Mules
This is a travel story with a little history thrown in for good measure.
About 1910, a group of farmers in Virginia experienced a shortage of horses. Horses were in great demand to pull wagons, buggies and plows. One of the farmers had heard that mules were popular in the South. They were said to be stronger than horses and didn't tire as quickly. The place to buy mules, unfortunately, was hundreds of miles away. Murfreesboro, Tennessee was the mule capital of the South.
So they decided to send someone to Murfreesboro to buy mules. They had to have a man who knew livestock. That wasn't a serious problem, because all farmers knew livestock and almost everybody was a farmer. They also needed someone who could be trusted with a large amount of cash, and who was tough enough to protect it.
There was only one choice. The preacher was a part-time farmer, he was honest, and he was six feet, three inches tall, a giant in those days. A would-be robber would think twice about trying to rob a man his size. A thousand dollars back then was a lot of money. It was more than the annual salary of a part-time preacher, so they were putting a lot of trust into the man when they handed him about $1800 in cash and put him on the train to Murfreesboro. When he arrived in the Mule Capital of the South, he quickly purchased a number of fine, young mules, loaded them into a cattle car, and headed home to Virginia.
The mules worked well for the farmers and they prospered. So did the preacher and his family, because farmers tend to share the bounty, and they would drop by the parsonage from time to time with a ham or a bushel of beans.
I heard this from my grandfather, the preacher, when he was about 85. He was happy to hear that I was living and attending college in Murfreesboro. He had good memories of the trip and told me this story.
About 1910, a group of farmers in Virginia experienced a shortage of horses. Horses were in great demand to pull wagons, buggies and plows. One of the farmers had heard that mules were popular in the South. They were said to be stronger than horses and didn't tire as quickly. The place to buy mules, unfortunately, was hundreds of miles away. Murfreesboro, Tennessee was the mule capital of the South.
So they decided to send someone to Murfreesboro to buy mules. They had to have a man who knew livestock. That wasn't a serious problem, because all farmers knew livestock and almost everybody was a farmer. They also needed someone who could be trusted with a large amount of cash, and who was tough enough to protect it.
There was only one choice. The preacher was a part-time farmer, he was honest, and he was six feet, three inches tall, a giant in those days. A would-be robber would think twice about trying to rob a man his size. A thousand dollars back then was a lot of money. It was more than the annual salary of a part-time preacher, so they were putting a lot of trust into the man when they handed him about $1800 in cash and put him on the train to Murfreesboro. When he arrived in the Mule Capital of the South, he quickly purchased a number of fine, young mules, loaded them into a cattle car, and headed home to Virginia.
The mules worked well for the farmers and they prospered. So did the preacher and his family, because farmers tend to share the bounty, and they would drop by the parsonage from time to time with a ham or a bushel of beans.
I heard this from my grandfather, the preacher, when he was about 85. He was happy to hear that I was living and attending college in Murfreesboro. He had good memories of the trip and told me this story.
posted by Howard at 12:28 PM
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