... I had some experiences that probably no one else ever had.   We had a good lively little community down in the forks of the creek.  The young folks had parties, dances, and a good time generally.  Everything in the community moved on quietly and peaceably among the old folks and the young. 

I fell for a little girl.   Her name was Josie.   During the summer of 18-- [rest of date not given], her mother died, and in the fall of the same year, Josie's father decided to move up on the hills to a more elevated country. This took my little girl Josie out of my range, about eight miles away.   The following spring about the middle of March, I decided to go and see my girl Josie.  So I got me a new pair of pants, wore my last winter's coat.  My hat had started to run up to seed.  My shoes were anything but decent, but I wanted to see my little sweetheart, Josie.  So, on a Saturday evening I dressed up as best I could, and about 2 P.M. I started afoot to walk 8 miles to see my sweetie.  I had no horse and buggy, not even a horse.  I tugged along very happy in mind, thinking of many things that I would talk about when I got to my girl's house. 

I got there just before sundown.  She was mighty proud to see me.  She was cooking supper.   Her daddy was out attending to his stock.   They done their cooking in a big open fire place, and Miss Jose had me take a seat up near the fire as it was a little cool.  She fried some of the best looking and best smelling ham a hungry boy ever smelt.  When she was through frying her ham, she set the frying pan against the wall of the fire place and turned to set her meat on the table in a small adjoining room.  I grabbed up the pan handle and poked my finger in the ring at the end of the handle and got it hung. 

About that time, the old man came to the kitchen door and howdyed at me and said to come take a wash for supper.  I thanked him and told him I was not hungry.  You see, I still had my finger caught in the pan's handle.  But hungry, oh boy, I could have eat a wolf.  Miss Josie said in a very kind way, "Billie,  you better come eat supper with us."  I thanked her very kindly and said that I did not wish anything.  When they got busy eating, I reached down in the pan and got a little grease and put it on my fingerm and by leaving a little finger hide, I got it out of the ring on the pan.

After they had finished eating supper, the old  many went out to gather in plenty of wood for the night.  Miss Josie asked me to make myself at home, that she was going to milk. I had begun to wish I was at home.  In a few minutes she came in and set the milk on the side tables and went back to turn out the calves.  I said now is my time for some milk.  I slipped into the kitchen, picked up about a three-gallon bucket half-full of milk, turned it up to my mouth and began drinking right out of the bucket.  When I had drank about half the milk, the bucket bail fell over my head and the rest of the milk spilled down my front and on the floor.

About that time Miss Josie came in, seen what I had done, began laughing and helped me get the bucket bail from over my head. I went back to the fire, by that time the old man came in.  He took a seat centerly before the fire, myself on one side and Josie on the other, and if that old man asked me one question, he asked me a hundred about how all the folks was getting along down in the forks of the creek.

After discussing every subject he might think of for about two hours.  He raised up from his seat and says, "Well, Billie, I guess it is about bed time.  Come, I will show you your room."  He carried me out to a little new log house not yet finished in the lower corner of the yard.  I went to bed and late in the night a norther blew up.  There was a big crack in the house that let the cool wind in on my head, so I got up and stuffed my pants into the opening,  and then I went back to sleep.  When I awaked the next morning, my pants was gone.  After about a half-hour had gone by, the old man came to my room and ask me why I did not get up and come to breakfast.  I told him what I had done and that my pants were gone. He went out to look around for them. 

Directly, he came back with the waistband and the buttons of my pants.  The calves had got in the yard and pulled my pants out of the crack and eat them up.  He laughed and said he would lend me a pair of his. So he brought in a pair.  I put them on.  (He was about such a size man as Mr. Underwood, and I was about the size of Mr. Jimmie Belk.)  So the pants did not touch me any where except the waist, and only after I buckled up tight. I went on to breakfast for I was so hungry I could hardly walk and so ashamed of my condition that I never noticed any thing but the good looking vituals on the table. 

There was a nice large linen cloth on the table, and while I was eating I noticed it across my lap.  Thinking it was the lower extremities of my shirt, I crammed it into my pants for there was plenty of room.  As I rose, the table linen began coming with me, and every thing on the table was upset.  I went out the back door, made a dive for the yard gate, but on old tig ????  lying on it.  As I went over the fence, the old man shot me in the back with a slop bucket, and about that time Josie stuck her head out of a back window and said, "Billie, I will be at home this evening."  I said, "Yes, and I will be too!"

Hats Off! to Ann Morris for providing this story.

(Note from Ann Morris:  William B. Whitaker kept a diary for many years noting his comings and goings, births, deaths, marriages, planting and harvesting during the very late 1800s and early 1900s.  In the 1930's, The Panola Watchman began printing them.  To read some of his diary entries, go to Days Gone By   for late 1999 and 2000. Based upon what I have been told by Mr. Whitaker's descendants, most of the original diary entries have been lost over time.  A few editing liberites were taken with Mr. Whitaker's story; however, for the most part the story appears as it did when it was published in 1910.)

If you would like to contribute diary entries to the Center for Panola County Research, please contact Webmaster or call the Center at (903)-693-1146.

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03/21/05