The Hays free press. [volume] (Hays, Kan.) 1908-1924, 1922-01-12
TRUTHFUL JAMES


where nearly everything that i Mt
INTO the ground, petrifes. It wasn't
generally known till they started to
move the bodies from a graveyard
and found that every one of the
bodies was perfectly petrifed.
''The bodies of those having friends
and relatives were reburied in the
new cemetery, but there were a lot of
men who had come to that country
and changed their names. They
probably had kinsfolks somewhere but
they were careful never to tell who
they were or where they lived.
The town authorities not feeling
unnder any obligations to these stone
stiffs made deal with a ranchman by
the name of Stubblefield, who hauled
the petrified corpses away and used
them for fence posts in his barbed
wire fence. Pm not scary or sensitive
about such things but it used to give
me sort of creepy feeling to ride by
Stubblefeld's pasture on a moonlight
night and see those petrified corpses
standin' along in a row with barbed
wire strung on their persons. Some
of them looked as natural as life.
There was Hair Lip Ike and Slew
Foot Bill and 'Cross-eyed Pete and
several more 1 recognized who were
acting in death as barbed wire sup
porters. Of course they were doing
more real service and amounting to
more than they ever had while they
were alive, but l couldn't help think
ing how they would have roared and
pulled their guns if someone had tried
to hang barbed wire on them when
they were on earth. I saw a lousy
Texas pony come up and scratch him
self on 'Cross-eyed Pete's' elbow and
l half expected Pete to draw his gun
and shoot the critter.
well, sir, them deceased fence
posts excited quite a good deal of
comment and tourists came out of
their way to see them. One day one
of these female up-lifters came along
and went out to see Stubblefield's
fence. She had a nose like a gimlet
and her eyes were set cater-wampus
She was a woman who had a grudge
against the world At first she talk
ed of having Stubblefeld arrested on
some charge or other, but decided be-
fore she began criminal proceedings
to go out to see the fence. Well, she
hadn't gotten more than the third or
:. - la I,
that could be heard all over the
farm.
''She recognized in the deceased
wire supporter her former husband
who had lit out and left her to sup
port herself and a couple of kids and
she never had been able to get track
of him. That's that no account nus
band of mine she said. Death hain't
changed him hardly any at all, but in
view of the fact that this is the first
time he ever did anything Worth while
1 am Just goin' to let him stay and
hold up this wire fence, but intend
TO make that man Stubblefield pay
me- reasonable rent for the use of the
corpse. He wasn't no account but 1
am. his wilder and. entitled to make
him help support me and the chill
dren' Stubblefield considered the
matter and decided that the woman
maybe was right and agreed to give
her IS year for the use of her petri-
fed husband as a fence post
zone of the remarkable cases
among those petrified corpses was
that of the town drunkard, Elijah
Bivins. Lige was never sober or at
least hadn't been so within the recol-
lection of any of the inhabitants. He
town and staid in that condition prac-
. tically all the time till he died. He
was always drunk and happy. At his
funeral everybody noticed the maud
ain grin on his face and remarked
how natural he looked.
"Wen, when they dug him up,
there was still that drunken smile on
his face and his nose turned to stone
looked like an autumn sunset. Some
of the women had organized chap
ter OF the w. -. L. y. anu IhSy dShSu
to have Lge's corpse to set at their
headquarters to use as a horrible eX-
ample, but after a couple of weeks
they asked the town to bury him, say
ing that his grin made him look so
much happier dead than most sober
men looked alive that he was provid-
ing an argument in favor of booze.
There was bunch of loafers who
used to sit out in front of Parker's
.ronaral Snnnlv store and SWan lies