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Dung-O-Ree
By nine we were fairly settled in, the temperature was dropping towards freezing, and it was time for a little adventure. I sent the Scouts on a hike up through the woods at the back of our camp to the top of the "Hill of Doom", so called because of the numerous briar patches that await anyone who strays from the beaten path. I met them up there twenty minutes later, and we spent an hour dancing around cow patties in the dark and examining the night sky. Off in the distance we could see the glow of our warm homes back in Clarion, but the sky was what held our interest. All night and all day --- every day --- the Big Dipper slowly rotates around the North Star, and we stayed long enough on that chilly hilltop to see that this was so. From the direction of the North Star you can, of course, figure out all of the directions of the compass. We used that information, and our knowledge of the geography of the United States, to guess where the airliners that constantly flew far overhead on that frosty Friday evening were headed. There were disagreements, but the idea that the stars so far above could help us to predict the destination of these aircraft was fascinating to us all. We saw shooting stars, the Milky Way and a few far distant galaxies, and pondered the possibility of life out near those far away dots of light in the sky. Then we made our way back down the hill and to bed. This was the part that was worrying me. My sleeping bag is rated for summer use, but that night it was to get down to freezing. So, as the camp quieted down, I put an old coffee pot filled with water among the glowing embers of the dying campfire and scraped orange-red coals all around its sides. Twenty minutes later, I poured the contents of the pot into a hot water bottle, doused the fire and jigged across the meadow to my tent. Leaving my smelly shoes outside, I changed into long underwear and got into my lightweight sleeping bag. I placed the toasty water bottle on my stomach and pulled the drawstring to close the top of the bag around my neck. Then, I lay breathing the cold night air --- listening to the far away noises of Friday night air traffic, and the occasional snort from the cows nearby. Sleep was slow in coming. The sun finally rose in a cold and cloudless sky, and the younger Scouts were soon up and noisily building a fire to warm their chilly bones. As I crawled wearily out of my tent, I saw that the cows had moved in the night and were now clustered around my white car, which they were busily licking. Did they think that it was a salt lick? Or, were they just tonguing off the heavy dew that covered every surface in the early morning light?
After a quick breakfast of bacon, eggs and orange juice, the Scouts were ready for their big day. The older guys spread maps on the hood of one of the cars and plotted a ten-mile hike that would take them from Crates to Limestone and Frogtown over winding byways made more beautiful by the late fall foliage. The youngest Scouts settled down with Steve Shreffler and Buck Heeter to learn some First Aid and other basics of Boy Scouting. The rest of the boys walked along the stream, prospecting a good location to build a footbridge. This was the crew that I watched over during most of the day, and they did themselves proud. Having located a good place, some Scouts went off to borrow tools from Bob Megnin and then set to clearing the bridge site of the multiflora rose bushes that clog the banks of the stream. The rest of the boys selected a 15-year old big-tooth aspen, and began to chop it down. It was 8 inches thick at the base, and after 20 minutes of inexpert nicking, they had chopped through about a third of it. Then came Bob Megnin, an old hand with an ax, and he dropped the tree neatly with just a dozen strokes --- everyone was very impressed. The Scouts then knocked off the branches and cut the trunk into three twelve-foot logs. Crosspieces were lashed to these as handles, and teams of Scouts then carried the logs to the bridge site. There the logs were maneuvered into place, and the work of lashing on the deck of the bridge was begun. Max, the Megnin's dog, stayed with us all morning to excitedly watch our activities. He was constantly in the way, but the Scouts loved having him around, patting and talking to him and treating him like one of the gang. Around one o'clock we called a halt for lunch. This was to be hot dogs cooked on spears and hamburgers fried in a skillet over an open fire. While Max and the cooks retrieved the raw materials and cooking utensils from the supply tent, the other Scouts foraged for wood to make the fire bigger. One Scout, remembering from school that the Plains Indians used buffalo chips as fuel, got a shovel and started putting cow dung on the fire. What he hadn't been taught in school was the necessity of selecting very dry dung, and the fire quickly started to smoke and give off a fowl odor. The dung was hastily removed and we went back to wood as fuel. Shortly the cooking began. The hot dogs went without a hitch, but the wooden handle of the hamburger skillet turned out to be hotter than expected and gave one of the Scouts a first-degree burn --- that was when all that First Aid they had learned was put to good use.
All afternoon the Scouts chopped down small quaking aspens, cut these into cross pieces and lashed them to the base of the bridge. They left spaces between these decking pieces, so that the cows would not be tempted to use the bridge to cross the stream. When it was finally finished, the bridge contained three large logs, 16 cross pieces and forty-eight lashings. The aspens it is built of will not last very long in the open, but, on completion, the bridge could easily hold the combined weight of 12 proud boys and one pestiferous dog. I crawled into my sleeping bag with my hot water bottle again that night, and had no trouble at all falling into an exhausted sleep ¾ until 3 a.m. I woke with a start as I heard an animal brushing up against my tent. Raccoon? Cow? Bear? The possibilities rushed though my head. Then I realized that it was only Max, and so, giving him a shove with my foot, I rolled over and went back to sleep.
It wasn't until the next morning that we discovered that Max had
been very, very busy that quiet night. As a sincere sign of his
proprietary friendship for this Boy Scout troop from Clarion, or
perhaps in retribution for being tied up at lunchtime, he had cocked
his leg at the corner of each of our tents. |
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The
sun was just setting as we swung the gate open and drove through the
stream and up into Bob Megnin's west pasture. Max, the husky little
dog of the farm, trotted alongside the truck until we pulled into
the campsite, and then made a pleasant nuisance of himself as we
unloaded a pile of firewood that Bob had kindly supplied. Then, as
the bull and four cows gathered at one edge of the campsite to
watch, we scurried to set up tents in the waning light
--- the main rule of site
selection being to avoid the many piles of cow dung that liberally
dotted the field. 
Max
was everywhere, begging his lunch and stealing any unattended
morsel. Worse still, when the skillet cooled sufficiently, he
greedily started eating the grease that it contained. This was the
last straw, and the boys tied him to a bush. Then they spent a lot
of time visiting and listening to him as he whined over his
captivity.