A Story By: Benjamin Groff© Groff Media 2024© Truth Endures
In the backwoods of Eastern Oklahoma’s hill country, an older man named Sam McElroy and his wife, Dora, lived a quiet life. Sam, my great uncle, was a man of grit and stubbornness, traits that only deepened as he aged. Their modest cabin, tucked away from the world, sat outside a small community known as Eagle Town, home to the oldest post office in Oklahoma.
Despite his years, Sam’s marksmanship was legendary. His eyesight might have dimmed for reading, but he could still shoot a rock off a ledge from a hundred yards away with his trusty .22 rifle. He favored his 12-gauge shotgun up close, dispatching targets with the same precision. But Sam found no thrill in shooting at rocks; they didn’t challenge him. His absolute joy came from hunting squirrels, rabbits, and other small game—creatures that could run, making every shot a test of skill.
“There’s no sport in shooting something that can’t run,” he’d say, “and you can eat them too!”
In the mid-1970s, the tranquility of Sam and Dora’s life was disturbed. Tree-logging companies began encroaching on their land, felling the tall trees and sending them off on giant semi-trucks to be milled. The loud and reckless trucks sped down the dirt road past their cabin, kicking up dust that settled on everything, including Dora’s freshly washed laundry.
One day, Sam had had enough. He stopped one of the drivers and firmly requested that the trucks slow down on Tuesdays, the day Dora hung her laundry out to dry. The driver nodded but dismissed the request as soon as he drove away.
The following Tuesday, as trucks roared by again, covering Dora’s linens in dust, Sam’s patience snapped.
“This is it!” Sam declared. “They’re going to goddamn stop today if it’s the last thing I do!”
“This is it!” Sam declared. “They’re going to goddamn stop today if it’s the last thing I do!”
He grabbed a cane-bottom chair from the porch, slung his 12-gauge shotgun over his shoulder, and marched to the dirt road. There, he placed the chair, sat down, and waited.
It wasn’t long before a truck barreled down the road, only to screech to a halt in front of Sam. The driver, bewildered, got out and demanded,
“I need to get through here.”
“My wife needs to get her laundry dry without you jackasses throwing dirt on it,” Sam retorted. “I asked you to slow down on Tuesdays, and you ignored me. Now, you can sit here until her laundry is dry!”
The driver, clearly irritated, shot back,
“We’ll see about that, old-timer!”
He climbed back into his truck and radioed his boss. Soon, more trucks lined up behind the first, and another from the opposite direction joined the standstill. Sam remained steadfast, his shotgun resting across his lap.
Minutes later, a man in a company pickup arrived. He introduced himself as Mike Williams, the logging company supervisor. He informed Sam that blocking the road cost them a lot of money.
“And you’re costing us clean clothes!”
Sam shot back.
“You’ve been speeding past here every week, covering my wife’s laundry in dust.”
Williams threatened to call the sheriff, to which Sam responded,
“Go ahead.”
Forty-five minutes later, McCurtain County Sheriff Joe Phillips arrived at the scene. The road was clogged with trucks, stretching ten deep in both directions. After hearing the situation, the sheriff walked over to Sam’s porch, grabbed another cane-bottom chair, and carried it to the middle of the road. He sat beside Sam, pulled out a stick and pocket knife, and began whittling.
“How long do you think it’ll take for the laundry to dry?”
the sheriff asked.
“A couple of hours should do it,”
Sam replied.
Sheriff Phillips turned to the drivers and Mike Williams.
“Well, we’ll be here for at least two more hours. Might as well kill your engines and save some fuel.”
From that day forward, the logging trucks were no longer scheduled to run on Tuesdays between 10:00 AM and 4:00 PM. Sam’s act of defiance earned him respect, and he soon became a valuable liaison for Mike Williams, helping the logging company identify landowners in the Oklahoma Hills, where they sought to expand. Sheriff Phillips also found a trusted ally in Sam, who knew the remote areas of the county like the back of his hand.
Today, the old cabin is little more than a dilapidated shack, barely standing along the dirt road north of Eagle Town. But the legend of my Uncle Sam lives on, echoing through the hills where I was born.
benandsteve.com 