The Tupelo journal. (Tupelo, Miss.) 1876-1924, 1905-10-20
PEN-PICTURES OF THE OLDEN TIME

4 ScnOOl ldupuC III AldDaIna III
1857, | approached a middle ageC
man who was himself school
teacher, and asked him to sub
Iscribe to my school. | was ther
not quite twenty years old, anc
| beardless. and looked rather
youthful. He looked me in the
face, and remarked in rather
cutting way, "You are too young
to teach school. 7 Uncle had
posted me about him before
went to him, so that | felt my
way pretty secure, and simply
replied, my friend. | have seen
some old men who couldn't teach
school. He did not subscribe,
but sent all the while and chang
ed his opinion, and was as good
friend as | had.
In 1854, as best my memory
serves me, Ben Johnson taught
a school at old Andrews Chapel,
then in ItaWamba county, and
which I attended for some time,
walking about four miles. Ben
Johnson was a great hand for
exhibitions at the close of his
schools | remember one he
had at the close of one Of his
schools in the Bowland neigh
borhood, in about 1852 or 1853,
at which school brother James
attended. Johnson captivated
his patrons and his audience by
his skill in bringing out some
thing new and unusual and, af-
ter he left the Andrews Chapel
neighborhood he moved down a
few miles south of Smithville, N
Monroe county, and remained
there for quite a while after the
war when he moved to Johnson
county Texas, where he died
many wears ago. About the time
he LETT the Andrews Chapel
neighborhood, having lived while
there at the place known as the
I Nathan Riley place, he was
taken with a very severe cough,
and both he and his friends
thought he had tuberculosis.
This lasted for several years,
! and he then began to mend OF
that; but soon thereafter he had
a wonderful trouble with his
liver, and his tongue was coated
like a man with tyfo-malarial
fever, except that the coating
| on. the tongue was very white.
| He also suffered very much.
This lasted during the entire
war and for several years after
wards, when he began suffering
intense pain in the side of his
back, and he was prostrated on
his bed for a long while. Fin
ally, the hurting in his back de-
veloped into a boil, as the doc
tors thought and declared. Some
days after the boil was lanced
there came floating out through
the boil an ordinary sized sew
ing needle, with the thread close
Ecut still in the eye of the needle;
land this needle had been the
cause OF all his suffering for all
these years, being about thir-
teen years in all. | saw him
paly a short time after the needle
ioated out, and saw the needle
with the short cut thread still
in it, and remember very well
| how it looked, so soon as the
needle came out, Johnson got
we'll, and had no more trouble.
This was about 1867, | think.
Ben Johnson was q Very eater
prising man, ana had q great de-
sire to assist any worthy young
man in his education He it
was who brought Ben ManleTe
to this country. | had q letter
from Maniere only recently say
| ling so, but for Ben Johnson 5
enterprise and influence, Lee
county would doubtless never
have been blessed with the genial
and lovable Ben Maniere, whose
life has been a benedictlon to
many in old Itawamba and Lee
counties and whose temperance
Iwave started in 1854, has blessed
/ many homes and gladdened many
hearts.