Speaker 1: They run one vehicle up behind him and running another
Speaker 1: one up and parked in front of the car and
Speaker 1: open fire. Dad bailed out and he said, he he said,
Speaker 1: I just ran, he said, and I ran hard. He said.
Speaker 1: There was two ba bar fences. I don't remember jumping
Speaker 1: any one of them. On this episode of the Bargaras Podcast,
Speaker 1: we're going to continue building a biographical sketch of Louis
Speaker 1: Dell and Charlie Edwards, two Southern characters known for being
Speaker 1: turkey hunting outlaws, but also beloved men in their community.
Speaker 1: By most we'll be diving into the Moonshine incident and
Speaker 1: giving some backing for why people said they were rough men.
Speaker 1: You're gonna hear about some fighting and some gun plays,
Speaker 1: so if you're sensitive to such talk, be advised. But
Speaker 1: if you want a picture into the American South, these
Speaker 1: guys will deliver. These men were connected to the land
Speaker 1: and it shaped their identity. Having known them my whole life,
Speaker 1: I'm unashamed by how much I like these guys, but
Speaker 1: conflicted by how much I disagree with some of the
Speaker 1: stuff they did. Life is a paradox, and linear equations
Speaker 1: built for judgment don't always add up. This episode is
Speaker 1: a character sketch of two modern colorful characters. Their lives
Speaker 1: were just straight up entertaining and intriguing. I doubt you're
Speaker 1: gonna want to miss this one. And hey, stick around
Speaker 1: to the very end and you'll hear me and Game
Speaker 1: Warden Jimmy Martin relive the run in that I had
Speaker 1: with him when I was sixteen years old. According to
Speaker 1: game laws, they were poaching. According to our forefathers, they
Speaker 1: were doing what they were supposed to. They grew up
Speaker 1: with that mentality right Eron's Valley, and it still exists
Speaker 1: to point we're more civilized now. Yeah. Yeah. My name
Speaker 1: is Clay Nukelem and this is the Bear Grease Podcast,
Speaker 1: where we'll explore things forgotten but relevant, search for insight
Speaker 1: and unlikely places, and where we'll tell the story of
Speaker 1: Americans who lived their lives close to the land. Presented
Speaker 1: by f HF Gear American Maid, purpose built hunting and
Speaker 1: fishing gear that's designed to be as rugged as the
Speaker 1: places we explore. In Part one of our Genuine Outlaw series,
Speaker 1: we introduced you to two brothers by the name of
Speaker 1: Louis Dell and Charlie Edwards from Big Fork Arkansas in
Speaker 1: the western wah Hitals. If you haven't listened to it,
Speaker 1: you've got to for all this to make sense. Charlie
Speaker 1: passed away in at the age of seventy three, and
Speaker 1: Louis del in one at the age of seventy six.
Speaker 1: I expressed my inner conflict in telling their story because
Speaker 1: there is a risk of glamorizing breaking the laws and outlawing,
Speaker 1: but being true to our mission. I love telling the
Speaker 1: stories of people who live their lives close to the land,
Speaker 1: especially in the South, and without a doubt, my whole life,
Speaker 1: I've been intrigued by these men. I think it's an
Speaker 1: apropos time to clarify the intent of telling this story.
Speaker 1: It is not to decide if breaking game laws is
Speaker 1: right or wrong. We all know the answer to that.
Speaker 1: What it is is an intriguing look into human nature.
Speaker 1: Often we gravitate towards stories that are far outside of
Speaker 1: our personal experience. I've never been an intentional law breaker
Speaker 1: or fighter, but these boys were. They're real deal characters
Speaker 1: that shaped my view of rural Arkansas. You see, I
Speaker 1: grew up in the same community as Louis Dell and Charlie,
Speaker 1: and I was heavily influenced by my father, Gary Knucom,
Speaker 1: a small town banker who would come home from work
Speaker 1: and tell me stories about people he had met and
Speaker 1: done business with. At the time, he nor I would
Speaker 1: know how influential his storytelling would be in my life.
Speaker 1: It taught me to value people of all types, and
Speaker 1: he told me stories about Louis Dell and Charlie. But
Speaker 1: the knowledge of these stories didn't push me to want
Speaker 1: to break game laws. It was clear he valued them
Speaker 1: for other reasons, and he still does. A window into
Speaker 1: their life gave me a broader picture of the reality
Speaker 1: of the world, a world that he knew I would
Speaker 1: have to live in. The intent of exploring this story
Speaker 1: is to help us evaluate our own biases, to search
Speaker 1: for oocracies, and to see the bigger story that most
Speaker 1: people have. Humans can't be described in totality by a
Speaker 1: single descriptor or label. Life is sometimes gray. We don't
Speaker 1: function well in those gray areas. Lastly, I hope this
Speaker 1: story fortifies a culture of putting the wildlife resource first
Speaker 1: by obeying science back to game laws. Being a poacher
Speaker 1: isn't complex. You either is one or you ain't one.
Speaker 1: But this story about Louis Dell and Charlie. Their life
Speaker 1: is complex, and I'm not trying to decide whether I'm
Speaker 1: okay with people being outlaws. I'm trying to make sense
Speaker 1: of why people love them so much, and in the
Speaker 1: same breath, understand how they were such rough characters. A
Speaker 1: little backstory from episode one, we learned that the Edwards
Speaker 1: brothers came from a family of moonshiners, and their uncle
Speaker 1: and his coon dog were killed by police in the
Speaker 1: ninth twenty six traffic stop gone Bad. These men were
Speaker 1: known for killing a lot of turkeys and evading the
Speaker 1: law with almost a supernatural ease, and they worked hard
Speaker 1: at everything they did, including outlaw on we learned they
Speaker 1: were generous and forthright, genuine even people used to the
Speaker 1: scripture of pure But one thing is for sure, you
Speaker 1: didn't want to cross them. Here's Stony Edwards, the son
Speaker 1: of Charlie. He'll get us going into a string of
Speaker 1: stories highlighting their rougher side. Get ready for a few rumbles.
Speaker 1: They were as nice as can be, either one of them,
Speaker 1: but they didn't have a whole lot of push to
Speaker 1: The fuse was about that long and as long as
Speaker 1: everything was going good and you were treating them as
Speaker 1: well as they would treat using. You're fine, but then
Speaker 1: you get on the bad side. And we were rough fellers.
Speaker 1: I mean, they didn't believe in I will call the
Speaker 1: law on you. They were gonna take care of it
Speaker 1: theirselfs Do you remember several years ago there what was
Speaker 1: the guy's name, How big old boy? Are you? Hard mercer? Well,
Speaker 1: you know Pete Hillard and Jackie Ryan. They got this
Speaker 1: great idea to call on Gloodell because they knew that
Speaker 1: that would stir him up. And I don't remember who
Speaker 1: they put, Oh they did. They got on the phone. Well,
Speaker 1: we lived over here at dill Back Place at the time,
Speaker 1: and I was about twenty, I guess, and here come
Speaker 1: Uncloodell sliding into the yard. I mean he said, y'all
Speaker 1: get in. We got take care of Now. You think
Speaker 1: I'm joking, But when we left the house, every one
Speaker 1: of us had a gunning ring. This wasn't gonna be
Speaker 1: no barroom brawl crap. This was well, we got down
Speaker 1: there and it was Jackie and peace and uh so Louis,
Speaker 1: I mean Louis Dell was ready to it was. He
Speaker 1: was ready for a shootout whatever it was gonna take
Speaker 1: him and Dad both were really hard people are That's
Speaker 1: how they came off. When you grow up like they did, though,
Speaker 1: it was you gotta have that shell out there. That
Speaker 1: was their protection. And then when they left here and
Speaker 1: went to the city, they were dumb hillbillies according to
Speaker 1: the city people, but they had that shell. Well. Everything
Speaker 1: with them, too, was a fight. They didn't believe in
Speaker 1: all the talking stuff. You just got walked. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know, I've heard stories of a lot of our fights. Yeah,
Speaker 1: if only that phone call could have been recorded. Whatever
Speaker 1: they said pushed Louis Dell to the edge. These brothers
Speaker 1: had a stark and temperamental sense of justice. They didn't
Speaker 1: do well with a lot of talking. Here's knee Old Taylor,
Speaker 1: a good friend of the brothers. You know, Old Lois
Speaker 1: del There's a lot of people that morning, Mike lud
Speaker 1: mad h. I'm gonna tell you what, And you could
Speaker 1: make him mad pretty easy. Charlie it was hard to
Speaker 1: make mad, but Charlie is the one he wanted to watch.
Speaker 1: He got mad because he was tougher and mean. Really,
Speaker 1: everyone I spoke with said the same thing about Charlie.
Speaker 1: He was tough here's Stony And for a little info,
Speaker 1: The Candle Light is a bar on the edge of Oklahoma.
Speaker 1: I was probably six and he had been over at
Speaker 1: the Candlelight. They were shooting pool, which my dad loved
Speaker 1: shoot pulling, and he had won a few games. And
Speaker 1: he always wore a great, big old black leather cowboy hat.
Speaker 1: I mean I remember him wearing one till the brim
Speaker 1: on it was just nobs and he had sewed it
Speaker 1: back together himself to three times. He was over there
Speaker 1: that night and Uh, a man stood up and said,
Speaker 1: I bet I can knock cut some hat off and
Speaker 1: he won't do a thing about it. Well, he made
Speaker 1: about two steps across the floor before Dad hit him
Speaker 1: with a Q stick and he went down. He was done.
Speaker 1: A couple of weeks later, they cornered Dad to go,
Speaker 1: you know, bear to go, and uh went shooting at him. Well,
Speaker 1: Dad bailed out of the car and off out across
Speaker 1: the retaliating for what had happened. Well, they they run
Speaker 1: one vehicle up behind him and running another one up
Speaker 1: and parked in front of the car and opened fire.
Speaker 1: And yeah, he Dad bailed out and he said he
Speaker 1: he said, I just ran He said and I ran
Speaker 1: hard and said. A couple of hours later he was
Speaker 1: coming back. I want to get back to the car,
Speaker 1: you know, And uh he said, there was two baby
Speaker 1: our fences. I don't remember jumping in one of them.
Speaker 1: Dad got into uh more of that stuff, and uh,
Speaker 1: Uncle Adelle did. Uncle Ade was a little he was
Speaker 1: just as rough, but he was a little more settled
Speaker 1: about it. But as far as their heart went, they
Speaker 1: do anything for for a friend or for somebody that
Speaker 1: needed them. But they didn't want everybody to know about
Speaker 1: it because that would affect that shell that they wouldn't
Speaker 1: be tough guys. Anymore. Interesting analysis from Stony about them
Speaker 1: developing a hardened shell. It seems the catalysts of this
Speaker 1: hardness worked both ways. It made them deeply loyal and
Speaker 1: devoted to friends, and it made them dangerous if you
Speaker 1: cross them. Y'all remember Andy Brown here he is recalling
Speaker 1: a story of a bar fight in Texas. If you remember,
Speaker 1: these brothers worked out of state a fair bit in
Speaker 1: the city. Oh Loudell talk hells a story about what
Speaker 1: they were down there in DALYs of work. He said,
Speaker 1: got that other one night, so it went to a
Speaker 1: bar and he said, we walked in. He said, I
Speaker 1: ain't been that bar ten minutes he said, he said, oh,
Speaker 1: broke loose back there in the dangpool room. He said.
Speaker 1: I looked around, and I said, where Charlie. He said,
Speaker 1: he said he went back there and he said here
Speaker 1: old Charlie that he said, Man, he's find the big
Speaker 1: old boys. And he said, he said that old boy
Speaker 1: and he whooped, he said, and he said about that time,
Speaker 1: he said that old boy went to screaming and take
Speaker 1: it on. And he said he finally looked. He said,
Speaker 1: old Charlie was just taking bitens clugs out of me.
Speaker 1: Tried to get away from him. Uh, it doesn't and
Speaker 1: he whooped. He said, he went to their blugs out
Speaker 1: of him. Wow, I can imagine a few people got
Speaker 1: surprised by these outwardly unassuming hillbillies. You remember were Stoney
Speaker 1: mentioning Jackie Ryan Prank calling Louis Dell, Well, this is
Speaker 1: Jackie telling a story about the brothers. I was doing
Speaker 1: a job in Dallas and they went down to a
Speaker 1: club and uh, Charlie playing pool and and uh he
Speaker 1: got in fat. I mean they getting he gets uh
Speaker 1: you know it over money. I'm sure they're probably having
Speaker 1: a bed. And Charlie he was good a bought both
Speaker 1: of them is good pool shooters. And uh, but but
Speaker 1: he gets in the fat in there, and there was
Speaker 1: other people around and and uh, Louie got out there
Speaker 1: truck and got his pistol and and I think the
Speaker 1: fat he had moved outside or got outside, and there
Speaker 1: was people around him while he was at the pistol
Speaker 1: out and and Ann was keeping everybody off of them
Speaker 1: while they was fat, and you know, and make sure
Speaker 1: nobody get it bobbed, you know. And uh, I think
Speaker 1: Charlie had used cuesdick on the game, you know. And
Speaker 1: and there there was another part of it where he uh,
Speaker 1: he chumped down on he's there. I know he did,
Speaker 1: but he's uh. And Charlie had fathered face and they
Speaker 1: he been a chunk guys there, that's what he did.
Speaker 1: These guys weren't afraid to pull a gun or to
Speaker 1: bite you. They played by their own rules. Like Andy said,
Speaker 1: that's just the way it happened. Here's Andy with another one.
Speaker 1: They were Dallas or Fort Worth putting in drop ceilings
Speaker 1: for Walmart store, and uh, anyway, everything was kind of
Speaker 1: open and anyway they had some old boys come in
Speaker 1: there and kind of put in on them, and uh,
Speaker 1: it was Charlie in Louddale in Vernon, Ryan Vernon was
Speaker 1: working with him. This guy was yeen with with Loue Dell.
Speaker 1: He was up on the scissor lift and Vernon said,
Speaker 1: the whole time he's y yang and telling Loudell what
Speaker 1: he's gonna do to him. He said, Charlie is slipping
Speaker 1: up on that guy. He said he's got a claw Himer.
Speaker 1: He said, he's got it in his hand. In Vernon.
Speaker 1: Of course, Vernon says he's watching all this and watching
Speaker 1: Charlie and he said, Charlie walks up behind that guy,
Speaker 1: he said, with a claw in and he draws back
Speaker 1: and Vernon said, I went, oh, whoa, whoa like it,
Speaker 1: you know, And that guy saw him, but he said
Speaker 1: Charlie was fixing and knocked him in the head with
Speaker 1: that claw. Hammer said, but anyway, the guy kept telling
Speaker 1: on Liddell, I'm gonna go get get my bunch and
Speaker 1: I'll be back. And Loudelle said, that's exactly what you
Speaker 1: guys need to do. And he said when that guy
Speaker 1: walked off, Loudelle got down off his sister left, went
Speaker 1: to his truck and I don't know, Clay, if you've
Speaker 1: ever heard about the trust and the stories, he had
Speaker 1: a rifle, that's all he ever deer hunted with. And anyway,
Speaker 1: he went and got the five, put it on. The
Speaker 1: sister left and got back up in the deal and
Speaker 1: just kept working. And he kept working. But Loudell was
Speaker 1: a great shot. I mean, when you run, when you
Speaker 1: run deer with dogs, you've gotta be And then boys,
Speaker 1: they wouldn't knew what happened if they had come back.
Speaker 1: They never came back. No, they never come back. Thank god.
Speaker 1: You know Verdon is scared to death or gonna come up. Yeah. Man,
Speaker 1: it sounds like you wouldn't want to cross these boys.
Speaker 1: And I'll tell you another thing that would not be
Speaker 1: advisable would be messing with their dogs. This is a
Speaker 1: longtime friend of the Edwards brothers, Jerry Dean Pickett. Well,
Speaker 1: it was a dear season and we had been running
Speaker 1: the dogs. There's a gap in there dogs. When I
Speaker 1: was gap. We didn't kill the deer, but anyway, the
Speaker 1: dog was checking it out. He had him with tracking
Speaker 1: colors on and we come around are catching the dogs
Speaker 1: and he said, one of my dog right up here,
Speaker 1: on the right up here, and we drove up this
Speaker 1: feller's house. He got out and he said, with my
Speaker 1: dogs around here, right here close. He said, yeah, your
Speaker 1: colors were on the woodpile. He said, I killed your
Speaker 1: dog up there, and yeah, LOUI ain't never threatened him,
Speaker 1: He never said nothing, but he just kept walking to him.
Speaker 1: And when he got hands of him, he spatted him
Speaker 1: when bouncing across him. Rocks and as a feller from
Speaker 1: Texas hunting with this other fellow, I don't forgot his name,
Speaker 1: and uh, Louis went to working on him. I'm telling you,
Speaker 1: working on him. You're you're here, you're watching. I'm standing
Speaker 1: right there and that other feller standing of workers. I
Speaker 1: knew what was fending to happen when he said he
Speaker 1: kill that dog, and I figured the other feller getting it,
Speaker 1: but he didn't. Finally he hollered the whole hold Louis,
Speaker 1: he didn't kill you, dough. So he stopped and he
Speaker 1: told me, said asked him a question, He said, why
Speaker 1: did you tell me you killed my dog? He never
Speaker 1: would say, tell him, so he got his collar. He
Speaker 1: got off fellow and he told him he said, I'm
Speaker 1: going back to my house. My dog don't come home.
Speaker 1: I'm coming back over and finished when I started, and
Speaker 1: that's how Louis said, went on to the house. Sure enough,
Speaker 1: the dog did come home. So so the guy was
Speaker 1: just messing with Louis. Well, I guess, but Loui Dea
Speaker 1: was't the type that you can mess with. He wasn't
Speaker 1: gonna argue with you. It was just him and Charlie both.
Speaker 1: You know, they didn't mind falling down the dirt, will
Speaker 1: you if that's what you want to do. Now that
Speaker 1: that's the part of them, I'm still trying to put
Speaker 1: together the pieces because they were such like you get
Speaker 1: this one feeling that they were just the nicest guys
Speaker 1: in the world, which they were. I want to hear
Speaker 1: how you connect the nicest guy in the world to
Speaker 1: a guy that'll just fight you in a second? How
Speaker 1: did that? How does that? Have you ever been in
Speaker 1: there where people go to argon and you know, carrying on? Well,
Speaker 1: I just want to time Charlie want nobody to tangle with.
Speaker 1: So Charlie was the was a real tough guy, and
Speaker 1: Louis was bad. But Charlie got more scrapped and Louis
Speaker 1: did if you gen the beer, join or anywhere and
Speaker 1: you got to won't argue with him. It was just
Speaker 1: on Well, they shaved me three years old. He was
Speaker 1: still laying block. Charlie was really he was still land
Speaker 1: block at seventy three years that he was drown How
Speaker 1: how big were they? You know? I knew when I
Speaker 1: was a kid. Louis was about my side. Carl It
Speaker 1: was a little bit taller than Louis and he was.
Speaker 1: They were both solid, yea stocky guys. Hands would big.
Speaker 1: Both of them had big hand when you shook hands,
Speaker 1: whether you could feel it. I find it a healthy
Speaker 1: practice to peer into a world foreign too your own.
Speaker 1: I've never been a fighter, nor would I condone violence
Speaker 1: as a productive means of solving disputes. But I do
Speaker 1: admire their certainty to continue on in our study of
Speaker 1: these brothers. I'm gonna read from a newspaper clipping from
Speaker 1: the nineteen nine edition of the Mina Star. The headline
Speaker 1: of this newspaper says big fort Man arrested and charged
Speaker 1: with a legal whiskey still operation. A big fort Man
Speaker 1: has been released a ten thousand dollar property bond after
Speaker 1: being charged with the operation of the legal whisky whiskey
Speaker 1: still near the Polk Pike County line. Louis D. Edwards, forty,
Speaker 1: will be arraigned Monday in Polk County Circuit courts, according
Speaker 1: to Polk County Sheriff Fred Niblock. Niblock said it is
Speaker 1: the first still confiscated in Polk County in approximately eleven years.
Speaker 1: Officers also confiscated three hundred and five pounds of what
Speaker 1: is believed to be deer meat, fifty to seventy five
Speaker 1: pounds of what is believed to be turkey meat, along
Speaker 1: with fifty two turkey beards at the house. According to the
Speaker 1: the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, Enforcement officers officers found
Speaker 1: an operational whiskey still, a hundred and sixty five gallons
Speaker 1: of fermating mash, and partially filled wooden barrel containing approximately
Speaker 1: twenty gallons of whiskey at edwards residence in Big Fork,
Speaker 1: according to Nibblock. Also found were several gallon and half
Speaker 1: gallon jars of whiskey. The officers sees the loaded shotgun
Speaker 1: and several cartons of rifle and shot ammunition at the site,
Speaker 1: along with the nineteen four Chevrolet four wheel drive pickup
Speaker 1: containing a bottle of what the officers believed to be
Speaker 1: illegal whiskey. Also confiscated where sugar yeast, corn starter mash,
Speaker 1: and utensils believed to have been used in the illegal
Speaker 1: production of whiskey. Hey had a really nice set up.
Speaker 1: I'll be dar Do you remember that as a kid.
Speaker 1: I wasn't a kid. I was in the United States
Speaker 1: Army when that What year was that? N Here's Neil
Speaker 1: Taylor with what happened in the Moonshine raid. There was
Speaker 1: a guy come over to buy some fish. You know,
Speaker 1: Louie used to raise catfish. Louie had a little steel
Speaker 1: learned in the fish room, and they were just making
Speaker 1: it for himself and mainly a few of his friends
Speaker 1: out there. You know. Hey gave us old boys un well,
Speaker 1: they got drunk, got caught, told the more he got it,
Speaker 1: you know. So they sent a sheriff Montgomery count here
Speaker 1: over in pair of camouflage and talking about turkey hunting,
Speaker 1: you know, and and one off knew any place had some. Well,
Speaker 1: Louis gave him a court a game shot. That's good
Speaker 1: that can I buy something? And not that I ain't
Speaker 1: gonna sell it to you, but he said, I'll give
Speaker 1: you a chuard of it. And Old Fred Neblake he
Speaker 1: was sheriff and it was re election and he thought
Speaker 1: that that would get him reelected. Oh, it was kind
Speaker 1: of a political move. Well to some extent it was
Speaker 1: he and they were just after and you know the
Speaker 1: game Mordens eight was all in it in Ah. Oh.
Speaker 1: Look he was there at the house one morning and
Speaker 1: he's camo overalls and barefoot didn't and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: long cars started pulling up in the front yard. Old
Speaker 1: went out there and Old Fred he stepped out. He said,
Speaker 1: what't going on? Fred? And I was I was kind
Speaker 1: of afraid going out there, you know what he might do.
Speaker 1: And he's, well, look you know what we heard. You
Speaker 1: had some uh well that he was making whiskey out here,
Speaker 1: and Laris said, so he said, are you the smile
Speaker 1: said the best whiskey you ever tasted. And so they
Speaker 1: coming learned. Of course the game wardens they had there's
Speaker 1: been they had been after him all his life, and
Speaker 1: they coming there and they took Mete out of the
Speaker 1: freezers and they got turkey beards he kept through the years.
Speaker 1: And I don't know they had him for about twenty
Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of game violations, and he was up.
Speaker 1: They heading to jail. I took him to jail, of course,
Speaker 1: and as upper and coming in, and I said, Lari said,
Speaker 1: we've got you for this, this, this now. If you'll
Speaker 1: plead guilty to the here said we'll drop it down
Speaker 1: to in thousand and he said, boys, he said, I'm
Speaker 1: not going to plead guilty to it. Fine. It wound up.
Speaker 1: They didn't. I like it, coughed him about Tian Graham
Speaker 1: on Whishkey making for the record. The idea that the
Speaker 1: raid was a political move by the sheriff isn't really
Speaker 1: known for sure, but it was the speculation of many.
Speaker 1: The Moonshine raid also included a game and fish raid. However,
Speaker 1: all the wildlife violations were dropped. It's unclear to me
Speaker 1: if it was because of faulty procedure in the raid
Speaker 1: making the evidence unusable in court, or if they just
Speaker 1: couldn't prove that all the wildlife was taken illegally. According
Speaker 1: to the family, the game and fish had to bring
Speaker 1: back all the meat and return it to the Edwards freezer.
Speaker 1: So according to the law, Louis del was innocent of
Speaker 1: the wildlife violations. On a completely irrelevant and tragic side note,
Speaker 1: Sheriff Fred Niblock would later become the mayor of Cove, Arkansas,
Speaker 1: and in night he was murdered by a disgruntled seventy
Speaker 1: eight year old man upset about an eighteen dollar water bill.
Speaker 1: The story made national news because the murderer had ridden
Speaker 1: his lawnmower to the city hall and also used it
Speaker 1: as a getaway vehicle. David Letterman made a joke about
Speaker 1: the incident on his Late night show, bringing Arkansas into
Speaker 1: the national spotlight for the eccentric murder. I bet you
Speaker 1: weren't expecting that. Here's some more of the back story
Speaker 1: on Louis Dell's moonshining from Jerry Deane Pickett that paints
Speaker 1: a little different light on it. For some info, Mr
Speaker 1: Mack was Louis Dell's father who only had one hand.
Speaker 1: Mr Mack he had done his grandpa and his daddy
Speaker 1: and the old mate whiskey, and Mr Mack had a recipe.
Speaker 1: And Louis Dale told me all along. He said, you know,
Speaker 1: I ain't never made no whiskey, but I'd like to
Speaker 1: make it one time. Just see if I can, and
Speaker 1: so he ended up getting to steal. He was making whiskey.
Speaker 1: He was already making it out there and buying his
Speaker 1: house In't it a little garage I called it. He
Speaker 1: wasn't making it to sell or make a living. He
Speaker 1: just making it see if he could make Him and
Speaker 1: Charlie I think he'd ruined about Tim Gallands at the time.
Speaker 1: Did that bother him that he got that they busted
Speaker 1: him for that? No, really, it just I mean he
Speaker 1: had to pay a lot of money though didn't well,
Speaker 1: he had to get a lawyer affirt Main and they
Speaker 1: had to go to court and all that, But it
Speaker 1: didn't bother He wasn't mad about that. I mean, but
Speaker 1: Louis never I never heard him say a horse word
Speaker 1: against none of them he called him really so he
Speaker 1: just was kind of okay with him. Yeah, he got
Speaker 1: Uh was he embarrassed about it? You think? Just kind
Speaker 1: of like just another day on Edwards Farm. He wanted
Speaker 1: to see if he could make it. But they wasn't
Speaker 1: making it to make money. They just Louis wanted just
Speaker 1: he wanted to see if he could make it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've tried several times to get him to give me
Speaker 1: Max recipe, and he's to say, oh, jee, you don't
Speaker 1: need that his recipe. It just gets you intro him.
Speaker 1: That's all he would. He wouldn't give you till the
Speaker 1: day he died. He never give me that recipe. Everybody
Speaker 1: agrees that Louis Dell never made moonshine again. If you remember,
Speaker 1: on the first episode the game Warden, Jimmy Martin made
Speaker 1: some statements about how he never caught Louis Dell and Charlie,
Speaker 1: which was correct because during his career nobody ever caught him. However,
Speaker 1: before Jimmy Martin became a game warden, they were caught
Speaker 1: for illegal turkey hunting when they were young. Here's Neil
Speaker 1: Taylor telling about the brothers getting caught. Let me go back,
Speaker 1: let me go back. Before we was at just a
Speaker 1: minute ago. I said that Louis never got caught. In Charlie,
Speaker 1: they did get caught one time when they first started.
Speaker 1: Really I guess say turkey hunted all her life off. No,
Speaker 1: but when they really took off serious about it. Uh,
Speaker 1: he had no toy Yoda, and he had take that
Speaker 1: thing where a billy goat couldn't go. You could look
Speaker 1: at the body work on it until it But they
Speaker 1: went up as old skid trail top of the mountain
Speaker 1: and they drought turkey hunting and they killed one. But
Speaker 1: anyhow they called. They had parked down and walked up
Speaker 1: the mountain, was hidding the brush around a Loulie struck,
Speaker 1: he haven't Charlie come out, and they put the bird
Speaker 1: under the hood and stuff started getting the truck, and
Speaker 1: they come out and rested them, you know, and old
Speaker 1: Charlie out And I could nobody tell it like Charlie did,
Speaker 1: he said. After they rode as a tickets, he said,
Speaker 1: the dumb ass old bees ask us for a ride
Speaker 1: back down the mountain. Louie said, well, sure, you give
Speaker 1: you a ride, just crawling the biker. Old Charlie, you
Speaker 1: get tick, will tell me, he said. Louise hearted up
Speaker 1: and backed up, trying ran. He said he looked over
Speaker 1: it when he said, Charlie, you better hang on. He said,
Speaker 1: Louis forward that thing, and he said we went off
Speaker 1: of that dad gum mounting on that good trail on
Speaker 1: hitting him was wasshed out place, and he said, you
Speaker 1: looked back her in the back. He said, they had
Speaker 1: all be with her hands and hair stuck up in
Speaker 1: the air on their back one time, he said, next
Speaker 1: time they'd become down on her ants. He said, it's
Speaker 1: a wander at and killed. He said, you know when
Speaker 1: they stopped at the bottom, he said, has sound grateful.
Speaker 1: They didn't even think us for giving him a ride.
Speaker 1: So they did get caught. And I don't want to
Speaker 1: take lightly these guys disregard for the law or putting
Speaker 1: someone in danger, But that doesn't erase for me how
Speaker 1: interesting this story is. If there was a movie about
Speaker 1: these guys, which there probably should be, this would probably
Speaker 1: be your favorite scene. I I'm just trying to figure
Speaker 1: all this out because I don't think any of us
Speaker 1: would condone such behavior or do it ourselves, but it's
Speaker 1: no doubt intriguing. Author Mark Bowden, in his book Killing Pablo,
Speaker 1: gave some insight into the irony of our intrigue with outlaws.
Speaker 1: Here's the quote from the book, quote the ones immortalized
Speaker 1: by Hollywood al Capone Body and Clyde Jesse James. Large
Speaker 1: numbers of average people rooted for them and followed their
Speaker 1: bloody exploits with some measure of delight. Their acts, however
Speaker 1: selfish or senseless, were invested with social meaning. Their crimes
Speaker 1: and violence were blows struck against distant oppressive power. Their
Speaker 1: stealth and cunning and avoiding soldiers and police were celebrated,
Speaker 1: these being the time honored tactics of the powerless man.
Speaker 1: That sounds familiar in dearmot to an outlaw is the
Speaker 1: time honored tactic of the powerless. We'll hear a lot
Speaker 1: more about this in later episodes. Here's stody was some
Speaker 1: more interesting intel. They got caught again, So they did
Speaker 1: get caught. That was the one time they got caught. All.
Speaker 1: Dad got caught another time. He'd been hunting down here. Oh,
Speaker 1: there used to be an old man lived down here
Speaker 1: named Fred Ferguson, And Dad had went in behind his
Speaker 1: house that morning and he killed him a good gobbler.
Speaker 1: And when he come back out, which Fred was about
Speaker 1: seventy five or eight years old, then he stopped at
Speaker 1: Fred's and cleaned it and gave Fred the bird. Well,
Speaker 1: then Dad went home. Well, I guess the game, and
Speaker 1: Fish had heard him shoot or seen him to leave Fred's.
Speaker 1: And they went in and searched and found that turkey
Speaker 1: and told Fred called Charlie and tell him get come
Speaker 1: over here. And take his ticket, or we're gonna take
Speaker 1: you to jail. And Dad got in his truck and
Speaker 1: go back over there. Kind got his ticket. Dad told me,
Speaker 1: he said, have dollars that average apter list and thirty
Speaker 1: cents a bird today if you get caught. The law
Speaker 1: confiscates vehicles, guns and all kinds of stuff, along with
Speaker 1: fines that can cripple a man, which we all believe
Speaker 1: is a good thing. Again, I think Charlie's sentiment clearly
Speaker 1: shows this was a different era. Back then, it was
Speaker 1: just a ticket and a three fine. I'll let you
Speaker 1: do the math on how many turkeys Charlie claim to kill.
Speaker 1: This also gives us a one time glimpse into what
Speaker 1: these guys did with some of the meat. In this case,
Speaker 1: Charlie gave it to the elderly landowner. If you remember,
Speaker 1: the game warden didn't think they killed as many turkeys
Speaker 1: as people believed because of the unsolved issue about what
Speaker 1: was done with all the meat. However, one thing every
Speaker 1: single person agreed on is that they would never waste
Speaker 1: any meat. Here's Neil giving us some insight on some
Speaker 1: of what they did with it. You know, I know
Speaker 1: that a lot of old people old ladies and stuff.
Speaker 1: And even if something old men, they got too old,
Speaker 1: get out. Louis would take them, dear mate, he'd take
Speaker 1: them turkey breast when he when he gave somebody like
Speaker 1: get the mayor, you hey, might give a show for
Speaker 1: the refs too. Yeah, but them old people like it.
Speaker 1: He took the best cuts to him. He'd take him
Speaker 1: if he took them tender on something, onom he took
Speaker 1: them a young tender one, or he'd give them the breast. Yeah, turkey.
Speaker 1: When I mentioned to somebody about their ethic around meat,
Speaker 1: they said, turkey poachers only take the breasts. Well, I
Speaker 1: wanted to get to the bottom of this. Here's Jerry Deane.
Speaker 1: I've heard it said that he had a really strong
Speaker 1: ethic for not wasting meat. He would not hunt nothing
Speaker 1: anything they're waste. I mean a lot of these people
Speaker 1: take the breast out of a turkey and throw the
Speaker 1: rest of the way. No, no, we we take all
Speaker 1: the dark legion. Really, so, even even if he was
Speaker 1: illegally killed a turkey and was sneaking it out in
Speaker 1: his pants pockets, he was taking the drumsticks and the
Speaker 1: thighs and everything. You didn't leave nothing but the God.
Speaker 1: I had another person off the record confirmed to me
Speaker 1: that they always took the entire turkey and never just
Speaker 1: breasted it out. I got a question for you. Have
Speaker 1: you ever breasted out of turkey and not used the
Speaker 1: thighs and drumsticks? Be honest, because I sure have. With
Speaker 1: today's wild game movement, most people are now keeping and
Speaker 1: using the dark meat on a turkey. Back in the day,
Speaker 1: I'm telling you they didn't do that. But these boys
Speaker 1: were doing this long before it was cool. Again, I'm
Speaker 1: not saying that made poaching right. That's not what I'm
Speaker 1: saying at all. I'm just saying it's an interesting point.
Speaker 1: Here's Stoney with some more details. We ate everything. I
Speaker 1: I've had a lot of friends that would go hunting
Speaker 1: with us and they would sit there and bone out
Speaker 1: of deer. Oh most of them don't take ribs, and
Speaker 1: they don't take necks, And there's not a lot of
Speaker 1: meat on ribs or necks either one. But when we
Speaker 1: get home, what we don't eat, our dogs do. Because
Speaker 1: we've got a cook pot that's as big as this table.
Speaker 1: We'll take ribs, we take coon carcasses, possum carcasses. We
Speaker 1: don't skin coons and woods. We'll bring them home, skin
Speaker 1: them out. Carcass goes in the freezer when we've got
Speaker 1: enough in there. We filled pot up that potle feed
Speaker 1: dogs for about two weeks. When they were growing up.
Speaker 1: That's all the dogs eight was. There was dog food
Speaker 1: stuff when I was a kid, that pot cooking in
Speaker 1: the front yard and they just build a big pine
Speaker 1: not fire into that pot. So they had a really
Speaker 1: strong thing about not wasting meat. None of it goes
Speaker 1: to waste. As long as they knew you were taking
Speaker 1: it to eat, that they did not have a problem.
Speaker 1: Was it. Here's Stoney talking about the only time they
Speaker 1: turned somebody else into the game and fish. They came
Speaker 1: from a different era and just had a mentality about
Speaker 1: taking more game than they were allotted. Like why did
Speaker 1: why do you think they thought they could do that?
Speaker 1: And what would they have been mad at somebody else
Speaker 1: if somebody else has been like that, Like if there
Speaker 1: had been another another guy a couple of mountains over
Speaker 1: that was just as big a big outlaws them. I've
Speaker 1: seen them turn one person in and my whole life
Speaker 1: they called they went drove out and called game fish
Speaker 1: on that was wasting meat. We were hunting down on
Speaker 1: South Boundary. That was the only year we camped down there.
Speaker 1: And there were some people camped down just below us,
Speaker 1: and they had four carcasses laying there and they had
Speaker 1: they hadn't even skin them, and they cut back straps
Speaker 1: out of them, and the whole rest of the deers
Speaker 1: were all four deer were laying there. And my uncle
Speaker 1: drew by that and he said that ain't you on fly?
Speaker 1: And he drove from there to Langley and called game
Speaker 1: fish and had got him upburn and they got rope takes.
Speaker 1: Interesting stuff. These next two stories are just straight up
Speaker 1: entertaining that continued to paint a picture who these characters were.
Speaker 1: Here's Andy Brown. I don't know he just I'm missing
Speaker 1: my missing every day, you know, I think about everybody's
Speaker 1: got a Louis Hill story, and you know, I've one
Speaker 1: of the funniest stories and of all time probably this.
Speaker 1: If If I had this on tape, I would I
Speaker 1: would have been a millionaire because back when I first
Speaker 1: went to work for the company I worked for, I
Speaker 1: had insured a house that Louisdell owned over between Big
Speaker 1: FOURK and Opal. Charlie lived in it with his wife
Speaker 1: and so when I insured it, we had a field man,
Speaker 1: Charles glide when he's one of the greatest guys I've
Speaker 1: ever met in my life. And so we pulled up
Speaker 1: over to Charlie's got out and they had a rot
Speaker 1: water dog that you could road. I mean, he was
Speaker 1: a monster. Step on the porch, you know, but I mean,
Speaker 1: you know. We get by the roight waller dog and
Speaker 1: we go in and I said to Charlie, I said,
Speaker 1: I said, we need to look at your breaker box.
Speaker 1: And he I can't remember what his wife's name was,
Speaker 1: but she was really nice. He said, take him in
Speaker 1: there and sho him where the breaker box is. So
Speaker 1: we walk in this We walk in this bedroom and
Speaker 1: there's this big old cage, I mean a big cage,
Speaker 1: and breaker box is over on the wall that anyway,
Speaker 1: Charlie goes over and looks at it and takes a
Speaker 1: picture of it, and in about that time, this fox
Speaker 1: squirrel comes running out on this They got this tree
Speaker 1: for li Liam's cut. This fox girl comes running out
Speaker 1: there and I said, I said, oh, you've got a
Speaker 1: pet squirrel and she says, oh yeah, she says this thing. Thanks,
Speaker 1: I'm a smarma, and she just reaches over and opens
Speaker 1: up the cage. That squirrel just hops up on her shoulder,
Speaker 1: on her It's sitting there popping to stay like that,
Speaker 1: and Charlie is standing about about eighteen inches from her.
Speaker 1: And Charlie's dressed nice. He's got his tie on and
Speaker 1: his white shirt and his knit pants. And about that
Speaker 1: time Charlie goes, oh, that's a nice squirrel, And about
Speaker 1: that time that thing just hops over on charts. Oh, man,
Speaker 1: old Charlie. He just froze. He just stiffened up. And
Speaker 1: when she when she reached to get that squirrel, that squirrel,
Speaker 1: Clay just ringed him like a dead snack. He had
Speaker 1: no stiff pants up. And when it did, he just
Speaker 1: stiffened up like anyone. He screamed like a walk anywhe
Speaker 1: she got to squirrel over the closing anything like that,
Speaker 1: I was out of control. I couldn't even catch my breath.
Speaker 1: But anyway, that's a story, but that's hilarious. So they
Speaker 1: had a pet fox girl. Oh, he screamed like a wildcat.
Speaker 1: I'll never in my life forget Andy Belly laughing about
Speaker 1: this thirty years after it happened. Here's another interesting story
Speaker 1: about Louis Dell's appreciation of rattlesnakes and the Edwards brother's
Speaker 1: choice of footwear. This is Jackie Ryan, the guy that
Speaker 1: nearly got shot when he prank called Louis Dell. We
Speaker 1: was turkey out one morning, coming off a mountain and
Speaker 1: and I mean we should have ratt I mean just
Speaker 1: we went airborne to old same time, but uh, huge
Speaker 1: rattler and they rattle return and we scattered. Well, I
Speaker 1: mean he should leave it, baby, don't don't mess with it. Said,
Speaker 1: he could have been at either one of us, you know.
Speaker 1: And uh he's told me stories here just not there
Speaker 1: or four year ago or if five, maybe about one. Uh,
Speaker 1: he was a word turkey on one morning and daylight
Speaker 1: and and uh he heard some rustling in the leaves
Speaker 1: and and he should do was a monster one come
Speaker 1: right up between his legs, him sitting there against tree
Speaker 1: that he had set out on it. It was just
Speaker 1: cold that morning, you know, it was early spring. And uh,
Speaker 1: he just didn't never believe in killing rattlesnakes. I've seen
Speaker 1: him catch one. We've been aware of fishing on the
Speaker 1: cost Tot And he was out there barefooted at at dark.
Speaker 1: It was just after dark and and got him a
Speaker 1: stick and fork of stick, and he caught that thing
Speaker 1: and got it by the bash of the head and
Speaker 1: put it back to the truck and carried it back
Speaker 1: and were with him a word baylock. I mean, I
Speaker 1: never didn't even kill one, so he turned it loose. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he likes trattle snakes. I like that. I like rattle
Speaker 1: snakes too. And he wore tennis shoes every I mean
Speaker 1: when he went a hunting most every time he went,
Speaker 1: he wore tennis shoes. Did he really, Oh? Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: he didn't hunting boots. No, did he not know he'd
Speaker 1: wear tennis shoes old Tam, he did, but he kind
Speaker 1: of hunt and he did. He wore tennis shoes. This
Speaker 1: is new news to me. He always had crossing creeks
Speaker 1: and getting wet and I didn't care about that. He
Speaker 1: weighed right out in it didn't matter, and just wear
Speaker 1: wet tennis shoes. And I'm sure cotton socks he probably didn't. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't remember exactly what socks she wore, but I
Speaker 1: know he wore them tennis shoes old time. And he
Speaker 1: did that in Colorado too, did he really? Yeah, he'd
Speaker 1: wear tennis shoes. I don't remember him wearing many boots.
Speaker 1: He did backed years ago work in boots. I don't
Speaker 1: think he done a whole lot in boots. Really, he
Speaker 1: didn't even work in leather. But he wore tennis shoes
Speaker 1: most of the time. Oh my, okay, Jackie, you don't
Speaker 1: know what you've done, because this recks my philosophy. I
Speaker 1: have a really strong philosophy on footwear. And you are
Speaker 1: well inside the bounds. You're wearing a beautiful pair of
Speaker 1: probably red wing boots. I don't know if it was Okay, okay,
Speaker 1: I got my schnays one. I don't like to go
Speaker 1: anywhere where I don't have a good leather boot on me.
Speaker 1: Was he ever bit by a snake that you know?
Speaker 1: Not that I know of. I heard Charlie was one
Speaker 1: time a squirrel hunt, and they said he'd squirrel barefooted,
Speaker 1: you know, because where you slip around and got bit
Speaker 1: by a copy head. But I mean that just want
Speaker 1: hunted squirrels barefoot. Yeah, I believe it. And I think
Speaker 1: they had competitions. I mean, you know, they was they
Speaker 1: were competitive with each other, and you know, and and
Speaker 1: I think Louie always thought Charlie but a squirrel hunter,
Speaker 1: and he was that maybe not on anything else but squirrels.
Speaker 1: I think it's you know, he thought, butter squirrel on it.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't want have been a squirrel in the woods.
Speaker 1: Louis Dell was a woodsman in the truest sense of
Speaker 1: the word. He knew the woods like the back of
Speaker 1: his hand and how to gain resource from it. He
Speaker 1: spent more time in the woods in a year than
Speaker 1: most people would in a lifetime. To hear that he
Speaker 1: wore tennis shoes kind of puts all our fancy gear
Speaker 1: into perspective. I had a question for Stony about some
Speaker 1: of the deer's uncle and dad killed. Honestly, I was
Speaker 1: hoping to see some of the racks. I was very
Speaker 1: surprised at what he said. Did Uh did your dad
Speaker 1: or Louis Dell ever kill any I mean, I know
Speaker 1: they did, real big bucks. Oh yeah, have you got
Speaker 1: some of their horns? Still you don't have any of
Speaker 1: their horns? Uh? Gloodell's got two deer hanging on his wall.
Speaker 1: About four years ago, we had been running all morning
Speaker 1: and we got back to his house and I heard
Speaker 1: two him dogs, three of my dogs. They've been running
Speaker 1: five hours and I heard him come across the mountain
Speaker 1: up there, and Uncle, I'll run to the truck and
Speaker 1: got his gun, and uh, he said, they'll come out
Speaker 1: at the crowd down there, and I said, all right,
Speaker 1: well it's a cross three hundred yards. Well, we looked
Speaker 1: up and here coming this buck across the field and
Speaker 1: he's coming right straight at us. Well, he got out
Speaker 1: there and turned broadside, and Uncle I said shoot him,
Speaker 1: and I said I I can't. He's a hundred and
Speaker 1: fifty hundred and sixty yards and he's out of my
Speaker 1: He's got a six meli mate in his hand. I
Speaker 1: said you shoot him and he boom. He turned the
Speaker 1: circle there and fell over and then and he was
Speaker 1: he's a nice, nice eleven point. And I told Uncle
Speaker 1: and I said, we need to go get that one mounted. Well,
Speaker 1: we we sat down right there before we even went
Speaker 1: to the deer, because Dan's still hear the dogs. There
Speaker 1: was a mile behind him. He can still hear dogs running.
Speaker 1: And I said, they'll be out here in a minute.
Speaker 1: Let them let them find him, you know. And directly
Speaker 1: here you see all three of them coming across the
Speaker 1: field right up there and circling in that deer. And
Speaker 1: we went ahead and drove out there then. And I
Speaker 1: don't know if he was more proud of the deer
Speaker 1: or the dogs, because he sat there petting on him
Speaker 1: and feeding him liver. And you need, you need to
Speaker 1: put that deer in this uh gas station. Uncloud Hell's
Speaker 1: got three sets of horns that he's kept his entire life.
Speaker 1: Ones is both kill elk five to five elk that
Speaker 1: buck there and then year before last he killed a
Speaker 1: nice nine point. They saw off horns and just keep
Speaker 1: him in the barn or something. Yeah, but they gave
Speaker 1: him way over the years. Yeah, dad killed a killed
Speaker 1: a thirteen point. They had a twenty three inside spread
Speaker 1: and uh, my nephew came came from Tulsa, and Dad
Speaker 1: gave him the horns. And they killed a lot of
Speaker 1: nice ones over the years. But the horns just didn't
Speaker 1: mean much to him. It didn't mean anything. Give they
Speaker 1: give away their deer horns. They just when we're deer
Speaker 1: camp during that week, it's all important, the big bucks,
Speaker 1: who killed the biggest buck. When we go home that night,
Speaker 1: the last night of camp, none of it matters anymore.
Speaker 1: In fact, when we're packing up camp. Oh, you can
Speaker 1: have them horned I feel on them. That was surprising
Speaker 1: to me that they didn't care about the horns. It
Speaker 1: doesn't fit the stereotypical ideas we have about quote poachers,
Speaker 1: but it does fit the character of Louis Dell and Charlie.
Speaker 1: I'd sooner give away my truck than a set of
Speaker 1: white tail antlers. Does that make me a trophy hunter?
Speaker 1: Louis Dell and Charlie were serious deer hunters, and the
Speaker 1: only way they cared about killing one is if it
Speaker 1: was in front of a dog. And for the purpose
Speaker 1: of the expansion of our worldview, I'll mention this dog
Speaker 1: deer hunters have often been known to think that still hunters,
Speaker 1: tree stand hunters, guys that hunt over corn piles and
Speaker 1: food plots aren't real sport wortsman. They believe it takes
Speaker 1: more skill and dedication to craft to kill a deer
Speaker 1: in front of a dog, and when you hear their side,
Speaker 1: it's hard to argue with the purpose of this is
Speaker 1: not to incite an argument or debate of whether the
Speaker 1: doctrine is right or wrong, because there isn't an answer.
Speaker 1: I've always talked about supporting all legal methods of hunting.
Speaker 1: Stuff like this teaches me the world is much bigger
Speaker 1: than my small window into it and my personal preferences
Speaker 1: in my style of hunting, and I respect the way
Speaker 1: a man wants to hunt as long as it's within
Speaker 1: the boundaries of the law. What Stony is about to
Speaker 1: say is controversial, but he's speaking for his own father
Speaker 1: and uncle, who can no longer speak for themselves, and
Speaker 1: I think he's got the right to express the mechanics
Speaker 1: of their mentality. For anybody to hang a poacher stigma
Speaker 1: on them, I believe it's wrong. According to UH game laws,
Speaker 1: they were poaching. According to our forefathers, they were doing
Speaker 1: what they were supposed to. I mean that, and that's
Speaker 1: the way they looked at it. If I come into
Speaker 1: your house and tell you how to eat your corn,
Speaker 1: you know you have to have this much butter on it,
Speaker 1: and you can only have ten pieces. You're gonna tell
Speaker 1: me to go to when they come into our home,
Speaker 1: which I'm sorry. These mountains are their home, all of them,
Speaker 1: not just the land they own. All these mountains are
Speaker 1: their home. When you come into their home and say, well,
Speaker 1: here's all these, dear, you can only kill this one
Speaker 1: or this one, but leave all these alone. They're gonna
Speaker 1: tell you to go to if you go back far enough.
Speaker 1: Our country is founded on that very principle. Those guys
Speaker 1: got tired of England telling them what they could and
Speaker 1: could not have. Well, the people that moved in here
Speaker 1: weren't very far removed from those people that told England
Speaker 1: go to So they grew up with that mental to
Speaker 1: your Eron's Valley, and it still exists to a point.
Speaker 1: We're more civilized now. Yeah, the need isn't there now.
Speaker 1: I asked Neil Taylor a question about how the community
Speaker 1: dealt with these guys killing more than their share. How
Speaker 1: do you how did people perceive that, because everybody knew
Speaker 1: that these were turkeys that you know, they were taking
Speaker 1: away more than their share. What was your perception of
Speaker 1: the way people in the community handled that. Well, I
Speaker 1: may not everybody knew it. You know, people's way of
Speaker 1: thinking change from time to time. From when you was
Speaker 1: a kid, you already see a huge difference in how
Speaker 1: people thinks and takes different things. Yeah, it's totally different.
Speaker 1: There were still enough of the old timers back that
Speaker 1: so they didn't care. There was plenty of turkeys for
Speaker 1: them and everybody else too. And there wasn't there that
Speaker 1: many turkey hunters back right, I could go out and
Speaker 1: go hunting and never see a vehicle hardly. Now you
Speaker 1: go out there and there's four or five vehicles where
Speaker 1: you've been scouting. On opening the morning, you know, a
Speaker 1: lot of people started coming in from the city, you know,
Speaker 1: and there was a few people that didn't like it
Speaker 1: at all. I mean, you know, you know what you
Speaker 1: said about how people's mentalities change over time, that's a
Speaker 1: that's a very real thing that's hard to calibrate. Like
Speaker 1: I think today, I feel like today, even though certainly
Speaker 1: there's still people that break the law, it's much more
Speaker 1: common for people to pretty much obey the law. And
Speaker 1: there's a lot of reasons for that. You know, people
Speaker 1: are more educated about the science of game management, even
Speaker 1: if they're ones are not back then to call call
Speaker 1: a game ward and you had to go to the
Speaker 1: house now and they can't take a picture of you
Speaker 1: and your tags right there, you call right there and
Speaker 1: follow you know, right, Okay, So yeah, technology has made
Speaker 1: enforcement easier, which has made people be more apt to
Speaker 1: obey the law. But I don't think that that's as much.
Speaker 1: Is is what some people thinks it is. I think
Speaker 1: it's uh. The mentality of thinking what Neil is tapping
Speaker 1: into is true. We have too many examples throughout history
Speaker 1: of a shifting value system, and it doesn't make what
Speaker 1: happened before necessarily right. It just helps us make sense
Speaker 1: of how some stuff happened. I wanted to ask Stony
Speaker 1: something and I had no idea what he would say.
Speaker 1: What are the things that you you would pound the
Speaker 1: table for for your kids or grandkids in terms of
Speaker 1: the values that they had that you would want them
Speaker 1: to have. I want my kids to be law abiding
Speaker 1: in in this day and time. You go buy a car, well,
Speaker 1: if you met us up the game and fish can
Speaker 1: take that car back in their prime when this was
Speaker 1: going on, game fish didn't have that power. I mean,
Speaker 1: you get a fine, all right, we'll pay it and
Speaker 1: go on. I want my kids pounding the table for
Speaker 1: their guns, and my boys believing their guns, and I
Speaker 1: want them to pound on the table for their right
Speaker 1: to hunt, had to hunt the ways they want to
Speaker 1: bid bows and arrows or guns or black powder or
Speaker 1: spear checking. I mean, but I also want them to
Speaker 1: pound the table for conservation. There's a touch of that
Speaker 1: bear grease redemption that we've all been looking for inside
Speaker 1: of that. It's pretty powerful to hear Stony, Charlie's son
Speaker 1: say that about conservation. It took this family a little
Speaker 1: bit longer to get there, But I think the Edwards
Speaker 1: have shifted their positions in a lot of ways. Here's
Speaker 1: Jerry Deane. They may have been some game warned. It
Speaker 1: could have called him when he was young. I'd like
Speaker 1: to seeing them because they have been too. They probably
Speaker 1: some of them set out there the last fifteen years
Speaker 1: trying to catch him, and even home eating breakfast. Undoubtedly
Speaker 1: the last fifteen years of their lives, Louis Dell and
Speaker 1: Charlie slowed down on violating game lass. Many people said
Speaker 1: this it would be a cute bota in this story
Speaker 1: to say that they had a change of heart, that
Speaker 1: they could look back and say that they've done stuff wrong.
Speaker 1: But I don't really know if that's true. Perhaps they
Speaker 1: just simply slowed down physically, or maybe the penalties for
Speaker 1: game violations increased to the point that they couldn't risk
Speaker 1: losing it all. Will never really know. Would it change
Speaker 1: the way that you feel about them at the end
Speaker 1: of the story, if they'd realized the error of their
Speaker 1: ways and changed. I guess the game of fish will
Speaker 1: always know him is outlaw. Well, I get a lot
Speaker 1: of other people of outlaw suit. But the world will
Speaker 1: be a whole lot better if everybody would like old Lois.
Speaker 1: That's all I can say about to get. If I
Speaker 1: were falling on a rope somewhere, he'd be the one
Speaker 1: I wanted on the end of the rope, I want anything.
Speaker 1: Pire's Neil with a very interesting take on Louis Dell
Speaker 1: and Charlie Well. A lot of people that laugh at this,
Speaker 1: and I find it kind of comical, but it's the truth.
Speaker 1: They kind of they was kind of modern day Robin Hood.
Speaker 1: Tell me what you mean by that, Well, you know,
Speaker 1: I mean Robin Hood. He was an outlaw by the government.
Speaker 1: He would killed the king's game, and he robbed from
Speaker 1: the rich. Louis didn't rob, but in a way he
Speaker 1: did rob some games from some people. People might think
Speaker 1: but he but he gave a lot of meat away.
Speaker 1: Like I said, old people on fixed incomes, okay, you know,
Speaker 1: and you could always count on him to help you.
Speaker 1: They're kind will never be again. It was pretty much
Speaker 1: the last of a of a tie of people and
Speaker 1: I miss them. Oh, Louis, you know, hey, he was
Speaker 1: quick to get mad, but he was quick to laugh,
Speaker 1: you know, quick to forgive. Why won't there be other
Speaker 1: people like them? Well, it's just it takes the times
Speaker 1: that they lived through will never be again. You know,
Speaker 1: that's what develops the power person. What they are and
Speaker 1: what they've lived through. Like I said, the mentality and
Speaker 1: and the thoughts of the people that raised them and
Speaker 1: they grew up around or them, people are no more. Man,
Speaker 1: I don't know what to say. I've had a lot
Speaker 1: of people that I question why I highlighted these men,
Speaker 1: But I've also had a lot of people that I
Speaker 1: trust thank me for it. As we come to the
Speaker 1: close of this biography section of this series, I'm still conflicted.
Speaker 1: But I have noted one thing. People that knew these
Speaker 1: men were much more apt to extend mercy to them.
Speaker 1: And I'm not saying that mercy means condoning illegal activity.
Speaker 1: It just means they weren't ready to lock them up.
Speaker 1: People that never knew these men were much more likely
Speaker 1: to want justice. I envisioned some other podcaster making a
Speaker 1: series on some outlaws that I didn't know. Maybe some
Speaker 1: hellbillies from Alabama that just wore the turkeys out. I
Speaker 1: have a feeling I might be like, how the heck
Speaker 1: could these guys use their platform to highlight those heathen criminals.
Speaker 1: These guys are the biggest threat to the North American
Speaker 1: model of wildlife conservation I've ever seen. Lock them up. Honestly,
Speaker 1: I might say that, but I think we're all full
Speaker 1: of paradoxus. And I think that face to face human
Speaker 1: relationship with other people means all the difference in a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of stuff, and that's what makes life interesting.
Speaker 1: One thing is for sure. We're entertained and intrigued by
Speaker 1: outlaws for better or worse. And after exploring the fullness
Speaker 1: of these guys stories, I am still proud to have
Speaker 1: known these men, and I think their story is of
Speaker 1: great value. Man, thanks so much for listening to Bear Grease.
Speaker 1: On the next episode, we're gonna find out why we
Speaker 1: love outlaws, and I don't want to leave you with
Speaker 1: a nondescript cliffhanger, but I really doubt you're gonna want
Speaker 1: to miss the next episode. Please leave us a review
Speaker 1: on iTunes and share this podcast with a friend. We've
Speaker 1: got our famous bear grease hats back in stock at
Speaker 1: the meat Eater dot com, so check that out too.
Speaker 1: But hey, now I want to give you some of
Speaker 1: that bonus material. This is some interesting stuff that I
Speaker 1: couldn't fit into the main podcast. You guys remember the
Speaker 1: game Ward and Jimmy Martin from the first episode, who
Speaker 1: spent his whole career chasing Louis Dell and Charlie Well.
Speaker 1: After our interview, I asked him if he remembered the
Speaker 1: time that he stopped me. He said he had zero
Speaker 1: recollection of it, so I proceeded to tell him the story.
Speaker 1: I do want to tell you about our run in
Speaker 1: that you don't remember. Listen to this. I've never told
Speaker 1: this story publicly. I was sixteen years old and it
Speaker 1: was a Friday night, and I had a blue tick
Speaker 1: coonhound named Thunder, and he got loose. I heard him
Speaker 1: way off somewhere, treed long like I'll just as far
Speaker 1: as I could hear. Somehow I knew he was treed
Speaker 1: down in this hollow and it was it wasn't coon season,
Speaker 1: I want to say, it was this summer, and I
Speaker 1: had my coon light that had my pistol attached to
Speaker 1: the belt. All in one deal and and when I
Speaker 1: I had to go get the dog, and I grabbed
Speaker 1: my coon belt and I had my pistol on there
Speaker 1: and my light, and I jumped on a fore wheeler.
Speaker 1: And now this is where the story gets interesting. I
Speaker 1: had decided that if there was a coon in the tree,
Speaker 1: I was gonna shoot him, just I was. It was
Speaker 1: a young dog and he's treed down there, and it's
Speaker 1: just like it's in my heart. I was like, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna shoot this coon, but I wasn't coon hunting. Well,
Speaker 1: I jump on my dad's fore wheeler and it didn't
Speaker 1: have lights, no lights on the fore wheeler. So I'm
Speaker 1: running with a head lamp, my coon lamp shining, riding
Speaker 1: a fore wheeler. Well, to get to the dog, I
Speaker 1: had to jump out on the highway, and I was
Speaker 1: riding is after dark, and I'm riding in the ditch
Speaker 1: of the highway going down to get to my neighbor's land.
Speaker 1: And he he would have known, you know, it's been
Speaker 1: a good friend of mine. And I was gonna drive
Speaker 1: down to his driveway and then go into the woods
Speaker 1: and get the dog. Well, as soon as I get
Speaker 1: out onto the highway, there's one truck coming and it's you.
Speaker 1: And so you see this coon light coming down the
Speaker 1: road and you're like, what's going on? Anyway? I see
Speaker 1: you turn around you put on your lights, and I
Speaker 1: just go, oh no. And you come over to me
Speaker 1: and you say, son, what are you doing? And and
Speaker 1: I was honestly, was just like honest to a fault.
Speaker 1: I said, sir, I'm coon hunting. And I didn't even
Speaker 1: have I mean, I was sixteen, so I just didn't
Speaker 1: have the wherewithal to like really give you the whole
Speaker 1: story of what was happening. And I just told you
Speaker 1: I was coon hunting, and you said, is it coon season?
Speaker 1: And I said I don't think so. And you pulled
Speaker 1: out your book and you look through and you knew
Speaker 1: it wasn't coon season, but you look through and you said,
Speaker 1: look here, well it turns out it's not. And uh
Speaker 1: and you said, well, take off your gun and your
Speaker 1: light belt and give it to me. And so I
Speaker 1: gave you my gun on my light belt. That's right.
Speaker 1: And I didn't tell you that and uh. And you
Speaker 1: said meet me at the courthouse tomorrow at noon. And
Speaker 1: so you get in the truck with my light and
Speaker 1: drive off and then I've got a fourth of no
Speaker 1: lights and I drive all the way home with no lights.
Speaker 1: And then uh so the next day, I mean, you
Speaker 1: treated me with complete respect. The next day, I show
Speaker 1: up at the courthouse and I'm scared to death, you know.
Speaker 1: And I really didn't break the law on purpose. I
Speaker 1: mean I I've always been, even since a kid, straight laced.
Speaker 1: I mean, now I broke I've road claws on accident
Speaker 1: and some on purpose. That you know it's happened. So
Speaker 1: I meet you at the courthouse and you you've probably
Speaker 1: got a little more of the story from me. And
Speaker 1: you said, Clay, I was on my way last night
Speaker 1: to break up a party out at ink At at
Speaker 1: the river down there somewhere, and he said, and here
Speaker 1: you are, minding your own business, coon hunting, he said,
Speaker 1: And you you reached in and grabbed the belt and
Speaker 1: gave it to me and said, I just said, going
Speaker 1: your way. So you didn't give me a ticket. So
Speaker 1: you have no recollection though, man, that it happened just
Speaker 1: like that. Oh man. I was a nervous wreck that night.
Speaker 1: Lucky for me, Jimmy showed me mercy. I had another
Speaker 1: question for Jimmy about Louis Dell and Charlie. Were they
Speaker 1: the most notorious guys you ever chased guests in your time?
Speaker 1: They would have been in Polk County, but there were
Speaker 1: lots of others in other candies. Of course, my district
Speaker 1: was six counties is that we worked. So we worked
Speaker 1: some good ones out of Scott County and Yale County,
Speaker 1: and we had Louis Dale's, but they were in other counties.
Speaker 1: The other ones that I ran into them and I
Speaker 1: had to help work on weren't as likable as Charlie
Speaker 1: and Louis Dell, if that's a good way to put it.
Speaker 1: They the others were just out for what they could get,
Speaker 1: and if they weren't making money, well they just they
Speaker 1: just didn't enjoy what they were doing. They were just
Speaker 1: doing it to get even. I guess in these other
Speaker 1: candia they were getting as much as they could get.
Speaker 1: But Louis if, Loui Delle and Charlie may have been
Speaker 1: getting as much as they can get, but they you
Speaker 1: liked him for it. You guys remember Uncle Andy from
Speaker 1: the first podcast. He was a ten year old brother
Speaker 1: of Carl Edwards that was killed by police. He was
Speaker 1: involved in that shootout. Here's Jerry Deane. So you knew
Speaker 1: the Edwards. Yeah? Yeah, did he have part of his
Speaker 1: ear shot off? Sir? What what? What part of his
Speaker 1: ear was shot up? Was the top part of his ear? Yeah? Me?
Speaker 1: And then he was uncle and that's what ruby. Here's
Speaker 1: another interesting clip from Jerry Deane about Louis Dell's character.
Speaker 1: Jolly was fine fellow, but he uh, he wasn't worried
Speaker 1: about material things. Louis had the best business mind and
Speaker 1: he had done well, you know, with his job. And
Speaker 1: he treated everybody worked for the way he wanted to
Speaker 1: be treated. I mean you would you wentn't out nothing
Speaker 1: when you worked for Louis, and he paid good money.
Speaker 1: He took care of his workers. He took care of everybody. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Louis was fine feller and most people thought he was
Speaker 1: out law. But if you ever had anybody you wanted
Speaker 1: as your friend, he'd be the man to pick. I
Speaker 1: had heart surgery ten years go. Louis told me, And
Speaker 1: most people don't know it, but he told me. He said,
Speaker 1: don't worry about nothing, you need anything, you know, I
Speaker 1: pay forward. I'm here and he offered to pay my bills. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he pushed that type. And but let me tell you something.
Speaker 1: Money didn't mean nothing. Damn. That's why he was. That's
Speaker 1: why he could be so generous. You feel like it's
Speaker 1: because money didn't Well he wasn't. He wasn't a multimillionaire.
Speaker 1: But I guess you'd say, uh, he made money, money
Speaker 1: didn't make him. You understand. Yeah, he's really something. Everybody
Speaker 1: would have met him and my daddy, finest two fellers
Speaker 1: I ever met. Here's jerry On Louis del as a
Speaker 1: dog man. Lou Dell would have been just an all
Speaker 1: around woodsman. Correct. Tell me about the kind of dogs
Speaker 1: he had? Oh man, like what what types of that
Speaker 1: he had squirreled off? He had squirreled? Oh dear though
Speaker 1: whom no, I'm man hog dog hog dog Louie probably had.
Speaker 1: It's one time. He probably had twenty dolluh. He still
Speaker 1: had good score though when he passed away. He kept
Speaker 1: dogs all the live. He's a dog man. Here's jerry
Speaker 1: On Louis Dell's willingness to take people hunting. We'll probably
Speaker 1: learn on a later episode how willing he was to
Speaker 1: even entertain undercover officers too. No doubt Louis Dell and
Speaker 1: Charlie shared their passion for turkey hunting with anyone that
Speaker 1: wanted to go. Some of the turkey ounors wouldn't even
Speaker 1: to tell you where they gonna go turkey hunting. If
Speaker 1: they heard the turkey Louis tell you, say, go right
Speaker 1: of where they went there. He'd tell anybody for the
Speaker 1: turkeys that you know. He wasn't no tyke to be
Speaker 1: staying you about anything. He'd take them. People that never
Speaker 1: had even turkey hunt, He take them and put them
Speaker 1: out there and uh let him kill one. And most
Speaker 1: turkey owners ain't that way. Yeah, exactly. And that's another
Speaker 1: thing about Louis there's a lot of young boys like
Speaker 1: John now that Louis Elle has told how to to
Speaker 1: turkey on and he just wasn't his family know it was.
Speaker 1: Anybody that wants to come, he he teaches what he could.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening, guys. We'll check in with
Speaker 1: it next week on the Bear Grease Render