As in any country, not all Japanese of the top social caste were necessarily wealthy. Towards the end of the feudal era in Japan poor and even destitute Samurai did exist. Many Samurai were just making ends meet and only a few Samurai could afford a sword of high quality. While a low to medium grade Japanese sword was still a marvelous piece of technology for its time it was the finer swords which were truly amazing.
In forging a Japanese sword the master would crouch on one knee at the anvil, holding the red hot billet with tongs in his left hand and strike it with a hammer in his right hand (Japanese of any social standing, had they been born left-handed, were forced to become right-handed). During the forging process there were three apprentices standing around the anvil – one opposite the master, and one on either side. When the master struck the billet they would, in sequence, strike the exact same spot on the billet with larger, two handed hammers.
While common Japanese swords were forged from a single billet, the best quality blades were composed of separate billets of different composition, forge welded together for the end product. Usually this was done with two billets, each having started as a piece of iron forged to a piece of steel, heated, folded over on itself, then hammered together. This folding and hammering process was repeated many times to create thousands of layers within the width of the billet. Two of these iron-steel multi-layered billets would be forged to a pure steel billet between them, then forged into a sword blank. This resulted in a sword having a body of layered iron-steel with a center core and cutting edge of pure steel.
A blade forged like this, when heat treated, would have layers of iron which were still flexible while the layers of steel would be more rigid, resulting in a blade which is much more difficult to break. In addition, forging a blade in this way would align the steel molecules more uniformly while driving out inclusions (microscopic spaces or impurities) resulting in a harder and more rigid material with less tendency to break or crack.
But that’s not all. Japanese sword makers had a unique process for quenching blades which was the same for all Japanese swords. When the sword had been forged, shaped, and ready for heat treatment it was covered in a layer of clay mixed with ash. This layer of clay was about one quarter to three-eighths inch thick. After application of the clay, before it dried, the clay was scrapped off the part of the blade which was to be the cutting edge. When the blade was heated then quenched in water the exposed edge cooled quicker than the body of the blade, making the steel at the edge much harder than the rest of the blade.
When this quenching process is used the difference in hardness shows up when the blade is polished. The body of the blade, being relatively softer, comes to a brighter shine while the harder edge is still duller. In fact, a Japanese blade polisher (not the same as a blade maker) will apply a slightly courser grit to this harder edge area to highlight this difference. The result is a blade with a very high polish on most of the surface with a cloudy finish on the area at the cutting edge.
It was known that meteorite was prized by Japanese swordsmiths for use in making their blades. I have also read that some swords tested with modern equipment have been shown to have chromium in the steel. I have no idea how a feudal era Japanese swordsmith would find and identify natural examples of chromium and then blend it uniformly into a steel billet. I can only assume they had an empirical understanding about how some ore looked different and how that related to the end product.
In the late 13th and early 14th century lived a man by the name Masamune who is regarded as the finest Japanese swordsmith ever. In his own lifetime his blades were so highly regarded that after one point he would no longer sign them (Japanese swordsmiths sign their blades on one side of the tang using hammer and chisel) believing that if a person could not recognize the quality of his work that person didn’t deserve to know who made it.
While blade testing in Japan was not particularly common there are known historic examples of this practice. One test involved securing a blade of average quality in a solid fixture and cutting it with the blade being tested. To pass this test the superior blade should not show any nick or crack where it cut the other blade.
Another testing method involved cutting through human bodies. In some cases this was done while executing a convicted criminal. A superior Japanese blade was expected to be able to cut diagonally through a human torso from one shoulder, through ribs, spine, and on through the ribs on the opposite side without damaging the blade. In one legendary case I have read about the blade had the inscription “five body sword” on the tang opposite the maker’s signature. Legend has it that this blade had cut through five stacked human cadavers in a single stroke.
75 years ago US troops fighting the Imperial Japanese in the Pacific often faced Banzai charges of massed troops, some with little more than rifle-mounted bayonets and swords after running out of ammunition. In fact, there was a training film shown to some Imperial troops which described how to disable an American machinegun with the stroke of a sword in which a sword expert did just that with captured American equipment.
During WWII and the following occupation of Japan many Japanese swords made their way to the US – a number of them true museum pieces. There still are some significantly valuable Japanese swords in the US market but you can expect that the best examples of them have already been identified and repatriated to the much higher priced market in Japan. Should you happen to possess or find one and wish to have it reconditioned please understand that only a person properly trained to polish Japanese blades will be able to do the job without seriously detracting from its value. This is a very expensive proposition and only worth it if you have a blade of exceptional value. Any collector can immediately tell the difference between a blade which was polished by a traditionally trained polisher and one which was polished with modern equipment.
I think it speaks to the undercurrent of distrust of the government and the military,” said Lt. Gen. Ronald R. Blanck, the Surgeon General of the Army, the service that oversees the [anthrax] vaccination program. “Agent Orange. Nuclear tests in the ’50s. People say, ‘How can you say this is safe?’ Clearly, we have a credibility problem.”
~ Steven Lee Myers, Armed Services Opt to Discharge Those Who Refuse Vaccine, N.Y. Times, March 11, 1999.
The United States Armed Forces has a long and not-so illustrious history of testing nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons… on its own citizens. From at least the 1940’s on (and if you want to include Native Americans, we can go back a lot further!), the Department of Defense has conducted experiments on U.S. servicemembers using ‘unconventional’ weapons. A report prepared by the staff of the Senate Committee on Veteran’s Affairs in 1994 concluded that “[f]or at least 50 years, [the] DOD has intentionally exposed military personnel to potentially dangerous substances, often in secret[.]”[i] That report followed a Government Accounting Office inquiry into experiments conducted on servicemembers by the Department of Defense.[ii] The GAO report detailed many different programs, some of which the DoD still lists as classified, in which servicemembers were given experimental drugs and other treatments without their knowledge or consent. A few of the more stunning examples of experimentation are worth discussing in detail, not simply to attack the Department of Defense or the military establishment, but rather as context because it is against this history that the DoD’s anthrax program was launched. And it is against this background of secret experimentation and tests conducted on coerced subjects that the DoD asks members of the Armed Services to “trust us” with regards to vaccines and inoculations claimed to be safe and effective.
[i] An Institute of Medicine report looking at the history of mustard and lewisite gas found the Armed Forces researching chemical warfare after World War I and up through World War II. The report even traces some research back before the Civil War. See Senate Report No. 103-97, at 15 (1994).
[ii] The Government Accounting Office (GAO) is the watchdog arm of Congress that investigates government agencies. See “Human Experimentation, An Overview on Cold War Era Programs,” U.S. General Accounting Office, September 28, 1994, GAO/T-NSIAD-94-266.
In the 1940’s, the Department of the Navy began soliciting volunteers to participate in a program to test protective clothing. In reality, the program was designed to test mustard and lewisite gases, chemical agents that the United States thought might be used by the desperate Axis powers at the end of World War II. There are some who claim that the tests were done simply to see what effect mustard gas had on soldiers in order to determine the offensive potential of chemical weapons. The truth is likely that these are not exclusive propositions. Either way, the program solicited potential ‘volunteers’ with the promise of two weeks of extra leave or some other similar incentive. “Due to the strategic importance of these experiments [however], the Navy deemed it inappropriate to inform potential volunteers as to the precise nature of the tests. Instead . . . the . . . volunteers were led to believe that they would be testing uniforms for use in tropical climates.”[iii] These ‘volunteers’ were sworn to secrecy and threatened with court-martial if they told anyone about the program for which they had just ‘volunteered.’ Of course, at this point, because no one had told them exactly what they volunteered for, it was relatively easy to extract such a promise. It is rather doubtful that most members would have agreed had they known that they were about to be experimented upon with chemical weapons.
Nathan Schnurman was a young sailor who figured he could use the extra few days off. He had just finished boot camp and was stationed at Bainbridge, Maryland, awaiting further orders when he volunteered for the program. He was put on a bus for Anacostia, Maryland, where the experiments actually took place. Young Nathan Schnurman, along with the other volunteers, was given a bunk in a Quonset hut and some blankets for that evening. All of the volunteers were issued protective clothing, including a gas mask, given a physical, and the next morning the experiments began. The protective clothing and masks were fitted and checked and then the ten volunteers were led to the testing building. At this point, the volunteers had still only been told that they were testing clothing for tropical weather.
The building itself was a simple structure with an entrance platform and test chamber. A single door separated the platform from the chamber and an intercom allowed for communication between the subjects inside the chamber and the corpsmen on the platform. The subjects were told that, once inside, a vapor was to be introduced into the chamber and that they were to remain in the chamber for one hour. The subjects were not told what the vapor was, but were told that it might produce a slight irritation on the subjects’ skin, similar to a sunburn. The subjects were admonished not to discuss the experiment with anyone.[iv]
The volunteers were exposed to the vapor for the one hour, as advertised. After that, they were instructed to continue to wear the protective clothing for another four hours, to eat meals and pass the time in their Quonset hut. They later disrobed and were given physical exams to check primarily for burns on the skin. This routine repeated itself the next day. The second day’s physical was the last one that any volunteer ever received as a part of the experiment.
The hour-long gas exposures continued on a daily basis for the next four days without incident, save the departure of a few of the subjects due to painful burns. On one of those days, just prior to the morning’s exposure, plaintiff [Schnurman] was informed by a corpsman that they would be testing mustard and lewisite gas that day.
On the sixth test day, while inside the chambers, plaintiff’s gas mask malfunctioned and plaintiff breathed the noxious vapor being tested. The inhalation of the gas produced extreme nausea and a burning in his eyes, nose and throat. Before being helped out of the chamber, plaintiff regurgitated in his mask. Once outside the chambers and free of his mask, plaintiff continued to experience nausea and dizziness, plus an intense pain in his chest. After further vomiting, plaintiff lost consciousness. No record was made of this incident.
Upon regaining consciousness, plaintiff was informed that he would no longer be needed for the experiment and that he could return to Bainbridge. He was not given any physical examination or treatment with the exception of local treatment for the minor burns on his skin. Plaintiff left the site of the experiment and traveled to his home in Roanoke, Virginia for a ten-day leave.[v]
Mr. Schnurman went on with his life, experiencing long-term health problems. Sworn to secrecy, Schnurman felt that he could not tell his personal physician about the source of his ailments because of his oath and the threat of punishment. Thus, he did not provide essential information to his doctors about his health because of his fears of what would happen to him if he told. This scenario was not uncommon.
A Mr. John T. Harrison described to a senate committee how he was sworn to secrecy in 1943 when mustard gas tests were conducted on him.[vi] Because of these vows to which the man had been sworn, it was not until much later in life that plaintiffs, such as Mr. Schnurman, (1) learned of what had been used on them, and (b) then filed lawsuits against the government.
A very similar incident happened to a John William Allen in 1945, according to a statement before the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs. Mr. Allen testified that the real purpose of the testing was to determine how much sulfur mustard a man could take before being overcome: these were known as ‘man-break tests.’ “He was exposed several times to sulfur mustard and was removed from further exposure on May 5, 1945, when he passed out in the gas chamber. A physical examination on May 14, 1945, revealed many wounds as the result of exposure to mustard gas.”[vii]
It is important to understand that these are not isolated incidents. An Institute of Medicine report in 1993 estimated that some 60,000 military members were used as human subjects in the 1940’s to test just for two particular chemical agents, mustard gas and lewisite, and the majority of these people were not informed about the nature of the experiments, nor were they given proper medical care or follow up after the research.[viii]
[iii] Few things have amazed me more in my time in service than what members of the Armed Forces – even moreso Marines – will do for just a few extra days of leave or liberty. I am still not sure what that says about the military, but leave and liberty are the promise land to most servicemembers.
[iv]Schnurman v. United States, 490 F. Supp. 429, 430 (E. D. Va. 1980).
[vi]Is Military Research Hazardous to Veterans’ Health? Lessons from World War II, the Persian Gulf War, and Today, Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, 103rd Cong. May 6, 1994.
[viii] Veterans at Risk: The Health Effects of Mustard Gas and Lewisite, Pechura, C.M. & Rall, D.P. (Eds.) Institute of Medicine, National Academy Press, Washington, DC, 1993, p. 3-4, 6-8, 50-52, 224-226.
During the 1950’s and 60’s, the CIA and the Army engaged in experimentation on U.S. servicemembers, both with and without their knowledge. In several different experiments, the DoD caused servicemembers to unknowingly ingest hallucinogens. Most of the experiments centered around ‘mind control’ and interrogation of persons under the effects of hallucinogens. This was prompted by the perception in U.S. intelligence that China and the Soviet Union had used, and were using, hallucinogens for ‘brainwashing’ and interrogation of prisoners of war. This program was known by the code name MKULTRA. It involved giving LSD and another substance known as quinuclidinyl benzilate, a hallucinogen code-named BZ, to unsuspecting members of both the Armed Forces and civilian communities.
In 1958, Master Sergeant James Stanley responded to a posting on Fort Knox, Kentucky, that solicited volunteers to help the Army develop methods for testing and defending against chemical weapons. Ironically, the volunteers were told they would be testing protective clothing (just as in World War II). MSgt Stanley was transferred to Aberdeen, Maryland, for the testing. He did not learn until seventeen years later that he had been unknowingly given LSD during the program. He found this out accidentally in 1975 when contacted by Walter Reed Army Medical Center, which was conducting follow-up on those who had participated in the 1958 test. Walter Reed wanted to know of any long-term health consequences to MSgt Stanley from his ingestion of the hallucinogen. MSgt Stanley in the intervening years had suffered health problems and hallucinations that he had no explanation for that eventually led to a divorce. SeeUnited States v. Stanley, 483 U.S. 669 (1987).
In another instance, Lloyd Gamble, who enlisted in the U.S. Air Force in 1950, volunteered for a special program to (yet again!) test new military protective clothing in 1957.
He was offered various incentives to participate in the program, including a liberal leave policy, family visitations, and superior living and recreational facilities. However, the greatest incentive to Mr. Gamble was the official recognition he would receive as a career-oriented noncommissioned officer, through letters of commendation and certification of participation in the program. During the 3 weeks of testing new clothing, he was given two or three water-size glasses of a liquid containing LSD to drink. Thereafter, Mr. Gamble developed erratic behavior and even attempted suicide. He did not learn that he had received LSD as a human subject until 18 years later, as a result of congressional hearings in 1975. Even then, the Department of the Army initially denied that he had participated in the experiments, although an official DOD publicity photograph showed him as one of the valiant servicemen volunteering for “a program that was in the highest national security interest.”[ix]
What is worth noting about these programs, beyond the experimentation on servicemembers without their informed consent, are the arguments offered by the proponents and defenders of these programs. According to Sidney Gottlieb, a doctor and former CIA officer, MKULTRA was established to investigate whether and how an individual’s behavior could be modified by covert means. Dr. Gottlieb testified before Congress that “it was felt to be mandatory and of the utmost urgency for our intelligence organization to establish what was possible in this field on a high priority basis.”[x] Although many human subjects were not informed or protected, Dr. Gottlieb’s defended these actions by stating, “. . . harsh as it may seem in retrospect, it was felt that in an issue where national survival might be concerned, such a procedure and such a risk was a reasonable one to take.”[xi]
These attitudes persist even today. Dr. Gottleib’s responses in the 1970’s sound remarkably like the reasons offered to justify mandatory vaccination of troops today with unapproved, unlicensed, or investigational drugs. In a television appearance in 1997, Secretary of Defense Cohen held up a five-pound bag of sugar and stated that if the bag were filled with anthrax spores, it could wipe out half of the population of Washington, D.C.[xii] In a later opinion editorial appearing in Army Times, Secretary Cohen wrote that
At least 25 countries, including Iraq and North Korea, now have – or are in the process of acquiring and developing – weapons of mass destruction . . . This is not hyperbole. It is reality . . . The race is on between our preparations and those of our adversaries. We are preparing for the possibility of a chemical or biological attack on American soil because we must. There is not a moment to lose.[xiii]
The truth of these matters will be examined in greater detail later. The point to be made here is that Secretary Cohen’s defense of the anthrax program, and the justification for biological warfare programs generally, distilled to its essence, is nothing more than “the ends justifies the means.” Where matters of national security (Gottleib called it “national survival”) are at stake, it does not matter how we go about defending ourselves, even if it means experimenting on unsuspecting troops, because it involves ‘National Security’.
This is a particularly dangerous path for a number of reasons, some obvious and others not as obvious. While there are any number of moral points of view about using troops in this way, one’s opinion about whether it is right or wrong to experiment on troops in this fashion depends largely on one’s view of individual liberty for the citizen-soldier and the limits of a nation state’s ability to protect ‘itself.’ These arguments inevitably devolve into philosophical debates, punctuated by twelve-letter words and citations to long-dead philosophers, spoken by people far removed from the gas chambers and vomiting victims on their hands and knees; much like Dr. Gottleib’s testimony in an air-conditioned chamber in front of politicians and cameras during the famous Church Committee hearings. More importantly, where ‘military’ or ‘national security’ matters are concerned, the academics inevitably defer to those wearing uniforms with stars on their collars.
It would appear on the surface that this issue was decisively concluded at the end of World War II in favor of the rights of the individual. In August 1947, the Nuremberg Trials of the Nazi Doctors, including those such as Karl Brandt, came to a close, resulting in the death penalty for many of the doctors who conducted such experiments on unwilling prisoners in concentration camps across Hitler’s Reich. It is there that we must turn briefly in order to understand the law of informed consent and how it applies to the military, if at all. But if it seems that the present author is ‘laying it on a little thick,’ compare Secretary Cohen’s above remark about the necessity of the mandatory anthrax vaccine program to this one:
We are not conducting these experiments, as a matter of fact, for the sake of some fixed scientific idea, but to be of practical help to the armed forces and beyond that to the . . . people in a possible emergency.
This is from a letter written by Doctor Wolfram Sievers, Colonel in the German Army in November, 1942, to Dr. Karl Brandt, both convicted Nazi War Criminals, excerpted from Prosecution Exhibit No. 263 at their trial.
[x]Human Drug Testing by the CIA, 1977: Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Health and Scientific Research, Committee on Human Resources, U.S. Senate, September 20-21, p. 169 (1977).
In the following exposition I will try to explain my understanding of Japanese swords – a subject which first enchanted me about 50 years ago – with common English terms. I will refrain from using Japanese terms when not required.
Understand that Samurai and their weapons were part of Japanese history over several centuries. To say that some item or use never was accepted or it was the one, true item or way a real Samurai would use or act often cannot be pinned down as customs and usage did evolve over time. In this discussion I will mainly be presenting the ultimate condition of the Samurai caste and the swords they carried up to the middle of the 19th century.
The sword was considered the soul of the Samurai. But exactly what was a Samurai?
From the 12th century until 1868 Japanese society was rigidly structured into 4 castes (with numerous other groups outside and socially beneath these castes) placing the Samurai at the top, followed by Farmers, then Artisans, with Merchants at the bottom. At the end of this feudal period Samurai made up only 7% of the Japanese population. The Samurai and royalty were the only Japanese to bear family names.
In the beginning, the primary weapon of the Samurai was the bow and arrow, with the spear being secondary. The sword was a personal weapon and almost always the weapon of last resort. In combat, should the Samurai run out of arrows and lose or break his spear, upon drawing his sword it was not uncommon for him to discard the scabbard signaling that he did not intend to live long enough to need it anymore.
As you would expect for a country with a strict social caste system ruled by warriors Japan never really knew peace for much of its history. However, for most Samurai much of their time was spent in cities and fortresses which made every day carry of a bow or spear impractical. For this reason over time the sword became their primary weapon mostly because it was what he could expect to have immediately available.
Samurai were the only Japanese who could legally carry a pair of swords – the long sword, either Katana or Tachi, and the shorter sword known as Wakizashi. This pair of swords was the badge of their caste. The Katana differs from the Tachi mostly in the format of the scabbard furnishings – the Katana scabbard was thrust through the Obi (waist sash) with the cutting edge upwards while the Tachi had two metal hangers or attachments with a cord which was to be wrapped and tied around the waist, suspending the blade with the cutting edge downwards. As the Katana was easier to remove from one’s body – something one would do often in an urban lifestyle – it became the preferred long blade over the Tachi. For this reason I will be focusing my discussion on the Katana.
The Japanese sword differs from swords of most other cultures in that it was constructed to be easily disassembled. The entire assembly was held together by a single, bamboo pin. The handle was constructed of two halves of wood, glued and often pinned together in a single unit. It had a flat guard and an end cap where the pommel would have been on a European sword.
The handle had a hole bored through it side to side at a point that corresponded to a hole in the tang. The bamboo pin was sized to fit in this hole and hold the sword assembly together with a friction fit that put slight tension on the tang of the sword.
Japanese sword furnishings are a standard pattern for all Japanese blades from short daggers to immense, two handed swords often longer than the men who carried them. While the pattern was a common standard for any fighting blade the nomenclature had some slight variations. In general, one can expect that each of these items will be ornate and even have gilded features or inlaid with precious metals. I will give the most commonly used Japanese name for each item in parenthesis – but use the English equivalent in my explanation.
Here are the components of a standard Katana – Scabbard, blade with Hit-extension, Washer, Guard, and Handle assembly. Like many old blades the one here has more than one hole showing that it has been re-shaped and re-polished three times. Often this is does when the tip has been broken or damaged and requires a new hole to be drilled through the tang.
Hilt-extension (Habaki) – this is a wedge-shaped copper, brass, or bronze tapered block which the blade’s tang passes through. It is fit tightly to the base of the blade and fits snuggly into the mouth of the scabbard. This holds the blade securely in place while in the scabbard.
Hilt-washer (Seppa) – This is a thin washer which the tang passes through after the Hilt-extension and before the Guard. These would be changed with thicker or thinner replacements as the different components of the handle and furnishings became worn or were replaced over time. It is not unusual for a blade to have more than one Hilt-washer – usually on opposite sides of the Guard.
Guard (Tsuba) – This is the handguard which protects the user’s hand from being struck by the opponent’s blade. The tang passes through this before attaching the handle assembly.
Hilt-collar (Fuchi) – This is a metal ferrule on the handle which goes against the inside of the Guard.
Handle (Tsuka) – This is the wooden handle which goes over the tang.
Sharkskin (Samehada) – This is a single sheet of polished shark (or ray) skin which is wrapped around the handle.
Cord wrapping (Tsukamaki) – The Cord wrapping which goes around the Sharkskin. This is a flat silk or cotton woven cord which is folded or twisted in intervals which gives the traditional diamond-pattern seen on most Japanese swords. This pattern also provides a practical grip surface.
Pin covers (Menuki) – These are a pair of flat metal ornaments, one on each side, held in place by the Cord wrapping. These covered the pin holes and would hold the pin in place should it somehow become loose.
Pin (Mekugi) – This is the bamboo pin which holds the Handle on the tang.
Endcap (Kashira) – This is a cap which goes on the end of the Handle opposite the hilt end. The Endcap is held on the Handle by the Cord wrapping which passes through holes in the Endcap.
Scabbard (Saya) – This is the housing for the blade in which the sword is carried. It has its own group of standard furnishings with numerous examples where some items are omitted.
Scabbards were made of wood and generally lacquered or sometimes covered in metal, or ray or shark skin. These were the primary surface treatments although other finishes or coverings may be encountered. The scabbard has a small wooden (sometimes metal) protrusion (Kurigata) on the outside (away from the body) surface at the balance point of the sword and scabbard. This had a hole for attaching a long cord which could be used to secure the scabbard to the Samurai’s sash when the he was expecting to be moving vigorously. Alternatively, this cord could be used to tie back the voluminous Kimono sleeves when a fight was expected. The cord was tied to the scabbard with an elaborate knot which could be instantly unraveled by pulling on the ends of the cord.
There is one major variant of the above handle and scabbard pattern – a plain wood set which is used for storing a blade and not designed for fighting. The only pieces of the standard furnishings which would be used with this set are the pin and the Hilt-extension. It is unusual to see these decorated.
There were two predominant types of rack which were made for Japanese swords – at the time these were basically furniture, somewhere to put one’s swords when not wearing them. In present time I see these used to display swords but it seems few people, even Japanese, understand the correct way to place swords on these. One common rack is made for two swords held horizontally. This is made for a pair of swords, the Katana on top and Wakizashi on the lower position. Both blades should be placed on the rack cutting edge up. If a Tachi is on this type of rack in place of the Katana the Tachi is placed on the rack with the cutting edge down.
The other type of rack you might encounter is made for a single, long blade and holds the sword upright at a slight angle. The sword would be placed on this rack with the handle downward and the cutting edge towards the rack. This orientation may seem unintuitive until you realize that this would be on a Tatami mat next to you while you were seated on the mat. Preparing to leave, before standing you would first reach for your sword in which case is more practical to have the balance point towards the bottom and closer to you.
I would say something about Ninja swords but in the 50 years I have been interested in Japanese blades, having visited dozens of sword shops and museums in Japan, and in the hundreds of books I have seen in both English and Japanese, I have never seen nor even heard of an historic example. The only examples I have seen are fantasy replicas.
“This court will come to order in the case of United States versus Petty Officer David M. Ponder, United States Navy, at Marine Corps Base Camp Foster, Okinawa, Japan.” I’m a little nervous, like I am at the beginning of every trial, but I don’t show it. It’s just an arraignment anyway. We’re mostly here to arrange dates for trial and I’ve already talked to the prosecutor, known as the “trial counsel” in military parlance, a professional Marine Captain by the name of Chris Kolomjec, and we’ve agreed to push the dates out a bit on this case. Like me, he had another specialty in the Marine Corps before becoming an attorney, so we have a collegial relationship. Chris is going on temporary duty to an exercise in Thailand called “Cobra Gold” and I’m in the beginning stages of a plan to plead this case out under very favorable terms if I can get in to see the Convening Authority – my client’s Commanding Officer – while he’s out of town. In courts-martial, the prosecution has one-hundred twenty (120) days to be ready to go to trial and the arraignment stops that clock from running.
In David Ponder’s case, stopping the clock is mutually agreeable, but we have to coordinate our plans with the judge’s trial schedule.
I put on the required lawyerly mask of indifference, but inside, my guts still twist a little. A trial is like the start of a “big” game in sports, except the stakes are a whole lot higher. I am, as one might expect, extremely competitive, particularly in sports, but I’ve played and lost enough games to have perspective – at the end of a game, even after a loss, nobody goes to jail, gets busted, kicked out of the service, or loses their pay. On the other hand, as a defense counsel I also have a standard line to my clients: “At the end of the day, I’m not the one going to jail. I’m going home to my wife and four daughters.” Notwithstanding this shpiel, I’m a bit new at this and keenly feel the punishment hanging over my clients, the mythical sword of Damocles hanging there, waiting to fall. One mistake on my part…. On the Defense side of the courtroom, it is your intellect, initiative, imagination – and a ball point and legal pad – against the resources of “The United States of America.” While it can be a unique intellectual challenge, it is also daunting because I am gambling with another person’s liberty. Anyone who ignores that is either another class of lawyer than I am or a fool.
I edge a little closer to Petty Officer Third Class Ponder, a sailor who refused the controversial anthrax vaccine. My move closer might appear to outsiders as a sign of my solidarity with my client; and in David’s case, it’s got some truth. We’ve only just met, but I like him. In most cases, however, being proximate to my client makes me feel less alone. I am six months removed from Naval Justice School, nine months from passing the Bar, eleven months from law school graduation, and a lifetime away from my former occupation in the Marine Corps as a Cobra attack helicopter pilot.
Captain Kolomjec finishes reciting his bona fides and how the court came to be created by the Commanding Officer of Naval Mobile Constriction Battalion Seventy-Four, Petty Officer Ponder’s C.O. This part really was boring, scripted, and I waited for my turn to speak.
“Captain Saran?” the military judge, Lieutenant Colonel Tim Miller, looked up from his Military Judges’ Benchbook in my direction, my cue to do my part.
“Sir, I have been detailed to this court-martial by Major J.R. Woodworth, Senior Defense Counsel, Legal Services Support Section, Third Force Service Support Group, Camp Foster, Okinawa, Japan. I am qualified and certified under Article 27(b) and sworn under article 42(a) of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.” I don’t need to look down at my trial guide for this, which is a script for Navy and Marine Corps trial proceedings for the repetitive parts in the process. It keeps everyone tracking where the trial is, but the real reason for it is to make for better records of trial. Anyone who receives a punitive discharge in the military gets an automatic appeal up to their service specific appellate court. Given the number of courts-martial in the military, this helps the appellate courts do their jobs. Arguably, it also helps the accused get a better, cleaner trial. The familiar recitation helps my nerves dissipate; I suspect it has something to do with being raised Catholic.
“I have not acted in any manner which might tend to disqualify me in this court-martial and no other defense counsel, either military or civilian, have either been detailed to or are on this case.” I start to sit down and then stay on my feet in anticipation of my client standing up when the judge speaks to him for the first time – just as I instructed him to do.
“Are you Petty Officer Ponder, the accused in this case?” David Ponder stands up to the position of attention.
“Yes, sir.” Firmly, not too loud, perfect. He looks good in his uniform, as well. I know because I inspected him myself before we came into court. The defense shop keeps an extra set of uniforms, spare ribbons and devices, and whatever else we can scavenge for when our clients are brought in by the chasers – military escorts – from the brig. They come over in those ubiquitous orange jumpsuits in shackles; while their units are supposed to provide the uniforms for them, we always wind up with clients missing ribbons and sundry uniform items, so we have a small stock available.
“Okay, Petty Officer Ponder, you may take a seat, and you may remain seated unless I otherwise direct you to stand.” Lieutenant Colonel Miller nods gently from behind his glasses. I notice he’s still rubbing his hand as he continues, a habit since the pins were removed. The judge flipped over the handlebars of his bike and busted his wrist up pretty badly and I knew the scar must itch where the pins had come out. Reconstructive shoulder surgery at 15 left me with an intimate understanding of that feeling.
We finish with the preliminaries; I rattle off all of the awards which David Ponder had earned during his three years as a Navy Seabee. The judge goes through my client’s rights to counsel, military and civilian, and then his own qualifications. He then gives us a chance to challenge him or ask any questions if we think he might be partial for any reason, a formality at this point, because I’m pretty sure that Lieutenant Colonel Miller isn’t even going to hear this case if we go to trial. He’s likely to pass it to Major Eric Stone, the other military judge on Okinawa, because of some scheduling conflicts with other cases in the Pacific region, which includes mainland Japan and Korea. We all do a good bit of traveling because of the odd and disbursed units that have occasional courts-martial, but the bulk of the work is on Okinawa.
I look over at my client; David Ponder looks young to me – and I just turned thirty. He has the beginnings of a moustache, but it’s just that, the beginnings. The good thing is that he likes to keep his hair short by Navy standards, which helps in a Marine court. He’s also a genuinely squared-away sailor. I liked him, which is supposed to be irrelevant to attorneys, but it’s not. Everyone gets the same level of representation; it’s just a question of whether you like defending them or not and whether or not you’ll feel badly if they’re convicted. It also helps in generating the emotional energy to work late nights and long hours cheerfully, as opposed to drearily.
“Petty Officer Ponder,” the judge breaks into my thoughts, “I now ask you how do you plead, but before accepting your pleas, I advise you that any motion to dismiss or grant any other relief should be made at this time. Captain Saran?”
I stand up, my stomach now fully settled, which is great because we’re just about done; we have our dates for trial, but I’m thinking this gets pled to a Summary Court martial, where my client can get no more than 30 days in the brig and no punitive discharge, but he’s probably going to have to waive his right to an Administrative Discharge Board and they’ll kick him out with ‘bad paper’ – an ‘Other Than Honorable’ discharge, which is like being fired from the military.
“Sir, at this time Petty Officer Ponder requests to defer entry of pleas and motions in accordance with the schedule the court has already set forth.”
The judge goes through the dates Kolomjec and I have already picked for motions, responses, witness requests, and discovery. All parties are agreed.
“Anything else from either party before we adjourn?”
“No, sir,” both Kolomjec and I answer after glancing at each other.
“Then this court is in recess.”
“All rise!” Kolomjec intones. I’m already on my feet and David joins me as the judge passingly says “Carry on” and departs.
As my client and I walk out, we almost bump square into David Allen, a reporter from the Pacific “Stars and Stripes.” I’ve only been on the island for a few months, but my reaction is immediate – I step in and tell David Allen we’ll give a statement at some point and he’ll be the first to know. Blah blah blah.
The first thing any decent defense attorney wants regarding his client’s talking – to anyone, but particularly law enforcement and the press – is to STFU and let the lawyer do the talking. The cop shows and movies are dead-on in one respect: anything you say can and will be used against you. Plus, offhand I can’t remember either the Code of Professional Responsibility or the more stringent Navy Instruction for all Judge Advocates on speaking to the press. I know generally it’s frowned upon, if not outright verboten, to speak to the press. Add to that my natural aversion to the media as a military officer and I’m curt, but polite.
Oddly enough, this is one of the few times it likely won’t matter. It’s not as if David could say anything damning – he had refused a direct order to take the anthrax vaccine and even talked about it in interviews with local media in his homeport of Biloxi, Mississippi. There isn’t a whole lot of dispute factually. I don’t want to give the government any additional ammunition for sentencing, however, should we ever get there. A jury or military judge would probably not look kindly on someone who was bashing the military in the local paper. So, we pass on the “exclusive.”
“Well, you heard the dates for motions. That’s the next big milestone. It’s likely that the prosecutor will file a motion asking the judge to find the order to take the vaccine lawful. That’s been the standard in the few other anthrax cases that have gone to trial. The good thing is that Captain Kolomjec leaves for Thailand the day that our response is due. Likelihood is he won’t be around in the afternoon when I drop the response off on the prosecution. He also won’t be back until right before the motions session and I’m betting no one else is going to pick up our response and run with the ball. So, it may not win the day, but it will certainly limit his time to be ready to answer our motion.” David Ponder nods, but I can tell he’s nervous. I would be, too, if I were in his shoes.
“Sir, did you get in touch with Major Bates’s attorney, Mister Smith, at that number I gave you?” David Ponder put me in touch with an attorney in the States named Bruce Smith, an administrative judge in North Carolina and Major in the Air Force Reserve. He defended Air Force Major Sonnie Bates, the highest ranking officer to refuse the anthrax vaccine. He had been discharged with ‘good paper’ as a result of a plea negotiation.
“Yeah. I talked to him. Interesting conversation.”
When I spoke to Bruce Smith, he calmly asked me if I could consider that the order to take the anthrax vaccine was unlawful. Not quite expecting the question, I had said, sure, albeit hesitantly. In my own mind, I figured he was a loon, a conspiracy theorist, but he had gotten a good result for Major Bates, so what did I have to lose by listening to the guy? He told me to look up a particular federal statute and then said he would send me some other materials and asked if I would I please keep them “close hold.” His manner was so cordial, I casually agreed, thinking nothing of it.
My boss, Major John Woodworth, figured he had done me a favor by assigning me – a brand new judge advocate – three of the four anthrax refusal cases on the island of Okinawa. The assumption was that these were guys looking for an excuse to get out of the military and the units would likely agree to Summary Court deals with a Board waiver and these would be over in short order. Like Tom Cruise in a “Few Good Men” I came to David Ponder’s case with the goal to get him the best deal possible, and do it quickly and quietly. I also have several major cases pending, including a rape defense.
I got the first three of my anthrax shots just before coming to Okinawa. I took them somewhat reluctantly, as I had read an article in a major news magazine about the possibility of some experimental substance called squalene being in the anthrax vaccine given to soldiers during Desert Storm. I had sat in the medical clinic at Naval Justice School in Newport, Rhode Island, discussing the matter with another Marine attorney. Both of us had served previously as officers in the Fleet Marine Force and while we tended to think that squalene had been used in the anthrax vaccine, our leaders wouldn’t allow it to be used now. Quite simply, we trusted our chain of command, our senior officers.
David breaks into my thoughts.
“Do you think my CO might consider not court-martialing me or something if you explained this to him?” David Ponder’s question was laden with ethical implications that I was glad I explained to him. While the anthrax vaccine was getting a lot of attention in the press back in the States, and the issue was very interesting legally, I couldn’t let that interfere with my duty to my client, which is to advocate his interests. If he wanted to deal, to plead guilty, no matter how much I might like to litigate the issue, it was his ass on the line. I explained as much to him from the start. David Ponder didn’t have a Juris Doctor, but he was sharp and understood the bottom line.
“Well, I’m going to set up a meeting while Kolomjec’s away and see if the C.O. won’t listen to what we’ve got to say. I’ll get back to you as soon as I get out of that meeting, okay?” I smiled at him.
“Okay, sir. I’m going to change up. Where can I go to have a smoke?”
“Out on the stairs at the end of the building.” I nodded toward the general direction. When he left, I went back to work. I was concerned with the other fifteen other clients who were counting on me to keep them out of jail. At the time, I had no idea that David Ponder’s case would take us both from Okinawa to the highest military court of appeals, to the doorstep of the Supreme Court, and eventually to testifying in front of Congress. It would also eventually cost me my active duty career, but that was a long way off.
This entire time I thought this scene was from American Graffiti. Totally wrong, and it took me a bit of searching to figure out it is actually from The Warriors. Perhaps it would help if I watched either movie.
Then I find out American Graffiti is a George Lucas film? That can’t be right either, he hasn’t tried to ruin it by remaking it…
This is my review of Lic Beer Project SAMO IPA (H/T: Iobot)
You can probably deduce where I am going to go from looking at the can. Graffiti is a word derived from the plural Italian word graffito, which means “to scratch.” This makes perfect sense because even if this site wants to credit a bunch of handprints in Argentina for being first, the word itself was coined from evidence of vandalism carved into Greco-Roman monuments. One of the earliest examples is from a walkway in the city of Ephesus, giving directions to the city’s largest brothel…
Nowadays it is thought of as part of urban blight in some circles, but in others it has become an art form unto itself:
…the modern form of street art and graffiti writing was undoubtedly born during themed to late 1960’s. Darryl McCray, better known as Cornbread, is the man who is often credited with being the first graffiti writer, tagging his name all over North Philadelphia. The story goes that he started graffiti writing because of a girl he had a crush on, Cynthia Custuss, which led to him writing ‘Cornbread Loves Cynthia’ all over the area, then continuing with his own tag. Cool Earl was best friend to Cornbread and also became known for his tagging exploits, the pair gaining media attention. Another Philadelphia tagger, Top Cat 126, moved to New York in 1967 and helped to spark the graffiti trend there. Watch Cornbread and Taki 183 in action in this MOCA 2011 video.
[…]
The world of street art and graffiti has changed dramatically since the days of Cornbread, who incidentally, now works with The Mural Arts Program that helps to prevent illegal tagging, with the two movements becoming accepted in the wider art market. Edward Seymour could have had no idea just how much his paint in a spray can invention would change the face of our urban landscapes It is the ultimate guide to the world’s most remarkable pieces of graffiti and street art. This book is the definitive survey of the international movement, focusing on the world’s most influential urban artists and artworks. Since the lives and works of urban artists are inextricably linked to specific locations and places, this beautifully illustrated volume features specially commissioned “city artworks” that provide an intimate understanding of these metropolitan landscapes. Organized geographically by country and city, more than 100 of today’s most important artists—including Espo in New York, Shepard Fairey in Los Angeles, Os Gêmeos in Brazil, and Anthony Lister in Australia—are profiled alongside key examples of their work.
It is a sentiment I am inclined to believe, given what might have been running through the artist’s mind while this was painted on the Belfast “Peace Wall”. I pondered whether Swiss Servator’s series on the Catalan Separatist movement was the main driver; I pondered it enough to take a photo while at a red light on my way out of Belfast. While some look at it as the harbinger for urban decay and avoid such neighborhoods at all costs, it seems that it only harms the owner of the structure–assuming he or she has a problem with graffiti. A problem easily solved by setting up a couple cameras, or at the very least a big dog wandering around.
I will admit this wasn’t too bad for an IPA. It has a blend of four hops, which are common by themselves but not always together. It is unfiltered and has plenty of body. It results in something pleasant in texture, bitter upfront, and fruity in the back. Overall, its a solid build and I can dig it. Lic Beer Project SAMO IPA: 3.5/5
In the summer of ’81, I was 15 years old. I wasn’t your average teen. I was a committed juvenile delinquent and drug “enthusiast,” with a somewhat troubled past. My parents were hippies who–like many counter culture rebels–became hard core drug addicts. They divorced during a state mandated custody battle. The cops seized my siblings and myself because my parents refused to snitch on their dealer, basically. I spent two years (’76-’77) with my grandmother, who was a vicious and mean, high-strung stress case with an extreme superiority complex. My Mom eventually regained custody of us and we returned to our outlaw life. After a few years, and developing a drug habit, I tired of the poverty and stress of it all. I was offered to return to my Grandma’s house and I accepted. I returned much more street smart and ready to party it up.
The San Fernando valley in the early eighties was a great place to party. Cruising Van Nuys Blvd (if you google “cruising Van Nuys Blvd” you can see what it was like) had been shut down about a year earlier and that scene had moved to a large park called Balboa Park. The lot would fill with cars, all of which would tune their radios to KMET, and a huge party would happen. Every once in awhile, the cops would drive through and everyone would hide their beers and what have you. It was a great scene.
My friends and I would buy six packs of Mickey’s big mouths and split them. You’d put one beer in each back pocket and drink the third. That way, if you had to run, you only lose one beer. We had a plan for everything. This informal gathering happened every Wednesday night, just like the Van Nuys Blvd scene it replaced. We had many memorable times there, and this story centers around the last one I had there, during the summer of ’81.
This photo was actually taken at Balboa Park on a Wednesday in 1981 or 1982 . Obviously it’s early in the day and things were just getting started.
I had a friend named Marvin. Marvin was far more criminally minded than I. He had been to juvie a few times and had a huge record. He’d dive right in to any criminally oriented situation with aplomb. He pushed me to expand my lack of respect for the law. I was positively small-time by comparison.
Marvin was very small. I was about 6” taller than him. I was kind of a protector of his. He’d get belligerent often and at ill-advised times, and I’d usually smooth things over with whomever wanted to kill him this time. Sometimes a fight would be unavoidable. Those times we’d just fight it out.
This particular Wednesday night was off to a good start when I ran into Marvin. I was already a little drunk, had my three Mickey’s big mouths and was raring to go. Marvin pulls out some ‘ludes and gives me two of them. I was starting to feel really good about things, a feeling later proven to be misguided. As we walked the rows of cars, talking to girls and checking out hot-rods, this big dude runs up and starts hassling Marvin. Here we go again.
I go to assess the situation. It seems that the ‘ludes Marvin had given me earlier had been fronted to him and he had no plan to pay for them. The big dude seemed very agitated and was demanding his 20 bucks. I sprang into negotiating mode and asked what he needed that we could maybe actually get for him. After some back and forth, we agreed that Marvin and I would go steal a car battery as payment. This seemed like an easy was to avoid violence, and we were sure it’d be quick and painless.
There was really only one option for stealing car batteries near this park, a row of apartment buildings across the street. We went to the first car, in the first space of the first building. It turned out to be a horrible choice. There was an overhead storage locker which covered the front half of the hood. I told Marvin to be the lookout, so he stood at the edge of the lot watching out. I had no tools, but I figured I could just wind the clamps off. The hood crashed loudly into the storage bin when opened. I got the negative cable off as planned, but the positive side would not budge more than a slight partial turn. Eventually, I decided to just yank it out and hope the inertia would pop it off. Drugs and booze famously spawn bad decisions. We had both the former and the latter.
Well, after one particularly loud crashing noise I see Marvin waving at me frantically. I start waving back to say, “I can’t help it,” but he responds as if to say, “NO, not that.” Then, he raises both his hands like a stick-up victim from the movies. I was perplexed until I saw the three people with guns pointed at him. They told me to come out with my hands up, so I did. They ushered us into one of the apartments and sat us on the couch inside. There were more armed residents inside and now we had about 6 guns pointed at us. I remember one of them looked like a flint lock taken from a plaque off the wall. Anyway, they held us until the cops arrived. I’m sure the proximity of the park caused them much concern, with all the partying and such, explaining the guns and quickness with which they used them.
The cops took us down to the station and handcuffed us to bench. After about an hour, Marvin’s Mom came and picked him up. I assumed my grandmother would come for me next. Well, an hour later, she still hadn’t come. Finally the cops came and told me that she had told them to keep me. I was going to be driven to Juvenile Hall. Whoo-hoo! After another hour on the bench, they walked me out to a waiting car and we were on our way.
Juvie was pretty much what I expected. It was a huge concrete building with only tiny windows way up high on one wall. It was three floors high and the lesser offenders like me were on the upper floor. That meant we could watch the traffic on the overpass through our window slits, if we stood up on our beds. The food was disgusting and the place was noisy and smelly and fucking cold all the time. We stayed in our cells almost all day. Ate in there and everything. There were some tables in the hall area outside the cells and we’d go out for about an hour every day. I spent about two months there going to trial and then waiting to get shipped out. I remember the radio played the Stevie Nicks/Tom Petty duet over and over because it had just came out. I will always connect that song to that place and time.
This is the actual juvenile hall I was in, as seen from one of the cars we would watch pass by.
Juvenile court is (or, at least, was…) unlike any other depiction or reality of court I had ever seen. As a minor, you have NO rights at all. There’s no concerns about proportionate punishments, rights to confront accusers, even the right to defend oneself. Marvin’s Mom had hired a lawyer for him and he (the lawyer) was the only one who spoke, other than the judge and, briefly, some kind of social worker/probation person, who made recommendations to the judge. Marvin’s lawyer gave a dissertation on what a good kid he was and how the only reason he was in trouble was because of my bad influence. I was steaming mad and kept raising my hand. The judge seemed irritated by me and kept waving me to shut up. After awhile he proclaimed that he had heard enough. Marvin was sentenced to house arrest and probation and I was sentenced to “suitable placement.” For how long, I had no idea. What suitable placement was, again, no clue. All I knew was I got jacked in that courtroom.
Well, one day they drove me out to my “suitable placement.” It was a large group of brick buildings arranged like a school, with a quad, dorms and a cafeteria. It was run by Catholic monks. Everyone was “Brother X, Brother Z,” etc. There weren’t any walls or fences, so escape was always an option. Only the knowledge that I would be hunted down kept me from just leaving, well, that and the constant reminders that the next place was gonna be much worse. There was a school adjacent to the facility and we would spend regular school hours there. I was assigned a job in the kitchen and a dorm space with a cabinet and a bed. We had group therapy every day, where we’d talk about our problems and receive any news about our status, etc. The staff got to determine how long we would have to stay. We got weekend passes which we could earn in various ways. I had to talk my grandma into letting me go to a few at her house (I’m pretty sure the staff called her and made it happen). I got two weekend passes, one of which turned out to be transformative.
There was three things that stood out as notable events while there. First, when I had just arrived, a guy in the kitchen had a half a joint. He was gonna share it with me. I figured we could put a ladder all the way up to the vent so the smoke could escape without smelling the place up. Then, we decided to cover any remaining smell with a mixture of all the cleaning products available, particularly the strong smelling ones.
It turns out that mixing these chemicals can cause a variety of symptoms, including loss of consciousness and even death. Who knew? All the fumes rose to the top of the room, where we were atop the ladder. The fumes were so overwhelming, I couldn’t tell if the pot had any effect. The other guy fell off the ladder, hurt himself and I had to go get him help. The whole thing was viewed as us mixing the wrong chemicals and we never got into trouble because they never found out about the pot.
The second thing was much more consequential. On my second weekend pass, I was out looking to get high. I ran into a friend and asked if he had any dope. He said he didn’t but he was going to a meeting and I was welcome to go. I had to cram as much into my time as possible and there was nothing going on so I said, “yes.”
We drove to some little room in a church. I walked in and immediately thought, “there’s no way these are my kind of people.” They all had cars and jobs and they seemed like normal people. Then they started talking. They talked about all the things I was doing as a delinquent and how they had done similar and felt bad about it. They talked about having a conscience and how it seemed no-one else did. They talked about how it felt to know you were gonna keep doing dope, no matter if it killed you and how hopeless it felt. They seemed to have a window into my soul and made me look at myself in ways I never thought I could.
Prior to that I had all those thoughts and feelings, I just never considered saying them so out loud. I watched people (in my fucked up outlaw world, anyway) go steal, fight, scam and do any manner of devious stuff and never seem to have any feelings of guilt. I assumed that I had to do these things and I would force myself to, but I was wracked with guilt. I thought my guilt was a personal defect which kept me from being all I could be. My life to that point had been a constant battle with my morality to overcome its influence and finally feel the way others looked like they felt. I had never imagined that they all experienced the same turmoil. Now I had proof. I was hooked. I got sober and stayed that way for 30 years.
I was the only one at my placement who had gotten sober. I began to explore my soul and how it worked to regulate my morality. I completely changed my outlook and focus. In the group therapy sessions, I started actually being helpful to the other kids. I started helping them to solve their problems or at least begin to. The average stay there was about 6 months. Some people stayed 5 and some 7. I stayed a whole year. I’m pretty sure some of that was to find a suitable foster home (more on the “suitability” later) but I’m pretty sure my effectiveness at counseling the other kids played a part in extending my stay, as well. In any case, I set the record for longest stay for at least that era. Even a couple of other kids who went to foster homes were released after 6 months.
It was during this time that I developed an ulcer. I was taken to the doctor who injected me with some dye and then x-rayed me. Back then, they had no real drugs for this so they just gave me a list of what not to eat. It was basically everything. Because I was institutionalized, they made me actually stick to it. I spent the last month there eating plain mashed potatoes and egg whites with no seasonings. It was hell. Every meal was a plate of bland whiteness. It sucked balls. I was getting really fed up with the system and wanted out bad.
Eventually, the day came when I was allowed to leave. I was to move to a foster home in a good neighborhood with one other kid who already lived there. Oddly, the “parent” was just a single man, not a couple. I was happy to be leaving and ready to go out into the world. The guy seemed nice enough and the other kid was OK, I guess. I was happy to able to go to meetings and be out in the world, finally. It was about 14 months after I had tried to steal the car battery, and I was finally free to walk the streets, or so I thought.
The other kid that lived there was a full-on fuck-up. He would waltz in with a shiny new stereo and claim he found it in an alley. He’d say that he hoped it worked and then try it out. Amazingly they always worked. The “parent” seemed to buy all of this hook, line and sinker. This kid never got in any trouble whatsoever. He even got brought home by the cops once for some crime or another. The guy never even asked about any of this. In my case, however, if I was a few minutes past curfew, there’d be handcuffs on the tables and endless threats to send me back. It was clear that the other kid was immune from trouble and I had a target on my back. I was young and at least somewhat naive, so I never really understood what was going on until after I decided to leave.
One day I had had enough. I decided to find my bank book with my kitchen job earnings (about $300.00) and split. It was over a year and a half since my crime. I figured that I had paid my debt and was not going to live under this cloud of threats any more. I ditched high school and went hunting for my bank book. As I rifled the drawers in the “parent’s” room, I hit one that was locked. I assumed my stuff was in there, so I used a playing card to open it. Inside was a huge cache of gay porn and some sex toys that seemed like they were aimed towards women, IYNWIMAITYD. That’s when I started to remember a bunch of details. I would come home in the middle of the day and both the “parent” and the other kid would be in bath robes. Sometimes the kid would be taking a bath and the parent guy would go into the bathroom and stay 20 minutes or so. I realized that this guy was fucking the kid and knew I wasn’t going to be down with that. He was trying to get rid of me to cover it up. At that moment, he came in and started yelling about me being a thief, because I jimmied open his drawer. I really wanted to beat the living hell out of him with a lamp. I mean badly. The guy was a minister at a huge church, someone who convinced the state he could look after wayward teenaged boys, and this was what he did. I restrained myself and just left, not even bothering to find my bank book.
It was not easy, being alone on the streets at 16 years old. On top of that, I had a warrant for going AWOL. I started using a fake name, at least for anything official (like talking to the cops). I slept in an abandoned bar across the street from my AA clubhouse for a few months. I would put 4 bar stools together for a bed. I spent my days in bookstores reading book after book. I really can’t remember how I fed myself.
Eventually, I started getting jobs doing drywall or framing houses. Back then, you could buy a tool belt full of tools and just walk up to a jobsite and ask for work. 8 or 10 bucks an hour and if you worked really hard, they’d keep you. Nobody asked for ID or social security info. I did phone sales, auto repos and a bunch of other crap, too. Eventually, I got a job from a guy at the meeting in title insurance. It paid OK and I started saving a bit. Finally, I went to trade school for auto repair and became a mechanic.
One day, I hitchhiked to Santa Barbara with a friend of mine. We just went to hang out and have fun. We were walking down State Street and as we walked, I was cleaning my finger nails with a buck knife. My friend bumped into me a few times. I kept telling him to watch where he was going, but he persisted. Finally, I stopped and adamantly told him to knock it off. Right as I was doing this, a guy walks up and asks, “what are you doing?” He was just a regular looking guy with a Levi’s jacket on. I said, “nothing, just messing around,” and realized I had my knife in my hand, so I folded it and put it away. Well, he opened his coat and pulled out a gun and yelled, “Freeze!” which was silly, because we weren’t moving. We put our hands up and he took his coat off to reveal a Santa Barbara Police shirt. He arrested me for “disturbing the peace.” I used my middle name for a first name and my Mom’s maiden name for the last one. I told him I was 18 years old, so they took me to the county jail. This was on a Friday night.
I sat in jail until Sunday evening, when they called out my alias. I had forgotten it by then so there was significant lag time in my responding. Eventually, I caught on and answered up. The officer told me to roll ’em up because I had made bail. I was shocked. The only one who even knew I was there was my friend and he was 16 also and penniless. The cop walked me down some halls and finally stopped me in a quiet spot. He told me that some friends from L.A. had come up to look for me after my friend hitched back down there and told them what happened. They went to juvenile hall, the police station, the hospital, basically everywhere before ending up at the jail. They tried every combination of my name with no luck (they didn’t know what my alias was).
Finally, they asked to see pictures of arrestees from Friday night and found me that way. The cop said they told him my whole story and he was impressed. He said he was gonna let me them bail me out, but first he took me on a scared straight tour. This guy killed his mom, that guy stole a car, etc. Then he gave me a hundred bucks and said, “don’t come back to my jail,” and I was out.
I tried to make good on his admonition, but it wasn’t to be. About 2 years later, I was riding my motorcycle around and got pulled over. I had long since stopped using fake names, so I gave them my real name. They gave me a chicken shit ticket for loud pipes or dim tail lights or something and after I signed it, they whipped my hands behind my back and handcuffed me. I asked what they were doing and they said I had a warrant from Santa Barbara. Damnit!
This time, I went to L.A. County Jail and had to sit there for 5 days until a bus left for up north. I rode up with all the people who were sentenced to state prison. I got to Santa Barbara jail on Friday, so I had to wait until Monday to see a judge. When I finally did, he seemed pissed that I was there. He said, “years ago you did basically nothing on State Street, there’s not even any peace on State Street to disturb! Now, you’ve spent ten days in jail, and forfeited $100.00 bail for no good reason. I apologize and the case is dismissed.” So now, I get released at like 11 p.m. in Santa Barbara with no money and no way home. I hitched home and it took all fucking night. When I finally got home, my motorcycle had been impounded and cost me about $600.00 to get it out.
I could go on, but this seems like as good of a place as any to end this story. My life, both before and after these events, has been filled with the similar craziness, this is just one sliver of it. BTW, Santa Barbara County Jail, circa early 1980s, was a WAY better place to be an inmate than either L.A. County Jail or Sylmar Juvenile Hall.
P.S. When I adopted my son 7 years ago, I told this story in somewhat abbreviated form, to our social worker. She was amazed, not by that fact that it happened, but by the fact that I turned out OK. She said, basically, “ most of those kids end up spending their whole lives in prison.”
I thought that I’d profile someone a little more palatable – indeed, admirable – this time.
Appearances Can Be Deceiving
The fellow in this photo to the right looks a distinguished figure; a bank president, perhaps, or a judge, a governor, maybe a college professor. He is a figure of great dignity and gravitas, indeed.
Well, he was a college professor and a Governor (of Maine), in fact, but that’s the least of his story. The old man here is Brigadier General Joshua Chamberlain, hero of Gettysburg, one of America’s premiere military heroes, a man who may have single-handedly saved the Union on a fateful day in 1863.
His Maculate Origin
Lawrence Joshua Chamberlain (for unknown reasons he is best known by his middle name) was born on September 8, 1828, in Brewer, Maine, to Joshua and Sarah DuPree Brastow Chamberlain. A studious and deeply religious child – his mother raised him in a strict Congregationalist household – he was shy and spoke with a pronounced stammer. His father instilled in the young Lawrence an understanding of the importance of educating one’s self, as well as an abiding interest in military matters. This was to lead to one of the most remarkable feats of American arms in our history.
As a young man he pursued various occupations including lumberjack (hardly a novelty in Maine) and bricklayer, meanwhile studying Greek and Latin, because lumberjacking and bricklaying are both occupations that give you plenty of spare time for studying Greek and Latin. At age twenty he entered Bowdoin College, graduating in four years. Then, perhaps remembering his mother’s insistence on rigid Calvinism, Chamberlain entered the Bangor Theological Seminary. On his graduation from that institution, however, he declined the ministry and returned to Bowdoin, where he was hired as a professor, teaching Rhetoric and Natural and Revealed Religions. In 1855, he married his childhood sweetheart Frances “Fanny” Adams, and no, I will not speculate as to the source of her nickname.
Then, in 1862, Chamberlain was to embark on his military career, and it is possible that no other American Army officer has ever led a more distinguished career with so little preparation.
His Adventurous Career
Chamberlain in Uniform.
On the outbreak of the war, Chamberlain lectured his students on the necessity of preserving the Union and, being one to put his money where his mouth was, then wrote to the Governor of Maine, one Israel Washburn Jr., “I fear, this war, so costly of blood and treasure, will not cease until the men of the North are willing to leave good positions, and sacrifice the dearest personal interests, to rescue our country from desolation, and defend the national existence against treachery.” Chamberlain then proceeded to do just that, declining the command of the 20th Maine Volunteer Infantry until, as he put it, he could “start a little lower and learn the business first.” He didn’t start that much lower, serving first as Lieutenant Colonel of the regiment under Colonel Adelbert Ames. The 20th was assigned to the 3rd Brigade, 1st Division, V Corps of the Army of the Potomac under the command of Brigadier General Dan Butterfield. With these men Joshua Chamberlain went to war.
The 20th saw first action at Fredericksburg, where the inept General Burnside ordered repeated attacks against the Confederates entrenched on Marye’s Heights. The entire mess could have been avoided had Burnside, who despite his impressive facial hair and his invention of a successful breech-loading carbine was only a fair general, allowed one of his subordinates, Winfield Hancock, to cross the river the day before. Had they done so, Hancock’s men could have occupied the heights before Lee’s men arrived; but that was not to be the case, and so the 20th Maine charged the heights.
The charge of the 20th came late in the day, and like the units before them, they failed to take the heights. They were still on the long, deadly slope when night fell and the men of the 20th, with Chamberlain in their midst, spent a cold and uncomfortable night using the bodies of slain soldiers as shields from the Confederate bullets that kept probing their lines throughout. Come morning, they withdrew.
A faulty smallpox vaccine that made much of the regiment ill spared them from the debacle at Chancellorsville, but about this time Colonel Ames was promoted away from the 20th, and Chamberlain ascended to Colonel and command of the regiment.
The next July, Lee invaded Pennsylvania, and the 20th Maine marched towards a little Pennsylvania town called Gettysburg.
His One-Man War
To call what happened on July 2nd, 1863 as a one-man war is perhaps a bit of a misnomer. The entire 20th Maine fought that action, after all, and their commander, Colonel Chamberlain, thereafter, always insisted that credit for their victory on that day properly went not to him but to the regiment. But the command was his, the responsibility was his, and the decisions were his. On that day, Chamberlain prevented another Chancellorsville-style disaster and may have saved the Union.
On that fateful morning the 20th Maine was ordered to secure a hill called Little Round Top, which formed the extreme far left of the Federal line. “You may not withdraw under any circumstances,” Colonel Chamberlain was ordered by his Brigade commander, Colonel Strong Vincent. Realizing that if his men faltered and lost Little Round Top, the entire Union line could be flanked out and rolled up like a cheap carpet, Chamberlain spoke to his men, ordering them to prepare positions, to pile up rocks, to be ready for a stubborn fight.
The attack was not long in coming. The 15th Alabama attacked in force, charging up the steep hill several times. The 20th suffered losses, but for the most part the men fared well in their defensive positions. As the Alabama men probed for the 20th Maine’s flank, Chamberlain reportedly ordered his left flank to refuse the line, forming a new line at a 90-degree angle to the old.
“Bayonets Forward!” Gettysburg, PA, July 2, 1863 – Little Round Top – Colonel Joshua Chamberlain, his 20th Maine almost out of ammunition, orders a bayonet charge against a superior force of attacking Confederates. Original Commissioned by the U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA.
During the fighting, Chamberlain was hit twice, both minor injuries; a bullet struck his sword scabbard, leaving a large bruise on his leg, and a spent bullet hit his boot.
After several charges by the Alabama men convinced Chamberlain that the Confederates didn’t intend to give up, he decided to change tactics. The Maine men were running low on ammo, and Chamberlain reckoned that charging down a hill beat the daylights out of charging up it, so he ordered his men to fix bayonets.
The 20th fixed bayonets and charged. As they charged, the left flank wheeled forward like a slamming door, hitting the 15th Alabama’s flank. In the charge the 20th took over a hundred prisoners, including an Alabama captain captured personally by Chamberlain.
Thus, ended the Battle of Little Round Top and the threat to the Federal left flank. But while the battle ended that day, the history has stayed with us; when I was a U.S. Army officer candidate in the mid-Eighties, we studied this battle as an example of what thoughtful, courageous and committed leadership can achieve on the battlefield.
The 20th Maine went on to fight at Cold Harbor, Second Petersburg, White Oak Road, Five Forks and Appomattox. Chamberlain was badly wounded at Second Petersburg, taking a bullet through the hip. The brigade surgeon predicted he would die, but he survived and, after an extended leave, during which he was promoted to Brigadier General – an honor that was intended to be posthumous – returned to duty.
Because of his well-known bravery and gallantry, General Grant personally named General Chamberlain to accept the surrender of the arms of the Army of Northern Virginia. Chamberlain, seeing the defeated Confederates lining up to surrender their muskets, raised some eyebrows when he ordered his men to attention, showing respect for a valiant foe.
Thirty years after the Battle of Little Round Top, Chamberlain was belatedly presented with the Medal of Honor for his defense of the Federal flank; the citation described his “extraordinary heroism,” and “daring heroism and great tenacity.” Fewer citations were delivered with such accuracy. By war’s end, Chamberlain had served in twenty battles, been cited for courage four times, had six horses shot from under them and was wounded six times. His biography, The Passing of the Armies, details all these things with much more detail that I could present here.
His Golden Years
Professor Chamberlain
After the war, Chamberlain returned to Maine, where he won four one-year terms as Governor, in 1866, 1867, 1868 and 1869. He eventually tired of political service and, in 1871, returned to Bowdoin College as President of the institution, a position he held until 1883, when complications of his Civil War wounds forced his resignation.
But a few old wounds weren’t enough to keep Chamberlain at home. He served as the Surveyor of the Port of Portland, Maine, dabbled in real estate, and even traveled to the West Coast to supervise the building of a railroad. In 1898, he volunteered for service in the Spanish-American War, figuring that even a seventy-year-old man could serve in some way, but was rejected due to his age and the wounds from which he never fully recovered.
Chamberlain died in 1914, not long before the explosion of the Great War in Europe.
This is a particularly interesting piece for me to write. The first two men portrayed in this series were remarkable in many ways; W.D.M. Bell was a man of iron courage and endless lust for adventure and possessor of an enormous set of brass balls, while John Johnston was an unsavory, drunken lout who nevertheless was tough, resolute and fearless.
But unlike them, Joshua Chamberlain is one of my personal heroes, and has been since I first read an account of the battle of Little Round Top. He possessed many admirable qualities, not least among them iron courage. His is an example that young men today would do well to emulate.
I used to love fireworks. As a kid, that was the best part of Independence Day. Fireworks shows, shooting off bottle rockets and Roman candles…. ah.
Then a year in NE Afghanistan went by. Came home and went to a Class A baseball game near my town, that featured a fireworks show afterward. First shot started a bit of a panicked reaction from me. (No, really Chipwooder, it did!) It was the sound, not the flash or such. I excused myself, and figured I would wait it out in the restroom. WRONG. Being a Single A park, it was cinderblock and sheetmetal…it actually amplified everything. Before I could really freak out, I got back to tell my wife, that I kind of needed to leave. As we walked back to the car, the show ended. Haven’t been a big fan since. Going to Iraq for the second half of TEH SURGE didn’t help any adjusting, I am guessing.
Later, being a bit discomfited by my fireworks enthusiast neighbors, I wondered….why of all days, is this the one people blow stuff up to celebrate? [NOTE: by the time this started happening, I had started to transmogrify into a libertarian. No police were called, no complaints to the City, no going out and yelling at them….especially since their kids seemed to love it.]. I mean, there is some history of noisemaking on New Year’s Eve…firing off guns seems to be a tradition in many places. [When I was a prosecutor, I spent 8 months running a branch court location in a city with…a sizable Messican, um, transient population. New Year’s Eve 1998, we had 286 calls of shots fired. The next year, the cops got smart – they had a Spanish speaking officer in each car, and they would simply go the area and have the cop tell everyone…”Happy New Year. By the way. No shooting here, please. People think it is a gang war. Thank you and good night.”] But nothing on the scale of July 4.
As with most problems in the entire world IT STARTED WITH A DEAD WHITE MALE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
(Missing by only two days, due to the difference in the vote of Congress and the Declaration being dated)….John Adams explained to his wife
“The second day of July, 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires, and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more.”
OK, so I see where this started.
And as any libertarian could tell you – what started as a sort of spontaneous celebration was slowly co-opted and somewhat smothered by the gubermint. Eventually fixed as a holiday, then an unpaid Federal Holiday…then, of course, a paid Federal Holiday. The guns, bonfires and bells got shushed or extinguished. But the fireworks remained. Until the nanny-statists started getting them banned, or taken over by the G. Some cooperation with sponsors and such has kept many a civic fireworks show going (“Macy’s Fourth of July Fireworks, as seen on NBC! Chicago Navy Pier Fireworks show, brought to you by Miller Lite”). In many liberty oriented states, fireworks are legal (Hi, Indiana!) and often brought by the carload into more nanny-scold states (Illinois) and blasted away with a complete disregard for rules, laws and finger-wagging. While I may not care for it, I say “good!” At least one little bit of defiance of the Panopticon State.
Go shoot off a Roman Candle and pack of bottle rockets for me, will you? I’ll be in the basement with the dog and some imperial stout or whisky (or both).
See that handsome, rugged fellow to the right? Looks like the very picture of an old-time mountain man, doesn’t he? Hirsute and tough, yet still ruggedly good-looking; no doubt a wilderness gentleman, a man of good breeding and manners.
Of course, he’s nothing of the sort. That is, of course, Robert Redford, in his role as Jeremiah Johnson, from the movie of the same name. His character was based on a man who was none of the things described above, save perhaps hirsute and tough. He was John Jeremiah Garrison “Liver-Eating” Johnston, and his story is quite different than the movie version – and a lot more interesting. Johnston was no heroic figure; in today’s world he probably would have landed in prison. But it’s an interesting contrast, between Redford’s noble character and the unsavory, drunken, violent lout on whom Redford’s character was based.
His Maculate Origin
Johnston was born John Jeremiah Garrison. He emerged into the world in Little York, New Jersey, in 1824, and if anyone could be said to be living proof of the maxim “what doesn’t kill you, makes you stronger”, it is the young Johnston. His father, one Isaac Garrison, was a violent, abusive alcoholic who sent his young sons to neighboring farms to labor to pay off his drinking and gambling debts.
It didn’t take long for the young John Jeremiah to tire of this treatment. At age twelve or thirteen – the record is unclear – he signed up to be a crewman aboard a whaler, which occupation he followed until the outbreak of the Mexican War, when he signed up with the U.S. Navy.
It was during this tenure that the course of young John Jeremiah’s life changed. He had matured into a massive, intimidating figure; six foot two inches tall, heavily bearded, two hundred and sixty pounds of solid muscle. His Navy service ended when an officer reprimanded a friend of John Jeremiah’s with the flat of his sword; Garrison knocked the lieutenant ass over teakettle and, facing court-martial, fled ashore.
Now he faced a crossroads. Twenty-two years old, with his only skills being sailing and fighting, he decided to head inland, making the obvious choice for a youth in his position: To make a living in the Rockies. He adopted the surname “Johnston,” because why not, and struck out for the West.
His Adventurous Career
The Real Deal.
Johnston surfaced in 1846 in Alder Gulch, Montana Territory, working as a woodcutter supplying the steamboats on that Missouri River port. One story of Johnston from around this period describes him lounging on the Missouri River dock with a partner. Johston was wearing only mule-ear trooper boots and “a filthy red woolen union suit that he had apparently been living and sleeping in for several years.” While he was thus occupied, a riverboat arrived bearing wealthy tourists from St. Louis who were taking in the sights, of which Johnston and his partner were not the least. Several prominent ladies of that city found Johnston and his unnamed partner fascinating, and invited him into the steamboat’s parlor for luncheon, with the understanding that he put on some trousers first.
Johnston and his partner were nonplussed by the luxurious dining salon, and their confusion was heightened at the end of the meal, when dishes of ice cream were passed out.
“John, what is this stuff?” the partner asked.
“Don’t look ignorant,” Johnston told him. “It comes in cans.”
1863 found him signing up with the Second Colorado Cavalry, to serve as a scout. He was with the cavalry for only a few days before going AWOL to spend his enlistment bonus on a drinking binge, but eventually returned to the regiment in time to ride east, where he took part in the battles of Westport and Newtonia. Johnston was shot in the leg but recovered and continued to ride with the Second until his discharge in September 1965.
Set at liberty again, Johnston returned to the Montana Territory, where he worked at almost any occupation that would make money: Trapper, fur trader, woodcutter, carpenter, whiskey trader. He viewed the law as only a set of mild suggestions, engaging in running liquor to the various Indian tribes and selling Indian skulls to tourists. In 1868 Johnston formed a partnership with one J.X. Biedler to run liquor to the Indians in an extremely hostile area known as the Whoop Up Territory, which had the reputation of being extremely dangerous for white men; that information bothered Johnston not a jot, and he continued in the illegal whiskey trade until 1873, when he executed an adroit 180-degree turn and got himself appointed as Sheriff in Coulson (now Billings) Montana. Johnston worked as a lawman more or less consistently – again, the record is not complete – until he retired in 1894 at age 70.
Incidentally there is no record of Johnston’s preferring the Hawken rifle. The movie not only got that wrong, they got it badly wrong; a “.30 caliber Hawken gun,” as referenced in the film, would be suitable only for rabbits and squirrels. The only armed photos of Johnston I have found shows him with what appears to be a Sharps rifle and, later, an 1876 Winchester.
As to the source of those Indian skulls, that is the part of Johnston’s legend that is best known.
His One-Man War
Legend has it that, in 1847, Johnston took a woman of the Flathead tribe to wife, only to have her killed by a man of the Crow nation; in this respect, the story is much like the one in that movie. But Johnston’s revenge on the Crow was far more brutal than Hollywood’s imaginings.
According to the book Crow Killer: the Saga of Liver-Eating Johnson, taken from the accounts of people who knew Johnston, this one-man vendetta claimed the lives of over three hundred Crow Indians over the course of twenty-five years.
One account has it that Johnston was captured by the Crow. Held prisoner in winter in the norther Rockies, stripped to the waist, tied with thongs and left in a tepee with a single guard, Johnston managed to work himself free of his bonds. He knocked his guard senseless with a kick, took the brave’s knife, scalped him, then proceeded to cut off one of his legs. Taking the guard’s leg with him, he fled shirtless into the winter wilderness with only the Indian’s leg for provisions; he lived by this act of cannibalism to reach his partner Del Gue’s cabin, some two hundred miles away.
The appellation “Liver-Eating Johnston” derives from this vendetta, during which Johnston was said to have eaten the livers of the Crow he killed. He may have fostered this reputation, as to the Crow it was a deadly insult, as they could not go to the afterlife without their livers; but reportedly the incident dates to the early days of the quarter-century conflict when Johnston and several other men fought a Crow war party. Johnston later claimed to have shot an Indian, and then ran his knife into the brave to finish him. When he withdrew the knife, there was a bit of the Indian’s liver stuck to the blade; Johnston noticed a young tenderfoot watching, so he pretended to nibble at the liver, then extended it to the young man, asking if he wanted a bite. The tenderfoot, as Johnston put it, proceeded to “sick up his guts,” to the amusement of the other members of the party. However, other than this account, there is no actual record of any acts of liver-eating.
Johnston’s taste for revenge (and human legs) ran out in the early 1870s, when he formally made peace with the Crow, referring to them thereafter as his brothers. After that he limited his killing to members of the Sioux and Blackfoot nations.
His Golden Years
The Older Johnston.
Johnston’s health declined after his retirement. His former great strength was eroded by alcoholism and the several wounds he had received in the Civil War and his years of fighting Indians. He moved into a veteran’s hospital in Los Angeles in 1899, at age 74, and died a year later.
John Jeremiah Garrison Johnston was a much more interesting sort than Redford’s far less colorful depiction. He was a product of his times, as are we all, but even for his times, he was a violent, profane man. A thoroughly unsavory character, he did nevertheless possess determination and great tenacity, traits of which we should all study up on. And again, even for his times, his career of adventuring seems like one big caper across the most dangerous areas of the West, where he fearlessly engaged in the most dangerous occupations around.
We should not overlook the contemptible parts of Johnston’s personality. He was not a man to be respected or held up as a role model. But we shouldn’t overlook his courage and tenacity, either. Maybe, one day, some Hollywood producer will make a movie that more accurately depicts Johnston as he was, one of the toughest, roughest, shootin’est, most colorful characters our nation has ever produced.
On a small wooden stand in my office, there is an old watch. It’s nothing special and has no value to anyone but me. It’s an old Westclox Pocket Ben, which probably cost a couple of bucks back in the 1930s; an old windup tin case watch with a little second hand and a fob hand-braided out of nylon string. The crystal is cracked, and the watch will run when wound but only for an hour or so.
It’s an old, cheap, busted watch, with a market value of zero. But Bill Gates couldn’t buy that watch from me. It was my grandfather’s watch, and aside from a few old letters and postcards my mother saved, it’s the only tangible thing I have from him.
Back in The Day…
When I was a little tad, there were several figures that loomed large in my young life. My Dad, of course, and his father, my Grandpa Clark; our neighbor, who had the farmstead down the road, Brownie, a WW1 veteran who was a great surrogate grandfather. But my Grandpa Baty figured very high among that lot.
Grandpa in 1915.
It is no understatement to say that Grandpa was, as they put it in those days, “a bit of a character.” Born in 1896, he had attended college and obtained a degree (exactly at what level, I never have known) in business, and worked in a bank in Waterloo for a few months around the time of the Great War. But he found he hated being indoors all day, and so went back to the family farm and ended up taking it over from his father; he was a farmer and carpenter for the rest of his life. He was widely known around northern Lynn County for his dry wit, his skill at shoring up old barns, and his uncanny ability to pull harvests of corn and soybeans out of the dry, sandy soil of the old farm.
The Baty family farm was a century farm, having been homesteaded by my great-great-great-grandfather, one William Baty, in the 1830s. It was passed on in turn to his son Thomas Jefferson Baty, who served in the Civil War; then to my great-grandfather, Andrew Jackson Baty, and thence to Grandpa. My mother was fond of pointing out that when she was growing up during the Depression, that farm families may not have had much money but they always had enough to eat; she was also fond of paraphrasing a Patrick McManus quote, pointing out that her family was among “…the landed gentry of eastern Iowa during the Depression; we owned the wall we had our backs to.” During those hard years Grandpa kept a bunch of laying hens, a milk cow and a few pigs, and they got along just fine.
The farm was fifty acres of sandy bottomland along the Wapsipinicon River in northern Lynn County, Iowa. I spent a good part of my youth wandering around that old farmstead.
When I was a little kid, I remember watching Grandpa shave, which he did every day, even if he was just choring around the farm. I’d watched my Dad shave with a safety razor, but Grandpa used shaving soap with a badger-hair brush and a straight razor, which he touched up on a leather strop before each use. I thought that was pretty cool. Grandpa always wore his old hickory Key bib overalls, and he always had his old pocket watch stuck in the bib pocket, secured with a fob he had tied up out of coarse nylon string. Whenever I remember my Grandpa, I remember the smell of his shaving soap and the sound of that watch ticking.
The Great Outdoors
A string of Minnesoda fish, 1968. Grandpa, Mom, Dad and me.
Like most of my family, Grandpa didn’t care much for hanging around the house. With a good fishing river only a ten-minute walk from the house, there just wasn’t any reason not to go try to catch a mess of smallmouths for supper.
Not content with his friendly little stretch of the Wapsi, Grandpa accompanied my Mom, Dad and I on adventures fishing in Minnesota and Wisconsin. A family friend had a cabin on the edge of the Red Lake Indian reservation, and it was a favorite destination. While he was a better-than-average angler, Grandpa always opined that the best part of fishing was just being outdoors, along the river, on a nice day, with his family.
Grandpa taught me how to roll cornmeal and strawberry jam doughballs for carp bait. He taught me that those same doughballs made decent snacks. He taught me how to cook up corn dodgers to pack along for solid fare in a cold camp. He taught me how to start a fire with two sticks, as long as both were matches. He taught me the importance of dry socks before even the Army did. He taught me more outdoor lore than anyone except my Dad, and I’m happy to say that the most important lesson, just how great it was to be outdoors and not mucking about inside, has stuck with me better than all the others combined.
Spinning a Yarn or Two
Ever heard of flying snakes? Grandpa had them on his farm, or so he told me when I was seven or eight years old. One summer day we spent the better part of the afternoon tramping around the place looking for flying snakes, which he had convinced me really existed. We didn’t find any. When we returned to the house, my Mom called me away for a moment, explaining, “Grandma wants to talk to Grandpa for a minute.” I remember not being quite able to make out words, but I had the distinct impression that Grandma, a tough old farm wife, was giving Grandpa a damn good piece of her mind.
But his wife’s disapproval would never stand in the way of a good yarn.
On one visit Grandpa handed me a badly worn chunk of what appeared to be hard black rubber. “I was out working on the tractor,” he explained, “and this fell out of the sky and hit me on the head. I saw on the news last night that one of the Apollo spaceships flew over yesterday. I think this fell off its steering wheel when they went by.” This was a stretch too far for me to quite believe, even coming from my Grandpa to the eight-year-old me, especially when I noticed later that Grandpa’s ancient John Deere was missing a chunk of the hard rubber coating for its steering wheel that was suspiciously the same size as the chunk off “the Apollo spaceship.”
Endless were the tales of Grandpa’s adventures. Fish would poke their heads out of the river and talk to him. Once a raccoon woke him up and warned him that the neighbor’s cows were in his cornfield. He was on a first-name basis with every squirrel on the farm and conversed with them all regularly. In that case I suspect he may have been telling some sort of truth, as after I started hunting in earnest, he reminded me of the rule that all my cousins and I had to follow, namely that no squirrels were to be harmed on his place.
A Work Ethic
But most of all, Grandpa was a man who couldn’t abide other people butting into his business, whether those people carried a government-issued title or not. He was an old-fashioned sort of man who minded his yard, his farm and his family, and didn’t bother anyone if they just left him alone.
Watching Grandpa fish, 1970
My first paying job came along when I was about ten years old. I had a brand-new pellet gun and took it along when we were down at the farm visiting the grandparents for the weekend. Grandpa eyed the pellet gun and asked me if I was a good shot.
“Pretty good,” I bragged, full of ten-year-old bravado.
“Good,” Grandpa grinned at me. “Come on.”
We walked across the barnyard to where Grandpa’s corncrib sat, full of the recent harvest. “I’ve got some problems with rats,” he told me. “Sit quiet here on this old tractor tire and watch for a while, and you’ll see them. I’ll give you, oh, a dime for every dead rat you can pile up.”
“OK,” I said, “I’ll get a bunch.”
I made five dollars that weekend, my first foray into the gig economy. This would have been around 1971, when five dollars would keep a kid in pop and candy bars for quite a spell. I was happy to have the cash, Grandpa was pleased with the pile of dead rats (although not so pleased that he didn’t leave it to me to bury them out in the cornfield) and my folks were pleased that I had learned a lesson in exchange of value.
A few years later, I was about thirteen, and Grandpa offered to buy me a bottle of pop in town if I’d help him rig up the galvanized metal chutes in that same corncrib; the corncrib had two sides, and Grandpa’s little PTO-driven elevator would dump the corn in through a hatch in the roof, through the chutes to one side or the other for storage. We spent about an hour rigging the Rube Goldberg contraption up; when we finished, Grandpa flashed his characteristic grin at me and said, “those cobs will go through that like shit through a tin horn.”
I realized then and there that I must be growing up, as Grandpa would never swear in front of a woman or a child.
Grandpa put in his last corn crop the year before he died at 78. He worked, always, well past the age that people nowadays think of retirement; but I honestly don’t think the idea ever occurred to him. He gave up carpentry for hire about the time he turned 70, but he honestly loved farming and saw no reason to quit; he loved muddling around the place, plotting next year’s allocation of land to field corn and popcorn for the popcorn works at Vinton. He enjoyed fiddling with his ancient John Deere Model A, patching up the fences and occasionally sneaking down to the Wapsi for a spot of fishing. He had a simple life but a great life. He taught me more than I have time to tell you here, but all of that is paying off now that I’m the Grandpa.
And Then…
Grandpa’s Watch
The summer I was fourteen, in 1975, Grandpa died, of complications of diabetes. It’s useless to think about how these days, improvements in treatment may have resulted in a longer life for this man I loved and admired; that was then, he died, and that was that.
But for the fourteen-year-old me, it was a hell of a bad time. It was the first time I lost anyone I loved. Since then, that instance has come along more often, but that was the first time.
A few months after the funeral, Dad and I were out fishing. We walked down a favorite northeast Iowa trout stream, fishing as we went, until we came across a spot Grandpa had called a favorite. It made me feel bad, and I said so. But Dad, with wisdom typical of him, said I shouldn’t feel bad. He had, after all, loved and admired his father-in-law, as so many people did, but he also knew the way to see things. “We should feel glad,” he said, “that your Grandpa was here to enjoy these days with us. He’d want us to keep doing that.”
So, we did.
That’s how Grandpa left us. Last year, after my Dad passed, Mom dug out Grandpa’s old pocket watch, which she had put away all those years for this moment. “I want you to have Daddy’s watch,” she told me. “Take care of it.” I promised her I would; now Mom is gone too, but my promise to her holds.
Now, once in a while, I take the old Pocket Ben off the stand, wind it up, put it to my ear and listen to it ticking for a few minutes… And suddenly, I’m a little kid again, sitting on my Grandpa’s lap at the kitchen table, hearing his watch, smelling his shaving soap, and listening to one of his tall tales.
Nowadays it is thought of as part of urban blight in some circles, but in others it has become an art 
