THE (after) LIFE OF THE PARTY

   “Fear is in the mind, but except in pathological cases has its origin in external circumstances that are truly threatening.”- Yi Fu Tuan, Landscapes of Fear 

    

     I’ve always been afraid and insecure. I overcome this by acting like a loud fool and pretending I’m not afraid of anything. It’s a defense mechanism. I’m still scared to death. 

    In 2003 I read in the Sunday morning paper of a black minister who had set up shop a few towns over, in Woodbourne. It being Sunday, I jumped in the car and headed for the 11:00 am service. Arriving at a shabby, old Borsht Belt hotel repurposed as a church, I parked the car and looked around. There was a Bentley in the driveway, alongside a lot of Toyotas and old Chevys. The members of the congregation eyed me suspiciously, as I seemed to be the only white face in the crowd. A “Farrakhan” looking gentlemen in dark suit and bow tie came over and asked if he could help me? I told him I was a minister of a church a few ridges to the south (even though I’d yet to have a service upstate) and just wanted to welcome the congregation to the neighborhood. His attitude immediately changed and he asked if I wanted to meet the Bishop? Why not.

   Bishop Elijah Bernard Jordon, who styled himself as a “Prosperity Preacher,” was a follower of Rev. Ike, a famous black preacher whose theology embraced the almighty dollar. The picture in the Sunday paper showed him standing on a pile of cash. Jordon’s Zoe Ministries was started in Brooklyn and (like my church) had moved to the Catskills. I introduced myself and The Church of the Little Green Man. The Bishop shook my hand and asked “Is that an ecology church?” Of course it is. After a short conversation I was asked if I wanted to say a few words to the congregation? Why not.

    Here’s where fear comes in the picture. I had no idea what to say to a room full of African American acolytes in their Sunday best. My knees were shaking. So I repeated my “welcome to the neighborhood,” narrative, hoping I would not be run out of the building. Then, I told the congregation that we had something in common—money. I continued after a few “amens” and a “wow!” “In my church we burn money.” The air went out of the room. I felt their icy stares. “But…” I quickly added, “You only have to burn a dollar. Any more than that is a big sin.” I had ‘em. They laughed, raised their hands in agreement and invited me to join them at Sunday dinner. Why not. The “wows” were coming from a familiar looking brother in the first pew. Turned out the owner of that Bentley was Reverend “Run” Simmons of Run-DMC. I was warmly welcomed into the fold, sitting at the main table with the Bishop and the Simmons family, my fear vanquished. I went back a few times, but couldn’t get behind the whole “give me your last dollar,” theology. Amen.          

    In a letter written to Ward Rugg in Kalkasha, MI., upon the death of his brother Wilbur, Rev. Dr. Smith Stanley Osterhout wrote:

 “We buried your brother yesterday in our city cemetery about a mile out of town, on a slope between the foothills and the river Thompson. The location is a very pretty one and the spot is marked so that it can be identified at any future time….There is not property belonging to your brother, except an old camp stove, camp bed, and blankets, which I suggest might be given to a neighbor…who was carrying in his wood for him, being unable to do that for himself….From the first time I prayed with him in his little tent by the river, he responded earnestly to all my prayers in his behalf…I hear your brother did some prospecting in the north, but whether he was able to discover anything of value I do not know. He died without making a will, perhaps having nothing to leave behind…. 

Sincerely S.S. Osterhout, Box 168 Kamloops, B.C.

P.S. Your brother had $60 cash when he arrived. He spent $15 before I brought him from the river bank and remaining $45 went to his funeral.”

   Forty-five dollars seems like a high price for hole and few words in the 1890’s. That’s all the dead prospector, Wilbur Rugg, had left. My church has a cemetery down the road, open to all comers. I promise not to burn the last dollar in your pocket, just to scatter your ashes. Donations welcome.

    I do have a will. Everything (ha!) goes to Mrs. Osterhout. That’s not to say, that if you want something specific that you can’t come claim it early. I know Jeremy wants that dusty, carved toad on the piano, and if she ever learns to drive, Teddy (my step daughter) can have whatever clunker I leave in the driveway. Like my mother used to say, “If you want it, put your name on it.” When she died everything was marked— Susan Lee Osterhout Sojka.      

     

    Nobody knew who started the rumor. Maybe it was the drunken surgeons from the Orange County Medical Society, angry over not receiving Jack Hodges’ body for dissection, or Jack Penney, still fuming over missing the execution and having to dig the grave. Or maybe somebody had read Mary Shelley’s new book Frankenstein. In any case it didn’t take long before people were whispering that Dunning had arisen, as reports of his reanimated corpse, seen walking around Sugar Loaf the same night he had been executed, began to filter through the community. This was no joke to the authorities. Had anybody checked Dunning’s pulse before burying him? How deep was the grave? How many nails did they put in the coffin lid? Did they even bother to nail it? Had two necks snapped, or maybe just one? Buried alive was not an uncommon occurrence in 1819. 

    According to The Orange County Patriot, on the evening of April 27,1819, eleven days after the execution, a group of villagers, led by Jack Penney and Ainsi Ball, gathered and set out for Dunning’s grave site to settle the ghostly argument. The surgeons and medical students would not be denied their chance at examining a corpse, (if there was one) and the rest of the crowd were just drunk, and curious. Scalpels at the ready, the medical students followed Ball and Penney to the grave. Not trusting Penney had properly buried Dunning, Ainzi Ball fully expected to come upon a turned over, empty coffin, with Dunning long gone. 

      You can imagine Ball and Penney’s relief when the coffin was dug up and David Dunning’s rotting corpse lay there, glassy eyed, mouth agape, undisturbed—dead as ever. With kerchiefs to their noses and mouths, the students gingerly lifted the rapidly decomposing body, put it on a cart and headed to back to their laboratory with their putrid prize. They would finally have their dissection. The townsfolk, (and Teed and Dunning) could finally rest in peace. The conspiracy was snuffed out; dead and buried. Hodges and Conklin would be sent off to serve out their sentences in prison and Hannah Teed could fade away into obscurity. Jack Penney was pleased. It looked like he’d finally done something right. 

   

 END OF PART ONE