More Ten-minute Tales

Trouble is Sure to Come

The infamous and disastrous Ghost Dance

Paiute prophet, Wovoka, came face to face with his deceased ancestors in the Land of the Dead. They promised him, he would later relate, they would one day return to their loved ones. As he watched in wonder, he also witnessed a mystical dance. It was a circle dance like many other Paiute rituals, but there was something unusual about this one. The dancers sidestepped left around the circle at an unusually fast pace. In addition, they wore shirts and dresses adorned with magical symbols, including suns, moons, stars, birds, and various animals.

A frenetic drum beat accompanied a series of songs and chants. The words told of the rebirth of an earlier lifestyle. The members of his Paiute nation and the surrounding tribes would be lifted into the sky while the earth was being restored to its former beauty. When the Indians were lowered back to the land, they would be joined by their deceased relatives – now very much alive. Together, they would witness beautiful sprouting flowers and trees, as well as the return of massive herds of bison and elk.

Yes, the world would be peaceful and enchanting – for everyone that is, except the troublesome white settlers who had been steadily encroaching on their land. During the resurgence, according to the vision, they would be unceremoniously sucked into the ground. The images of Wovoka's vision were stamped deeply into his memory. Those pictures seemed especially vivid since his eyes could see nothing other than shadowy outlines, due to an ongoing solar eclipse on the first day of January in 1889.

In his mid-thirties at the time, Wovoka was a shaman, or medicine man, of the Northern Paiute tribe in Nevada. His vision occurred at a time of intense suffering among the Plains Indians of the West. Disease had ravaged their communities, and countless broken treaties left them stripped of their lands, their cultures and their hopes. The prospect of seeing their departed relatives, the return of the buffalo and…not least of all, the disappearance of the white man, was very appealing.

The word of Wovoka's vision soon spread to neighboring tribes. Curious representatives came to hear his prophecy and witness the new ritual dance. When you get home, he would instruct the visitors, you must begin a dance and continue for five days." Wovoka explained that they should dance for four successive nights and on the fifth, they should continue dancing until morning. If enough people did this, he promised, his vision would become reality.

The dance was considered by the Paiute to be a spirit dance because it summoned their dead ancestor's spirits. Soon, the media translated that into Ghost Dance. Wovoka was not the first one to experience a vision about the dance. Twenty years before, another Paiute shaman, Wodziwob, experienced a similar prophetic image. As in Wovoka's vision, their deceased ancestors reappeared, the earth was renewed, and the white settlers eradicated. The earlier version, like Wovoka's, elicited a great deal of attention. After performing the ritual dance with no results, though, most Paiutes abandoned the practice. Perhaps it was the deep despair of the later time period that led to a resurgence of hope. Whatever the reason, the dance and accompanying religion caught on with the frenzied speed of the Ghost Dance itself.

Another component of the new religion was its emphasis on living a good life. Wovoka felt the dance would only work if the participants followed rigid rules. Instead of engaging in their old practices of war, he explained, they must love each other and not fight – even with the white man. Treat one another justly, he assured those visiting his demonstrations, and all evil in the world will be swept away. Somehow, though, as the new belief spread across the country to the Lakota Sioux of the recently established states of North and South Dakota, the emphasis seemed to shift. The participants talked less about the values of honesty, love and peace, and more about the hopeful eradication of the white settlers. Their demeanor during the ceremonies also took on a more ominous tone.

Kicking Bear, a Miniconjou Teton Lakota, had traveled to Nevada, along with a mystic from the same tribe, named Short Bull. When they returned to their Pine Ridge reservation, they reenacted the ritual with their people. Their version was even more harried than Wovoka's, and the dancers often drifted into trances and fell unconscious. As they did, observers from the local Bureau of Indian Affairs as well as nearby settlers, became increasingly alarmed. Their apprehension only increased when they learned the dance's purpose included the eventual elimination of the white man.

In early October of 1890, Kicking Bear met with Sitting Bull at the Standing Rock reservation to seek his approval of the new dance. Although Sitting Bull doubted the ritual's ability to bring dead ancestors to life, he did not object to his people participating in it. He had heard rumors, however, that the Indian agents were so worried about the dance; they had called in soldiers to some of the reservations. He told Kicking Bear that he didn't want any violence to befall his people. If the dancers wore their magical Ghost Dance shirts, Kicking Bear assured him, no bullets would reach them and they would be safe. In response, Sitting Bull allowed Kicking Bear to remain at the Standing Rock reservation to teach the new dance his people.

The Lakota at the Pine Ridge reservation soon poured their energy into the dance. They began making ghost shirts, mostly of white cotton cloth. They painted them blue around the neck and adorned them with the traditional designs of stars and moons, bows and arrows, and varieties of animals. Rows of feathers hung from the sleeves and flew in the breeze as they danced. Many dancers also wore birds or squirrel heads tied in their long hair. To top it all off, their faces were painted red with a black half-moon on the forehead or on one cheek. As the furiously paced dancing progressed, first one, then another would break from the ring, stagger away and fall down. By the end of an evening, as many as 100 participants would lie on the ground unconscious.

Tragically, the result of the volatile fusion of the agitated Lakota and the overzealous soldiers was recorded in blood on the frigid morning of December 29th in 1890. The day before, about 350 Lakota had been marched to a camp in the Pine Ridge reservation, near Wounded Knee Creek. The next morning, the military ordered all Indian weapons to be relinquished and burned. Despite glaring looks and disgusted grunts, the Lakota turned over their weapons without resistance. One of the last men asked was a young Minneconjou named Black Coyote. He was deaf, and was likely unaware of the reason that the soldiers demanded his rifle. Black Coyote defiantly held it above his head, rather than turning it over. Immediately, two soldiers grabbed him and spun him around. In the process, his gun accidentally discharged.

That shot launched a massacre, which included the army's rapid-fire Hotchkiss guns. Many of the previous dancers were still wearing their Ghost Dance shirts and dresses. Sadly, as the horrified Lakota soon realized, the clothes held no magic powers. By the time the smoke cleared, over two hundred men, women and children lie dead. Despite the ominous appearance of the Ghost Dancers and the fervent temperament of the soldiers, the volatile combination never had to mix. A former Indian agent with the improbable name of Valentine McGillycuddy – had previously written a warning to the federal government, which went completely unheeded. If the troops remain, he cautioned, in what was to become a historic understatement, trouble is sure to come.

Handmade Fiddles

and Homemade Fun

The birth of the rollicking radio barn dances

Shortly after the birth of radio itself, fiddle-playing farmers and honky-tonk heroes leaned over huge carbon microphones and filled the air with their music. As they did, country plowboys and hardworking housewives tuned their magic dials and strained their ears to pick them out of the static. The music that the early country radio shows brought to life over the quivering radio waves, was filled with real-world joys and tears. Farmers and mechanics laid down their tools to pick up timeworn fiddles, banjos, and guitars. The stories they sang, told of love, death, heartbreak, and the simple joys of life.

From the Sagebrush Roundup to the Iowa Barn Dance Frolic, they were filled with characters like Slick and Sleepy, Hiram Hayseed, Big-eared Zip," and all the other colorful pickers and grinners. The shows brought the rough-edged simple country fun of a neighborhood Saturday-night barn dance to the millions of town dwellers who may have never had the chance to sweep out the barn and welcome neighbors and friends in for a night of singing and swinging.

The early rural or hillbilly music, not yet universally called country, was played mainly for farmers during the times they were likely to tune in. Being early-risers, after breakfast they went out to their fields for a full morning's work before they headed back to the house for the noon meal and a little rest. Therefore, their favorite music was programmed for the early morning and noontime slots. The shows often had names like Sunrise Serenade or Midday Matinee.

In many cases, the station owners gritted their teeth as they gave the okay to station directors to begin programming the hillbilly format. This low-brow music was often distasteful to their more refined ears. However, they knew that the mixture of the newly invented entertainment form of radio and the old-time melodies from the roots of the country, was a successful blend. As always, when money talks; people listen. While more and more listeners tuned in, advertisers bought time-slots to pitch their products to them. As their profits grew, the radio station owners gritted their teeth a little less often when the early morning fiddlers picked up their bows or the midday pickers tuned their guitars.

Soon, the creative program directors looked for other time slots for this popular rural entertainment. Weekday evenings didn't seem to be a logical choice, since the farm folks were usually early-to-bed types. But what about Saturday night? Even the most hard-working serious-minded farm family didn't mind putting on their best dancing clothes and heading over to a neighbor's barn for a Saturday evening of wholesome family fun. The first Saturday-night barn dance to find life over the radio waves was broadcast in 1923, from WBAP in Fort Worth, Texas. It wasn't long before the word got out to other stations that the successful barn dance format had appealed to a good-sized segment of listeners. Stations like WSB in Atlanta, WNAX in Yankton, South Dakota, and KMA in Shenandoah, joined in.

Although these scattered barn dance formats popped up and gained local fans, none had yet found national recognition. That would come in April of 1924. About a week after going on the air, a Chicago radio station owned by Sears and Roebuck, put on a Saturday-night barn dance show. The show didn't have a very impressive beginning, having been broadcast from a small mezzanine in the Sherman Hotel. It would, however, grow into the granddaddy of the barn dance shows, and would lead the pack into the 1940's. The station's call-letters, WLS, described the Sears and Roebuck building – the World's Largest Store. The WLS Barn Dance would truly become the WLS National Barn Dance.

Throughout the life of this famous show, it tended to follow the format of mixing popular and country music. The show contained a much greater variety of music than most of the barn dances that followed it. Mixed in with the pure hillbilly fiddlers, guitar pickers, and yodelers were popular-music singers and Irish tenors. Sentimental tunes were a staple of many of the Midwestern listeners, who also enjoyed the rural hillbilly style. Down by the Old Mill Stream and In the Shade of the Old Apple Tree poured out through the radio speakers, right along with Bringing Home the Bacon and Little Old Sod Shanty.

During the 1930's, radio barn dances began to spring up in cities everywhere. By 1932, Midwesterners could tune into the Iowa Barn Dance Frolic, out of station WHO in Des Moines. The Wheeling Jamboree originated on WWVA in West Virginia in 1933. Charlotte, North Carolina began broadcasting the Crazy Barn Dance on WBT in 1934. Knoxville turned the noon-time programming into the now-famous Mid-Day Merry-Go-Round. New York's WHN Barn Dance got off the ground in 1935. And in 1937, the Renfro Valley Barn Dance hit the airwaves from WLW in Cincinnati.

The Grand Ole Opry, National Barn Dance, Louisiana Hayride, and the other big-name barn dances have left an indelible mark on the history of country music. Many of the smaller local shows, however, created equally warm memories for those who grew up around those stations. In fact, some of the most memorable characters will only be recalled by the people within the limited signal-range of the small-town stations. Yes, the Hickory Nuts; Cowboy Roy Lykes, the Yodeling Fence Rider; Poslo Bill's Razor Backs; Slick and Sleepy; Hiram Hayseed Godwin and all the rest left indelible memories for their local audiences.

Since many of the entertainers were now being seen by radio studio spectators as well as the audiences at show dates, it was important that they looked like professional entertainers. Little by little, they were setting the stage for the showy sequins and spangles that would become part of the outfits associated with so many country singers of the fifties. That style would reach its peak with the gaudy stage suits made by Nudie Cohen in California. Having several Nudie suits in your wardrobe meant you had made it to the big time. Incidentally, the Nudie name seems appropriate since, before making sequined suits for country musicians, Nudie Cohen created outfits for striptease dancers in New York City.

As the individual country stars began to shine brighter, some of the small radio stations were realizing that the local musicians couldn't always draw the listeners that the better-known singers and bands could. Year by year, more stations began to hook up with nationally syndicated radio shows. Not only that, but between the syndicated programs, the stations were beginning to play records of nationally popular musicians. One by one, the Sunrise Serenades and Mid-day Music shows signed off the air for the last time. In most areas, only the large super-shows like the Opry held on.

It was becoming obvious that the local hillbillies in overalls, who gathered around old carbon microphones with their fiddles, banjos and guitars, would soon be sadly hanging up their instruments and picking up their farm tools and mechanic's wrenches again. Fortunately, the new musicians no longer had to pose in overalls, surrounded by pigs and hay bales. And the listening audience didn't have to hear them fake their hillbilly accents or chew on a piece of straw while they talked. But, then again, those listeners weren't able to close their eyes and be surrounded by the smell of newly swept hay and the warm friendly hillbilly sounds of handmade fiddles and homemade fun.

Oh Say Can She Sing!

Reba McEntire's rodeo national anthem that would

one day bring the country music world to its feet

The sun-dried cowboys were primed and ready to ride. They had racked up a year's worth of hard-earned bruises to get here. And the raging broncos were definitely raring to go. This was their annual chance to buck off America's best, in front of thousands of screaming spectators. Even the bulls had finished dreaming up new ways to dislodge their unwanted cargo. As soon as somebody sang the national anthem, the whole rough-cut cast of characters was prepared to tear loose.

Suddenly a small redhead bounced toward the microphone. Surely they weren't going to let her sing the anthem! After all, this was the 1974 National Finals Rodeo. The Oklahoma City organizers certainly would have found someone with more gusto. The gritty collection of leather-skinned cowboys and wild-eyed beasts definitely needed more to set them off than a trembly-voiced little cowgirl.

The second that little cowgirl began to sing, however, everyone knew why she had been chosen. Her powerful and agile voice reached out like a golden lariat, encircling each audience member. Her performance was not only an ideal beginning for the National Finals Rodeo; it would mark the opening of a career that would send that little redhead on a wild ride that not even the broncos and bulls could have envisioned.

That career opening would spring from a meeting with another redhead. Country-music singer, Red Steagall, happened to be in the rodeo audience that afternoon. Following the performance, a mutual friend introduced him to the dynamic anthem singer – Reba McEntire. At a party later that evening, Reba further impressed Steagall with her rendition of Dolly Parton's Joshua.

After the event, Reba returned to her day-to-day life at Southeastern State College in Durant, Oklahoma. Within about a month, her mother received a phone call from Steagall. He asked if she could get Reba down to Nashville to cut a demonstration tape. He didn't have to ask twice. Along with her mother, Jackie, and her brother, Pake, Reba was soon Nashville-bound.

Her mother not only supported Reba's singing, she had inspired it. As the family traveled from rodeo to rodeo, Jackie McEntire devised a clever way to keep her son and three daughters occupied. She taught them harmony singing. Jackie was a talented singer herself and might have turned professional had she not dedicated her time to her family.

The four children soon soaked up their mother's passion for singing and threw themselves into the music. Month-by-month, the little back-seat quartet began to sound more professional. By the time Reba was in high school, they had transformed into The Singing McEntires. They began entering...and usually winning talent contests. Soon, their mother booked them into rodeos, community centers and clubs as they traveled the circuit. In 1971 they recorded a tribute song to their grandfather – The Ballad of John McEntire. The record became a regional hit.

The popularity of the young group on the circuit would eventually lead to Reba's being selected as the anthem singer for the rodeo finals. The ensuing Nashville demonstration tape would snag her a contract with Mercury Records the following year. But the door she had entered didn't exactly swing wide open. Her first record, I Don't Want to be a One-night Stand, went nowhere. She turned out two more unsuccessful singles in 1977.

Being the practical type, Reba finished college. It would be 1979 before fortune would look her way. Her remake of Patsy Cline's Sweet Dreams climbed to the Top Twenty. The next couple of years yielded two Top-ten hits – (You Lift Me) Up to Heaven, and Today All Over Again. The climb was often frustrating for her, despite her scattered successes.

Once, Reba remembered, nearly everything had gone wrong during a show. As she sat in her van grumbling, her cousin asked her why she didn't simply quit. That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life, she fired back. I'll never quit! At that moment, she realized that backing away from her goal of becoming a successful country-music singer was simply not an option.

Her determination stemmed from her youthful experience in the rodeo game. She followed in the footsteps of her world champion' steer-roping father, Clark McEntire. Her grandfather, John, had been the rodeo legend she and her siblings sang about. As a teenager, Reba competed in horseback barrel riding. Just 'cause you're a girl, she reflected, they're not gonna cut you any slack, so I never asked for it from the beginning.

Her perseverance paid off. She was finally getting recognition in the country music field. In 1982, her producer suggested she record a song titled, Can't Even Get the Blues. Reba resisted. She hadn't had much luck with emotional ballads and thought she should concentrate on upbeat numbers. But her producer recognized the song's potential and insisted that she record it. That insistence produced Reba's first Number-one hit.

With her 1984 album, My Kind of Country, Reba took off like a bronco out of the gate. The best-selling album was packed with hits like How Blue and Somebody Should Leave. The album showcased her unique sound perfectly. She decorated her strong voice with the trills, twirls and near-yodels of the old-time mountain songs. The beautiful mixture not only opened the door to her future career, it blew the hinges off.

That year, 1984, the Country Music Association selected her as Female Vocalist of the Year. Both the CMA and the AMC would present her with that award for an unprecedented four years running. In 1986, the CMA awarded her its highest honor – Entertainer of the Year.

Despite the continuing deluge of praise and awards, Reba has retained the soul of a little redheaded cowgirl. Following her 1987 divorce from rodeo hero, Charlie Battles, a disturbed fan wrote to ask how Reba could possibly get a divorce. I was patterning my life after you, she complained. Don't you dare put me on a pedestal, Reba fired back. I'm just a regular old human being.

The Inexhaustible Gun

Samuel Hancock is able to bluff his way to

safety from an attack by angry Snohomish

Indians, using an inexhaustible gun

Young Samuel Hancock knew the fifteen Snohomish warriors intended to kill him. As they yelled and danced, clothed only in black paint dotted with bright red spots, they frantically slashed the air with their huge knives. There was no confusing their intentions. They planned to serve up the same fate to Hancock they had dished out to his two predecessors – death.

The night before, the Virginia-born Samuel Hancock had been allowed to pitch his tent near the lodgings of the village chief. The residents of the Snohomish village in the Puget Sound area were on their guard. They had originally greeted Hancock and his two guides from another nearby tribe, with a wary silence. As the three poled their canoe ashore, Hancock knew