The Legend of the Stone House

Since it's almost Halloween and the stone house in this legend is the inspiration for my new book, The Stone House Legacy, I thought I would republish a blog from November 4, 2013. Hope you enjoy it.

Wanda

The farmhouse where I grew up was built of native limestone quarried right on the property.  The walls were two foot thick and the glass in the windows was clouded and wavy.  High up in the eaves of the house were holes just big enough to sight a rifle barrel so the home's original owners could fend off Indian raids. Limestone was the building material of choice because the stone lay close to the surface and was easy to quarry.  It was also soft enough to shape into building blocks when it was first unearthed, but it dried as hard as cement after being exposed to the air.  The cornerstone on our house was crudely carved with the words "The summer of 1857 was dry."

Although the house had been added onto over the years, the footprint of the original stone house remained. There were two rooms downstairs and one large room upstairs that my sister and I shared. The shadow of a fireplace, long since cemented in, remained in the kitchen where the original settlers must have cooked and warmed the house.  We had running water and electricity, but never got around to installing a bathroom so we used the outhouse until it blew over in a storm.  After that, we simply squatted in the bushes.

Although I often lay awake at night listening to the sound of rats scurrying across the attic floor above me, I was never afraid of the house. It was an impenetrable fortress against the storms that had buffeted it for over a century.  No it wasn't the house that made me uneasy, it was the legend around it.

The house was once part of an early settlement called Neosho City, founded by a group of religious zealots from the East who bought the land on speculation and offered the lots to anyone willing to follow the charter rules they set out.  The settlement was to be a "city of no sin" and the inhabitants were to follow a strictly vegetarian diet.  They were to eat nothing they couldn't grow themselves and they were not to use any medications to cure or prevent illnesses.  Death was simply God's will and they were not to interfere.  The women were to tend the fields while the men attended religious meetings and prayed for God's blessings upon the community. This, they believed, would ensure their prosperity. But Mother Nature didn't get the message.  A few summers into the settlement a severe drought ruined the crops and left the settlement to suffer through one of the hardest winters on record with no food.  Starvation and sickness descended upon them and the aged and the children were the first to feel the effects. 

The settlement was built on an octagonal plat with the church and cemetery situated in the center and plots of one hundred and sixty acres spanning out from the center like the spokes on a wheel. The remnants of a livery stable still stood on the far edge of the property, but a small cemetery overgrown with brambles and weeds remained within sight of the stone house. The cemetery was filled with ornate limestone headstones carved in the shape of cradles and cribs bearing the names of children, most under the age of two.  The sayings carried the grief of the parents from the past into the afterworld with their children..."beloved son...infant child...precious gift..."

The settlement disappeared after that winter and nothing remained except the old livery stable, the stone house and the little cemetery.  And sometimes at night, when the wind howled through the chinks in the stone house, I thought I could hear children crying.

Captain Kirk Lives!

On September 8, 1966, Star Trek made its debut on NBC. Star Trek was not simply a far-out science fiction program- it was a science fiction program that reflected the America of the 1960's.  Throughout the series, characters, themes, motifs, and of course, individual episodes made strong comments on sexism and feminism, racism and improving race relations, as well as militarism and peace, all major social issues during the late 1960's, and to a different degree, social issues of today.

I admit, with no shame, that I was a “Trekkie” during  the first incarnation of the show. I had an immense crush on Captain Kirk (a.k.a. William Shatner). He became the yardstick by which I measured every man I knew.  The problem was that he set the bar for sensitivity, integrity and leadership so high that no man (or woman) could measure up to it. He was like Martin Sheen’s president in The West Wing - above reproach and much wiser than those around him.

Captain Kirk saw the world as it should be. He wasn’t threatened by women in leadership roles. He didn’t seem to notice that his crew included not only women, but also those of different races and ethnicities.  He wasn’t shocked by the grotesque appearance of space aliens. He simply accepted them all as individuals.

His “mission” was one of peace.  As an explorer, he had an intense curiosity about civilizations and beings that were different, but he did not judge them as inferior because of those differences. He looked first for common ground upon which relationships could be built.

The major plot line of The Stone House Legacy follows closely the social and political events unfolding in the early part of the 1960’s. I have tried to focus on how these events affected the lives and relationships of ordinary people and not just the ones who managed to procure their fifteen minutes of fame on the emerging monster that has become “live TV”. 

But in fiction, there is a fine line between creating a character and creating a caricature. As I began to work through rewrites of the chapters it suddenly dawned on me that I had reincarnated Captain Kirk as my protagonist! The difference is…my hero is plagued by a fatal flaw. I think this makes him more real and hopefully more human. I hope you think so too.