The Cape Girardeau Democrat. (Cape Girardeau, Mo.) 1876-1909, 1897-01-23
JIM WRIGHT'SC
Rotated by Silas Hawkins, P. M.
and Storekeeper.
~lCoPYRIGHT. 1871

I amt much of Il story teller, but
guess | can give you The straight facts
about Jim Wright's cOurtship and mar.
riage as well as anybody. 1t happened
about 20 years ago, and il interested
the folks around Barkley's orners 81
much hat for four or five years there
wasn't no quiltin' bee, nor mite so,
ciety, nor apple cut, nor raisin', nor
stump pullin' that somebody didn't tel
something new about it, and l guess
they're talking about it yet at the tea
drinkin's. 1t was all brought back
fresh to my mind m day last week,
when l found out my Oldest boy, Sile,
was kind o shinin' up to Jim's oldest
girl. Sarah, named after her mother.
,Jim's a pretty prominent citizen o
He's the manager OF the Barkley place
and n member of the county board of
supervisors, and some do say he's go;
his eye on the Legislature for next term.
Yes; that's him goin' by now. You see,
he's a big, tall Teller and looks kind of
imposin' like. When he was a young
Sur he wasn't exactly what you'd call
ItIlAlSOIllt, Jul liz lOOhNi 10 SSAlh 81 a
rock, and his eyes was always wide
. only when he had to face n girl,
then he used to weaken. That's what
made his courtship and marriage so
curious.
\ good talker? Well, yes, he is, now.
Not very polished, maybe, but he can
speak to the pint, and that's more than
some of your college educated fellers
can do. But he never was much of a
speaker till after he got married to
Sarah Anderson.
Jim got well acquainted with Sarah
when he was nothing but Il hired man.
workin' on the Barkley place, when old
man Thompson was manager. Sarah
was workin' there, too, then. She was
Mrs. Thompson's hired girl. No; you
couldn't call 'em servants, the way sou
CITY folks look at it. Sarah's father was
old Deacon Anderson, and he stood just
as well in the community as old mai
Thompson did; maybe better, because
Deacon Anderson owned his own farm
and Thompson was a kind OF a hired
man for Barley. The Barkley place,
you know is about 500 acres. It's the
biggest farm in this town, and Barkley
himself spends most of his time in New
York and Boston and Europe, and other
far-away places, where folks has more
money than brains, and has coachmen
to drive for EN- and puts on different
coats at different times of the day and
all that. Sarah Anderson used to eat
at tie same table with the T~hompsons,
of course, and so did Jim. Why, if
either of them had been asked to eat sep
arate from the family they'd have quit
right off and everybody around the cor
ners would have backed 'em up in it, too.
Why, the ThompsOns would have been
run out of the neighborhood if they'd
set themselves up to be too good to
have Jim Wright and Sarah Anderson
set with them when they ct their meals.
jim Wright's father, you know, was
the doctor here for a good many years.
and he wanted to send his boy to col
lege, but Jim wouldn't go. He liked
workin' with his hands better than
studyin' books. He said he could make
more money in the long run his way,
and when he hired our to old man
Thompson he declared that he'd be
nag of the big farm some day,
and so he is now, as 1 told you a little
while ago.
Maybe I'm getting off the story a
little bit, but l just wanted to explain
how Jim and Sarahstood in this neigh