ahead, hell bent to let folks know what was coming! We arrived at home, Janith, Carley, Maggie and Eliza May was setting out pots of food under the orchard trees. It were mostly stew, there were also bread and butter, pitchers of milk and hunks of cheese already set out. The women washed each child's hands and set them down to the food. Those children must have been near starved, every scrap of food were eaten!
Poor Kelly were in tears when he saw those children, it must have taken him back to his own early days! He and Carley took in two of the little girls and the next day he come back for a little boy, the brother of one of the girls he had in his house! It were a short thing, finding places for two dozen children to sleep, some of the older boys slept in the bunkhouse with the hands!
Terry come to me the next morning, tears in his eyes, "Mr. Isaac, them boys is nothing but skin and bones, you kin count theys ribs clear across the room!" Janith said pretty much the same thing about the girls.
We finally put the girls spread out in the houses and the hands doubled up so's there were a spare bunkhouse for the boys. No parent ever did come looking for theys child! We are going to need to come up with a better arrangement soon, I don't believe these are the only children in need!
Things began to get a little bit better by the end of the next summer. We got a half-way respectable price for our wheat and corn, and Anchor Beer swallowed up all our rice right aways. It were slim, but we did show a profit, so's we decided to have bunkhouses built for the boys that was staying with us. The girls was doing just fine in the several houses. We had three bunkhouses built, theys had bedrooms like a house and would hold four boys in a bedroom.
We had hardly got them built but what Carter found another eight boys living in the abandoned house just down the street from the store. He brought them down in the delivery wagon, oh theys was a sorry sight! Dirty, rags for clothes and so skinny theys nothing but skin and bones. One little boy, Johnny Braithwaite, and Steven become instant friends, they were both the same age and Steven hollered and shouted until I let Johnny sleep with him. The two become like brothers! We had thirty-two children extra living with us, it were time for a Family Council!
The women were being run near ragged trying to take care of an extra thirty-two children, the boys wasn't so bad but frightened little girls is another matter! There weren't no way we was gonna turn them children out and weren't nobody coming to claim them. We all sat down for a "war council" one night and decided if we's was gonna keep the children and not turn them out, then we's needed to build a proper house for them!
Well the hands took the boys under their wings and soon they was riding line with the hands. We called in the carpenters what built our house and told them what we needed, Theys come up with a three story house with twenty bedrooms and places for adults to live there also! Theys got started right away and none too soon! The hands was getting' grumpy all crowded into one bunkhouse!
They loved those boys though, theys might complain about bein' crowded, all in one bunkhouse but don't nobody say nothing bad about them boys, they be right down on them, fast like! Them boys belonged to the hands and don't nobody say nothing any different! It weren't long before the boys was riding right alongside the hands doing they's chores!
Soons as the carpenters got the home built, we let the boys choose theys bedrooms. There were a near battle until we's let five small boys sleep in one room! Kelly and Carley took over running the Boy's Home, Carley were already expectin' but it didn't slow her down none! It become a common sight to see some boys hanging out laundry with Carley supervising!
Slowly things become better, prices come up on our grain and we took over what were left of the bank in Marysville Town. Folks was surely glad to see us open the bank door for business! Nobody never come to collect they's children and the older boys was startin' to work for us. We opened a school room and hired a teacher, Mr. Blake, who did a good job learning them theys letters and maths!
I got the weeps one day when Carl Blevins called me "Poppa"! I didn't tell him not to, it made him feel right good and me too! Pretty soon all the children was callin' me Poppa and poor Maggie near died when they called her Auntie Maggie! Kelly still calls me Uncle Isaac, so's I guess we really is one big happy family!
The Carlsons just moved away from their farm. Jan Carlson give me the paper deed to their place before they left saying that they would never be back. They had lost their boy to the croup and they wanted nothing more to do with California! Their place were 2,000 acres so I told the boys livin in the Home that I would supply the machinery and the seeds, if they would farm it, we would split the profits.
Carl led the boys out to do the plowing, danged ifn they didn't do a man's job! We planted it all in red wheat and the price were darned good that year, we got $8,000 for their wheat, although I told them we got $10,000. They split their $5,000 eight ways and we carried eight proud boys to Marysville Town to open bank accounts! They spent most of it on Christmas presents for the other children, but it were theys money! Those boys was high strutters for a while!
Most those boys stayed at the Home until they was 18, then they went to work, most of them with us on Blount Farms! Carl became a foreman on Blount Farms, little Bobby, the three year old boy, took to numbers like a duck to water and ended up working alongside Jeff, doing our accounts!
The Home were never empty, boys was always living in it! It were a permanent fixture in our hearts! Things was getting' better, the year ended with a fair profit. I suddenly realized I were turning 40 years old! It were 1882 and I can hardly remember the years passin'! I hope it were gonna be a good year!
Carl come running hell bent one afternoon, there was some men, he said they was surveyors, and they wanted permission to cross our land. I rode out with Carl, the men were from Southern Pacific Railroad Company and they wanted a track right of way across our property. I told them they could, but I wanted a freight siding on our property in exchange for the land. The head man said he would have to get approval of that from San Francisco, but didn't think it would be a problem.
Four weeks later they was puttin' in siding tracks for Blount Siding! That were going to be a big help in shippin' grains! We was the only owners of a private siding anywheres near!
The winter wheat took a blight and our harvest were off near half! We planted 25,000 acres to red wheat, we could not have done it without using three steam tractors, the poor old Percherons were gone to old age and they just couldn't keep up with those iron monsters! Heck, it took four boys, near men, to keep the harvester grain chute clear! We even used a steam tractor this year to haul the grain wagon to the silo! We done worked that poor machine near to death! We had a wagon and two horses pulling the barrels of fuel for those infernal machines! They was always thirsty for coal oil or water!
The Southern Pacific has two trains a week. If we had cargo, we put up a red flag and theys left off an empty box car. If we put up a blue flag, theys left us a grain gondola. It were a rare operation to fill that gondola from our wagons until Jimmie done invented a thing he called a grain screw! It were so handy, we had him build us one that went to the top of the silo, rather than us pull up a ramp to the top with the whole wagon load!
Befores I knowed it, Jimmie were adding to the height of our silos, he near doubled our capacity just with higher walls! The hands were grateful, there be no more shovel work to empty the wagons into the silos! Joe planted us 4,000 acres of rice and Anchor Beer done bought the whole crop before it were ever harvested! They was calling theys beer Anchor Steam Beer, I don't knows why, I guess I ain't no beer drinker. Joe and me ain't touched none of that stuff ever since Uncle Bill got us hoopy on nogs! I know Jimmie tried it, one morning he were dumping his guts over the porch rail at his house and Maggie were giving him fits! Tim smokes a cigarillo thing now and then, when he don't think me or Joe see him! No ways would Janith let him smoke the thing in our house!
It is surely a joy to come home each day and have children come running, callin' me Poppa! Steven be the leader of that mob, theys seven of them and theys all young gentlemen!
I were surely proud of Carl, he restarted the dairy and cheese making all on his own. He ships 450 pounds each week by rail in boxes he designed with a space for the ice to keep the cheese cold! He collects telegraph orders each Tuesday in Marysville Town and ships on the Friday southbound train! Between the Dairy and the cheese house, he is running a crew of 35 men and 6 women! Theys a fanciful eating house in San Francisco that serves only his cheese, theys take over 300 pounds a week! He says that someday he will go there and see what they do with his cheese, but I don't think he ever will, heck, he won't hardly go to Redding Town!
We lost Aunt Emma in the fall, she died in her sleep. She were the last of Momma and Poppa's generation. It were sad to see her go, but she weren't happy without Uncle Bill, so maybe it be for the best.
Jimmy were all abuzz, he ordered a new kind of steam tractor, it have no wheels! He say it be good for boggy land, it were invented by two brothers down in Stockton Town. The durned thing arrived at our siding on a flat car, it were humongous! He were right, no wheels! It got these tread like things running each side and it rests on those! He fired it up on coal oil, the blasted thing near scared every chicken in the county! It hooted and screeched until he got the thing adjusted. It do work good in the boggy land, but it takes two men to run the thing! Jimmy were beaming on how wonderful it were, I think it need to go back for a new design! Anyways, we got it so's I guess we use it!
For Christmas, I took my boys, all seven, to San Francisco on the train. It were a real expedition, keeping seven teen boys under control! There were an amazed park right in the town, it were all decked out for Christmas, lanterns and all. We stayed at the Saint Francis Hotel, I made the boys to promise behaving, they was good but it near wore me out keeping track of them!
A man had a telescope set up in the park, he were showin' folks that some of the stars was planets like our Earth and said maybe there was folks on them like here! I ain't gonna worry about it, lessin' I can sell them some grain! We come home right after The New Year Day, just in time to go over the year end books with Jeff.
He were all adither, he had $46,000 in cash in his office and wanted us to ride guard on him to Marysville Town and the bank! Joe and me rode with him, he were jumpy the whole way, but there were no trouble. Joe and me own 85% of the bank, so's we have Jeff audit their books every year. He say the bank is in good financial condition, Joe and me have final say on any loans theys make, just to protect our own money. Our business done amazed well for the year past, total profit were $385,000! Joe, Jimmy, Tim and me sat down to decide what we should do, that money don't do much good hiding in a bank vault!
Tim told us that Myron Tillotson were selling off his beef herd over at Stanley Bridge, so's we all took a day to go look. After haggling some, we bought the whole herd for $20,000. They was all good white faces, so's they was a good addition to our own beef herd.
Two weeks later, Joe come running in, Old Man Garcey, near to Marysville Town, had dropped dead and his widow were selling the land and house. They was going back to Tennessee. Joe, me and Tim took us a ride over to talk at Miz Garcey, she were pretty broke up but she agreed to sell to us for $1.50 an acre and $4,000 for the house. We thought it were a fair offer, so's we accepted. That gained us another 9,000 acres of prime farm land. Janith and Billy Wright asked if they could live in the house and Billy foreman the land. It were fine with us, but we was sore sorry to loss Janith in the house. Her sister were still with us and we hired a window lady, Mrs. Pearl, to cook and help keep our house.
1883 started out a good year, the winter wheat come up pretty as a painting and we was waiting for the spring rains to start planting the corn and red wheat. The rains never come! It looked like we was in for a drought, hot dry winds blew all spring, making it worse. We got a partial crop off the winter wheat, about enough to feed our stock. We was going to have to make our corn holdover stretch and even buy for the stock next winter.
Jeff told us we had $603,000 cash reserves, but some of there were needed to support the bank through the drought. We told our folk that we wasn't going to lay off any employees and they was going to eat regular, sames as us!
Terry come to me with some of the hands and asked, "Mr. Issac, what we gonna do if the drought don't lift?"
I looked at him and said, "Long as we's got money, we's stayin' right here WITH all our hands!"
By summer, I was thanking the Good God above that we had the deep wells on all our farms, folk's shallow wells was starting to go dry! By September, we was hauling water into Marysville Town for folks to drink. Redding Town were alright, theys had just put down a town well and put up a high tank. Our fields was nothing but dust, we's was afraid to plow, for fears all the soil would blow away. The river were so low, the packet boat could no longer come up as far as Redding Town, we was cut off except for the railroad. We continued to ship milk and cheese, our dairy herd were in pretty fair condition.
In both towns, folks was gettin' worried about loosin' theys homes. We told our bank theys had to check with us before callin' any loans in. We wasn't gonna put no families nor childrens out on the street! The drought continued into the next year, we wasn't worried for ourselves but the town folks were getting' mighty scared.
Late in February of 1884, I were awoked to the patter of rain on the roof, the drought were broke! It rained straight for two weeks before any water showed in the creeks! We told the bank to, make easy loans to folks so's they could buy seed for plantin', it were amazed how fast the fields greened up after the rains started! The drought chased out several families, we's bought theirs land so they could move back to wheres they come from. We paid the premium price for they's land, it weren't no sense squeezing folk we had to live with! I sat thinking on it one Sunday, Poppa always told me to keep back enough money to feed us and start again. He were right!
THIS IS THE END OF BOOK 5. LOOK FOR THE NEXT BOOK THAT TELLS HOW THE FARMS AND BUSINESS CONTINUE TO PROSPER. THE BLOUNT FAMILIES EXPAND AND HAVE MORE ADVENTURES. JOE BLOUNT FOR STATE SENATOR!