Category: Fiction

A Haunting Story

July 18, 2026 | Fiction, Remembrances | Comments
This story has haunted me many years. I do not recall where I first read or heard it. I do not know whether it is true or fiction or who wrote it. They lived in a small frame house, unpainted, close beside the railroad track. They were black. The father was a feed-mill hand in the nearest town. He unloaded sacks of unground grain from farmers’ mule-drawn wagons and trucks, loaded sacks of ground and mixed feed back on them, and did whatever else the mill owner asked him to do. He walked along the track to and from work six days a week, three miles each way. Neither the father nor the mother could read or write but the son could. He was a diligent student. Read more

Some Luck

April 27, 2023 | Fiction, Short Stories | Comments
The year was 1953. They were on the prairie in Manitoba at July’s end, camped twenty miles apart. Jim Chambers was there with a string of puppies, derbies and all-ages for his employer Sid Simon, one of America’s wealthiest men. He had come up from Union Springs by train while his hands had hauled the dogs up in a two-ton truck. The horses they used stayed in Canada year-round. They belonged to Simon but were lent by him, when not in use for dog training, to Canadian farmer-ranchers who in exchange for boarding them, used them under saddle or to pull wagons, slays, cultivators, plows, harrows, mowing machines, rakes, whatever. It was a good deal for all. Read more

A Brace at Ames

December 17, 2022 | Fiction, National Championship | Comments
The year was 1938. The place was the Ames Plantation at Grand Junction, Tennessee, 55 miles east of the Mississippi River at Memphis. The event was the National Bird Dog Championship. It had been held most years since 1896, and here since 1901. The subject of this story is the winning performance and the players in it, canine, equine and human. Read more

1937

March 19, 2021 | Fiction | Comments
A desperate time. The Great Depression was in its eighth year. No sign of a lift out of it. Yet for a few, times were fine. Prices were low, very low, so for anyone with cash, things, all things, were cheap. Purchasing power, for the few who could afford to buy anything, was awesome. Read more

Too Honest

February 2, 2021 | A Little Competition, Fiction | Comments
With headlights out, the small black car rolled slowly up the live-oak-lined sand road toward the kennels and stables of Mossy Swamp Plantation. At 3 A.M. the only light came from a third quarter moon and a dusk-to-dawn pole light in the graveled parking lot where a dozen long horse trailers and a single dually pickup were parked. The car stopped fifty yards from the pickup, and two men in dark clothing emerged and walked to the dually. Read more

Buck and Booty

September 8, 2020 | Fiction, Short Stories | Comments
Buck was handling and Booty scouting for Bootjack in the opening prairie championship of the season. The dog’s owner Fred Gray was riding in the gallery for his first prairie trial. He had bought Bootjack as his first trial dog in April and put him with Buck on recommendation from a friend. The grounds were new to all. Buck and Booty had studied them on Google Earth on Buck’s iPad, a recent gift from his son. Read more

The Hole

January 4, 2019 | Fiction, Short Stories | Comments
Ike Brown had a derby to sell. The derby, Fast ‘N Furious, had made a reputation by scoring three firsts in prairie trials. It was January first now, and Ike decided it was the time to sell F&F. The ideal buyer was a person intent on winning the Continental Derby Championship, set to begin the third Monday of the month. F&F appeared to be an ideal candidate. And he was, almost. But he had one hole, and a big one. So far, only Ike and his scout, Booty Blevins, knew of the hole. Read more

A Quiet Withdrawal

December 23, 2018 | Ben Reach, Fiction, Short Stories | Comments
Ben Reach went to the National Championship only when someone close to him—a handler or dog owner—had an entry in contention. Still, with all Ben’s connections to the sport, he found himself riding at the Ames Plantation for a half-day every few years. This was one of those years, and Ben was enjoying it. The friend and client with a dog qualified and ranked high in the Gossip Rankings (the only rankings save Purina Points) was a client from Thomasville with a private jet who invited him along. Ben loved to fly thus, and hated to fly commercial. Read more