LVXXXI – on the river below Coffeeville Lock and Dam

Wednesday November 5th, 2014

We had a nice run down river today and Mary Lynn was very excited to see her first alligator. There he or she was right in the middle of the river looking like a stick with eyes. She tripped over herself to get the camera and take a few pictures. From then on Mary Lynn kept her eyes peeled and scoured the shore for any other sign of the critters.

A Facebook post by one of our friends about a famous ancestor (Ed Ferguson and his grandfather’s grandfather ‘Black fish’ (capturing Daniel Boone)) reminded me of a somewhat famous ancestor of my family. My father told me this short story (the pun will become obvious) a year or so back. There was a midget in our family…please, I don’t want the midgets and their families rising up and attacking me…

The little fellows name was Basil he was a cousin or uncle or something like that. He doesn’t show up in family photos from the time. Perhaps he wasn’t in attendance or perhaps he had not yet learned to jump (this to will clarify as we go). I have seen hair or the top of someone’s head in several photos, I can only assume that this is Basil prior to prison.

Basil killed a hooker or a prostitute (not sure which is appropriate or acceptable). Apparently Basil jumped up and pushed the poor unfortunate hooker down a set of stairs in Grand Falls New Brunswick. This event, to the best of my Dad’s memory occurred in the late 40’s or early 50’s. Basil was sent to prison. I’m sure the walls were likely high enough to hold him, jumping notwithstanding.

I have tried several times on the Googlizer with no success. I searched terms such as; Basil, midget, killer, hooker, jump, famous midget killers, etc. Perhaps one of you who read this can help me find out the truth about this tragic event.

Where was I?

We went up the creek some with the inflatable and discovered more creek and no alligators. The sign clearly says no hunting. All afternoon we heard gunfire and hounds. The shooting was getting close to the boat so I gave a blast of the horn just to let them know there were humans nearby. This action presupposed that they were not hunting Loopahs… A few minutes later a genuine Alabama hunter popped through the growth along the creek and asked if we needed any hep… Americans are so conservative with their use of letters. Dropping the u and now l, perfect. He said “you did blow that air horn”…messages traded the hunt continued and we went below. I hope that the darkness will end the hunt…what am I saying???

I hope to get a good night sleep tonight. We have our last lock to tackle in the morning. There are two trawlers up the creek with us tonight so we have a group for the lock in the morning. Apparently they are travelling with two or three others who are at Bobby’s fish camp dock.

We are only 123.2 statute miles left to go to get to Mobile Bay and the ocean. It will have taken us almost two months to cross this country by river. The time flew and we had so much fun. I will add to this blog tomorrow if we are not shot. The shooting continues I have to assume that they are hunting squirrels or something that doesn’t run after shooting occurs.

It is now tomorrow…we have moved down river through our last lock at Coffeeville (there is a theme). Mary Lynn read that these woods are full of ‘possum’. Perhaps they were the target of last nights shooting rampage. We are up a little creek here at Three Rivers Lake. Only 52 miles left on the rivers until we get to the salt and make Fracas a proper sailboat once again. I don’t recommend having your sailboat neutered but it did help going under bridges.

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