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Wednesday, March 10, 2010
By MORRIS STEPHENSON -
Late Friday afternoon, I received a call from Dr. Francis Amos, as I periodically do, about a story he thinks would make a good one for me to do.
"What do you think about chasing the white dog?" he asked.
Hearing what he said but not understanding it, I asked him again what he said. Again I got the same question.
"What white dog?" Iﾠasked.
"The book 'Chasing the White Dog,'" he replied.
"Doc, I don't have a clue what you're taking about."
"What do you mean? You're in it just about all the way through it," he told me.
I still was drawing a blank. I had no idea to what he mean. Then he went into an explanation --the moonshine book.
All the lights came on in every room. He had to be talking about the book Max Watman was writing. I don't have a clue exactly when, but Max had come to Franklin County on a couple of different occasions to research his book. However, he never told me the title of his book, just that it was going to be about moonshining.
But Iﾠdid find out that the term "white dog" is used in many parts of the country instead of "white lightning" or moonshine. After all these years, I keep learning something related to the illicit whiskey-making business.
Doc said he had received a copy he'd ordered from a book club, and it had apparently arrived Thursday. "I finished reading it at 4:30 this morning," he continued. He offered to let me borrow an extra copy he had, but I told him I was going to see if I could buy one. If I couldn't get a copy, I'd take him up on the offer.
Then Iﾠstarted thinking back to Max. The likable guy came into the office one day and introduced himself. It was at that point I was informed he was working on a moonshine book. "Someone told me you would be a good one to talk with get some information," he said.
The first thing that crossed my mind was "Oh no, not another one doing a book or magazine story."
But Max was different. We hit it off immediately. I liked the crazy Yankee from New York. But I must note, he was raised in the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, a fact that was hard to believe when I read it in the book.
The thing that surprised me about learning the book had been published was I hadn't talked to "Maxwell Smart," as I nicknamed him, in months. In fact, he called me several times while he was covering the Joel and Margaret Smith trials in Roanoke's federal court. He told me what was going on from day to day, and he would ask me a bunch of questions, which I tried to answer.
Then the last time I heard from him was when he said he had sent the book to the publisher. And that was it. I have so much going on in my mind all of the time that Max and his book had been pushed to the rear of my "storage space".
So I called the book store at Tanglewood and asked
if they had copies. After a long wait, the clerk returned and said "yes" and she'd hold me a copy. So I talked wife Hazel into delaying the evening meal and instead of eating in Rocky Mount, we'd go to Roanoke. The plan worked. En route, I told her Iﾠhad to make a quick stop at the bookstore in Tanglewood. Things worked out fine and I had my copy.
Once in hand, I learned the book's subtitle was "An Amateur Outlaw's Adventures in Moonshine." On the cover was an old fruit jar with a worn label. The label contained the title of the book, along with the other important info, like Max's name.
So this column is going to be a teaser for next week's. I will devote the entire column to Max's book in the March 17 edition.I need to read all of it before I start writing my thoughts, opinions, etc.
I do know this much. There's a chapter about Max's visit with me at the News-Post. I do recall he spent several days going through our old newspaper files. In fact, he stayed in the back room, where the files are kept, for so long that I'd forget he was back there.
He also devotes a chapter to Lightning Strike and to "Duck" Smith's alleged operation a big still in Halifax County, which Max calls the Halifax Hunt Club. Also included in the book is the late T. Keister Greer's "The Great Moonshine Conspiracy Trial of 1935."
Like the little kid eating all the good white stuff out of an Oreo cookie, I admit to reading the three chapters concerning Franklin County. My opinion will be carried in next week's column, okay?
I did call Max. He was in SanﾠFrancisco on a book-signing tour for Simon and Schuster, one of the biggie of the big publishers. It was good talking to him, but I hate to see how many minutes I may have gone over my cell phone plan this month.
He said from there, he would be going to Colorado. His schedule allowed him only a short (measured in hours) visit to see his wife and son.
Max also told he had a book for me he had "scribbled on" and would put it in the mail as soon as he could. We had good time talking and he was anxious to see how the book was going to be received, or more importantly how it was going to sell.
I will say this. After "spot" reading the book, he writes a lot like he talks. He's good at both. Probably after going from the book's cover to cover, I'll probably change my nickname for him to "Max Max!"
Check out next week's column for a blow-by-blow account from my view of the book. I'm looking forward to it.ﾠAnd I apologize for not being able to read it all so I could do it all in this week's column.
Goldie Gets a Pacemaker--About the time I think Goldie is doing well, she nudges me in the rib cage as a reminder I need to pay attention.
She belted me Saturday afternoon in the nose when I pulled out of Hema's Restaurant. The dash board lit up like a Christmas tree. The "charge" and "brake" lights were on. I checked the hand brake, and it was all the way down.
Not having any choice, I drove on to get some bags of gravel to replace the ones in front of the mailbox. Those were "eaten" by the mud, left by the snow being plowed off the road.
To make a long story short, the two lights stayed bright red until I got back to home to Ferrum. I had to run back to Danny Perdue's minute market to get my lottery ticket. Turning Goldie's switch, things looked normal again. Both lights were out and the amp gauge needle was back to where it should have been.
Everything was fine until I tried to start it Sunday morning. I turned on the switch and I had absolutely nothing -- not lights, horn, radio, nor did any of the needles on the dash move off their pegs. Dead as a door nail, as the saying goes.
I called Dale Angell, Goldie's personal physician, who had diagnosed the problem as the alternator when he called me back. I was in Rocky Mount at the time in wife Hazel's Jeep. "I don't know if any of the auto part places will have one in stock," he warned.
Then he called me back to say Advance Auto Parts had one in stock. If I would pick it up and bring it to his shop at Crossroads, he'd have me back in business later in the day. (He knows how much I hate driving my wife's Jeep when I'm by myself.)
The NASCAR race wasn't even over when he called to say Goldie was ready. He drove a couple of miles and picked me up. I paid him and took him back home.
Goldie was in good health once again. Or maybe I should say for the time being. I guess Goldie is like most women -- If you don't pay enough attention to them, you get poked in the rib cage.
On second thought, maybe Goldie likes the publicity she gets in the column. From now on, I'll mention how well she's been doing from time to time in the column. I'll see if that makes her happy! |
