Sunday, February 20, 2011

"B" Maples


He was call "B" Maples ,he was my great grandfather. He peddle what ever around the country traveling with a wagon and team. he was my grandma Powell's father and she told many stories about B Maples. She sang his praises high.

One time he went with a group of men to fish on white river she said. The men went up the river into the wilds and fished and salting down the fish. They were noodling for fish and one of the men reached under a rock for a fish and brought his hand back with a water moccasin snake on his thump. Grandpa had the fellow lay his thumb on a stump and with one swift blow with a hatchet the man was minus his thumb and lived to tell the tale.

Grandma said one time B Maples gave her a gallon bucket of whipper will peas and told her to plant them in the corn patch. The peas would vine up the corn and be food for the family and the animals that winter.

Grandma planted peas for ever she thought and still had a good amount of peas to go. grandma could hear her sisters running and playing and she wished to go play with them. She raised this big flat rock and dumped the peas under the rock and dropped the rock over her sins.

Grandma told her father she had finished her chore and was allowed to go play with her sisters.10 day later those peas started to sprout and "B" Maples was checking on his peas crop in the corn field when he came to the rock with sprouting peas coming from under the rock. Gertie heard her father yell, "Gertie" deep in the corn and knew the jigg was up. Grandma said she started to run with "B" chasing her and she thought I CAN"T RUN FOREVER! so she stopped and took her whipping.

Grandma said "B" died from pneumonia and that all the Maples had weak lungs. Daddy told another tale he said "B" had been out with his peddling wagon peddling apples and he got drunk laying down to sleep beside his camp fire and as happens often here in the fall a cold rain fell during the night. "B" made it home with a fever and died from pneumonia.

2 comments:

Galla Creek said...

Love you so for these stories.

I wanted to put his stone on the find a grave site. They have sarah's but not B's. I told the lady for the site that B Maples was there and I would get a photo for her. Erin had a client down at Alpena and I told her when she had to go that way she need to go by the graveyard for me. She is a good girl and she went and took these photos for me.

Also, a plus from this is the good stories you added about him that I did not know.

Erin said...

Greg said you called. We don't need a bed, thank you for thinking of us... unless it's an antique and then i'll take it!