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Roots

Mike Schneider

    “Every legend, moreover, contains its residuum of truth, and the root function of language is to control the universe by describing it.”—James Baldwin.

    Susan Miller never wondered about where she came from until her 70^th birthday in 2018 when her youngest granddaughter, 16-year old Abby, announced she was pregnant and going to give the baby up for adoption. Susan herself had been adopted by loving parents when a year old, never gave much of a thought to her birth parents but now figured someday Abby’s baby might want to know who its birth parents were, and that put her in mind of trying to find who her own birth parents were, something her kids and grandkids deserved to know, too.
    Growing up it never crossed her mind because in those days adoptees birth records were sealed so tightly that you almost stood a better chance of getting the nuclear codes than discovering who your natural parents were. Then the laws were relaxed, making it much easier.
    “I figure I have a right to know, so do you and everyone else,” she told her daughter, Karen, Abby’s mother.
    “I’d love to know,” Karen said. “Do you really think you can find out?”
    “I’m hoping. I know I was adopted through an agency in Lexington because grandma and grandpa lived in Kentucky for a few years before settling in Cincinnati, so that’s where I’m going to start.”
    She did but the agency her adoptive parents went through apparently had closed at some point, or purged their records, as none of them had data back to the late ‘40s. The oldest was 1950.
    Next she checked with state offices in Frankfurt.
    “Back in those days the state only kept a reference that an adoption had taken place, paid much more attention to the child and its adoptive parents, than to its natural parents,” the clerk said. “But I’ll check and see what we have. Will let you know, probably in a few days.”
    “Thank you,” she said, and called Karen right away to share the good news.
    “Wonderful!” Karen said. “Call me as soon as you hear.”
    During the three days it took for the clerk in Frankfort to call back, Susan’s mind constantly buzzed with all kinds of scenarios about her birth parents and how she came to be adopted. Foremost, why did she need to be? Was she an unwanted baby? Did her parents die? Had she come to America as a refugee, maybe a war orphan from another country somewhere? Had she been taken away from her parents? Had they been sentenced to prison? Were they good or bad people? So many possibilities and the more she thought about it, the more determined she became.
    “I’m afraid I don’t have much for you,” the clerk said when she called, “I can tell you your adoptive father made $4200 per year, which was a pretty good income at that time. Your adoptive mother was a housewife, they lived in Lexington.”
    “Darn! I already knew that.”
    “Well, what you might not have known is that your birth parents lived in Harlan. Your father died two months after you were born in some type of accident but what kind is not specified. Your mother was killed three months later, cause of death was homicide. No names listed, just that they were dead. For anything else you would have to check with Harlan County.”
    She called Karen, related what she had learned.
    “That’s so sad...but so cool to know, too, mother. Did you call Harlan?”
    “Yes but too late. Their county offices had just closed for the holiday weekend, so I’m going to try again come Tuesday.”
    “Let’s hope you get more complete information.”
    As previously, during those days of waiting she found herself wondering about her parents with an insatiable curiosity. Would Harlan have their names? Ages? Did they grow up there, if not how long had they lived there? When did they get married, if they even were married? Where they were born if not in or around Harlan? More information on how they died? What did her birth father do for a living? And her mother, was she employed outside the home?
    So many questions!
    Also, from which one did she inherit her very noticeable physical traits? Being six foot two, having muscles like steel, and much to her chagrin, shaped more like a man, really, than a woman given her wide shoulders and almost skinny hips, she had always assumed she got her build and her strength from her father, but thinking a little more about it maybe not as her four kids’ bodies, both boys and girls, were spitting images of hers. They had the hard muscles, too. David had been an all-conference wrestler in high school, made it to Columbus for the state finals his senior year. James lettered three years in both football and basketball. Karen was a state-qualifying gymnast, and Lilimae wrangled an athletic scholarship from a small college in Indiana to play soccer. If she could pass those traits to her children, not to mention her grandchildren, it seemed quite possible they may have come from her mother.
    When she could finally call the Harlan Courthouse and explain her situation, the information turned out to be scant and disappointing: Her parents were J. Herbert and L. Honoré, no indication who was the father, or who was the mother but Herbert was born in 1918, Honoré 1923, both were born in Louisiana. Susan figured her father was probably the older one.
    “Is that all?”
    “I’m afraid so, ma’am. Sorry I can’t be of more help.”
    “Lexington told me my father died in an accident, my mother by homicide. Is there nothing about that?”
    “Maybe at one time but it’s not here now. I have no idea why.”
    “I was hoping for so much more. I need more.”
    “I’m so sorry we don’t have it but I’ll tell you what, honey, write down this name: Ezekiel Ray Thomas, 4277 Coon Dog Road, Bagger Holler, Harlan County, Kentucky, 40831. Zeke is almost 90, kind of a character but he keeps lots of information about people and events, has all his life. It’s almost a sickness with him. In fact it probably is a sickness. But if your mother was murdered and your dad killed in an accident, I’d say it’s at least 50-50 that Zeke would have something about it. He doesn’t have a phone, you’ll have to write him, or go see him.”
    “Thank you so much. I will.”
    “Feel like going for a ride?” she said when Karen answered the phone. She had to work but Abby said she’d be glad to go with her grandmother.
    By then Karen had spoken to a couple people at the office she knew were adopted, both had found their birth parents. Susan thanked her and found it encouraging, but then she had even better luck. Her friend, Marcia, whom she met a couple years ago line dancing on Saturday nights at the Elks, was the jackpot. Not only was she raised in Harlan, she knew Ezekiel Ray Thomas.
    “It’s a really small town, everyone knows everyone else. Zeke was a friend of my parents,” Marcia said. “There’s no end to the information that old man has. Reporters from the Harlan Enterprise go to him all the time, mostly for backstories as he’s still sharp as a tack, knows all the untold tales. Reporters from the Corbin News-Tribune also stop at his place every so often.”
    They left Cincinnati at 8:00 Friday morning for the 3-1/2 hour drive to Harlan. She and Abby talked all the way, covering a myriad of subjects like how different it is growing up in Cincinnati today than when she did, and when she was raising Karen.
    “Three radically different generations, from the early days of television in my childhood, to your mother seeing the dawn of the computer age, to you carrying a computer in your pocket that in your mom’s day would have filled an entire building.”
    They also discussed Abby’s current predicament, the Reds and Bengals, along with what they might discover in Harlan.
    They talked about heredity, too, and whether their bodies came from Susan’s father’s DNA or her mother’s. Abby had taken biology her sophomore year, was currently taking physiology, and knew a bit about it. After a prolonged discussion they agreed it seemed likely their physiques came through her mother since Susan was able to pass them on to her kids, and them to their kids.
    At the turnoff for London they stopped for a quick, early lunch, then hit the road again, arriving at Thomas’s about 12:15, with Susan positive she never would have found 4277 Coon Dog Road in Bagger Hollow without GPS as most of the homes, including the one she was looking for, didn’t have displayed house numbers, even on the roadside mailboxes.
    Thomas’s house was set back in, surrounded by enough trees to make it seem like very early morning or very late evening, during that short period when the sky is light but the sun is actually below the horizon.
    ‘Shack’ might have described it best. Clap boards totally lacking paint had turned black from exposure to the elements, the roof over the porch had a good size hole in it, and a rusted out clunker from the late ‘70s or early ‘80s sat in the side yard, the front passenger door window broken out, no hood, and a small dogwood tree growing up through the engine compartment.
    When they got out of the car they stood next to it for a minute or two as the place seemed like a natural setting for a pitbull or Rottweiler to come charging out of the shadows at them. Nothing happened so they advanced, cautiously, to the porch.
    When Thomas came to the door they explained how they found him and what they wanted.
    He smiled, said, “Well do come in. I believe I might be able to help you,” and led them to the kitchen where an old Hotpoint refrigerator exactly like Susan had grown up with—thick walls and a heavy door with a mechanical lock instead of a magnetic gasket—sounded like it would soon be heading to the recycler. Or maybe the side yard to join the jalopy. The cupboards were right out of the ‘30s, metal, white, as was the stand alone sink with a small counter area on each side, drawers and cupboards beneath. The place was plenty clean but lighting was poor.
    They sat down at the kitchen table.
    “So tell me ladies, what are we lookin’ for?”
    “My birth parents. Two people named J. Herbert and L. Honoré. Herbert was born in 1918, Honoré 1923. I was born February 1, 1948. The courthouse said my dad died in an accident two months later, which would have been approximately April 1, and my mother was killed, the cause listed as homicide, approximately July 1 of the same year.”
    “Oh boy. I graduated high school in ’48, went straight into the army. Worked out great, got out a few weeks after the Korean War started, had already served my obligation. So I was at Ft. Knox for basic training during July that year. And in April I would have been whooping and hollering, drinking ‘shine, chasing girls, and whatever else we might a done back then—boys having fun when the weather started to break around Easter time like it always does.”
    “Shoot!”
    “Well now, I’m not saying I don’t have something, let me take a look. Do you ladies like coffee? The Mr. Coffee on the counter there only needs to be turned on, cups are in the cupboard above on the left, powdered cream and sugar are in front of you, silverware below the coffee pot there in the top drawer. This might take me a little while so enjoy yourselves,” he said as he got up and left the room.
    They flipped the switch on the coffee maker, crossed their fingers and had time to drink two cups before Thomas came back.
    “Paydirt!” he said while holding a newspaper in each hand and wearing a big smile on his face. “I found them!”
    “On your dad there’s just a short paragraph, ‘‘‘John Herbert, formerly of New Orleans, Louisiana died in a mine accident at Timber Creek No. 7 Coal Mine April 12. The body was not recovered. He leaves behind a wife and baby girl.”’
    He handed the paper to Susan.
    “Deaths in the mines were pretty common back then. Hardly any safety rules. Heck, there may have been 25 a year in these parts. Probably more some years. Hard telling what happened, but since they didn’t recover the body he most likely stumbled into an abandoned shaft. They can be a hundred and fifty feet deep, or more, too dangerous to descend into. Being from somewhere else he may have been new on the job, would’ve been easy enough for a rookie to do. I’m sorry I don’t have more. Mine accidents were a dime a dozen in those days.”
    “Sounds like a scary way to live.”
    “It was. Sometimes when men were killed in mines they’d have the metalsmith out in Molus, old man McElroy, make a plaque with all the names on it to commemorate the deaths. His grandson, Daryl Lee, does it today. But if he was brand new and not from around here they might have forgone the plaque. Timber Creek 7 has been shut down for decades. I can tell you how to get to it if you want to see if anything’s there. It might make you feel a little closer to him even if there ain’t nothing there.”
    “It might. Perhaps Abby would, too. Is my mother in that other paper?”
    “Yes. It’s the Corbin paper from July 19^th that year. Says, ‘Loretta Herbert, of Harlan, recently moved to southeastern Kentucky from Vermilion Parish, Louisiana, was killed in Corbin at the Oak Street Diner July 9, when Addison Slocomb and his wife, Lucinda Lou, got into a heated argument and he pulled a gun, shot at her, missed but hit Miss Honoré in the side of the head. The victim expired on the way to the hospital.’”
    “Oh my gosh!”
    “I don’t know what the legal outcome was but there would certainly be a record of it at the Whitley County Courthouse.”
    “I would imagine. Now, how do we get to that mine?”
    She wrote down his instructions and before they left gave the man two twenty dollar bills for his trouble.
    “Why thank you, Mrs. Miller. Do appreciate that. I’ll use it to take some food to a family I know that could use a little more. If I can ever help you again, write or just show up, either way.”
    “I will, Mr. Thomas. And thank you so much.”
    They drove out of the hollow and 20 minutes later Susan turned onto the access road for the mine. Although thick second growth right up to the edge of the concrete going back to the entrance made for a narrow corridor, and weeds and grass sprouted everywhere in the dilapidated surface, the road was still good enough to drive on. The mine entrance was blocked with a heavy iron grill across it, the kind that’s placed by a crane, not men. It was overgrown with kudzu, they couldn’t see inside.
    While Abby watched a doe with her yearling fawn about 75 yards off to the west, Susan spied a small headstone in front of the entrance that was all but invisible behind camouflaging leaves of ivy. She began pulling it off the stone.
    Once cleared she read it, said, “Oh. My. God.” and fainted.
    Abby saw her, yelled, “Oh Nana!” ran to her, knelt down beside her, said “Nana wake up,” and revived her with a couple light slaps on her cheek.
    “Did you have a heart attack?”
    She was groggy but as soon as she realized she had passed out said, “No. Read that!”
    Abby read aloud. ‘‘‘At the bottom of this mine lies a big, big man—Big John.’ What’s that mean, nana?”
    “Sweetheart, that means my birth father, your great grandfather, and your baby’s great-great grandfather, was a genuine hero who sacrificed his own life to save 20 other men. We can be extremely proud of that heritage. And we definitely got our muscles from him.”f

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