It was the Depression and very few areas were as economically depressed as the rural South. The road in front of our house was dirt (mud when it rained) and with no electric lights and no plumbing, we lived a bare and stark existence. There was no money to purchase entertainment so we made our own. Whether rocking on the front porch before bedtime or sitting around the kitchen table after supper, it was story time. Daddy was a storyteller and had a number of tales he told on a regular basis.
Stories flew thick and fast when visitors were in the house. With my uncles it was tales about the family or about people they grew up with. With neighbors I learned who had been caught making moonshine and who was stepping out on his wife. Much of my early education came from sitting on the floor off to the side during these sessions. I not only learned the stories, I also learned how to tell one.
This Coon Dogs Volume 2 is a little different than Coon Dogs Volume 1 Tall Tales From The Old South. Most of these pieces are short stories but many of them came from some of these early tales. Most contain some element of truth although sometime that element is pretty small. Some are almost totally true. Hopefully, the reader will have a difficult time distinguishing between what is fact and what is fiction. Just where the reader draws the line is immaterial. The important question is: "Do they entertain?" I hope I have extended the front porch or added chairs around the kitchen table.
For more stories from Luke Boyd, see Coon Dogs and Outhouses, Volume 1: Tall Tales From The Old South. ISBN # 978-1-59095-837-7
Dr. Lucas G. "Luke" Boyd was born in a three-room shotgun house on Jabe Dunaway's place near Anguilla, Mississippi in the depths of the Depression. His father managed one of those sprawling cotton plantations the Delta was known for, and it is this plantation culture that left an indelible mark on young Luke.
After a stint in the Army and then earning a Ph.D. in English History at the University of Tennessee, he began a career in education that spanned 48 years both at the secondary and college levels. He retired after serving for 19 years as Principal of Battle Ground Academy, a private college preparatory school in Franklin, Tennessee.
