Beech Tree News Network

How do you describe a man like Sam Fuggle? I suppose likeable would be a good place to start. Also: story teller; fine company- a pleasure to sit and talk with; hard worker, even in his older years; all-around good farmer; dispenser of worthwhile wisdom; good parent…. Funny. All this and more, a good bit more.
    Sam was among the surviving veterans of World War I when I first knew him, when he came to Butler County in 1963 to teach agriculture… both high school and adult ag-education. I spent a lot of time on Sam’s farm. He and son Charlie farmed together near Woodbury. Charlie was a member of my adult- farmer education class, Sam’s laughter was infectious- he laughed a lot, so did the people around him. His stories were particularly entertaining. Regarding the amount of space, I’m only going to share a couple of my favorite ones:
    Sam said a fellow he knew liked to pull jokes on people. This guy would fill one of his rear tires with propane gas. Then he would pull into a service station somewhere and say “I’ve got a hot tire- so hot I’ll bet the air in the tire will burn. Naturally the attendant thought he was nuts. Worrisome the jokester would say, “let’s see if I’m right”. Then he would strike a match, loosen the tire valve stem and put the match to the escaping propane gas, causing a gosh-awful flame to shoot-forth.
    But one of Sam’s funniest stories happened to him. Years before the Fuggles came to Woodbury, Sam and his family lived near Albany, Kentucky, just this side of the Tennessee line. Sam custom-bailed hay all over the area. One job saw him across the border near Pall Mall, Tennessee, “Those folks were so poor,” he said, “I even contemplated not charging them anything at the end of the day-let alone sitting down to dinner with them; but I did. “There were no screens on the windows; chickens ran around under your feet on the kitchen floor”. Sam said, “A big, overgrown, frying-siege chicken sat in one of the open windows next to the dinner table. “I was hungry”, he said. “So according to polite manners I was passed the biscuits and gravy first- which, that and coffee- was all they had to eat. The large gravy bowl was returned to the center of the table. I wondered why there was no fried chicken to go with the gravy. Maybe that was Sunday only. I took two or three biscuits and covered them with a liberal helping of gravy. I had hardly taken my first bite when something scared that chicken in the window. “Here it came like a bat-out-of-a-board-pile, right across the table. I leaned over covering my plate with my hands”. It knocked cups and saucers and forks and spoons, and when that lout got to the center of the table it socked a big grimy foot right down in the middle of that gravy bowel. “I was awfully glad I got my gravy first.” Sam said.
    Sam left us some years back. He’s now with the Lord. I know the Lord laughs-but with Sam, I believe He laughs a little louder.

                    Kindest regards….