The It Girl and Me

Chapter One

Chapter OnePADUCAH, KENTUCKY,

May 1910

Tell people you’re from Kentucky and one of two things will happen. Usually, they figure either your family is so rich that you own a racehorse, or so poor that you have a still in your backyard. Ours was pretty nice as stills went.

As long as there have been DeBoes in this country, they’ve been making spirits. And Paw’s one of the best bootleggers there is.

When I was six years old, Paw got in an argument with his brother, Will Henry. Years later no one remembered what it was about; the cause wasn’t important anymore, only the feud itself. He didn’t need Will Henry, Paw said. The big city was the land of opportunity, and we’d do real good there. So off we went.

Paw hitched up the wagon to our nag, June, and we left Paducah early one morning when the sun played on the green waters of the Ohio River. My little sister Grace and I looked out the back of the canvas canopy at the clover and goldenrod swaying in the breeze. The clop-clopping of the horse’s hooves was hypnotic, and the rocking of the wagon made me drop off to sleep. In another day or two we’d made it to Carbondale, and then after a few more days to St. Louie.

As our wagon creaked across the Eads Bridge over the Mississippi, Grace and I gazed in awe at the river traffic below—stern-wheelers and side-wheelers, packets and barges—being loaded by big men, white and colored. We’d never seen so many people in one place in our lives. Paw got a job as a teamster for an ice company and found us a place to live on North 12th Street, not far from the riverfront. But before long he found a better job as a switchman for the Iron Mountain Railroad that ran between St. Louie and Texarkana. He kept a roof over our heads, but even with Maw’s vegetable garden out back it was hard keeping us all fed. He needed to find a way to make more money.

“There’s somethin’ we ain’t considered till now,” Maw said. “That’s the still.” It sat unused in our musty back shed, still in its crate from the move, covered in cobwebs, but otherwise no worse for the wear.

Paw lit his corncob pipe and inhaled. The smoky floral smell of his Old Squire tobacco scented the room. He puffed a few times, then a smile began to stretch across his face. “I done married me a smart gal.”

The first time he fired up the still in St. Louie, Paw chuckled. “I’ll be more popular than a fishmonger on Friday,” he said.

Maw showed me how to shell corn while she boiled some water. Paw put the corn in a burlap sack, then poured the cooled water over it. He dug a hole next to the shed, put the corn in, then threw some straw over the top. The corn sprouted after four days, so he hitched up the horses and drove over to Mercer’s mill. They ground it into cornmeal for us.

“Hand me that sugar, Daisy,” Paw said. He added it, along with yeast and a little water to the corn. Then he put it in a pot over an open flame in the shed. “We got to keep stirrin’ or our run won’t be no good.”

For four days we checked the run, and Paw shared his secrets. “See this here? How the mash is all a-bubblin’ like that? There’s a mess of gas fermentin’ in there.”

“What’s fermentin’ mean, Paw?”

“That’s makin’ it into likker.” He sank a ladle into the thick yellow broth and took a sip, then licked his lips.

“I want a taste! I want a taste!” I said.

He looked to make sure Maw wasn’t heading out to the shed.

“All right,” he said. “But don’t tell yer maw I’m givin’ you corn beer. And don’t tell Grace neither. You know how much she loves to tattle. This stuff’s got enough alcohol in it to knock you on yer backside.”

He handed me the ladle, and I took a sip. Nice and sweet, and real strong like he said.

“We cain’t let this sit too long or it’ll go sour on us. And we cain’t let it boil or it’ll leave too much water and gunk in the likker,” he explained. “We need it to be perfect. This first batch we got, we call this ‘sweet mash.’” He poured it into another pot. “Next, we slop it back. That’s where you take this stuff from the still pot and mix it in.” He showed me the inside of the still pot, with the dregs still clinging to it, and poured it into the pot with the sweet mash.

“Now what, Paw?”

“Now we cook it again. And for each batch we make, we add a little sugar. That’s how we make sour mash.”

We funneled the sour mash into the glossy green bottles Paw had bought at the King’s Mercantile on Chippewa Street. He told only a few people, but word spread fast. A small market developed around the Second Ward for Paw’s “Snakebite Stump”—enough to keep us warm in winter with food in our bellies.

September 1911

One crisp fall night Paw came home with a carton he’d piled full of a sack of potatoes, a container of eggs, and small boxes of salty peanuts, wrinkled raisins, and penny sweets like lemon drops, peppermint sticks, pralines, caramels, and horehound candies.

Grace and I crowded around him, twittering in delight. Maw was beside herself at the baking she’d be able to do. “Tom, where’d you git all this?” she said. “We cain’t afford it!”

“Some hobos got into one of the boxcars. They ripped open a couple crates and stole some of the stuff. So the company wrote it off and told Fred and me to take what was left.”

“It’s wonderful. Just wonderful. I’ll make some nice fresh loaves tomorrow!” she crowed. “And an angel food cake. What do you girls say to that?”

That night we went to sleep with our tongues colored pink and visions of the warm, fresh bread Maw would bake us in the morning, slathered with the sweet butter she churned with milk from Mr. Thompson’s cow.

Paw brought us one or two more cartons like that one, and Grace and I gorged ourselves on sweet treats when Maw wasn’t looking. By the end of October, a sea of red and gold leaves covered the streets and the winds were turning chilly. Grace and I were getting ready for bed the night things changed forever.

Paw had come home from the train yard not long before, and as usual, Maw had his late dinner ready. He’d brought home a burlap sack of more goodies, so Maw let us have one lemon drop each before bed.

As we said our prayers, a loud banging came at the door and a booming voice called out. “Thomas DeBoe! Open the door! This is the police!”

Grace and I ran to our bedroom door in time to see Maw let the police in. A line of black-coated men filled the parlor, and two of them made a beeline to the sack of potatoes, nuts, and candies on the table. “Here it is, Chief Smith. He didn’t even bother to hide it.”

“What is it? What’s goin’ on? Tom? Tom! Tell me what’s happenin’!” Maw begged.

“We already caught your buddy, Mr. Simmerman, and he confessed to everything, DeBoe. We know you’ve been breaking into boxcars. We set a trap for you, then followed you back here. We’ve known about you for weeks.”

Paw looked defeated. “I’m sorry, Ida. I’m real sorry. I wanted you to have a little more. Officers, I was just tryin’ to feed my family.”

“What’s this?” Chief Smith said as he searched Paw. He pulled a small derringer out of the back of Paw’s waistband.

“That’s for my personal protection,” Paw said.

One of the policemen put handcuffs on Paw, and the other said, “Thomas DeBoe, you’re under arrest for grand theft and carrying a concealed weapon.”

They led him out the door to the Black Maria, loaded him on board, and then careened off down the street, taking my paw to jail.