The Coolidge examiner., 1934-01-19

his bow. and played dance tunes, and one OF the
boatmen banged his feet on the cover OF the boat,
awkwardy jgging. One red-shirted bewhlsk-
cred fellow trailed a hook over the stern. A
little group of boatmen played with a deck of
greasy cards. Mike watched the menacng river"
And of the up-rlver trip, this picture: along
the shore, the boatmen might 'bushwhack-drag
the boat along by grasping overhangng bushes
and trees and pulling. On the river side Of the
boat, the oars were used as an aid. And now
they came to a sandbar, which there was
swift current. The men took to their poles and
began a struggling march along the running
boards Their bodies shook, their chests heaved,
as they pressed each ounce Of strength into the
tmbers poles bent the captain urged his men
on, now coaxing, swearing prodigiously.
Then a pole snapped and Mike had to do for a
time the work of two, for wavering meant dis
aster"
Then the Ohio and the Mississippi became
"too crowded" for Mike Fink The keelboat era
on those two rivers was coming to an end and
with it the end OF Mikes career on this frontier
His next on the Missouri river, where he
piled a keelboat for a short time Then he be-
came a member of General Ashley's famous fur
trading expedition and embarked upon the third
and last phase of his career on his third from
tier. that of the Upper Missouri and the Vel
lowstone.
Meanwhile the legends had begun to cluster
about him. Some of the more familiar ones had
to do with his feats of craftsmanship. There
was the time he shot the scalp-lock off an Indian
standing on the bank of the river a considerable
distance away Another time he noticed some
pigs roofing around a settlers cabin the bank
OF the river. They were fifty yards away "He
raised his rifle to his shoulder pulled the trig-
ger. On shore, pig squealed and ran Its tail
had been chopped Off close to its rump. And
that said Mike, want no accident To prove
it, standing on the deck Of the dancing boat as
1t sped upstream, he fired eight more shots, and
each time the gun spat bewildered pig lost
its curly tail Pretty good said a keller. Just
a detail said Mike"
Then there was the time when he was sitting
on the levee with Of his cronies when he
noticed, more than 100 yards away, negro sit
ting on the bank above the levee This black
man was town character, noted for the size
of his feet. So Mike shot at him and shaved of
a portion of his heel so "he can wear gentee
boot" Later he sent "a handful of silver to the
| darky to extract the pain"
Do you remember Emerson Hough's Covered
Wagon" and the two frontiersmen who were ac
customed to shoot a lineup of whisky of each
| others heads as proof Of their friendship anC
confidence in each others craftsmanship? Ions
before the Covered Wagon days, Mike Fink was
doing that stunt and, shall see later, it i:
an essential part of the Mike Fink saga.
But not all of the legends about Mike Finl
had to do with his shOotin' ability One story
| tells how he fought and killed bear with hi:
naked hands. Another tells Of his capture of
moose with the same weapons Then there I:
| the story of how he wiped out the nest of out
laws at Cave-in-R Rock after they had attacked hi!
keelbOat His drinking bouts in the dives o.
Natchez- [ Under- Hill and New Orleans and st
Louis and the playful habit he and his cronie
had of taking a town apart" form the basi!
for other wild yarns of his varied activities.
| SO the tales of Mike Fink could be multiplied
| endlessly. Some of them may have had some
basis of truth, but the majority of them ART