Historical Wyoming County April 1957 - Old Fulton History

April 1957 Page 8 9
OTHER TALES FROM NORTH JAVA (cont.)
One of Royce's neighbors was James Keenan, prominent Democrat,
supervisor and civic leader. One day while the two v; ; visiting,
Keenan said he thought someone was taking fuel from his wood pile,,
"That's bad," said Fletcher. "Now I wonder what I would do if I
thought someone was stealing my wood and I was curious who it wase
I might do this. I might bore a hole in a good sized chunk, fill
the h&le with gunpowder, put in a nicely fitting plug, then smear it
over with a little bit of mud. Now I am not advising you to do a
thing like that nor am I saying that _I would do it. I am merely
saying I might do it."
A short time after that another neighbor had an accident in his
home. His heating stove exploded.
Joe Herman at one time ran a grocery and meat market in North
Java. One morning as the bus was leaving for the morning train Joe
was standing in front of his store and the two or three passengers,
city bound, waved good-bye to him. Imagine their surprise when they
stepped off the train at Attica to see Joe Herman standing on the
station platform.
Of course this happened before the time of automobiles and
while the passengers were riding the mile and a half to the station
and v- :".]. they were waiting for the train, and while the & A. was
making its scheduled stops, Herman was treading his bicycle down the
creek toward Attica. And he arrived there first.
Halloween has always been a time for pranks. One incident, I
remember, happened on a presidential election year. I was quite a
small lad and so can not fix the date. But I remember the Liberty
Poles. The Democrats raised one in front of Mason & Crahan hardware
store. It was a beautiful straight stick of timber, sawed either
hexagonal or octagonal and painted. The Prohibition party put one
up beside Lester Alien's furniture store. It was not as nice as the
other but it was patriotically painted with three bands, one red,
one white and one blue. On the morning after Halloween both were
decorated. A wagon hung on the Prohibition pole and on the Democrat's
a beer keg.
Jim Keenan at one time a young man working for him, a
simple minded fellow who stutiu.. . .. It was the day when the first
automobiles were out and occasionally one was seen in North Java.
One went past Keenan's place one day, the first his boy had seen.
He stared at it in surprise, then began, "R-u-u-u-nawayl Ru-u-u-nawayl
Where in h..„s the h-h-h-h-orse?