It Only Takes One Leg to Run Moonshine...

I was born a poor, white child. I was born in 1979, so the poor part goes without saying. Jimmy Carter has been the only President to call the State of Georgia home. Thanks, Jimmy. They won’t make that mistake again. Know what my fondest memory of Jimmy Carter is?  My Meemaw used to have this bottle opener in her kitchen, and it was really neat. Now I ain’t talkin’ “Cool! I just farted the Battle Hymn of the Republic” neat; I’m talking more of the clown staggering down the train tracks with a shotgun neat. This thing was creepy!

It was a squeezable plastic head of Jimmy Carter on a stick, and the bottle opener was his big mouth. Whoever came up with this little gizmo was onto something. See, at that time, many things that are acceptable topics of conversation today were still taboo:  particularly drinking and violence. Looking back on it, I like to think that some creative soul’s pent up frustrations erupted into this little gem. Not only could you put a glass bottle in his mouth and pretend to do a curb stomp if your h-words were outta whack, but this appliance engineer capitalized on the fact that all it takes to shut most men up is to shove a beer in their mouth.

Speaking of drinking (which rhymes with bacon, for those of you struggling with pronunciations), it happens in the South no matter what the preachers say. Not in bars with tuxedo-ed ivory ticklers and hooker-boot wearing waitresses named Divine, but more often in the back of Scooter’s truck down behind the pediatrician and taxidermist’s office. One office, one doctor, so many talents! I heard that if your kid has rabies, he’ll treat them for the normal co-pay and stuff the culprit for half off.

I grew up in a Baptist church, bless my own heart. There are tons of awesome Baptist churches in the world, and many of my friends are Southern Baptist. I’m not knocking their beliefs at all since we all believe in the same Jesus. We believe in the trinity; for my non affiliated brethren, that’s God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit to you. The Holy Trinity is the cornerstone of Southern life, even though Lurlene over at the Harvester House used to swear that the Holy Trinity was meatloaf, mater sandwiches, and moon pies. But she didn’t even go to Sunday School, so what does she know?

So what does this have to do with drinking? Well, to the church I went to, Hannibal the Cannibal could be forgiven and allowed to hop-scotch down the streets of glory as long as he didn’t wash it all down with a Budweiser. Murder, thieving, and adultery could all be forgiven, but recipe stealin' and drinkin' would get your butt wrapped in tinfoil and placed in that picnic basket to hell quicker than Leroy could solve them hidden picture puzzles from back in the ‘90s. Growing up Baptist, my parents never drank and the grandparents I knew never drank. It’s still this way in my family. I was 24 the first time my momma learned that I drank.

Remember how I said what a blessing our first child was? This is a pretty good piece of that puzzle.  Were I not the mother to the only grandchild at that time, I know in my tainted sinner’s heart that she would’ve laid hands on me, and I ain’t talking about the Pentecostal way either. I’m talking 'bout she would’ve choked the ever-loving life out of me. (Now, all you sinners sing it with me...SORRY, MOM!) 

But they can't deny it...we wear flip-flops in winter because our veins are runnin' nice and toasty with, um, elixir. Genetically speaking, of course, not by consumption. My great-granddaddy, Papa Duncan, once created Beer-agra Falls on his back patio when a batch of his homemade beer exploded. I didn't think he was going to hell for it; I just liked watching the pretty bubbles!

Now, I never knew one of my biological granddaddies, and he was an alcoholic (which was unfortunate) …as well as a race car driver (which is freakin' AWESOME)! Those two go together like peanuts and Co-Cola, don’t they? But the trace of moonshine in my veins don’t stop with him. His daddy, Willie, was a moonshine runner, and that’s how my granddaddy got started racing:  by running from the police (pronounced like the latter parts of ‘cannoli’). 

Y'all, this is why I love Southern people:  we take our circumstances, and we turn them into opportunities. Was drinking frowned upon? Sure. Was running from the cops a good thing? NO, MOM. Did it allow my poor, disabled Willie to provide for his wife and kids? Dang skippy, it did. See, Willie’s momma and daddy didn’t send him to school because he was “crippled”. He knew that if he wanted to make a go of it, he had to work with what he had, and what he had was a keen eye for ec-o-nomic opportunity.

Back in his day, moonshine was the hot ticket on the black market. These country men would build their stills, crank them up, and then sell their product to the nearest Gulf station disguised as Unleaded. Naw, I’m just kidding. They drank that mess. (For more on that, please refer to my family history with Mercurochrome.) Moonshine had its own industry that benefited a lot of people. The still operators made good money from selling their product, the runners got to drive like my husband out of a Taco Bell after gallbladder surgery, and your local Barney Fife suddenly transformed into the Chuck Norris of law enforcement.

               

So, how did this help Papa Willie? He befriended the Chief of Police and proposed a little extracurricular fundraising. See, Willie knew who all was running stills because he and granddaddy delivered for them. Willie would then tell the Chief where to find them, so Mr. Police could go raid them and seize the liquor. Was that the end of it? Nope, Willie would’ve been found face down in the turnip patch if it stopped there. Have you ever seen those movies where they show the pomp and circumstance of police work during prohibition?

Well, that was actually true. They would seize the moonshine, and invite the public and the press to witness a ceremony where they would pour out the confiscated liquor on the courthouse steps.  It sounds like a pretty big deal, but keep in mind that in these parts, the ‘press’ consisted of Randy, from the Tribune, and Eloise, the town’s lone college graduate fresh out of the University of Georgia with a degree in Home Economics. But seeing as how women back then took care of their own homes and economics, her career choices were limited, so Eloise became a reporter for the paper.

                

So, on the steps of the courthouse, the Chief, a few of his officers, and the guilty manufacturers would smile for Randy in hopes of making the one page of the paper. So how does this involve Willie? When the Chief would pour out the moonshine, he would pour it into a big barrel that they’d dump out after the ceremony. But, being men of modest means, Willie and the Chief had a moral dilemma: when so many families struggled to put food on the table and clothes on their backs, was it right to just throw this stuff out?  Bless their hearts, they just couldn’t do it.

So what did they do? Willie, the designated overseer of the barrel dumpers, would relieve them of their duties and pour the moonshine right back into bottles and sell it again. Chief and Willie split the profits and rinsed the barrel for the next time. Fortunately, there were enough stills around that each one could operate for 6-8 months before they were raided again. So, the police chief became a hero, Willie made a living with no education and a bum leg, the local men continued making their magic stomach elixir/spark plug degreaser, my granddaddy polished his driving skills, and the altars remained full of repentant sinners on Sunday mornings, praise Jesus.

See, this part of history is what Yankees don’t appreciate:  breaking the law with a positive purpose.  It's what we do in the South. Sometimes our circumstances require us to do things that would make Barney Fife and Uncle Sam spoon on the courthouse steps. Did Willie want to break the law? I’d like to think not. Did he have to break the law to provide for his family? I think so. Will there ever be a statue of him in the square downtown? All signs point to no. But, as his great-granddaughter, I walk a little taller knowing that my Willie base-jumped off of the arrest warrants of life into heaven’s own barrel of bliss, where he is hindered by a bum leg no more.  Rest in peace, Willie. Bless your heart.