The Pumpkin People

   

Many years ago, there was a village where people farmed the land and hunted deer and quail. Their lives were happy and peaceful except for one thing. Once a year, at harvest, they found themselves at the mercy of a giant race of beings. These beings had eyes that glowed like jock-o'-lanterns and skin so orange that the villagers called them Pumpkin People.

   The Pumpkin People lived deep in the earth, but at harvest time they raided the village for furs and food. When they knock on the villagers' doors, they expected these things to be waiting. If they weren't, the Pumpkin People would leave and return again at midnight to punish those who refused to give them what they wanted.
   "Give us something you have planted," they warned, "or we'll take something of yours to plant!"
   One year, a drought struck the land, and the crops failed. The villagers were barely able to harvest enough food for their own families.  When the time came for the Pumpkin People to visit, the villagers had nothing left to offer. Knowing the consequences of leaving nothing, they put out what little they had.
   Only one man refused to share. Peter Vingle put out nothing. He had lost his wife when his daughter was born, and he treasured the child more than anything. She was perfect, except for a tiny birthmark - the outline of a star on her cheek. Peter thought that was beautiful, too, so he named the little girl Starlina. He was determined to have enough food to feed her through the winter.
   "Let the Pumpkin People grow their own food," he said.
   The people begged him not to anger the Pumpkin People, but he heeded no warnings. He looked at the food and furs the villagers had sacrificed and shook his head.
   "After tonight, they will know how foolish they've been," he told himself.
   The night they all dreaded came, and after dark, Peter heard the knocking. He did not answer. He fed Starlina her supper and tucked her in bed. Then he ate and went to bed himself. He heard the knocking again at midnight, but he did not get up. He buried his head between his pillows and slept on. He didn't hear his daughter's little feet patter softly to the door to answer the knock. It wasn't until morning came and he went to wake Starlina that he discovered she was gone.
   He frantically sounded the alarm, and all the villagers joined in the search. They shook their heads sadly, and Peter flew into a rage when they suggested that the Pumpkin People had taken her.
  "That's foolishness!" he yelled. "She has wandered off. We will find her!"
   When the day ended, however, there was still no sign of Starlina. They called off the search, and Peter Vingle walked home with his head bowed in grief.
  As he started to open the door, he noticed a single pumpkin seed on the ground. Anger boiled through him, and he stomped the seed into the earth.
   Winter came, and Peter Vingle's hair turned white to match the snow. He went into the village only when he had to. The villagers tried to engage him in conversation, but he barely replied in response.
   Finally, it was spring - the time of rebirth. Everything was blooming and growing. It was going to be a good year for crops.
   One day, Peter stepped outside and looked around. He noticed for the first time that a pumpkin vine was growing by the door. He looked closer and saw that it had one small pumpkin on it. He stared at in disbelief and fell to his knees. Eyes glowed from the pumpkin like jack-o'-lanterns, but he knew the features of the pumpkin face so well! The star outline was perfect on the cheek.
   The air grew cold, and a voice echoed from deep within the earth: "Give us something you have planted, or we will take something of yours to plant!"
   The pumpkin vine flew into the air and wrapped itself around Peter Vingle's neck. All went black as he fell across the glowing eyes of the pumpkin.
        From the book, The Walking Trees by Roberta Simpson Brown. Republished for Ono Almanac by Nash Black, with permission from August House Publishing. To enjoy more stories from the book click on the title.

Footnote: We've love Roberta Simpson Brown's multiple award winning stories. For many years she has visited schools, libraries and other arenas across Kentucky telling stories. Her fans are legion and she plays to packed houses that enjoy a chilling experience.
   The past winter Roberta contracted a virus that paralyzed her vocal cords and she lost her voice. A beloved story teller was silenced. At this writing, after months of treatment and rehabilitation she can speak to some extent, but has been forced to cancel her story telling sessions for the witching month.
   We are pleased to share with you a story from The Walking Trees and other Scary Stories, pub. 2006, when we were delighted to give it a well-deserved five star review on Amazon.com.

   We wish to thank Mr. Steve Floyd, publisher at August House Publishing for his permission to allow us to bring you a seasonal story from Roberta.
   Barbara Appleby designed the illustration for the story.

Scariest Stories Ever Told

 

Th's the season for Scariest Stories Ever Told by Roberta Simpson Brown. She delivers to her multitude of fans a humdinger collection of lip biting tales that will send you to peek out the window. You have no choice, but to look to see just what is out there milling in the dark.
   She uses her astute knowledge of place to set six stories in the most common everyday locations we know and visit. Trouble is in the making when we don't know what awaits us behind closed doors or after dark when sleep evades us.

      1. Something's Not Safe in School
      2. Shadows in the Woods and by the Water
      3. Welcome to Your New Home
      4. Things Aren't Always What They Seem
      5. Better Not Mess with What's Best Left Alone
Nowhere is off limits from her creative pen. It won't help you one iota to search  under the bed for what may be sulking there when you hide Scariest to savor by flashlight after 'light's out.' It will crawl in and cuddle up next to you because Roberta knows like the Shadow "what lurks in the hearts . . ."
   She gets requests for stories that are 'really scary" when she tells stories around the country. This volume is her answer to those requests. Roberta doesn't explain in minute detail all the gruesome aspects of disembodiment, or the blood and gore strewed across the floor. She hints and teases your mind to conjure up the fine details to your own tastes.
   We enjoy being scared when the lights are on and a favorite pet snoozes beside us. We know it would be up in an instant growling with hair standing on end if anything harmful was outside the window. I will admit ours do the same when a squirrel runs across the patio and they hide under my legs when firecrackers are exploded in the neighborhood.
  My favorite is 'The Dead of Winter.' Grace has a constant companion, 'Moosie." He is a stuffed moose she left at a friend's house. It was a difficult choice when there are 30 fascinating stories to send delicious shivers up the spine of anyone who loves to be scared. The mental image of tiny Roberta standing alone on a stage telling that story in her soft voice so you must strain to hear each word is strong in my mind. One knows she's earned her title, "Queen of the Cold-Blooded Tales."
   Roberta Simpson Brown is Ono County's national treasure of a storyteller and many are proud to call her a friend. Circumstances prevented her from appearing this year for a story telling session at the Star Theater, but she has given us a chest of some of her best stories yet for us to read and imagine every night during the witching season.
   You must read, Scariest Stories Ever Told or "the goblins will get you if you don't watch out."
Nash Black, author of Games of Death.

Pocket Knives

I watched an old man refuse to hand over his pocket knife to the deputies at the Justice Center. He turned around and walked out. A few minutes later he returned to pass through the scanner without the knife. He laid his vehicle keys in the basket and went to renew his driver's license.
The deputy called to him that he'd forgotten to pickup his keys.
"Keep 'em till I get back."
"We'd have returned the knife."
"Young man, I locked it in the car. I don't give up that knife to anyone. My father gave it to me when I was eight years-old."
Some years later I was watching one of the deputies admire the collection of pocket knives that he was holding for men who were transacting business and I asked him when he got his first knife. A smile of pleasure spread across his face at the memory.
"For Christmas when I was nine, my father gave it to me. I still have it."
What is it about the small knives that evoke a rite of passage from childhood to boyhood, which they treasure their entire lives? I posed the question on Facebook and the answers I got were from women.
Roberta Simpson Brown told me her father collected pocket knives and he gave her the ones she liked. She had one shaped like a coffin and several advertising Elvis. She never envied the guys because she had her own knives.
The famous Swiss Army knife came up in the discussion when one gal told of losing one while trying to cut a fishing line, buying a new one, and later finding the old knife crusted with mud, but still working. I carried an old Barlow in my camera case until the case expired from old age and it now resides in my desk to open letters.
Genealogies are traced with love as we handle the knives our fathers and grandfather's carried. A huge world of collectors meet to admire, discuss, appraise, and trade the sturdy instruments.
Nash doesn't remember when he got his first knife or when he started carrying one. It is a part of getting dressed in the morning like putting his wallet and keys in his pocket or combing his hair. He does remember each one he has lost over the years with fond regret like the one that had a tee bar that swiveled with one blade or the one with imitation pearl sides.
Another one he remembers is similar to the one my father carried. It was about two inches long with three blades and horn sides. My dad's was a Case with three blades, one of which had to be a fingernail file. I can't remember how many we bought over the years for presents after he'd lost the previous one in the garden. These shorter knives were often referred to a pen knives.
A good stout pocket knife has a many uses as it has owners: opening letters and boxes, cleaning your nails, pruning bushes and plants, cutting flowers, removing splinters, paring an apple into slices, and on-and-on.
A blade should be honed to razor sharpness to be effective for the many chores it is asked to perform and it must hold it's edge. What is your favorite use for a pocket knife?
Warm weather brings out that venerable institution of whittling and shooting the breeze. Many of the old men you once saw sitting in the sun were artists with wood  who'd produce small animals and toys for the lucky child who admired their work.
Times change, customs disappear with the years, but will we one day join the ghosts of the whittlers on the square?

Life Before Electricity

Noted ghost storyteller Roberta Simpson Brown recalls what it was like growing up without electricity.
As a child growing up in the country I had no problems with road conditions, school closings, food supplies, home activities, or entertainment. We lived on a dirt road about a mile off the main highway. If we needed something from the nearest  store that we could not carry, Dad hitched our mule or horse to the wagon in the summer or sled in the winter.
Our sled was handmade of wood with runners carved from small crooked trees. Most of the traveling was done by foot, by wagon, or occasionally by horseback. Few farm families had cars and for those that did during World War II gasoline was rationed and was only used for travel in dire emergencies.
In the winter we did not have school closings because of the weather. We used "shanks mare" transportation, which meant we walked in all kinds of weather and didn't think a thing of it. Our one room school had a wood stove for heat and light came in from outdoors through large windows so we could see to do our work.
We always had plenty to eat as we grew most of our own food during the summer month and preserved it for winter meals. Before our root cellar was dug, we buried beds of turnips, carrots, and potatoes for winter consumption. The orchard provided, apples, cherries, pears, and peaches, while our supply of nuts came from the wooded areas around us.
My mother kept chickens, so we had lots of eggs for breakfast and chickens to fry for Sunday dinner. My father raised hogs for hams, side-meat (bacon), sausage, and other cuts of the sweet meat. It was smoked in the smoke house for later usage.
Our cow provided us with milk, cream, and butter. Summer month were the hardest times to keep our food from spoiling. My father made a spring box that kept the milk and butter cool in its fresh, running water. We also had several hives of bees that provided us with honey for eating with butter on hot biscuits and for the homemade desserts Mom created. She used both the fireplace and the iron kitchen range to fix our meals.
After supper, we did our homework, read, or wrote by kerosene lamps. We often gathered around the fireplace or wood stove to share stories if neighbors or relatives came by. It was fun to talk and listen. Sometimes we played music and sang. We had a battery-operated radio, but we had to select favorite shows. If we used the radio too much the battery ran down. Hand cranked record players were called victrolas.
Air conditioning was unheard of, so much of our time was spent outdoors. By bedtime the house would cool off enough for us to sleep inside. You can still see many old farmhouses that had open or screened second story porches for sleeping.
My mother used a washboard, hung the clothes outside to dry, and ironed them with a flatiron heated on the kitchen range. In the summer iron kettles of water were heated over open fires for doing the laundry. The last load was usually the children so their mothers didn't have to carry extra water from the spring for baths. It wasn't unusual to see women using a board across the backs of two chairs and ironing outdoors. This was also true for those who had a second wood kitchen range to do their canning in the cool shade of the trees.
We've come a long way from those days and ways of thinking. Now we take electricity for granted. We walk into our homes, flip a switch, and expect a light to come on. We press a button on a remote control and expect to operate a TV or DVD player. We are comfortable with our refrigerator, microwave, washer and dryer humming along.
Then a storm takes down the power lines. Without a time machine to transport us, we suddenly find ourselves back in time. All the conveniences that we have grown accustomed to can be snatched away in a moment, leaving us fairly helpless unless we have a store of self-reliance to see us through the rough times of life without electricity.

Roberta Simpson Brown, grew up in Russell County, KY during World War II before electricity was brought to their rural farm. She graduated from Russell County High School in 1958, Berea College, and taught English in the Louisville, KY Public School System until her retirement. She and her husband have been publishing and telling ghost stories for nearly forty years. Their next collection is Holiday Hauntings: Twelve Months of Kentucky Ghosts which will be published by the University of Kentucky Press.