The field on the other side of our house, the North side, had scattered trees of various sizes, some hardwood and some pine. Beyond our fence line was forest with large mature trees, including sixty to seventy foot tall yellow pines, and one summer the owner sold some of the timber. The logger was a tall black man who worked by himself. He wore overalls with no shirt, showing muscles like I had never seen, and the sun on his sweaty arms and shoulders made his skin shine. He had an old logging truck and a pair of huge mules that were much larger than our horses. They were paired with a big leather harness. He cut down those tall pines by hand with a long logging saw (chain saws hadn’t come along at that time}. After dropping a tree he would cut it into shorter lengths of maybe twenty feet, then attach a chain to the logs and connect it to the harness of the mules. They would then drag the log to the truck, lining it up with the side of the bed. His communication with those mules was fascinating! Simple one word commands moved them simultaneously with exactness. Detaching the chain from the log, he would attach another chain with hooks to each end of the log and, moving the mules to the opposite side of the truck, connect that chain to their harness, and they would then pull the log up onto the truck bed. It was such an amazing process to watch. Those mules were so powerful, and seemed to accomplish it almost effortlessly. At the end of the day, he would drive out with his logs and leave the mules in the woods overnight in a simple rope corral, with tubs of feed and water.

I visited the location for several days to watch tree after tree removed from the forest. During all of the time that I spent there, watching from a distance, neither he nor I ever spoke to one another. He knew I was there, but he never even made eye contact with me. I was quite young and very shy around people, and sadly, in those days, “colored people” didn’t usually start conversations with “white folk”. The old adage of “speak when you’re spoken to” was the rule for children and black people. At that age, I think that the only black person with whom I had ever enter-acted was a hired man where Daddy had his shop.

In fact, the town of Vidor, and the surrounding area had no population of color, and that was intentional. It was well known that black people were not allowed to live in Vidor, and it would be many, many years before that could change. The town lay across the Neches River from Beaumont, and had originally been populated mostly by hired laborers from the steel works, shipyards, and factories in the city. Many were poorly educated and carried racist tenets from decades before them. It doesn’t seem that long ago, but I so well remember the “colored” and “white” drinking fountains, restrooms, and even separate waiting rooms with individual entrances at clinics and doctors’ offices. It would turn out that my first actual relationships with people of color would be in the military!

Across the road from us, the forest extended for better than a mile to the East before the next road. As a young child my imagination conjured up all sorts of wild things that probably inhabited those woods! In that part of the state the forests contained lots of low areas that collected water and made good wallows for feral pigs that roamed throughout. There were a good number of these hogs that we would see routinely, in the ditches along the road and in the edge of the woods. We referred to them as “razor-backs” because some them had very large tusks. On occasion, they could be aggressive, so we always kept our distance when they were around.

There was a time when I happened onto several in our North pasture. I believe they were as startled as I was, but they weren’t as afraid I was! A fairly large boar started to trot in my direction and I immediately searched out a small pine tree with branches low enough for me to reach, and began frantically climbing. When I was well off the ground I stood on a branch hugging the tree trunk while “the hair on my neck stood out.” The whole bunch of them rooted around the area for what seemed like hours before they meandered out of sight. I dropped down from my perch and ran as fast as I could back to the house, all the time envisioning them right on my heels!! Times of fright such as that would make my ears feel strange, like they were pulling forward!