Mincey’s Musings
Year Two, Week Twenty-Seven

Sometimes I think I am a most hard-hearted person. Things that seem to bother other people just don’t seem to affect me emotionally. Sometimes I think I am a little like Mr. Spock on Star Trek—non-emotional. I do wish if I had to be like Mr. Spock I could have access to more of his logic!

But there are things that can make even this hard-hearted sinner cry. I figure if they can get to me they can get to anybody that has any feeling for others at all.

The first thing that comes to my mind is the old country music song, “Old Shep”. If you google that title, you will discover from Wikipedia that the song was written and composed by Red Foley and Arthur Williams in 1933. The song was about Foley’s dog from his childhood days. The lyrics, even without the music, drip with sadness:

When I was a lad and old Shep was a pup,
Over hills and meadows we'd stray.
Just a boy and his dog, we were both full of fun--
We grew up together that way.

I remember the time at the old swimmin' hole,
When I would have drowned beyond doubt;
But old Shep was right there, to the rescue he came.
He jumped in and then pulled me out.

As the years fast did roll, Old Shep he grew old.
His eyes were fast growing dim.
And one day the doctor looked at me and said,
“I can do no more for him, Jim.”

With hands that were trembling, I picked up my gun
And aimed it at Shep's faithful head.
I just couldn't do it—I wanted to run.
I wish they would shoot me instead.

He came to my side and looked up at me,
And laid his old head on my knee.
I had struck the best friend that a man ever had.
I cried so I scarcely could see.

For Ol’ Shep he knew he was going to go,
For he reached down and licked at my hand.
Then he looked up at me just as much as to say,
“We're parting, but I understand.”

Old Shep he has gone where the good doggies go,
And no more with old Shep will I roam.
But if dogs have a heaven, there's one thing I know—
Old Shep has a wonderful home.

I suppose the only people who might not be saddened by this song are those who never had the privilege in their boyhood to have a dog as their best friend. Wikipedia will tell you that in reality Red Foley’s dog was a German shepherd named Hoover, and he met his end when a neighbor poisoned him. It doesn’t make me feel any better—I feel just as sad that human cruelty led to the loss of Foley’s real-life pet as I do that euthanasia was necessary to end the suffering of the fictitious Jim’s Shep. Both are cruel ways for a boy’s friendship with his faithful, beloved playmate to end.

The first time I heard this song was on a cassette (been a few years) from a series that honored the history of the development of American country music that I ordered from the Smithsonian Institute. A student of Deanie Carver’s shared the set with her, and she shared it with me, where for the first time in the early 1990s I heard Red Foley’s original 1935 recording of the song. Wikipedia will tell you that Red Foley again recorded the song in 1941 and 1946. Others who recorded the song throughout the years included Hank Williams (1942), Elvis Presley (1956), Hank Snow (1959), Walter Brennan (1960), Johnny Cash (1975),Pat Boone (1994), and Alabama (2006).

I also remember being greatly saddened by two books that told of the death of beloved dogs. Old Yeller, written by Fred Gipson in 1956, became a Walt Disney movie in 1957, starring among others Fess Parker (Daniel Boone) and Chuck Connors (The Rifleman). The theme song has, like the book, become a classic and can be accessed on YouTube. I can remember one of my fifth grade boys at Luttrell Elementary telling me with glee that Ms. Toppins (his fourth grade teacher) cried when Old Yeller died. Oh, well, what could I say? So did I.

And then there was another book written in 1961 that tells of the sad death of two wonderful hunting dogs, Wilson Rawls’ Where the Red Fern Grows. That book was also made into a movie in 1974, starring James Whitmore, Beverly Garland and Lonny Chapman, among others.

I challenge any of you faithful readers to listen to “Old Shep” and read or watch Old Yeller and Where the Red Fern Grows and see if you can do it without at least a lump in your throat. If you want a challenge, see if you can find the very first televised program that ever made this ol’ boy cry—the two part episode “The Boy Who Talked to Badgers from The Wonderful World of Disney.

Next time I’ll cry on your shoulder a little more through poetry.