A Tale Of My Grandfather's Defiance

My paternal Grandfather was the largest man I had, in my childhood, ever seen; and sometimes I often believed that he was actually a giant, like in the fairy tales that I had read.  Although I was adopted, he and my grandmother loved me fiercely, profusely, and---because I was the youngest of their four grandchildren---doted over me more than I deserved.  (I believe my three cousins still resent me for this; one of them having told me, in 2012, that I was a "fake Coddington"---although it turns out I am no different than they are, as I will explain at the end of this).  My grandfather went out of his way to make my Christmas and Easter experiences fantastic; especially Easter.

  My Grandfather's  mother, Lucinda my great-grandmother, had been conceived and born in questionable circumstances.  Her mother, my great-great grandmother, Amy, had run away from her parents' farm in Indiana, and ended up in New York City, unskilled, inexperienced, but said to be very petite and very beautiful.  This led her to the only job she could then acquire---as a prostitute.  Said to be much in demand, she became pregnant in her eighteenth year and, refusing to abort, was dismissed from the brothel.  She returned to the mid-West; met and was romanced by the son of a small town's richest man, despite the social stigma attached to her name; married him and raised my great grandmother Lucinda.

   My Grandfather's father, David my great grandfather, was the son of a hell-fire and brimstone preacher, who preached in a tent on vacant lots because no church would employ him due to his extreme prejudice toward people who were flawed Christians, or who were not Christians at all.  My great grandfather was expected to preach when he came of age, but he refused that calling, wanting to be a farmer; and then he began to court Lucinda who, in David's father's view, was a "whore's bastard."  In defiance that split the family, they married, operated a very successful farm; and, in those days before radio, television, and the internet, conceived thirteen children whom they raised on the farm, one of whom was my Grandfather.

    My Grandfather, who had been apprentised to a butcher until he sliced off one of his fingertips, became a highly skiled car mechanic, with a thriving business and a large clientele.  After the stock market crash of 1929, he continued to repair vehicles whether their owners could pay immediately or not.  This caused him to default on a mortgage payment on his repair facility, and the bank---without warning, and without seeking a collection arrangement---foreclosed immediately.  For reasons that are now unknown, the County Engineer, Vic Smith, offered Grandpa a job as a small bridge builder.  No one knows how Grandpa knew Vic Smith; but, as the repair shop was very close to the County Engineer's main facility, I believe that Smith must have brough hit car there for repairs.  

    When, in 1975, I went to work as a summer laborer on one of two survey crews in the County Engineer's employee, I was privileged to see, or even stand upon, several bridges built by Grandpa---small structures that were raised over creeks (our County was primarily rural), culverts, or drainage ditches.  My Grandpa had passed away in 1969, but, my visits to his bridges definitely allowed me to feel his presence once again; as did my visits to their small "country" home just above German Township, in the southwest corner of our County.

    While working as a summer hire, I heard a tale told of my Grandfather which, more than forty years later, I still delight to tell---especially to my own grandchildren (and two my great grandchildren when they are old enough to hear it).  Although Ohio is a northern state, our particular county was extremely racist.  In defiance of this, my Grandfather allowed his employee---and, yes, his friend---Ed, a somewhat frail and elderly man, not a member of the then dominant race, to ride in the front seat of the crew cab pick up truck in which they drove to the County's various bridge building projects.  (Grandpa supervised a crew of four, of which Ed was the senior member.)  Because all County jobs were controlled by a political Party, certain appointments were made without proper qualification or inquiry into experience.  To this end, a young man, from extremely racist geographracial region (far from Ohio), was hired by the Engineer and assigned to my Grandfather's work party.

   On his first morning, while Grandpa was in the dispatcher's office getting his orders for the day, the New Guy objected to the truck's customary seating arrangements, in which Ed occupied the front passenger's seat, or, as they called it, the shotgun seat.  This was, of course, due to Grandpa's approval, not because of Ed's pigment or frailty, but purely due to their friendship, which had become legendary in the County Engineer's office (although some were highly critical of it).  The New Guy told Ed that this was unacceptible, and that Ed should sit in the back seat, while one of the others could take the shotgun seat.  None of the others moved, so the New Guy installed himself into the shotgun seat; and, in a few moments, Grandpa came to the truck.

    As  Grandpa climbed into the driver's seat, the New Guy proudly announced, "I changed the seatin' arrangements, so that damned [N-word] sits where he belongs."  Grandpa, silent, simply nodded.  The other crew members, other than the New Guy, were somewhat aghast; and Ed did not at all complain.

    Maintaining his silence, Grandpa drove the truck out of the yard.  However, instead of heading right to the day's bridge project, he drove to the most rural part of the County which was, not coincidentally, very near my grandparents' home.  There, he turned onto a small road that was very infrequently traveled by anyone, and was shielded on either side by thick forests of trees.  Here, as the morning sun was beginning to shine through the dense, highly fragrant, foliage, Grandpa parked the truck.  No one on the crew moved.  Grandpa, still maintaining silence, stepped out of the truck, walked around to the front passenger door, opened it, and yanked the New Man, bodily, from his seat and body-slammed him to the gravel on the shoulder of the road.  Then Grandpa said, "Ed, a front seat just opened up for you," and Ed, a little shaken up himself, climbed into his accustomed seat.  When the New Guy picked himself up and got back in, my Grandather told him, "You don't ever change my seating arrangements," in a voice that was, according to the person telling me the story, horribly chilling.  Then he drove the truck to the bridge job, where they spent the rest of the day.  On their return to the Engineer's yard, the New Guy went to the supervisors . . . and resigned without explanation.  They noticed he was a bit "banged up," but attributed this to inexperienced clumsiness on the job.

*

Now the spoiler about my cousins which I promised above.  In 1988, at a lunch after the funeral for my Grandmother---a lunch attended by my parents, myself, and my Aunt Jane, the last living sibling from my grandparents' generation---Aunt Jane disclosed to us a very closely kept, unsuspected and almost unimaginable, secret.  My father's beloved sister, to whom he was very close; and the mother of my three cousins, my grandparents' other grandchildren, was not my Grandfather's daughter by birth.  My Grandmother had conceived her during an illicit affair with a Detroit salesman, whose route took him, by train, through Ohio to Cincinnati, making one of its stops at Middletown, where my Grandmother would board the train and ride with the salesman to Cincinnati, returning by train the next morning.  Upon her pregnancy, the salesman dumped her.  When she met my Grandfather, my aunt was already three years old.  Grandpa adopted her---in those days before records were meticulously kept and cross-referenced---simply by giving her our family surname, and identifying her as his daughter.  (I remember how profoundly she mourned his passing.)  As I small child, I had often noted the very distinct differences in appearance between by my father and aunt; and, aware of my own differences between my parents and me (which I knew was because of my adoption), I actually asked if my aunt had been adopted.  My father, of course, denied this; because, as Aunt Jane explained, all of my grandparents' siblings and their (then living) parents had agreed to supress this secret, and it was not disclosed to anyone born in my parents' generation or subsequently . . . until 1988.  My Grandfather's gesture was in keeping faith with his own mother's experience, having been accepted and adopted by the man her mother, the former prostitute, had married.

  To my Grandfather, my aunt was not a "fake Coddington."  And, to him, neither was I.  My cousins, my aunt's three children, were and are wrong about that.  I am glad that neither my grandparents, nor my parents, nor my aunt and uncler were alive to hear them say that.

 

Seryddwr

 

 

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