Newspaper, Grassroots & Cockleburrs, Vanished Sounds..., LaSalle Parish, LA. GRASS ROOTS AND COCKLE BURRS- Vanished Sounds… By Jack Willis Sponsored by Town and Country General Store Transcribed by Pat Ezell, PatEzell@worldnet.att.net Submitted by: Kathy LeMay Kelly, P.O. Box 219, Trout, La. 71371 From the Jena Times - Olla Tullos Signal, Wed., Feb 2, 2000, Section B, Page 5 Thank You to the Times -Signal for allowing the following to be added to the Archives. ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** VANISHED SOUNDS Y2K has finally come and gone. The frenzy, hoarding, relocating to supposedly safe havens like the mountain of Utah, these exercises in futility are finally over. Some people are reassessing their actions of the previous year of 1999 - - wondering whether they acted in faith, foolishness, or presumption? Occasionally, a friend of mine and I get together over a bottomless cup of coffee, simply because we've got no time table - no place to go and no particular time to get there. Nothing particular to do, about 30 days behind in doing that, and what's worse, we can't get any help. The conversation, somehow, drifted around to sounds which were as familiar as eating and sleeping, have now diminished and are no more an integral part of everyday living, as they once were. One familiar sound was the whistle of the Louisiana and Arkansas locomotives, that would be sounded at every road crossing the railroad tracks. The company had erected concrete pillars, bleached white by a rich cement content, with a black X emblazoned upon the face of the post, to indicate to the train engineer the existence of such crossings. The steam whistles were also sounded to let the populace know of the train's eminent arrival. The whistle sounds were not confined to just the L&A mainline. The Shay engines (so named because an engineer of the same name from Wisconsin invented them for logging purposes) were log-geared, sluggish powerful locomotives employed by the Buchanan interests to ferry the woods crew out to their logging operations. They would take men and supplies in the early morning before daylight and spend the rest of the day ferrying endless flatcars stacked with virgin pine logs back to the mills. Mr. Chris Francis, locally known Shay locomotive engineer, was noted for his ability to exact musical tones from his train whistle, much like an accomplished musician. He had codes worked out with all segments of the mill population, whether they be woods foreman or flathead or housewife/mother at home, or store clerk. One misgiving of Mr. Chris blowing his whistle signaling the last load of the day, usually after dark, was that one of the old time keepers for the company noted the time. In the 30s when men were working for 10 cents per hour due to the Great Depression, the tight-fisted company man would look at his pocket watch and if the time were 7:59 p.m. and since it wasn't 8 o'clock yet, he would not give the men credit for the 59 minutes worked. What goes around comes around. His widow was later evicted from her company house when the house was sold out from under her. Mill whistles dictated the activities of the mill town community. The early morning blasts signaled the beginning of the work day at six o'clock and ended the day's labors at five o'clock. The shrill sounds signaled disaster such as fires or even deaths in the hazard-filled workplaces. Around the turn of the century, the Davis family, one of Catahoula and LaSalle Parishes most prominent families, had a country store and grist mill located at Summerville. The grist mill had a steam whistle which was blown on the days prior to the grinding of corn or ginning of cotton. The resonant sound of the whistle would reverberate all up and down Mill Creek, where the mill was located, and over to the resident's ears on Bayou Funny Louis. After Summerville's demise as a trading center, the old whistle was acquired by Emanuel and Lillian Whatley Jones, and installed on the rear of their laundry and pressing shop in downtown Jena. Every day at seven, twelve, one, and five o'clock, the house was punctuated by the piercing blast of the whistle. The Jones began this practice in the late 40s and continued well up into the late 60s. Townsfolks governed their lifestyle around the sounds of this ancient clarion. Donald Powell, a resident of Jena, own both the train and mill whistles. The LaSalle Telephone Company had its offices next door to Mr. and Mrs. C.I. Humphries' residence. A siren was mounted on a tower on the side of the building, and if someone had a fire they could telephone one of the switchboard operators, usually Mattie or Loni Taylor, or Elsie Prince, and they would flip a switch activating the siren for all to hear. This would be the impetus to motivate J.B. Carpenter to begin one of his patented dashes out the front door of Carpenter's Department Store, across the street usually congested with traffic, up the alley, around the corner, where he would vault into the seat of the Jena fire truck. And it was off to the races. Another vanished sound that could b e heard around Jena on a cold, frosty morning were the trains. One could lie in bed, if they resided in proximity to the Louisiana and Arkansas, later La. Midland railroad tracks and listen to the switch engine making up a train of various denominations of rail cars. They would bang and clang all hours of the night until time to pull out for their eventual destination around daylight. People occupied in outdoor occupations would go to the Gulf Public Service Ice Plant to ice down their water cans. Here they would be furnished 12 and 25 lb. chunks of ice by Kennon Bradford or Dewey Crooks. Periodically, they would drop 600 lb. blocks of ice out of the cooler to be systematically sectioned up by a marvelous device invented by Aber Flowers. The huge block would be properly positioned by Bradford or Crooks, and the block would start its journey to getting carved up. The saws would whir and when it rolled through the precise, concise operation, a few well placed stabs with an ice pick would free the desired size block of ice to the customer. The LaSalle Courthouse had a magnificent bell, probably retrieved from a plantation situated on the Southwest corner of the building. It was later taken down and mounted on a stand at the east door of the courthouse. It would be rung prior to court sessions. When the old original courthouse was finally demolished, the bell was mounted on a stand, but it didn't have the proper tone. Someone that knew something told the Police Jurors that the bell supports had to be mounted on a wooden base, rather than steel. Made all the difference in the world in its sound. Automobile horns at first were a kind of novelty, witness the oogah! Of the Tin Lizzie Model T. Livestock paid absolutely no attention to them. Lewis Humphries related a tale of a trip he and some friends made to Georgetown. They were chug-a-lugging about in a Model T and somewhere near the community of Little Creek, they came upon a huge hog lying in the middle of the road! What road? The thoroughfare was little more than a wagon trail. He blew the horn to no avail. She refused to grunt much less move. Finally, one of his cronies told him to just run her over. He put the car in gear, the left front wheel started climbing up the behemoth's back and up out of the wallow she arose. She jumped up with such force that the action turned the Model T over on its side. They took some clubs and ran the hog away, righted the lightweight automobile, and were soon on their journey. Another sound seldom heard today is the screeching of tires. At one time in the 40s, a motorist could turn a corner and the tires would howl. The tires weren't really in a bind, their treat design just produced a lot of noise. Dr. D.L. Trax got tired of his tires screeching every time he deviated from the straight and narrow. He had heard that the Gates Tire Company had come out with a radical, new silent caisson, and since he resided in Alexandria, he went in search of a set. His quest proved successful and he drove into Jena one morning in his Cadillac equipped with four new Gates Silent Safety tires. He could then drive in peace and quiet. At one time the Jena Elementary School had a bell located on top of the school building. It would be rung every morning to announce the beginning of school. Since the school was located atop one of the highest hills in the Jena area, the tolling of the bell could be heard for miles, especially on a damp, foggy morning. The popping of firecrackers in the Halloween nights eventually ruined the tone of the bell. The old First Baptist Church, which was torn down in 1949, had a huge bell in its belfry. Its peals, often triggered by Jimmie Humphries would call the congregation to worship on Sunday mornings. The ability to hear is one of the most important of the five senses and we have a tendency to forget how sounds govern our daily activities. Illustrative of this is related by a man who lived in Clarks, right next to the Missouri Pacific main rail tracks that criss-crossed the state. One early morning about 2:30, he was suddenly awakened from a sound sleep. He couldn't figure out for the life of him why he woke up. He finally got up about three hours later, turned on the TV and a newscaster was relating a story about a train derailment that had occurred just South of Monroe. He finally put two and two together. His subconscious mind hadn't registered the usual passing of the south bound freight that morning and its absence woke him up. Humans are the funniest people, as proven by their addiction to sounds, some now long since forgotten, and only heard…back when.