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It was a grand old tree. We never ran a line around it to get the circumference but eyeballing it showed it to be at least 50 feet around. It wasn’t tall, compared to a Sequoia, but you could have cut a hole big enough to drive a semi through it if you wanted to - and could have gotten a semi in there to drive through it. In many ways that tree symbolizes part of my life. It stood unmolested by man for centuries - and then in a short period of time it was quickly hewn down and destroyed. I was raised on the frontier. Araguaína was a “jumping off” town when we moved there the year I turned 8. Folks from all over came to town and then “jumped off” into the gold fields, the jungle, the newly opened cattle country and many other destinations. The main street of town was full of general stores where you could buy anything from gun powder to chewing tobacco to hand tools seen only in museums in the US - yet still sold in brand new condition to the settlers of the new land. There was a small stream flowing down below the cliff where my Uncle Jim lived. It was full of “rabo de oro”, “cará” and “piába”- fish that would have cost a pretty penny in pet stores in the US. A short piece of six pound test, a size 22 hook, some cooked rice and we were good to go on a fishing expedition. Eventually we got cane poles, larger hooks and other bait, but those early outings taught me the basics of catching fish. Sling shots were common. The most coveted by me was one that my cousin had - made from the inner tubes of the early earth moving machines that carved the Belém - Brasilia highway through virgin jungle. Something changed in the rubber they used and by the time I could pull one that source of rubber was worthless for our purposes. So surgical tubing propelled projectiles through forked sticks as we hunted the woods around and through town. Dad acquired a lot “way out of town”, part of an old pineapple plantation that had gone to seed. There he built a house that forms the background of some of my fondest childhood memories. It was a good half hour walk or so across to Uncle Jim’s place and we’d get together with the cousins when possible. The area around the house was full of small game. Quail, various rodents, tiú lizards and countless smaller birds were our quarry. The lizards plagued our chickens, raiding for eggs and chicks. Dad kept the old 22 in the washroom where it was easy to hand with a full clip of ammo to try and put a dent in the marauders’ population. Possums also had a taste for chicken and provided some interesting episodes in our lives. Some of the kids found an old chair with metal legs that someone had tossed into the weeds. The legs tapered down from the seat towards the floor and were very thin walled. The boys cut off a leg from the discarded piece of furniture, hammered the narrow end closed and bent it over then used a nail to fashion a flash hole. They bound it to a cut out board with inner tube rubber, loaded it with black market black powder and a few lead balls then touched it off with a match. It made a glorious “BOOM!” and emitted beautiful clouds of aromatic smoke and scared the black birds that were the target - while causing no damage other than ringing in their ears. Well, we figured out that what they were doing was inherently dangerous. They could kill themselves that way! So, surely we could improve on their invention and come up with something safer - and yet more fun! In the meantime they went and blew up the first gun - by using the contents from a Brazilian firecracker for propellant. Bits and pieces surfaced, but a great portion was lost forever, even the hole blown in the sand pile where they’d rested it for the last shot soon vanished. Then they took a “36 gauge” (410) brass shotgun shell that one of the kids swiped from his dad’s hunting pouch and fitted it into the end of another leg from the discarded chair. They rigged a piece of iron in a U shape go guide a “firing pin” powered by a huge band of rubber. Upon the first firing the shell split - opening up and wedging itself inside the chair leg. From then on they loaded it like a muzzle loader - a muzzle loader with Berdan primers rather than percussion caps or a flint lock. With each shot the Berdan primer would fall out to be replaced with another that would be tapped in with the flat of a knife. Then they’d load it up like a muzzle loader for the next shot. So we purchased a piece of 1/2″ galvanized iron pipe and a threaded cap. Using tools from my uncle’s shed, we cut threads on the pipe, fitted the cap and ran a block of wood in front of it to bring the breach forward of the last bit of exposed thread. In front of the block of wood we drilled a touch hole. It was then fastened to a block of wood in which we cut a groove as a “barrel channel” and usually fired via a piece of firecracker fuse or toilet paper with us hiding behind a tree. We then began loading with increasing charges of powder and proof firing. At 2″ of black powder the barrel cracked - right at the threads. So we backed off 75% and declared a 1/2″ of black powder to be our working load in the forthcoming shoulder fired muzzle loaders. Prior to testing to destruction we even tried using the cannon on game - your’s truly being the “chosen one” to aim at an iguana up in a tree and getting whacked good in the shoulder when the cannon shot out of my hands backwards. And no, the iguana wasn’t even grazed by our load of shot. My cousin obtained a full brass 28 gauge shotgun shell from a local store. We then used epoxy glue to fasten it in a new piece of 1/2″ pipe. First he put a wad of paper in the shell with a string around it. He coated the shell with glue on the outside and slid it into the pipe. Holding the pipe vertical he pulled the wad out, thus smoothing out any remnants of glue left in front of the shell and left the pipe standing vertical to dry. He picked a piece of mahogany and cut it out in rifle shape. The mechanism was cut from thick aluminum and bent into a box shape. We never got a good trigger setup invented and had to hold the firing pin back and release it to fire the piece. The barrel was held in place with a couple of wide pieces of bicycle inner tube. Mine was similar, only dad saw what I was doing and made me put a cap on mine. I ground the cap down a bit, flattened it on the back and drilled a hole big enough to reach the primer to allow decapping and recapping the piece. My stock was made from jatobá, a very dense Brazilian hardwood. Needless to say, it didn’t recoil much - as far as I could tell. That stock absorbed the recoil beautifully. But then Mom found out about the guns and they got retired to save the peace. At that time one could buy a muzzle loader for about $5 at the open air market. There was plenty of black powder around in various brands and configurations. Although the national gun laws were quite strict one could obtain about anything one could wish for - if one had the $$$. Even a kid could walk into some stores and walk out with 100 grams of FFFg black powder, a bunch of lead and even full brass shells and Berdan primers or percussion caps - as long as he had the $$$. Fire crackers were common, as long as your finger and full of powder. There were “mortars” which were cardboard tubes with coarse powder at the bottom that launched firecrackers into the air a hundred feet or so where they’d explode. One time we purchased a box of mortars (12) and took half the box apart to make one giant mortar. We made a stiff paper tube by rolling paper around a pipe and gluing it. Then we used a smaller pipe to roll a smaller tube to contain the explosive powder. The projectile carried the full load of powder from the six destroyed mortars. We only used half the propellant to launch it, saving the rest for use in our muzzle loaders. As luck would have it, July 4 fell on a Sunday that year. We had a long and busy day and no chance to celebrate. That night we got home about 9:00 and immediately set out to launch our invention. We propped the tube up, lit the extra long fuse and bugged out, back towards the house. The launch came with a satisfying “WHOOOOOMMMMMPPPP!!!” and we saw the fuse on the projectile as it sailed up and up, at least twice as high as the usual mortar. It reached the apex and suddenly let go with a window rattling “BOOOOOOM!!!!!” - waking the neighbors that had moved in a while before. Well, we didn’t feel to bad about that part since they didn’t feel bad about hosting parties ’til the wee hours of the morning. In those days doctors were few and far between. The common folk often had no means of paying a doctor. Our family developed the means of treating many of the most common illnesses, for ourselves and others. The pharmacies would sell you anything you needed and reading gave us a knowledge of the drugs and their appropriate uses. Later, when my wife and I lived east of there, we were the only ‘medical personnel’ some folks ever saw. Our first aid kit’s contents dressed many a wound and provided relief for everything from amoebas to headaches. Life on the frontier was wonderful. We could hunt and fish anytime we wanted. Freedom was a way of life. And that was the curse. Yes, we were limited in some ways, but the freedom, OH the freedom! Each one had to take care of one’s self, and the consequences of stupid decisions were often swift and brutal. One learned to get out of trouble one had brought upon one’s self. Yes, folks would lend a hand when needed, but self reliance was a way of life. Our dads were raised in the SW US and also knew the taste of freedom. How I enjoyed hearing their tales of life back then, and to me they passed that enjoyment of freedom - along with the curse. You see, once you’ve known freedom you are not content to live under the laws of those who hate and fear freedom and self reliance. Once you’ve known self reliance - how can you submit to relying upon others? When you have a chronic problem, why should you go to a doctor when you know what he’ll prescribe anyway? When a mad dog enters your yard, why call the police rather than deal with it yourself? So to this day it is hard for me to submit quietly to laws passed by folks who fear self reliance and freedom. Oh, I’m a law abiding citizen but when laws show idiocy I will say so. “Safety” “Security” - when one gives up freedom to obtain either, one gives up both and freedom as well. Neither in matters of politics nor religion do I see a need to think myself less a man than any other nor do I feel a need to depend on others to tell me what to think or how to live. Nor do I respect anyone due only to their education or income. I want to know, can they survive when things get tough? Is there an innate sense of manliness or are they all bluff and bluster with no true character? Will they attempt to use their position or wealth to lord it over others - either in times of plenty or, worse, in times of need? Experience shows that many of those who seek refuge in excessive laws and wealth WILL attempt to lord it over others when push comes to shove - and even in the daily grind of “normal life”. In the meantime, a country boy CAN survive - as long as he learned reliance on self and his Creator. |
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