What's Freedom Mean to You?

January 19, 1966

Jocie Brooke here reporting from Hollyhill, Kentucky. What does this picture make you think of? Mr. Brown, my social studies teacher at school, told us to look at this picture and write a paper on what freedom means to us. Not to the country or to somebody else, but to each of us as individuals. 

Mr. Brown is always giving us hard assignments, but Dad says it's good to have to think about things like this. He says there's a lot about freedom in the Bible. Dad told me to look up Galatians 5:1. "Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage."

Noah, my friend that I met and you got to know too in that book about us, Orchard of Hope, says freedom is what the Civil Rights movement is all about. I do want everybody to be free in America. That's what America stands for. Freedom. Liberty. 

So I wrote about how great it is to be free to go to church without having to worry about somebody saying we can't like they do in Communist countries. I wrote how the Constitution says all men are created equal and that when it says "men" that means women too. I wrote about Noah and his little sister, Cassidy marching in the Children's March and how that was their way of fighting for freedom even though it turned out not so good for Cassidy. She ended up afraid for a long time after that. But in America everybody should be free. 

Dad says I should remember that being free doesn't mean I can do anything I want. That my freedom stops where somebody else's begins. I'm not real clear on what he means by that, but I guess it's something like I'm free to sing as loud as I want to at the newspaper office. That is, until Zella tells me to hush because she can't think. Do you think that's what he means?

What does freedom mean to you?  

Freedom means a lot to Bailey in Bailey's Bug too. He's free now but sort of wishing he was back in a safe backyard with a fence all around and food in his dish every morning. 

Bailey's Bug by Jocie Brooke
  (Continued from last week. All the story is under Bailey's Bug up top of the page)

   Bailey shook the hair out of his eyes and looked Skelley gratefully. The old dog's bones were sticking out on his sides, but he never complained even when they had to go all day with nothing but grasshoppers to eat.
   Bailey looked at his own sides and was surprised to see his ribs beginning to show up even under his shaggy coat. Reid's mother always took him to get his hair clipped down to the hide when it started getting long.
   Even Lucinda looked different. Slimmer. And not nearly so sleek as when she spent most of her day washing and smoothing down her black fur between naps.
   "I'm sorry, Lucinda," Bailey said. "I didn't think it would take so long to find Reid." He looked over at the old dog. "And you too, Skelley. If it weren't for me you'd be in the city where you could find lots of food in trashcans."
   "Be I worrying about trashcans, lad? Nay, the three of us are having a grand adventure."
   "Some adventure." Lucinda snorted and stood up. "Whatever it is, we best be getting on with it. Which way does your bug say go now?"
   So Bailey led the way past the cows, under a fence and across the way to another tree covered hill. He could hear the hum just fine, but for the first time he wasn't sure it was going to lead him to Reid. Bailey was tired and hungry. Especially hungry.
   Skelley started telling a story to try to keep their spirits up.
   "You know once when I was in the circus, they lost an elephant. Can ye imagine that? Losing an elephant. Of course, it was dark when Anne Marie went missing. Night isn't the best time for searching for elephants, being as how they are gray and all. Be that as it may, we poked around in folks' backyards and such for hours. Then, come morning, there she was waiting by her truck. Claimed to have been there the whole time, but we figured she wasn't telling everything about her escapade."
   Bailey liked Skelley's circus stories, but this time he couldn't keep his mind from wandering off to think about how many more hills, how many more nights of coyotes howling, how many more days trying to nose out something to eat until they would find Reid. 
   Bailey shut his eyes for a minute so could think about Reid. And there his boy was, laughing and throwing the plastic toy. Bailey shut his eyes tighter to see Reid better.
  "Watch out," Skelley warned.

(To be continued)
 

Hollyhill Christmas Parade

December 8, 1965.

Jocie Brooke reporting from Main Street, Hollyhill, Kentucky. Well, I'm not actually standing on the street right this minute. I'm at home in my room, but a few minutes ago I was standing out there in the chilly air ready to cover the news. 

We don't usually do the parade at night, but Dad says the mayor is trying to shake things up a little. One thing for sure, the police car bubble lights look way more impressive in the dark. I took my camera to take pictures for the paper, and got some good ones while it was still daylight. You might see some of them in the Banner next week. But after dark, the flashbulbs weren't quite enough to capture great images. Still I liked this one of a couple of kids seeing Santa riding on the firetruck to finish up the parade. They looked like they knew it was a long way down here to Hollyhill from the North Pole. 

But I love parades. Well, most of the time. There was that one parade back last summer where some unwelcome guests crashed our 4th of July parade and brought Hollyhill some trouble. You can read about that in Orchard of Hope. But that was last year and this is now. Everything was peaceful for our Christmas parade. That's the way it should be. I mean, didn't the angels proclaim "peace, goodwill toward men!" when they told the shepherds about Jesus being born. 

I love Christmas stories too. Too bad I didn't have a Christmas scene in Bailey's Bug. But it's the middle of summer for them and Bailey, Lucinda and Skelley have to get across that great river of cars. Do you think they'll be brave enough to try to make it? I guess it wouldn't be much of a story if they aren't or if they don't make it. That would spoil everything, wouldn't it? 

BAILEY'S BUG by Jocie Brooke
   (Continued from last week)

   Bailey ignored the dark on the far side of the roads. Instead he watched the river of cars. There were two stretches of blacktop. On the side nearest them, the cars always came over a hill and down toward them. On the other side, the cars' lights seemed to appear from out of nowhere as they raced each other up the hill without slowing a bit. 
   They never changed directions. Never. Best of all, what looked like a narrow park with grass and bushes was smack in the middle of the two roads. They could hide out there for a while to gather courage to chase across the other road into the darkness beyond.
   Bailey stood up. "If we watch the top of that hill over there and wait until it's very dark with no lights coming, we can make it to the middle." Bailey pointed with his nose toward the hill. 
   "That we can, lad. Easy as jumping through hoops." Skelley flashed a grin, then picked up his baton to trot toward the road. 
   Lucinda stayed where she was, staring at the road and beyond. 
   "Are you too afraid to try it, Lucinda?" Bailey asked.
   "I'm not afraid of anything." Lucinda snarled at him. "I'm thinking."
   "It's good when you think." Bailey lowered his back haunches to the ground. "Let me know when you're through." 
   "Dogs!" Lucinda turned to glare at him. Her eyes glowed green in the lights of a car flying down the hill toward where they sat. After the car passed, she stood up, her tail straight up in the air. Then as if to convince herself to move toward the road, she said, "I suppose there will be sunshine in the morning wherever I am."
   "Indeed, Miss Lucinda," Skelley called to her over his shoulder. "They say there's worlds of sunshine in the country. For a truth, I've been many a place, but I've never been anywhere that didn't have its fair share of the sun's light." 

(To be continued. Do you think they'll get across the road? Read the whole story so far under the Bailey's Bug link up top of my report here.)

March Marches

March 3, 1965

Jocie Brooke here reporting from Hollyhill, Kentucky. Not much has been happening here in Hollyhill. School. Basketball games. We actually won one game in the District Tournament. So we had lots of basketball pictures in the Hollyhill Banner. Even one of Valerie jumping up and cheering. I felt especially generous taking that picture. Valerie thinks she's so cute that it makes me sick, but it was a good picture of her actually cheering the team on. I can't help it if her hair did look a little messed. A little. She'll probably corner me the day after the paper comes out and demand we print a retraction. Her hair does not get messed up!!

But there was plenty of news this time last year when Martin Luther King Jr. and Jackie Robinson, the Jackie Robinson who played Major League Baseball, came to lead a march on Frankfort to try to get a Civil Rights bill passed. 10,000 people came from all over the state to march on the Capital to convince Governor Breathitt to push a bill that had been introduced in the General Assembly but was stuck in committee. It didn't work. The bill didn't pass and so in some places blacks still can't eat inside restaurants or stay at hotels. The day of the march last year the sun was shining but it was cold with sleet and snow flurries coming down at times. That's March weather for you. 

Anyway, thousands of people, black and white, lined the avenue to watch the Mr. Robinson and Reverend King lead the demonstrators down Capitol Avenue. After walking four blocks, the speakers made it up the Capitol steps to the platform, where Peter, Paul and Mary were singing. Dad went down to Frankfort that day and wrote up something about it for the next week's paper. Of course all the big city papers had already reported it by then.  

I read all the reports and saw the pictures, but I really didn't get it until Noah moved to Holly County and began working for Dad on the paper last summer. He knew all about the Civil Rights march because his mother used to ride the Freedom Train in the south. Noah was even part of the Children's March in Birmingham. He said I didn't know anything about Civil Rights and how it felt to be discriminated against because his skin was black. And he was right. 

But I was interested in hearing his story. Dad was too, but he had to make sure Noah knew what kind of paper the Banner was. Here's an excerpt from Orchard of Hope.

    "You might not like what I wrote," Noah told Dad when he asked him if he wanted to write something about school.
    "Then I wouldn't print it." Dad fastened his eyes on Noah. "We might as well get one thing clear right at the beginning, Noah. The Banner is just a small-town paper. We put out one issue per week. We're here to serve the community by reporting on what happens in Hollyhill and Holly County. We don't do national news like what Congress is up to or what's happening in Vietnam unless it has a local handle, such as one of our Hollyhill boys flying the bombers over North Vietnam or one of our senators coming through town. If something like that happens, it would be front-page news for the Banner. But we leave the rest of the national and state news to the daily papers out of Lexington and Louisville."
    "So how do you sell papers if you don't have anything much to write about?" Noah asked.
   "We manage," Dad said. "Folks here want to read about what happens in town and at the schools. They like seeing their pictures or their kids' pictures in the paper."
    "Sounds pretty dull," Noah said. "I thought newspapers tried to come up with controversial stories to keep people interested." 
    "I don't print stories to stir up trouble just for the sake of stirring up trouble."
    "But sometimes trouble needs to be stirred up in order to get wrongs righted," Noah said.
  
I don't think there would be any doubt that if Noah and his family had been living in Holly County last March, they would have been in that crowd marching on the Capital. At least Noah and his mother would have been. Last year, she helped turn us around here in Hollyhill on some of the things we should have been doing differently. 

I can't tell the whole story here, but you can read all about it in Orchard of Hope. Myra Hearndon is quite a woman. Somebody who makes a difference. That's how I want to be when I grow up. I want to do things that matter. I don't know what, but Dad says that's okay. The Lord will guide me to the right things if I let him. 

How about you? You ever march for something you believe needs to happen? And do you think papers like the Hollyhill Banner filled with local news are good or plain boring?

Oh yeah, and I've got to announce the winner of my blog contest. Sharon is the winner. She'll get her choice of one of my books. Thanks a bunch to all of you who left comments and entered to win a book. Maybe we'll do it again soon.

What Dad Believes

January 20, 1965

Jocie Brooke here reporting from downtown Hollyhill, Kentucky. Exciting news today. Dad got contacted by somebody to do an interview. It's usually Dad interviewing other folks for a piece in the Banner, but this time the tables were turned and somebody interviewed him all about what went on last fall here in Hollyhill. You remember, don't you? Well maybe if you don't, you should read those Heart of Hollyhill books. You can find out a lot about Hollyhill and all of us in those books.

Dad was interviewed about the book Orchard of Hope. It's a good thing that writer person wrote all that down, else we might have forgotten it. Not yet, but someday. Like in fifty years or so. Dad says he thinks someday people won't pay attention to the color of a person's skin. He thinks that anybody will be able to go anywhere and do whatever they want as long as it's legal. If that person wants to eat at the lunch counter instead of in the back booth, that will be fine and there won't have to be sit-ins and Freedom Trains and so much trouble. 

I guess because Dad can see how things should be instead of how they are is why Miss Lamb decided to ask him about what he believes. One thing for sure, Dad doesn't mind talking about that. He says that every Christian should be that way and ready to share what the Lord has done for them. He studies the Bible to try to get answers out of God's Word. He talks about some of those answers over with Ms. Lamb.

Here's one of the questions Dad answered. 

(Her Question) Orchard of Hope is about hope in the midst of a turbulent era in the South. I’d love to hear what you think about what was going on around you at that time. Do you believe that the tensions that caused such strife could have been handled in a different manner?
(Dad's answer) Things have been wrong in the South for a long time before now, 1964. A man should never be judged by the color of his skin or his religion. The Lord loves us all and in our great country, we claim to believe all men are created equal. If we truly believe that, we should live that truth. So things did need to change, but change can be difficult and as you say, turbulent. Sometimes it’s easier to not stir up trouble, to just let things drift along the way they always have been. But the Lord can poke our consciences to open our eyes and see that changes need to be made however hard that is to do. He empowers a man like Martin Luther King Jr. with a gift of words to find a peaceful way to make people see that all men have the right to equal opportunities. I’m a peaceful man, as is Martin Luther King Jr., but there are times when a man has to stand up for what is right no matter the consequences. Sadly, I think the strife was bound to happen because there are so many people who cling to the old prejudices. That’s sad but too true. Being human is a messy condition. We are not puppets on a string. The Lord gives us freedom of choice even when those choices lead to sorrowful and sinful decisions and outcomes.

Now doesn't that sound just like Dad? Wise and thoughtful, I guess that's why the Lord called him to preach. So he could share some of that. You can read more of what Dad thinks at Fay Lamb's Inner Source. 

Don't ask me exactly what that is. I think I must have stepped forward into the future. Funny, huh. I mean funny odd. Not funny ha ha. Anyway if you leave a comment on Dad's interview and on that author's interview on Wednesday and her guest post on Friday, you'll have a chance to win a copy

of Orchard of Hope. If you already have the book, I hope you enjoy the story. But if you win a new copy, you can always give it to someone as a gift or maybe donate it to your church library. 

Pretty soon that last book will be back out. You know, the one where Dad is getting all mushy over Leigh in Summer of Joy. I caught them kissing out of the porch last week. Leigh turned red as a tomato, but Dad just laughed. He laughs a lot since he started seeing Leigh. I wish I had a picture of him to show you. Maybe I'll hunt one up. 

Anyway, right now there's not much summer. Winter grabs hold and hangs on with more cold and snow coming. If we keep missing school, we won't get more than a week's worth of summer vacation. But that doesn't matter. I'm not going to be gloomy. I don't care if it is January. Good things can happen in January, can't they?

Meet Cassidy from Orchard of Hope

October 8, 1964

Jocie Brooke here reporting from Hollyhill, Kentucky. I'm sorry to be late reporting, but I had a whole page of sentences to diagram. Plus two pages of Algebra and I had to draw a picture of a flower showing all the parts, stamens or pistils or something like that. Mrs. Boggs, she teaches science, is a flower nut. I like flowers as good as the next person but I don't care what their stems are called. Anyway, it took me forever last night, but I got it finished and turned in. 

So tonight, how about I introduce you to Cassidy Hearndon? Never heard of her? Well, I hadn't either until her family moved to a farm out in Holly County. You might not think that too strange until I tell you they're a black family. I guess more than the school is getting integrated this year. The county is too. Dad says the Hearndons' are the first black family to buy land out in the country around the church. In this little scene from that book about Hollyhill, Orchard of Hope, Cassidy isn't sure she wants to come to our church.

    The first Sunday in September when Cassidy Hearndon's mama got her up and said they were going to the white people's church, Cassidy thought about sticking her finger down her throat and making herself throw up. She'd done it back in Chicago a time or two so she wouldn't have to go to school. It had worked them. It might work now, but then her mother would make her stay inside and it was way too hot to be stuck in the house all day shut up in the back bedroom to make sure she didn't share her sickness with none of the rest of the family. Not that the scaredy-cat sickness was catching or anything. 
    Cassidy picked up the dress her mother had laid out for her to wear. It was the green and white one with tulips on it, her very favorite, but she didn't want to put it on. Not till she had to. It was cooler just standing there in her slip and underpants.
      "What in the world is wrong with you, Cassidy Marie?" her mama asked. "Stop moping around and get dressed."
    "It's too hot to get all dressed up and go to church," Cassidy complained.
    "The good Lord didn't say it was too hot when he paid the price for our sins, young missy."
    "Then why can't we go up to the church in town? They like us up there."
    "Now listen to you. We aren't going to church to make people like us," her mama said. "We're going to church to worship, and the good Lord has put a church right down at the end of our road for us to do that. We don't have to spend a half hour and gasoline we can't afford driving to town."
    "But they look at me funny." Cassidy traced one of the tulips on the dress with her finger. She loved tulips. They'd had tulips in their yard in Chicago. Red and yellow and purple tulips.

Cassidy did come to church and after a while she liked it there. She always liked Miss Sally, but then everybody likes Miss Sally. Every church needs a Miss Sally - somebody who loves you just the way you are and makes you glad you came to church. 

     Does your church have a Miss Sally?

Hollyhill has a New Book

October 1, 1964

Jocie Brooke here reporting from Hollyhill, Kentucky. 

Somebody has written a book about us here in Hollyhill! Again! Last year there was that book about all the things I found out in the summer, Scent of Lilacs. Now I'm finding out lots of new things in this story, Orchard of Hope. And some of it happens right here at the Hollyhill Grill. Dad wasn't very happy with my part in that. Not because he didn't think I was right, but because he thinks I'm too young. Dads always think you're too young to understand big issues like the Civil Rights Movement.

Of course I know about that. I read about Martin Luther King Jr. leading a march on Washington. I just never realized things were so divided here in Hollyhill until the Hearndon family moved to Holly County and Noah Hearndon started working for Dad. Boy, did he open my eyes to things I should have known but didn't. His mother rode on the Freedom Train, you know, and he was in the Children's March in Birmingham. That didn't go too well for him or his little sister, Cassidy. Then Miss Sally opened the eyes of folks at the church. Sometimes a church needs revival! And sometimes that revival starts with forgiveness. 

But I can't giveaway the story. That wouldn't be nice. I could. I know the story since I lived it, but you'll just have to read it for yourself. And it's got a cute cover. That's me on the front. I wanted them to put a notebook and pencil on the table with me, but I guess they couldn't find the kind of notebook I like. Narrow ruled with a blue back. But they are letting me drink my favorite milkshake. Strawberry. Yum! 

I hope if you haven't already read my story that you'll look for it wherever you get books. I might even look at the library to see if it's there. Wouldn't that be the neatest thing? To see a book about me at the library. Maybe neater would be to see a book written by me on a library shelf. That's my dream. I love to write. I guess I could have written these Heart of Hollyhill books, but I just can't imagine anybody wanting to read about Hollyhill. Nothing ever happens in Hollyhill. At least it didn't till last summer. And then....

Come back next week and maybe this writer will let me give away some books. Actually this book looks familiar. I think it used to have a different cover, but I have to say I think letting me show up on the cover of the new edition is a big improvement. Don't you?