Springtime treasure, gained and lost. "For all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these, 'It might have been.'" John Greenleaf Whittier

(My 150th post)

I received an e-mail from my friend Lee the other day. He lives in the 'Copper Country,' home of that quintessential northern Michigan treat, thimble-berry jam. It's also where winter each year means Snow.  I might have been more accurate had I capitalized the entire word snow in the last sentece because their official measurement of the snowfall in the 2016-2017 winter now stands at 267 inches. (that's 678 centimetres) And it may snow again before summer finally arrives. I can't say spring because it often snows then. Only after summer arrives are they free of the chance of snow. (well, mostly)

In his message, Lee told me that he had just walked from his frontyard to his backyard on bare ground. That may seem like an odd statement. But I assure you, it is not, to anyone who has lived in the north and to whom bare ground becomes a distant memory for months at a time. It's amazing how a sentence fragment of just three words can carry such a depth of meaning to one who knows...

His statement brought back memories of my own experiences as a kid when bare ground first appeared in the spring. I can't quite find the words to describe the excitement I experienced or the wonder I felt at being able to see and even smell the ground, as the sun warmed the frozen earth for the first time in 7 months. 

And, I remembered that I had written a story back in 2010 about an experience I had had at precisely this time of year. I thought for this post that I'd share it with you in honor of spring in the U.P.  It's called...

Dentist to a Bear

By Doug Foster

From its beginning at the edge of ‘Jimtown’* and winding out of the little iron mining community of Wakefield, Michigan, heading generally eastward, was the bumpy, tire and suspension-destroying stretch of pock-marked pavement known as Castile Road. Houses had been built, for some reason, only along one side of it and as it progressed under the cables that ran between the Engine House and the only remaining mine shaft still in operation in Castile** in my youth, the houses spaced along it started thinning out. By the time it started its climb up the hill where my house was located, they were few and far between. Beyond our house there were only 6 more before the road doubled back on itself at what we called ‘the horseshoe.’ Our house was essentially surrounded by wooded hills with all their rock outcroppings and cliffs that were common to the area.

I was the oldest child in the family. My dad was always working and my mother had her hands full with caring for the younger kids. I had my share of duties of course, around the house; washing the dishes and cleaning our bathroom were my specialties. I also felt at times that I was unfairly burdened with the responsibility of overseeing the play of my several younger siblings in the yard. Still, despite the many demands on my time, I managed somehow to explore all the lands that lay within the area to which my legs could carry me.

We had a lot of freedom in those days that today’s kids don’t enjoy. I certainly never considered my parents permissive. If anything, I felt the opposite. However, it wasn’t at all unusual for me to head out in the morning with a lunch in my dad’s old World War II canvas ammunition carrier and not return until afternoon. I’d also usually carry the bayonet that fit the rifle he carried while stationed in the Philippines. I used it as a machete most of the time. You’d be surprised at how often a boy of 11 needs to clear brush on any given hike. When I opted not to take his bayonet, I’d take the even more impressive knife that Dad had purchased in ‘the islands.’ It had a long, curved blade that actually intimidated me with its sharpness and a hand-carved wooden handle and case. Much later I found that this style of knife is known as a Lahot in the Philippines, and was the style that many farmers used when my dad was there.

Many of my Saturdays during the school year and all my summers were filled with innumerable hikes, either to one of the three largest hills that I could then reach, or down what we had aptly named the “Junky Road,” because it served some of the folks in town as a place to dump unwanted cars or appliances. The Junky Road started nearby at a bend in the road just down the hill from our house and terminated in a large field about a mile into the woods. No one lived along it. It had been a mining company access road that led past a couple of the deep vertical mine shafts that were once a part of the system of active mine shafts in Castile Location that carried ore to the surface. For almost its entire length it sloped gently downhill. Along one side of it ran a deep ditch that was dry most of the year, but in the springtime, when the deep snows of winter were melting away, it could carry a couple of feet of rushing water.

One spring, this ditch offered my friend Bill and me what we considered to be the prize of our lifetimes. Since our definition of a lifetime was, at that time, 11 years give or take, it wasn’t surprising that my mother, when she found out about the prize and especially when she learned of the manner in which we had retrieved it, did not agree with the value we placed on it. In fact she was less than enthusiastic about me keeping my portion of the find at all. After some discussion, she finally relented. For my part, I felt that she put some pretty unreasonable requirements on me for allowing me to keep it. Mothers took all the joy out of life sometimes.

The day of our find, Bill and I had covered a lot of territory. It was one of those perfect spring days, when almost all of the snow is gone from the sunny parts of the woods. It was warm and we could run outside without our heavy winter coats, snow pants and boots. We felt light and free and energized. Our goal that day was to climb the southern face of Rocky Hill and eat our lunch on one of its cliffs, overlooking our little town below. Unfortunately, when we arrived at the base of the hill, we found that there was still considerable snow under the dense trees that covered its slopes. Snow that was soft and very wet and would not allow us to cross it without sinking. As an alternative plan, we decided to circle round the base of the hill, following the snow-free meadows that lay there, to the headwaters of Jackson’s Creek, which arose from a spring located in the big field at the end of the Junky Road. We would then take the Junky Road back home, and stop on the way of course, for the first time that spring, to drop some rocks down the 2 inch pipe that vented one of the concrete capped mine shafts along it.

We had a great time. We followed ‘Jackson Creek’ from its source in the field to our favorite spot along it located about a half mile downstream as the crow flies. This was a deep hole that we had once tried to swim in, but we found the water in it to be so frigid, even in midsummer, that we couldn’t even pretend to enjoy it. Thereafter we contented ourselves with simply trying to catch some of the minnows that made it their home.

On this visit we found that the water had not broken free from winter’s covering of ice. We were mildly disappointed but contented ourselves with retracing our steps to the sand pit nearby where we made a fire and roasted a couple of wieners apiece for lunch.

This sand pit was our regular dining area whenever we visited the creek. We had never built a fire anywhere else. We were very conscientious about our fires and truly took our responsibility for seeing that it was ‘dead out’ before leaving it very seriously. Since the sand pit was some ways from the creek and we had no way to haul water anyway, we couldn’t extinguish the fire by drowning it out. The expanse of sand we had at our disposal in the pit solved our problem. We simply buried the fire when it had burned down.

Once, the summer before, while we ate our lunch, a man had showed up at our sand pit. He was carrying a large pistol in his belt. We were at first uncomfortable with his visit. We thought that no one else knew about this place. It was our private place after all. Then too, the presence of an adult instantly diminished our imagined dominant position within our ‘territory.’ And, he was carrying a gun. I wondered briefly if he could be a ‘hobo’ or some other threatening character, but when he greeted us, I immediately recognized that he was one of the regulars I had often seen when I turned in empty pop bottles for two cents apiece at Rolando’s Bar in ‘Jimtown.’ Finally, I was faced with an uncomfortable dilemma. Here we were, adventurers meeting in the wilderness. Was I supposed to offer this guy some portion of our lunch? Cowboys on TV. always offered the other guy some coffee or beans when they ran into one another on the trail. I didn’t want to because we didn’t have much, but eventually, and probably hesitantly, I did. I was relieved when he declined.

That day, we didn’t put our fire out when we left the pit a few minutes later. The guy said it smelled so good, he thought he’d keep it going for a while and enjoy it himself. I hoped that he’d be responsible when he put it out.

He had told us that he was going to do some target practice at the pit. A few minutes later, as we crossed the field and were approaching the lower end of the Junky Road, we heard his shots starting. We made plans to try to recover some of his bullets on our next visit. Neither Bill nor I had ever seen a real “slug” up close. We could hardly wait. Unfortunately, we never did find any.

I think that only kids who suffer through an Upper Peninsula winter in the Lake Superior snowbelt area with its two hundred inches-plus average snowfall, can properly appreciate the wonder of seeing bare ground in the spring. This entire day had been one long feast for our eyes as we explored all the secrets on the ground that had for so long been hidden. And there was another pleasure for boys in the springtime. All that melting snow had to go somewhere. This past week at school we had gathered several times during recess along the edge of “The Boulevard,” that ran in front of Central School and had floated pieces of bark down the flowing rivulets next to the curb and watched with fascination as they disappeared down a miniature waterfall through the grates of the storm sewer at the corner.

Today, as we hiked back up the Junky Road, we had an even better opportunity to play with the water. It was running noisily down the ditch on the left side of the road and was at least two feet deep. We found that we could get a really good splash when we tossed in large pieces of the iron ore that lay everywhere along the road. In fact, we noticed that because the water was moving so quickly, the splash would actually travel with the water for a few feet, rather than just staying in one spot like it did if you threw a rock into a lake.

We were about two thirds of the way up the Junky Road when we saw it. It lay completely submerged under the flowing water and was hung up in some ice and large brush that clogged the ditch at this point. It was the remains of a black bear lying on its back. Most of its fur remained but its entrails were gone and the hide and meat covering its ribs had either been eaten or rotted away. We could count them all, right up to its breastbone. Its paws were all missing. Its head was still covered with fur, but its eyes were gone and its mouth was open wide in a ferocious snarl. What meat we could see was gray and little bits of it were moving back and forth in the swirling water. It appeared to us that the water was slowly washing ‘our’ bear away and that we had to act quickly if we were to salvage any portion of him.

We ran to my house and with the wisdom of children who do not want to be questioned by their parents, snuck in the back door and went quietly down to the basement where my dad kept his tool box. I grabbed a pair of pliers and just as quickly, exited the way we had come. Before long we were back at the bear and beginning our operations.

Most of the bear was visible, but was frozen into the ice below him. We would not be able to pull him out of the water. Since his paws were gone, claws were out of the question as trophies. His teeth though, were there, waiting to be pulled.

His head was fairly near the surface of the water, no more than 6 inches below it. To pull them then, we had to reach out over the ditch, submerge our hands in the freezing, rushing water, and pry away at what we discovered were very firmly rooted teeth. It was hard to see clearly just how good a hold we had on a tooth because the moving water refracted what we were seeing. We worked alternately with the pliers for quite some time. We could only stand to keep our hands in that frigid water for a couple of minutes before we had to turn the pliers over to the other while we would blow on our hands to warm them again. Soon, our pants were very wet from kneeling at the edge of the ditch, and from slipping in now and then as we tried to gain more leverage, and we were wet to the elbows of our coats from reaching below the surface of the stream.

But we were triumphant. We each had a genuine bear’s tooth.#  We knew of no other kid in our class who could make that claim and we each intended to drill a hole in our tooth, string it on a leather boot lace, and wear them to school on Monday. What a sensation we would make and how thrilling it would be to tell the others of our adventure! There is nothing that would elevate the status of a boy like having a bear tooth to wear. We had seen innumerable Indians on TV. that wore all sorts of feathers and teeth and claws when they went on the war path or were making medicine. It’s true we only had one, but it was a start. I think as we trudged home, cold and wet but happy, that bear was already getting bigger in our minds and by the time we told about in school, it would be a monster.

When we got back to my house, our elation caused me to recklessly put aside any fears that my mother might not find a rotting bear’s tooth to be an acceptable keepsake. We happily showed her what we had. She asked how we had come to have them and I told her that we had pulled them ourselves out of a carcass that was in the ditch. I said that it looked like the bear was about half rotted away, but that since it was underwater, it didn’t smell or anything. We hoped, I said, to recover more of his bones and maybe his whole head, once he thawed out of the ice and we could pull him up onto the Junky Road.

At this point, my mother, who was the daughter of a prominent lawyer in St. Paul, and had spent her youth in gracious and dignified living before getting married and ending up in the backwoods of the Upper Peninsula, for a few seconds simply stared at me in disbelief. I realized, with a sinking feeling, that giving her an exact description of the events, the recovery process and most of all, the condition of the bear, had been a big mistake. My tooth was confiscated, the condition of my clothes was noticed and worst of all, she stated her immediate intention of calling Bill’s mother with the whole story.

By the time she returned from the telephone, I had changed my wet clothes and she proceeded to insure that my hands were sterilized. It took a lot of washing and with her coarsest bar of old-fashioned brown laundry soap to satisfy her that they were finally clean enough, but the process must have softened her resolve a little because she did finally agree that I could keep the tooth, if I kept it in a bottle of alcohol. I asked her if I couldn’t soak it in the alcohol for a really long time; say, a couple of hours, and then drill it and string it on a leather strap. That was out of the question. She tried then to make me feel better by suggesting that I could still bring it to school. Moms just don’t understand. The prospect of bringing my bear’s tooth to school in a bottle of alcohol was too terrible to even consider.   The other boys would immediately ask why I hadn’t strung it on a cord instead of doing something stupid like putting it in a jar. My status would actually be diminished.

My bear’s tooth stood for a while in its jar on top of the cupboard in our kitchen where we kept our dishes. Each time I looked at it, I imagined what could have been. I realized that if only I had claimed to have found the tooth lying on the ground somewhere, I’d be wearing it proudly.

In those days Mom hauled us off to confession every other Saturday afternoon. Such was my sadness and bitterness over this episode of parental unfairness, that I vowed then to lie in the future if I found another such treasure and I didn’t care if it was a sin.

I was strictly forbidden to return to that bear and apparently, once the ice had melted underneath it, it got carried away by the current. In any event, it wasn’t in the ditch when I walked down the Junky Road the next time. I stopped momentarily where it had been in the ditch and once again fantasized a very different ending to the story. I could just see the bear’s huge, gleaming white skull, cleaned and nailed to a board that I’d hang on the wall in my bedroom. I decided that it would be worth giving up my bear-tooth pendant so that I could glue it back in to its proper place in its snarl. I didn’t know if Bill would give me back the other tooth, so that I could complete my trophy, but knowing his mother, I doubted that he still had it anyway. He sure hadn’t worn it to school...

* The area within Wakefield that was known as Jimtown was only about a block long. It boasted a couple of bars…Rolando’s and the Sunday Lake Bar. I remember cuspidors arranged down the length of the bar, pushed up against the brass foot rail. Jimtown lay between the end of ‘the Boulevard’ and the beginning of Castile Road.

** Although we all lived in Wakefield, if someone asked me where I lived, I’d reply that I lived in Castile. All the “locations” in Wakefield were named for the various mines operating there. There were Castile, Brotherton, Pike, Plymouth, Wico, Thomaston and several other locations. If there was a fire anywhere in town, the horn above the city hall would honk out a code, telling the whole area where the fire was. A fire in Brotherton Location may have called for two honks, followed by a pause and then 3 more honks. I don’t remember the code and can’t find a listing for it. It could also mean a mine emergency. Whenever the honking started, everyone would stop whatever they were doing and start counting.

# We started by trying to extract the upper canines but discovered that they were so firmly embedded that it was hopeless to continue. The lower canines then became our targets and finally, our treasures. 

UPDATE:

Once again, time is the great healer. Fifty five years after pulling the tooth on my bear, I have once again stumbled across a treasure. And this time, I was able to keep my prize. I washed it, bleached and disinfected it, dried it in the sun and finally shellacked it. It is the jaw assembly of the puffer fish I showed you a number of posts ago.  Take a look.

Here it is on the beach 

And here it is removed, cleaned and preserved for posterity. Betcha' I'm the only kid on my block who has one of these. I don't think I can string this on a leather boot lace though.  -djf