Fonze Cable, Nine Mile, near Maryville, Blount County, Tennessee
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Fonze Cable, 59 years old, was living in Nine Mile in Blount County, Tennessee, when recorded in 1939. He had little formal education and worked as a logging camp cook and hunter.
[transcripption copyrigh Michael Montgomery and Paul Reed, 2017]
Old Uncle Quill Rose was an old, be an old man over at, that lived in the Smoky Mountains, what they called Eagle Creek, had a hard way of making a living, he had to come out across the Smoky Mountains, what they call Cades Cove, and he had a big old oxen, he fixed him a pack saddle on him, and he’d drive him over here in the, in the cove and get him a load of provisions and take it back to Eagle Creek, well, he thought he was doing a little better then, he swapped that old steer off and got him a jackass, he’d shoulder up his Winchester and get on that jack and ride across the mountain, he was a-going across one day and the, the old mule kicked his, up and got his foot in the stirrup, the old man Quill Rose said “hmmm, by God, if you’re going to ride, I’ll get off and walk,” he went on, though, his mule got his foot out and he rid on and he, when he got back home with his stuff, the old man R. E. Woods was there and his wife, Montvale Lumber Company, they was logging Eagle Creek, they had a big fire on, it was wintertime, in the fireplace, and this lady and gentleman setting before the fire and the old man Quill setting in a corner smoking, his old dog come in, got between him and the fire, and he hauled back and he kicked his hind end and he jumped in the fire, now old Aunt Vi said, “Quiller, what the world did you kick that dog for, in the fire for?” he said “hmmm, by God, I didn’t kick him in the fire, I kicked his ass and he jumped in,” that’s a little tale.
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Fifty-nine year old when I killed it, twenty-six bear, have I, has he got it on?
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This here’s the old residenter and bear hunter Fonze Cable, I’ve killed twenty-six bear, well I guess I’ve been a-hunting something like thirty-eight year, I reckon though what makes me be such a hunter, like to hunt, my father was a bear hunter, him and one of his nephews went a-fishing one time and they was up on what’s called Desolation, and they had a dog with them, he’d run a bear in on them and they got to rocking it, and they, it got his dog down, and he run in and jerked it off, and it went to showing its teeth, it jumped back and went to showing its teeth at them, he said, “Riley, knock its damn teeth out of there,” and he, he cut down with a rock and right in the mouth he took it, and they, they throwed rocks there, and big rocks, and it wouldn’t faze him, directly he picked up him a little rock and it took about the burr of the ear and down he fetched it, he run in there and jobbed his knife in him, and, and then the old bear jumped and he grabbed him by the sleeve and jerked his shirt sleeve off, and this boy knocked him down again, and that time he run in and he s- he finished killing him that time, they killed hit with a knife and rocks, well, I’ll tell a little about myself, I was in on, well we went a-fishing, was going to go fishing and went out the mountain and found where a bear had killed one of my hogs, we turned back then and the next morning we got our dogs and started in there, these other fellows, Thomas Sparks and Asa Sparks, Bill Shuler, they went out to the mountain stand, I got down under there and I struck him, and we run him up on, bait him on Killpecker Ridge, I crawled through the roughs and got up there to him, nearly to him, and he, he left out and went back around by the standers and then come back, no, he about had my dogs whipped and I kept hollering at them and hollering at them and then directly, well they kept coming on towards me, one of my old dogs, he seen me and he whupped off under the hill and we went to hollering, I thinks to myself, “I’ll just slide down there and see if he’d make me holler,” down I went, I got up and about, oh I guess something like ten foot of it, there he stood, he’d look at me a while and then he’d look up a tree awhile and then he’d turn and look off, then he turned back on them, me a-snapping at him with old punk shotgun, directly the gun fired, and uh when it fired, he fell just the same as it blowed his head off, it jumped up then and come right at me with his mouth open, and I jumped to try to run, I seen I couldn’t and I hollered my dog "catch him," the old dog grabbed him by the ...
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Well uh, we was, passel of us fellows of us gathered up here to bear hunt, and we appointed Doc Jones for the, to lead the hunt, he says for us to go now, for us drivers to go to the Calhoun Ridge and start this bear hunt and uh John Cable and uh Allen Crisp, they was to go to the mule lot, Doc, he was a-going to the Brier Knob, well hit, we’s, Fonze Cable’s the driver, he drives Bone Valley, right in on Bone Valley there he rousted one, it come out through there, and run over Doc Jones, he was out a-kindling up him a fire and it got by, between him and his gun, the dogs went on and they, when the standers come or the driver come on out, the dog was in the Devils Courthouse a-fighting the bear, there we all lined up and we hit in that Devils Courthouse after it, and we wandered around through them roughs and we called it lettuce beds, and dark catched us in there, there we let the bear get away, and there we all come in, we’re all sad, you know, and had our wood to get up after dark and all out a-picking up wood, camp fires, and we didn’t get nothing that trip.
[INDISTINGUISHABLE]
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This party come from Jacksboro, Tennessee, to bear hunt with me, and we went up on top of Smoky Mountain, what’s called the Spence Place, we, snow on the ground about three inches deep, I guess, we hit out down on what was called the Antony Ridge, we struck a big bear there and we trailed him around and jumped him under some rock cliffs, and he come right over some cliffs and they was a boy climbing right up this cliff and the bear went right over the top of him, he shot two shoots with the automatic pistol, he hit him in the bottom of the foot, the bear run on and the snow a-boiling, dogs a-fighting, and run across the Antony Ridge over onto what we call the Little Spruce Ridge, a fellow by the name of Bob Walker run in there and shot him, he broke his neck the first shoot, and he didn’t know whether he’d killed him or not, he jumped again and he broke his foot that time, his own foot, and we had to carry him in then, the bear, and had to carry the bear in, then we took a horse and went back and got the man, we all gathered up and we come down into what’s called Cades Cove to one of our friends there, we stayed all night and dressed to our, finished dressing our bear and dividing it up, they all said that was the biggest black bear they ever seen, these old fellows guessed it to weigh five hundred pounds.
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Fonze Cable, borned in North Carolina, in eighteen and eighty.
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Well I guess xx, something about xx, about, so I’ve been in Cades Cove about twenty, or thirty-six years, then I moved out over here to the, what’s called Nine Mile, about fifteen mile below Maryville, the old bear hunter’s about sewed up now.
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I told the dogs to catch him, he grabbed him by the hind leg and jerked him, and the bear fell down, rolled over once, he got up then and walked around the hill and the dogs put in after him again, bayed him around there, well I looked up a tree, I allowed it might have had some cubs there and whooped them up the tree, I looked around there for cubs, couldn’t find none, and I got to looking around for my shells, and I couldn’t find them, well, I got to studying how nigh that bear come a-getting me, and uh I just got scared so bad it just appeared like my heart was right up in my mouth just a-beating, well, I kept worrying around there, I got sort of over that and the bear come in and, back around to the other side of the Killpecker, right in to a sink hole, they bayed him again, well I crawled out up at the top and I thinks I’ll try him again, I’ve got some big laurels run around here, and I took, they was a log a-laying right above to the sink hole, and I thought I’d run and jump on that log and shoot him as he went out, well when I went to make my spring to jump, a running brier catched me right under my chin and down it fetched me, and that scared the bear and he walked out, got away from me, I never did get up with him anymore, then one time my father and a fellow by the name of Bill Cope, they was a-bear hunting, they run one over in the Devils Courthouse and treed it, well they kept wandering on till they got to him, and they shot hit, uh well, when they got there we, the bear went to making a noise, growling and popping its teeth, this fellow by the name of Cope, he says, “Little John, Lord God, run, that’s that old panther,” and he said “no, that ain’t,” and they crawled down to a little closer, and Little John says, “I believe I can gut shoot him here,” said “come on down to me and we can both shoot,” Cope says, “no, you shoot there, I’ll shoot from up here,” and he cut down after him and out he fetched him and down into the laurel a-fighting, him and the dogs, they got down in there with them and shot it again, and then they’d have, they’d have got to trying to get to it, the dogs to it, they thought it, that it’d quit, they got in to him and they, when they struck, no, they struck a match, and when they struck the match the dogs landed onto it again, and Cope says, “Lord God, run, John, it’s a-going to get you,” and they found out it was dead then, and they buried or hung him up and crawled out of there, that’s all, I reckon.