Singers and Storytellers Page: 5
v, 298 p. ; 24 cm.View a full description of this book.
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STORYTELLERS I HAVE KNOWN
Folklore Society in 1924, under the title Legends of Texas.
Bertha McKee Dobie helped edit and write it.
It was in 1923 that I left Beeville with a small rancher for
Duval County on the trail of a legend pertaining to San Caja
Mountain-just a long hill. At that time Archie Parr, in the
Texas Senate, was known as "The Duke of Duval." His son
George has been notorious for years as the inheritor of the
Duke's ways. The little rancher I went with was not a good
storyteller at all. He was too much of a literalist. Not far from
his squat we passed a one-teacher frame schoolhouse inside
about a half-acre of black brush and catclaw enclosed by three
strands of barbed wire. "You might be surprised to know that
that fence cost the county a thousand dollars," the little rancher
said. I wasn't surprised. That's all he said on the subject.
I remember this helper in my search for stories mainly on
account of his bed furnishings. There were not any sheets in
the house, and the quilt I slept on had more animalitos in it
than any other quilt I ever encountered. Really, though, it was
not as bad as a bed I slept on in Karnes County while I was on
the trail of a story about ghost riders, a story well told by
Henry Yelvington in his Ghost Lore. This Karnes County bed
didn't have any more sheets than the Duval County bed, but
it had the seven-year's itch-"just waiting," like the boll weevil,
"for a home."
In the summer of 1933, I went down to Saltillo with Henry
Nash Smith, of Virgin Land fame, now at the University of
California. From Saltillo we rode on a short train over a jerk-
water railroad to the end of it and got burros to take us to a
hacienda in Zacatecas called Los Cedros-the only time I ever
rode a burro on a pack trip. The administrador of the hacienda
was a good storyteller. He helped a person soak up life. When
the Madero Revolution began in 1910, Los Cedros had an
extensive vineyard, but every time the Carranzistas came they
sacked the wine cellar, and every time the Villistas came they
sacked it again, and finally the owner ordered all the grape-
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Singers and Storytellers (Book)
Collection of popular folklore of Texas, including personal anecdotes about storytellers and singers, as well as folk songs, myths, and ghost stories. The index begins on page 295.
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Boatright, Mody C. Singers and Storytellers, book, 1961; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc67655/m1/11/: accessed April 28, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Press.