I feel like reminiscing for a little bit about… “My Uncle Dutchy”

I feel like reminiscing for a little bit about…  “My Uncle Dutchy”

To Cousin Joann,

I feel like reminiscing for a little bit, about your Daddy,

and my “Uncle Dutchy”.

I know that he died before you had gotten to know him very well.

Even before your birth, as he grew older he mellowed.

This was the man, as I remember him.

He would have enthralled you!

He would have gratified you!

He would have befriended you.

You have every right to appreciate your paternal parentage and legacy

with pride!”

LDA Friday, April 30, 1999

“My Uncle Dutchy”

Joann, I loved your good Father, Arthur Herbert Turner.

I affectionately, knew him as and called him “Uncle Dutchy”.

Your Daddy loved your Mommy, and he even cherished her.

Your Mommy loved your Daddy, and she even revered him.

He was about twenty years older than she was.

It was evident to me that God meant them for each other.

He needed her!  She needed him!

He seemed always to understand her.

He understood her heart, and her words, despite Aunt Fern’s verbal-handicap.

She seemed always to understand him.

She defended him and respected his heart.

She referred to him with reverence.

He always expressed fondness to Fern, with such compassion and tender caring!

His loving devotion to her influences me to this day!

“A Delightful Eccentric”

He had his unique ways and understandings mind you!

On at least one occasion he reportedly gave your mother a spanking as though she where his darling but naughty child.

However, she only loved him the more.

On some Saturdays, he would bring your Mom by to spend some of the day with my Mom.

When he would return to retrieve her, he would routinely drive into our driveway with his big black car.

He would honk the car horn, honk and honk!

Usually, we children would run to his vehicle full of jubilant delight.

We would jump up onto his running boards.

Through his car’s open windows, we would implore him to come into our home,

We would customarily persist until our Dad would have found his leather slippers,

and then Dad would join us kids in this hearty invitation.

We all knew the routine.  We anticipated it!

We all played our roles well.  We would prevail.

I knew that he was an eccentric, but somehow his uniqueness,

made him the more special to my boyish heart.

The prospects of sharing meals with him present at our table delighted everyone.

I saw him as a jolly, an admirable, even a wonderful man.

“A Study in Health”

Hs made intelligent study of nutrition, food, and diet.

He discussed the correlation of good health and good diet,

with the expertise of a nutritionist.

Albeit, one could only serve on the table,

the foods in the cupboards, available.

As an example, he taught you, Joann, to enjoy good cheese and to consider it a treat, as it was, rather than to expect candy,

and so you did,

at least to please him, and at least then!

That benefits me to this day.

“Hymnbooks”

He had been active in the Bakers Mills, New York,

Wesleyan Methodist Church.

That was my home church, but before my time there.

He had donated many hymnbooks,

to that Church on one occasion, and

he had written his name on the flyleafs.

Those hymnbooks were still in use during my time there.

I felt pride, in a youthful way,

as I would stand with the congregation and

sing from a hymnbook that my “Uncle Dutchy” had given.

His sacrificial giving to the Church influences me.

“Standing Alone on the Mountains with God”

Your Daddy wanted things right with God.

He did not want flamboyance.

He did not like religious gobbledygook.

He hated hypocrisy, pretension, and Pecksniffians!

His desire for the genuine influences me to this very day!

“One Before God!”
“Or The Non-Religious Church Man”

He had despised church politics and pharisaisms.

He never cast blame.

He saw himself neither as victim nor as victor.

He just lamented at injustices and offenses

he observed some inflicting on yet others!

I heard him discussing this with some men folk,

in the parking lot outside the Church.

He felt that everyone should have the right to worship God,

without judgment from others equally flawed.

As I heard them expressed, to my father, his perceptions,

have proven the true color and texture

from my own adult experiences.

He was willing to declare “wrong” what was “wrong”.

He was willing to declare “right” what was “right”.

To him it was “black and white”.

It perturbed him that other leaders

would amble on passively or obliviously, to inequities.

His church attendance ended.

Nevertheless, he held nothing against God, mind you.

On the contrary, he astutely loved God and without compromise.

He lived on good terms with the true God of Heaven.

His morality, honesty, integrity, and decisiveness were manifest.

All that, having been said, I do not know

that he would have been characterized as a religious man.

Not by anyone.

Nevertheless, to Him that was just fine!

He felt that the One to whom it mattered most, knew the truth!

His devotion to God influences me to this very day.

To him real religion was not talking it, but living it!

“A Jaunty, Dynamic Entertainer”

I was always favorably impressed with your Daddy’s,

lively animation,

his quick wit,

his brilliant mind, and

with his profound sense of humor.

Some of his favorite antics stick in my mind to this day.

“A Dubious Scholar”

He was an alumnus of JCS, and had been an excellent student.

He was an avid reader.

He loved literature, and especially the classics.

He challenged and inspired me to read them.

He loved magazines, especially the “National Geographic”.

On visits, he would offer to me his latest issue.

He would invariably inquire what books I had last read in school.

Then he would delight in knowledgeably rehearsing

the story line of that book, with me.

He probably was known more, by most, for his brawn than his brain,

because he chose the mountain-man life style,

His bombastic bravado lent itself well to that erroneous assumption.

But mind you well, while alone with him often,

I absorbed from him, of his education.  It could not be masked.

He had:

An extensive vocabulary,

A broad grasp of literature,

A vast comprehension of the sciences,

A thorough discernment of history and politics, and a

capacity to perform mathematical calculations without a device.

This was all overwhelmingly challenging, to my young mind.

‘A Mountain-Man Philanthropist’

He loved little people.  He loved to bounce them on his knee.

He loved to play with them and

an imaginary friend that he kept in his shirt pocket

that only he and the kids could see and did see!

He always had time for each one individually.

He loved unfortunate people, sympathetically.

He loved disenfranchised people, with empathy.

As I fondly remember, he allowed every major or minor event,

every planned or spontaneous visit,

and any chance encounters to have meaning.

For him these occurrences should stand-alone.

It was as those this was of most importance,

and it might not happen again.

Each should be allowed to develop significance.

Each should have its own time.

Like a lollipop or an ice cream treat,

it should be good to the very last lick.

“Fire-side’s Animated Chats”

He loved deep discussions.

Few were willing to carry on these discussions with him,

however, or were unable to.

Nevertheless, all seemed delighted to hear him,

carry on these discussions.

He never lacked for audience.

He would always have such a grasp of the issues and topics.

He usually chose the particular subject to be discussed on any visit.

He manifestly knew the many sides of every discussion in focus.

He would speak with authority.

He would speak as one in the know.

I observed however, that this did trouble some of his audience.

Nevertheless,

He enthusiastically and energetically expressed himself with eloquence.

I liked that, about this mountain-man!

Even as a kid, I esteemed his intellect, and his spirit.

He influences me to this day.

“Birthday Dolls as Toys”

When I was “Five” and my brother Ron was “Four”,

Grandma Dalaba and Aunt Fern, your Mommy,

gave to each of us a doll for our birthdays, on March 2nd & March 4th.

Your Daddy came with your Mommy to our brand new house.

Your Aunt Rose still lives there.

He saw the dolls that had been given to each of us boys as toys,

That was back when most others felt

that boys should not play with dolls.

Though he teased us, he thought, “Why not?”

He encouraged us in play to go put the dollies down to nap.

Though he had his rough and gruff side,

he had  a cosmopolitan and gracious side.

We both kept those dolls until worn out, years later,

even if secretly.

Who knows, maybe his encouragement inspired me.

We have six children and six grandchildren!

I thank you, “Uncle Dutchy”!

“Contentedly Independent”

He did not try to impress anybody.

He did not try to unimpress anybody.

He was one of the fortunate few

who was content to be who he was all by himself.

He was himself and without apology.

With or without the approval of a hard-to-please society,

He was content!

And let the opinions of the others take their places in the breezes.

He was not arrogant, not in a haughty sense.

He was proud, however.

He was proud of God, Family, and Country,

his talents, and his knowledge.

At the same time, however, he was humble before God and man!

It was his person, his stature and

his personality that were commanding.

He could even be loud and aggressive on occasion.

Some may have even considered him obnoxious, every so often.

He was genuine, however.

He was his own person.

He knew who he was.

He knew what he stood for.

He knew what he knew.

He was not even slightly, pretentious.

I liked that about this Mountain-Man!

“A Gagster, A Jokester, and A Humorists”

His leg-slappin’,

His belly-laughin’,

His story-tellin’,

His knee-bouncin’,

His fun-lovin’,

His body-huggin’,

His jest-joshin’ joking,

ways won my heart, with great fondness.

Our visits were always delightful, and invariably memorable.

His consistently predicable good nature exuded delight

with life as it was!

I think that, “He kinda was a party, a one-man riot!”, all by himself!

Moreover, “If in’ yaw’d put a few kids with him,

it’d be bedder than a circus!”

All of us kids loved him for being secure enough

to take life as it came.

He did not grumble and complain, as others might be prone to do.

His high energy knew no bounds.

He would climb up the Mountains of the Adirondacks as though they were his own backyards.

I feel like reminiscing for a little bit about…  “My Uncle Dutchy”       Page Seven

“A Studied Naturalist”

He did not worship nature, but he sure did appreciate it, and

with authentic devotion, respect, and admiration.

All of the flora, and all of the fauna had its place in God’s creation!

He felt that among the reasons God put us here on “terra firma”, was to care for all of its inhabitants, both plants and animals.
He scientifically studied nature, and

outdoor survival and mountain living.

He had broad understanding, beyond that of most of his peers,

or so it seemed to me!

They likely would be reticent to admit it, if even aware of it,

or worse yet, deny it.

On mountain hikes up Crane Mountain and Gore Mountain,

with him, he educated me to

the “flora (plants) and the fauna (animals)”

of this, “his” vast wilderness.

(He kinda shared ownership with God accordin’ to his talkin’)

He thought of it as his own turf.

I never heard anyone dispute him, on that.

He was very knowledgeable.

He was as good as my later college biologists (life-scientists),

botanists (plant scientists) and zoologists (animal scientists).

He knew his turf!

“Enjoying Nature out under the Sky”

It was widely observed that sporadically

he would enjoy life as a recluse.

There where several periods of time that he did live as a hermit.

He delighted in his own company.

He could have lived a happy life in his hermitages.

He also loved more the family responsibilities he had lovingly adopted!

Though, there were times that he wrestled

with his responsibilities, and with his preferences for freedom.

But in his own mind, he always managed to keep

everything and everyone balanced and tended.

Usually while on fire-tower mountain-duty,

he delighted to stay in the fire-tower cabins atop the mountains.

When not on fire-tower duty

he delighted to stay in the Cabins about the countryside.

Sometimes he would stay in the “Bert Shanty”,

beside the pristine streams, his favorite for fishing.

It was on the North backside of Eleventh Mountain.

Sometimes he would stay in “The Baker’s Cabin”,

in the woods, his favorite for hunting.

It was on the South front side of Eleventh Mountain.

Sometimes he would stay at his cabin “The Dutchman Cabin”

in the Kibby Creek area of the Goodman District.

His cabin had the most majestic view of Crane Mountain from the front

and an impressive view of Eleventh Mountain from the back.

This cabin was just off The Goodman Road on the elbow curve.

This was his favorite place for reading and thinking and just living.

Though he also hunted small game while here.

Sometimes he stayed at “The School-House Cabin”

in the Bartman District.

He spent these times fishing, hunting or trapping for small game for fur or food.

Nevertheless, his assays in solitude, always ended.

He was somewhat like the monarch butterfly, which he admired.

The Monarch Butterfly’s life cycle, that he taught me,

patterned his own life cycle.

He too, would come forth from his cabin-cocoon.

And just as surely as the monarch butterfly

on this side of his cocoon was new and uniquely different

from the singular and colorful caterpillar

on the other side of the cocoon,

so too this mountain man would come forth from his cabins,

with new display,

increased purpose,

deeper insight and

more prolific conversation.

“The Fire-tower’s Friendly Monarch”
“Or How to Make a Living and Love It!”

As a fire ranger for Warren County,

he spent much time in the high fire towers during the annual fire-seasons

on both Crane Mountain and Gore Mountain,

in the Adirondacks of Upstate New York.

During these fire seasons, in the fire towers,

he spent the days looking out on the 360º panoramic vistas.

He scoured more than a hundred miles in each direction.

(NEWS: North, East, West & South, He taught me that).

He looked out on the Central Adirondacks

from his Crane Mountain Tower vantage.

He looked out on the High Peaks of the Adirondacks

from his Gore Mountain Tower vantage.

Through the tower windows, with his “precision ground” binoculars,

he kept his eyes sweeping the vast horizons,

With winds high or low,

with weather scorchingly hot or bitterly cold,

with the terrains wet or dry he held his vigil.

He faithfully made his arduous trek up to his mountain stations,

to keep his vigils.  While there, his eyes swept the vast horizons.

He studied his geological relief maps, his magazines, and his classics.

He called from the tower telephone, to kith n’ kin, alike, just to chat.

He called the other towers, to check on the smoke.

Cornell University students regularly came to the mountain trails,

to study Adirondack ecological niches.

He would share with them in knowledge discourse,

answering a plethora of inquiries.

He kept, his favorite snacks, and Thermos at hand.

He always took with him plenty to share, with the hikers,

of the “Queen of the Adirondacks” trails.

He deftly kept these mountain top picnics

in his own hand made backpack.

He made his own backpack of heavy canvas.

He had made and fashioned the frame for this backpack with steamed wood,

bent to his large shape and size.

He had tied this frame and canvas bag with rawhide.

He wore the uniform of his own choosing.

His gray/black heavy woolen pants were secured with broad-striped suspenders.

These suspenders were slung neatly over each shoulder.

His heavy broad-print flannel or solid-color woolen shirts

where always neatly tucked in place.

He wore heavy socks and massive waterproofed leather boots.

He frequently had to walk through muddy trails, climb over rock ledges,

clamber through storm strewn debris and

scale the mountain heights while wielding saws and axes

to clear storm damaged trails.

This rugged clothing was necessary gear for this work, which he loved with passion.

He favored both a heavy leather hat, and a beaver pelt hat.

Both hats had a leather string dangled under his chin.

Both hats were soiled from robust use.

Both hats carried emblems, feathers, fishhooks, and even a-b-c chewing gum

and “et cetera” with stories begging to be told of his life.

His cold-weather mittens of deerskin leather were wool lined, oiled, and soiled.

At dusk daily he would climb down from the high tower

and spend his evenings at the mountain cabins below the towers, during the most severe fire-season.

During the inevitable march of tourists, hikers, and residents fires threatened.

Summer’s thunderstorm’s, with their lightening bolts,

unleashed raging fury all about him.

He would chronicle chilling accounts of the hairs on the back of his neck telling him,

“Impending bolts of lightening are about to discharge”.

Hopefully innoxiously.

Lightening bolts struck at the mountains where he stood,

where even he would cower, in the energy fields of nature’s lightening,

He would hazard the rages of the severest storms.

As lightning’s matches kindled summers parched tinders,

he would put out the earliest bulletin from his mountain telephone

to salvage the maximum

from the fury of the ravaging storms, opposing his mountains!

After the storms inevitable demise he would scan the skies and the mountains.

When he could report all was well, he would retire to his mountaintop cabin.

He would spend his evenings with a campfire.

His campfire was on the mountain’s granite rock ledge in the fireplace

outside his rustic cabin beside the eaves trough & barrel that had caught the seasons rain.

His rustic cabin was plain and minimally furnished.

Inside he had his handmade furniture.

He had a table, a chair, and a bed.

All these he had made from tree-poles, nature’s-stuff and canvas.

He had a three-legged book table.

The tabletop was a cut from the butt of a tree.

The legs were saplings, plugged into holes he had gouged in this slab

with his big large and very sharp knife.

He had one huge gray/black woolen blanket.

On his table I saw a fire-blackened heavy cast iron pan.

In it was bacon drippings from a recent meal.

He had a kerosene lantern with a wire bail,

in the middle of his table.

I saw his pewter plate, bowl, and mug,

a three tined fork, a big spoon, and a big knife.

I saw metal cans of store-bought food,

and canning jars from home’s pantry shelves.

I saw a recently picked tin can of berries.

There was a citronella pail to ward off the Adirondacks vilest monsters,

the black flies and gnats.

He had a wooden bail-bucket with its own wooden dipper

and wooden butter-bowl washbasin.

Outside his cabin there was a large wooden barrel steel-banded .

In this, he had caught “eaves trough water”.

He liked it best when this barrel was fullest.

Then his work was least.

“Simple is Better”

He loved life to be plain and simple.

He liked it uncomplicated.

“The more things a man has about, the less time a man has about.”

“He Built His Mountain Cabin”

He descended from the mountains after the fire seasons annually.

During the rains of one autumn,

He constructed a new rustic cabin, for his growing family.

He was anticipating your arrival.

At that time I was attending high school at his alma mater and studying industrial arts in shop classes.
I particularly enjoyed studying his hand made mountain cabin.

He built this cabin on the East side of Gore Mountain,

about midway up the mountain on the road to the Garnet Mines.

He had used rough-cut lumber,

from a local sawmill of one of his friends.

He used old nails, old windows but new glass.

He had built by hand, with old tools,

the foundation, the trusses, and the frames.

He used the same rough-cut boards for walls, floors, doors, and the furniture.

The boards of the outside roof, became the ceiling inside his cabin.

I observed the sleeping loft above the big potbelly stove.

I noticed the ladder that became part of the cabin,

nailed to the wall for the lofts access.

I admired the hand made doors, hung on large hinges.

To warm his cozy mountainside shelter he employed a potbelly stove.

On this potbelly stove, he brewed strong mountain coffee.

His mountain coffee had the coffee grounds in the pot with the water and boiled.

He was adept at building his own brand of Adirondack furniture.

After our tour, of his new cabin we relaxed while sitting in his homemade dining chairs, at his homemade dining table.

We were sipping piping hot and bitter mountain coffee.

He enjoyed the role as host.

He reported that the kettle of stew was ready.

He pulled from the oven a large pan of corn bread plump and yellow.

He served his mugs of mountain coffee,

his plates of stew and his pieces of corn bread with imitable humorous anecdotes,

and stories, all fascinating and all entertaining.

We remained enthralled as he would spin his yarns.

It was somewhat like us flipping channels.

He was simultaneously entertaining adults and kids.

Our cousin Neil tells of typical episodes.

While all of his guests were about the cabin eating their cabin lunch,

“Uncle Dutchy” would lean forward toward one victim and remove his big hat

and reveal a large bullfrog that had been concealed there atop his baldhead.

The entertainment value was more than could be tallied.

He would playfully offer the bullfrog to all, for a pet,

especially the women and the girls.

He would have the heartiest belly laugh, which was utterly contagious.

His companion, foot stomping would offer its own amusement value.

“Old is Good”
“Or Practical Ways to Save Money and Having Fun Doing It!”
“  Or Life is Short, Enjoy It!”

I learned that if something was considered antique, or even old-fashioned,

by most others, “Uncle Dutchy” would consider it great!

He would value machines and tools old or new, as he valued a good book.

He saw worth in other people’s old throwaways.

He would collect and collate items, for refurbishing and recycling.

He used a large, powerful, and noisy single piston, two-cycle engine,

that was easily heard for miles around.

This powered a generator to produce electricity, for your Mom.

He used this engine rather than subscribe to the utility company.

Remember this was the transition period of time from no electricity,

to total dependence on electricity.

In addition, one had to think up ways to employ electricity, at first.

Therefore, he used his generators to produce lights for your Mom,

to see to care for you, and to run his radio.

I too, have salvaged the throwaways of others, because of his influence.

” Avant-garde “

Even as a youth, I observed that few others appreciated

this mountain-man,

with the richness of his uniqueness,

as I believe he deserved to be appreciated.

But then again, I wonder…

“How many of us today, express appreciation for each other?”

What I did see in this, big, intentionally extraordinary mountain-man,

some others, did also see.

He preferred, to be unconventional,

on the qui vive and avant-garde.

This was with genuine resolve.

At least it seemed so to me.

Why?  Because!

That was just, who he was!

As I have grown to know him better and better, I think that he felt to himself,

“Why be like everybody else?

Why not be unique?

He was, in my considered opinion, a very special, mountain-man!

He was a one-of-a-kind, kind-da guy!”

I join the rank and file of all those who not only knew him,

but those who also loved him.

I join all those who genuinely appreciated him!

This man positively influences me to this day!

En Agape, & Affectionately,
Cousin Duaine