Sewed up in a bed sheet. My grandma Taylor told my Uncle Floyd to do some chore,

When he did not do the chore she got a switch and was going to give him a good thrashing. He was about 16 years at the time and believed that he was too old to be whipped. He took the switch away from grandma and broke it up. She walked away. That night when Uncle Floyd went to sleep my grandma came into the bedroom and took the sheet he was laying on and folded it over and sewed him up into the sheet. She then took the new switch she had secured and proceeded to administer the punishment that she had been thwarted from doing.

Dividing the catch of the day at the local cemetery. Two men after a successful day of fishing were returning home and as they got to the local cemetery where the road forked they stopped to divide their catch. Because they were tired they went into the cemetery and sat on some large tombstones. As they walked into the cemetery one of the men dropped a couple of the fish by the gate as he entered. Two brothers were returning from a date and were walking by the cemetery. One was a cripple who walked with crutches. They stopped by the gate when they heard the voices. They could not make out the image of the speakers so they stood still. They heard the voice saying you, “You take this one and I’ll take this one.” I’ll take this one and you take that one.” The brother decided that God and Satan were dividing up the dead. The brothers keep listening until one of the fishermen remembered the two fish he had dropped near the gate. He then said, “You can have the two over there by the gate. The crippled brother said, “He may get you but he want get me and the crippled brother beat his brother home.

Going through a cemetery at night. A man out late one night decided to take a short cut through the local cemetery. Unbeknownst to him there had been a new grave dug in the cemetery and he fell into the grave. He tried to extract himself but the grave being deep and rather sandy soil he finally decided that he would wait until the next day and maybe someone would hear his call for help. He moved to one side and got as comfortable as possible, then went to sleep. It happened that another man decided to take the same short cut. He too fell into the grave and started trying to get out. This woke up the first man who had been asleep. The man who had been asleep said, “You can’t get out of here”, but the second man did.

Foot prints in the snow. One evening when my grandma Taylor was at home with her smaller children, grandpa was gone off on one of his many adventures, someone shot a gun and the bullet came into the house. Grandma grabbed a gun and went outside but the person had disappeared. There was snow on the ground so she followed his foot prints. They let to the school house where a revival meeting was in progress. She went into the service and interrupted the service and told the people that someone had shot into her house where she and her children were and she ask that they point out who had just entered in to the building. Not wanting to see a man shot in their church service they very logically refused to tell who had done such a cowardly thing.   

Bear in the house. Bears were a problem in the early days of the Boston Mountains. A certain family had killed a hog when the weather turned cold. They had cut up the meat and hung it in one of the spare rooms in the house. To inter the house you had to come into the front door as there was no other way into the house. In the early days they did not have hinges on the doors but used a system of removable doors. There were four hooks two on each side of the door. The door had 2 two by fours which went across the door and suck out on each side of the door about 8 inches. To open the door you simply lifted the door of the side hooks and set it aside. The bears had not yet hibernated for the year. The man had to go on a trip over night. This was the night when the bear came to visit. The bear simply put his snot under the door and lifted it and walked into the house went past the bed where the woman was laying and literally shaking with fear. The bear went into the spare room and toke a ham and went out with it. When the man returned he pitched a fit. “That meat is our winter supply for the winter and you let a bear take it.” He ranted and raved. A few nights later the bear remembering where he could get meat came back for more. The same scenario except the man was at home so when the bear came by the side of the bed the man pulled the cover over his head and let the bear have his meat.

Running from a panther. One evening a certain lady was going from her house to a neighbor house. The distance was several miles and this was in the times when panthers roamed the Boston Mountains of Arkansas. The lady was carrying her infant child. She encountered a panther and began to run from it. Of course she could not out run the animal but she would take of a piece of the child’s clothing and throw it down. The panther would stop and shred the clothing and take up her trail again. When she had striped the child she started shedding her clothes. When she arrived at her destination she arrived necked but alive. 

Don’t insult a preacher who has a mean son. This story also has to do with Al Starbuck. A man was mad at great grandpa Starbuck because of one of the sermons he preached about sin so he cursed great grandpa out publicly. Al was not present at the time but he met the man one day just as he was riding his horse across the Arkansas River. The story is that the man back his horse backward all the way across the river to escape.

            A knife in a grave. A group of young people were discussing about whether they would be afraid to visit a cemetery at night. One young lady avowed that she would not have any fear to do such a thing. They challenged her to prove it and gave her a knife to stick into a certain grave to prove that she had actually gone to the cemetery. She went to the cemetery and stuck the knife into the grave. It was in the days when girls wore long dresses so when she stooped down to stick the knife into the grave she accidental stuck it through her dress also. When she raised up the knife sticking through her dress gave a pull on her skirt. They found her there the next morning. The puling on her dress scared her so badly that she apparently died of a heart attack.