Specimens of Ante-Bellum
Buckeye Humor
By GEORGE KUMMER*
Native American humor, that is,
"humor which by reason of its
subject matter and technique possesses
an emphatic native quality,"1
flourished vigorously in the backwoods
of the United States for
several decades before the Civil War.
Produced by the folk and
recorded by rural doctors, lawyers,
preachers, and journalists, it
portrayed the comedy of character and
background as seen in various
parts of the country. From it, sectional
types like the Down Easter,
the Flush Timer, the Pike, the
half-horse, half-alligator Kentuckian
emerged to make their bows upon the
national stage and to become,
like other kings of the wild frontier, a
part of the American heritage.
Thanks to the labors of such scholars as
Constance Rourke, Franklin
J. Meine, DeLancey Ferguson, and Walter
Blair, the importance of
this body of literature is now generally
conceded. Coarse and crude
as such writings often were, they not
only prepared the way for the
masterpieces of Mark Twain, but also by
virtue of their realism
cast important light on the language,
attitudes, and tastes of the
common man.2
Scholars have written at length upon the
contribution of New
England, the South, the South West, and
the Far West to this
literature, but they have said less
about the humor of the Middle
* George Kummer is an assistant
professor of English at Western Reserve University.
1 Walter Blair, Native American Humor
(New York, 1937), 3.
2 Napier Wilt, ed., Some American
Humorists (New York, 1929), xi.
424
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR 425
West, and about Buckeye humor almost
nothing.3 To be sure, they
are aware that both Artemus Ward and
Petroleum V. Nasby made
their debuts in Ohio newspapers, but
about the rest of the great
crop of humor which Ohio brought forth
in her agricultural phase,
they are silent. The purpose of the
present paper is to call attention
to this oversight and to urge its
correction.
Adequately to describe ante-bellum
Buckeye humor would require
a large book. Here I merely bring
together a few specimens in the
hope that they may stimulate further
research. Such investigation
might very well lead to a revision of
the widely cherished notion
that most native humor was begotten by
longwindedness upon
hyperbole, a view which disregards the
laconicism of Josh Billings,
Kin Hubbard, and Calvin Coolidge.
Evidence that a brief and pithy
jocosity, akin to theirs, existed in
Ohio can be found in Bushnell's
delightful History of Granville and
in Theresa Thorndale's Sketches
and Stories of the Lake Erie Islands.
Bushnell says:
In 1819, G---- was accused of forgery,
having been before guilty of
petit larceny, was tried, convicted and
sent to the penitentiary for a short
term. He had long failed to enjoyed the
confidence of the community.
About the same time (not far from 1814)
L---- was guilty of altering
bank notes from the denomination of
one's to ten's. He was of a singular
disposition, loving to be much alone,
studying in his father's library; but
as it afterward appeared, for the sake
of finding the secret mechanical and
chemical arts which he used in his work.
He kept a private room which
was always under lock and key, where
were found the evidences of his
crime. He was assisted to leave the
country, starting from home on horse-
back, going south never to return. (p.
310)
Equally concise is the following history
of Kelley's Island which an
old resident of the Bass group
contributed to the Thorndale book:
In the beginning Kelley Island was eaten
up by rattlesnakes. You could
harvest them by the wagon load, and the
varmits held high carnival. Then
came old Ben Napier, the pioneer of the
archipelago. Old Ben turned loose
a drove of hogs on the island, and the hogs
ate up the rattlesnakes. Next
the Kelley family alighted on the spot,
and the Kelleys ate up the hogs.
3 One
of the few books dealing with middlewestern humor, Jack Conroy's anthology,
Midland Humor (New
York, 1947), is principally concerned with a later period.
426
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
Then came the Dutch, and the Dutch ate
up the Kelleys. And that's the
history of Kelley Island. (p. 208)
This sort of terseness was specially
characteristic of the Yankees,
who probably carried it with them into
Ohio. Further research might
well show that here it flourished best
in the Western Reserve.
Additional study of ante-bellum Buckeye
humor would yield a
variety of data of interest to social
historians. For example, the
ignorance of backwoods doctors is scored
in the following item from
a rural weekly:
Dear Daddy, I concluded I'd come down to
get grounded into a doctor.
I hardly don't think I was more than 8
hours afore out I cum as slick a
one as ever wuz seen.
Hale Columby, happy land,
If I aint a doctor I'll be hanged!
I pukes, I purges 'em, I swets 'em
Then if tha die wi--then I lets 'em
I gets plenty of custom because they
dize easy. When you write, don't for-
get to put Doctor afore my name.4
Again, the magniloquence of another
learned profession furnished a
subject for satire. According to the Western
Law Journal, in 1845,
Attorney Stilts presented the following
petition in a divorce case
in the Erie County Common Pleas Court:
The said Catherine C----, of said Erie
county, represents unto your
Honors: that about nine years ago, she
was married to the said Thomas,
in Ireland, that for about two years
after her said marriage, the said Thomas
well behaved himself toward her, and in
most respects, discharged the
various obligations devolving upon a
husband with fidelity. During the said
period, said Thomas conceived the
project of migrating to the United States
of America. And by many arguments, and
highly embellished pictures,
drawn by said Thomas, portraying the
rich advantages, offered in the United
States to poor people; your oratress,
was thereby induced to leave her
native land, kindred, friends, and
acquaintances, and all the associations of
her childhood, and wend her way . . . to
a land of strangers. That soon after
our arrival in this paradise of lords
and ladies, silver bells and gold spoons,
perpetual health and eternal youth, said
Thomas began to contract vicious
4 Norwalk Experiment, April 17, 1840.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR
427
habits; those habits became more and
more permanent, until he became the
loathing and offensive drunkard. The
first fruits of said change . . ., reaped by
your oratress, was coldness, neglect and
abuse, which soon ripened into
personal violence, too revolting to be
mentioned. Your oratress represents,
that said Thomas has often beat and
pounded her, with different kinds of
weapons, and his fists, until she considered
her life in danger; that said
Thomas has frequently turned her out of
his most inhospitable doors, and
even out of her bed, in the dead and
silent hours of night, in the cold
and inclement season, when all were
wrapped in sleep and repose, save the
Backanalian and Maniack! when the
elements of heaven were in motion;
the rain descending in torrents, when
the winds were lashing the waves
against the shore, and sending back
their echoes, resembling the sound of
the distant tornado; and compelled her
to seek a shelter, for herself and
infant, wheresoever a shelter could be
found. That said Thomas' mal-
treatment, personal and violent abuse,
and inhuman conduct toward your
oratress, became so frequent, constant
and alarming, that she considered her
life in danger; and that it would be
suicidal in her, to attempt to live and
cohabit any longer with said Thomas.
(III, 83)
Institutions of the time like the
militia muster also afforded sub-
jects for Ohio humorists. The Hamilton
Intelligencer of October
20, 1832, tells of a certain company
which always marched in open
ranks because Cupid Skinflint was
"so 'tarnel switchel bellied."
Another member of this outfit, Michael
Bigelow, is reported to have
always primed his firelock with brandy.5
This may not have been
an Ohio company, but Buckeye troops were
often quite as spirited.
A Sandusky company once made their
captain unhappy by coming
to drill in Shakespearian costumes
purchased from some stranded
players.6
In the days before the Civil War a
craving for sociability led
numerous Ohioans to join organizations
like the Odd Fellows and
the Masons. This willingness to join was
the basis for an elaborate
hoax, the Sons of Malta, a fake secret
society, active in Sandusky
(and throughout the United States as
well) in the early fifties. The
object of the society was represented to
be the capture of the island
of Cuba, and candidates were examined to
determine their quali-
5 Philip D. Jordan, "Humor of the
Backwoods," Mississippi Valley Historical
Review, XXV (1938), 29.
6 Hewson
L. Peeke, A Standard History of Erie County, Ohio (Chicago, 1916),
I, 468.
428
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
fications as recruits to this cause. At
the beginning of the initiation
ceremony the gull would be led into a
room dimly illuminated with
blue lights and shown an open coffin
guarded by four mysteriously
gesticulating figures in long monkish
robes. Then he would be
blindfolded and asked to demonstrate his
ability to sign his name
in the dark. (Three or four days later
he would learn that he had
signed an order for various liquid
refreshments.) Next, a deep
impressive voice would ask him if he
would be willing to lie on
his stomach and steal into the camp of
the enemy in order to procure
information. If he answered
"Yes" to this, the deep voice would
say, "Let it be recorded that the
candidate will lie and steal." At
this a strong endeavor would be made to
impress upon the victim
that he was in the presence of several
clergymen and certain other
prominent citizens for whom he was
supposed to have great respect.
And so the initiation proceeded until
the poor fellow was thoroughly
hazed.7
Where can Buckeye humor be found? Though
many choice
morsels can be dredged up from memoirs,
travel books, county his-
tories, and almanacs, newspapers are by
far the best source. Most
of them printed some humor and at least
one-the Norwalk Ex-
periment--often gave as many as three or four columns of the front
page to it, a fact which indicates the
interest readers of the time
took in such material.8
In the Experiment they could find
predecessors of the modern
moron jokes like these about the modest
maiden:
A young lady in our town is so
excessively modest that every night before
retiring, she closes the window curtain
to prevent the man in the moon
from looking in. She is related to the
young lady who would not allow
the Christian Observer to remain in her
room over night.... She is likewise
a relative of the lady who refused to
carry a watch in her bosom because
it has hands.9
7 Ibid., I, 470-471.
8 Mrs. Trollope observed that
"every American newspaper is more or less a maga-
zine wherein the merchant may scan,
while he holds out his hand for the invoice,
'Stanzas by Mrs. Hemans' or a garbled
extract from Moore's 'Life of Byron.'"
Domestic Manners of the Americans (London, 1832), I, 128. The Experiment is a
good illustration of a rural newspaper
which was also something of a magazine. In
addition to humor it printed both
fiction and verse.
9 August 4, 1857.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR 429
There were also philosophical cruxes
like:
Is a woman, a woman, when she's a little
sulky?10
And burlesque testimonials like:
My Uncle, Bacchus Pottinger, was
afflicted so long with gout, contracted
by living too much on bears' meat and
alligators' eggs, that life became a
burden to him. He took only four boxes
of the said pills and his life was
a burden to him no longer.11
Then, too, there were stories such as
the one entitled "How Jim
Wicker's Head Got Bald." Jim, said
the Experiment, was a young
man who "looked very old from his
eyebrows all the way around
to the back of his neck" by reason
of his having no hair. Of the
origin of his affliction he said:
"You see the har always did keep
rather scarce 'bout my scalp, and I
was always rubbing in one thing and
another to fotch it out, for I was
sartin the roots wasn't dead, though
there was little to be seen above ground.
I'd heard of bar's grease and bought a
gallon in bottles; but I believe it
was nothing but hog's lard and mutton
taller; so I thought I'd have the
genuine article, and I got old Dan to go
out and kill something for my
especial benefit. Dan told me it was in
the spring, and the bar was in bad
health and out of season; but I believed
he was trying to quiz me, and
wouldn't take no for an answer. A short
hunt fotched a critter at bay, and
Dan, by a shot in the vitals, 'saving
the varmit'; but the bar was in bad
condition, he looked seedy as an old
Canada thistle, and he had hardly ile
enough to keep his joints from
squeaking; but what he did have I got, and
used; 'and strangers,' said Jim, looking
sorrowfully round on the company,
'in two days what little har I had
commenced falling off and in a week
I was as bald as a gun barrel. Dan was
right; the varmit was a shedding
himself and had nothing in him but bar
shedding ile and the consequence
is, I can't in the dark tell my head
from a dried gourd, if I depend on
feeling.'"12
Most of the humor in the Experiment was,
of course, clipped from
its exchanges. In this way that
newspaper made available to its
10 February 8, 1848.
11 January 1, 1856.
12 October 30, 1855.
430
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
readers such nationally famous pieces as
"The Big Bear of
Arkansas,"13 "The
Harp of a Thousand Strings,"14 "John Phoenix
on Railroads,"15 "Sut
Lovingood's Shirt,"16 and Washington Irving's
"The Devil and Tom Walker."17 It also printed yarns with
an Ohio
background, such as the story of
"How Sandusky Was Saved from
Famine," credited to the Buffalo
Republic. The story told how in
the early days, as "a result of a
severe drench," Sandusky under-
went "all the horrors of a protracted
famine." The water at the
mouth of the bay was so low vessels
could not reach the port, and
as there was no land transportation,
Providence seemed to have
forsaken the place entirely. There were,
however, large numbers of
wild hogs in the surrounding woods.
These creatures would come
down to the bay for water, but owing to
the vast fields of fine sand
on the shore, they soon became blind.
This obliged them to select
a leader, who had partial sight, "a
blind hog taking the leader's
tail in his mouth, another, his, and so
on until a long line had been
formed." Then the partially blind
hog would lead the drove to the
bay to drink. One day a brave Sanduskian
secreted himself on the
beach and awaited the approach of the
drove. As the leader came
abreast of him, he fired, severing the
tail close to the body. The
startled leader fled, but the brave
settler, quickly stepping forward,
grasped the amputated tail still in the
mouth of the now foremost
hog and began gently pulling on it.
First one hog started, then
another, and then still another, until
like a train of cars, the whole
drove was in motion. Thus the hunter led
them all into the corporate
limits of Sandusky and the famishing
city was saved.18
Another yarn in the Experiment dealt
with a fire safe which had
been purchased by a Cleveland dry goods
firm shortly before the
establishment burned to the ground. When
the manufacturers
13 August 16, 1841.
14 October 2, 1855.
15 April 21, 1857.
16 August 4, 1857.
17 August 11, 1857.
18 January 27, 1857.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR
431
wrote the merchant asking how the safe
had withstood the con-
flagration, they received the following
reply:
Gentlemen: Your safes are wonderful.
Nothing can surpass them for
protecting books and papers, though they
have some unfortunate opposite
effects. One of our clerks, on Saturday,
bought a Shanghi rooster, and
at night, unknown to us, put it for
safekeeping in the safe. That night our
establishment was destroyed by fire, and
the safe and its contents were
exposed to a tremendous heat for 36
hours, at the end of which it was
hoisted out red hot. As soon as possible
it was opened, when, you may
judge of our surprise, we found within,
the Shanghi rooster, leaning against
the ledger frozen to death.19
Although such stories may strike the
present generation as being
quaint rather than funny, historians
realize that in any evaluation
of humor dates must be kept in mind and
that in jokes as in dress,
fashions change. The difference between
Abraham Lincoln's de-
light in the writings of Petroleum Nasby
and the distaste with
which modern readers regard them is
mainly a matter of time.
Nasby and his peers served their day and
generation well. Though
their writings do not please our
contemporaries, they afford his-
torians many insights into the attitudes
and tastes of the period.
How can this instructive humor be
classified? Much of it, I
believe, can be grouped under three
heads: stories exploiting the
oddities of atypical individuals, tall
stories, and anecdotes told to
make a point. An example of the first of
these forms is the tradition
that in the 1840's Josh Billings, then a
resident of Norwalk, tor-
mented the Millerites, a sect that held
the end of the world was
imminent and that all true believers
would shortly ascend to heaven,
by blowing up an old boiler near a
meeting house in which some
of these people were congregated. As a
result of the explosion the
faithful, believing that their time had
come, poured out of the
building ready for the ascent.20 This
may have happened, but the
19 March 17, 1857.
20 Henry Wheeler Shaw (Josh Billings) for a year or more in the early
forties
lived in Norwalk, where he is said to
have indulged in practical joking. Apparently
he published no humor until he left
Ohio. See Osman C. Hooper, History of Ohio
Journalism (Columbus,
1933), 153.
432
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
fact that essentially the same story is
told of Lorenzo Dow in
Georgia casts doubt upon its
historicity.21
More factual is the account of the
doings of Daniel Tuttle of
Texas Township in the History of
Crawford County (Baskin and
Battey: Chicago, 1888). Tuttle, who
seems to have been an able
man and sane on every subject except
religion, was an avowed in-
fidel, who became so alarmed at the
progress of Christianity that
he felt he must do everything in his
power to obstruct it. In 1850
he issued the first number of the Divinity
Physician, a satirical paper
which he said he would publish
"semi-occasionally" and which had
for its motto a sentence from Tom Paine,
"I will go any length
for truth, but not one step for popularity
at the expense of truth."
On this publication Tuttle expended
several thousand dollars, ac-
quiring nothing from it in return except
libel suits and the nickname
"Bishop." On one occasion he
sneaked into a schoolhouse which
was being used as a church and before
the congregation arrived
scrawled upon the wall with a piece of
charcoal:
Oliver, Bender, and Gillem
Have caught the devil
And are going to kill 'im.
The Rev. Mr. Oliver, taking this as a
text, as if to verify the
declaration of Tuttle, preached with
great potency for nearly two
hours (pp. 672-673).
Factual, also, is B. F. Phillips'
account of two scoundrels of much
the same type as the King and the Duke
in Huckleberry Finn.
According to Phillips' Condensed
History of New Lyme, Ash-
tabula County, Ohio (Jefferson, Ohio, 1877), about 1811, one
Beckwith, "a man of bad temper and
profane speech," having made
"a fizzle of farming," decided
to try preaching. As deacon, at a
salary of a dollar a day and board, he
hired a certain Miller, whose
chief duty was "to cry and grieve
over Elder Beckwith's preaching."
For a time "the bait took
well," but soon folks "stopped nubbing
21 Dow,
the famous revivalist, is said to have hired a Negro lad who, concealed
from the audience, blew a tremendous
blast upon a trumpet at the moment when
Dow reached the climax in his account of Gabriel's
appearance at Judgment Day.
The effect was startling. See Eugene Current-Garcia,
"Newspaper Humor in the Old
South, 1835-1855," Alabama Review, II
(1949), 117.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR 433
the hook, having learned the character
of the fisherman." The elder
then retired to private life, whereupon
Deacon Miller sued him
for his promised salary and won the suit
(p. 9).
Another story of a peculiar individual
is Judge R. H. Taneyhill's
sketch of Joseph C. Dylks, who in 1828,
after appearing at a camp
meeting on Leatherwood Creek in Guernsey
County, succeeded in
convincing many of the wealthiest and
most influential settlers that
he was the true Messiah and that those
who believed in him would
never die. Taneyhill's version, which
first appeared in the Barnesville
Enterprise and later in pamphlet form, was, as is well known, the
main source for William Dean Howells'
novel, The Leatherwood
God. That book, however, without either sentimentalizing the
scoundrel or neglecting the comical
aspects of his imposture takes
a more compassionate view of Dylks than
did Taneyhill, who re-
garded him merely as a clever fraud,
somewhat in the tradition of
Simon Suggs. Taneyhill's description of
how Dylks and Robert
McCormick, a settler of good reputation,
encountered the devil in
the wilderness is diverting. The episode
is reported as if McCormick
were speaking:
"You will [Dylks said] shortly see
most wonderful things. I will increase
your faith so that you may see the
sights of my power. . . . As soon as
Dylks began speaking the chilliness left
me. . . . Here Dylks cast his eyes
skyward, and remained motionless a few
minutes. The bright light of day
suddenly became as mere twilight, then
it as rapidly grew light as ever
again, when Dylks exclaimed: 'Did you
not hear that sound--like the
rushing storm. It was the Adversary of
souls cleaving the air. I saw him
sweep with hell-lit wings the top of
yonder woods, and dart to earth to
give me battle. Fear not, I will
vanquish him.'
"We started on, and shortly
descending into a ravine, thickly wooded, with
steep hills on both sides of the road,
when we saw the devil standing in
our way. Dylks dismounted for the
conflict, and exclaimed in a loud
voice: 'Fear not, Paul [he had
previously revealed to McCormick that he
(McCormick) was Paul, the Apostle]; this
done, my work is done.' With
a firm and deliberate step, Dylks
marched on to the combat. Satan did not
flee, but prepared to meet him. He
poised himself on his cloven feet in
firmest attitude for mortal stroke; half
lifted his flaming wings; bristled
his scaly folds with sounds like
muttering thunder; shot out his forked
tongue, each prong streaming with liquid
fires; rolled his glaring eyes which
434
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
seethed in their sockets; while a
hissing noise, terrible as the screams of
the damned, bubbled in the throat of his
majesty infernal.
"Dylks knelt and prayed, arose,
shouted salvation, and blew his breath
toward the enemy of mankind. The devil's
wings dropped, his scaly folds
recoiled, his tongue was motionless, and
his eyes appalled, stood still, and
with leaps terrific, which shook the
earth at each rebound, he fled the field.
We followed with all the haste we could,
keeping close upon him, until we
came in sight of brother Mason's house,
when the devil jumped the fence
and sprang to the door. The door did not
open, but the devil disappeared
from us.22
Our second form of humor--the tall
story--provides the social
historian with valuable testimony as to
the basic sturdiness of Ohio's
people. What better proof of their
courage can be found than their
attempts to belittle hardships and
dangers by exaggerating them?
If the roads were bad, they recalled
James Hall's story about a
man who was stuck so deeply in the mud
that only his hat showed
above the surface of the ground. When an
English traveler knocked
off the hat with a riding whip, the
backwoodsman growled, "Hullo,
stranger! Who told you to knock my hat
off?" A heartfelt apology
and an offer of assistance brought the
reply, "Oh, never mind, I'm
in rather a bad fix it's true,
but I have an excellent horse under me,
who has carried me through many a worse
place than this--we'll
get along."23 If the
settlers were troubled by the poisonous snakes,
they recalled the story of the Licking
County farmer who killed a
rattler by forcing open the reptile's
mouth and inserting therein a
quid of tobacco from his own, or the one
about his neighbor who
little by little taught a snake to chew
tobacco by feeding it the
weed in homeopathic doses.24 If
certain sections of the state were
said to be unhealthful, the settlers
there often told of the stranger
who, attempting to get to the next town
by following the main road,
mistook his way and reached a dead end
in a cemetery.25 Or they
might print such self-disparaging verses
as these from the Maumee
City Express of June 24, 1837:
22 R. H. Taneyhill, The Leatherwood
God, in Ohio Valley Historical Series,
Miscellanies (Cincinnati, 1871), No. 3, pp. 22-24.
23 Letters from the West (London, 1828), 346-348.
24 Henry Howe, Historical
Collections of Ohio (Cincinnati, 1902), II, 79.
25 Clark Waggoner, History of
Toledo and Lucas County, Ohio (New York, 1888),
31.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR 435
On Maumee, on Maumee. . . .
There's possum, coon and fox
So poor they scarce can crawl;
They catch them in the trap
And eat them fur and all.
On Maumee, on Maumee
'Tis ague in the fall;
The fit will shake them so
It rocks the house and all.
There's a funeral every day
Without a hearse or pall;
They tuck them in the ground
With breeches, coats, and all.
Again, tiring of inverted boasting,
Ohioans might make light of
"the shakes" by stoutly
maintaining that conditions were really much
worse further west. James Silk
Buckingham said that in the early
forties, while traveling by stage from
Wheeling to Zanesville, he
heard a good deal of talk about the
unhealthy conditions which
prevailed along the Illinois River:
One traveller asserted that he had known
a man to be so dreadfully
affected with ague, from sleeping in the
fall on its banks, that he shook . . .
all the teeth out of his head. This was
matched by another, who said there
was a man from his state who had gone to
Illinois to settle, and the ague
seized him so terribly hard, that he
shook off all his clothes . . . and could
not keep a garment whole, for it
unravelled the very web, thread by thread,
till all was destroyed! The climax was
capped, however, by the declaration
of a third, that a friend of his who had
settled on the banks of the Illinois,
and had built a most comfortable
dwelling . . . was seized with ague, which
grew worse and worse, until its fits . .
. at length shook the whole house
about his ears, and buried him in its
ruins!26
A third form of humor--the pithy
anecdote told to illustrate a
point--was used extensively by
ante-bellum politicians. An example
is the following story, by means of
which a Democratic candidate
for governor in 1848 attempted to make
clear his attitude toward
Van Buren, who had gone over to the Free
Soil party:
26 The Eastern and Western States of
America (London, 1842), 271-273.
436
THE OHIO HISTORICAL QUARTERLY
An old man died, leaving for a couple of
grandchildren, two little boys,
and all the heirs he had, a flock of one
hundred sheep. The oldest boy was
to divide the sheep and the youngest one
was to choose his part. Among
them was a little pet lamb that the
younger boy had nursed and fondled,
and petted all its lifetime. This lamb,
the crafty brother put into a pen with
forty-nine of the poorest, dirtiest, and
scabbiest sheep of the flock supposing,
of course, the little fellow would not
part with his pet, and allow him to
take the big fat wethers he had selected
for himself.
The little boy was called out to make
his choice. His eyes were soon in
search of his pet. At last he discovered
him among the scabby sheep. He
got over to the pen, called his pet to
him, put his arm around his neck
and thus addressed him.
"My dear little lamb," said
he, "I have nourished you long and well. I
have loved you deeply and many a
pleasant hour have we spent together.
It is hard to part now, my pet, but part
we must--You have got into such
bad company that I cannot associate with
you any longer." And he took
the big sheep.
So with Van Buren--he has long been a
pet of the party, but now he
is found in such bad company that we are
forced to give him up.27
Anecdotes like this were just the sort
that Abraham Lincoln told
so successfully. Concrete and vivid,
they made a direct appeal to
the common sense which he never doubted
the average voter pos-
sessed. When in 1861 Lincoln crossed the
state on the way to his
first inauguration, his train made an
unscheduled stop at Ravenna.
There, responding to the cheers of the
quickly gathered crowd,
he said:
Ladies and Gentlemen: I appear before
you merely to greet you and say
farewell. I have no time for long
speeches, and could not make them at
every stopping place without wearing
myself out. If I should make a speech
at every town, I should not get to
Washington until sometime after the
inauguration. I am, however, all the time
sensible of the deepest gratitude
to the people of Ohio for their large
contribution to the cause which I think
the just one. There are doubtless those
here who did not vote for me, but
I believe we make common cause for the
Union. But let me tell to those
who did not vote for me, an anecdote of
a certain Irish friend that I met
yesterday. He said he did not vote for
me but went for Douglas. "Now,"
said I to him, "I will tell you
what you ought to do in that case. If we
all turn in and keep the ship from
sinking this voyage, there may be a
27 Norwalk Experiment, July 11, 1848.
ANTE-BELLUM BUCKEYE HUMOR 437
chance for Douglas in the next; but if
we let it go down now, neither he
nor anybody else will have an
opportunity of sailing in it again." Now,
was not that good advice?28
Evidently, Ohioans thought so, for in
the dark days which lay ahead
they did much to help Lincoln "keep
the ship from sinking." Like
his, their humor was frequently uncouth,
crude, and masculine, but
at its best it revealed the basic
sturdiness and the innate intelligence
of the people of the Middle West.
In 1920, when Champ Clark drew up a list
of humorists "of
the first order" who had sat in the
house of representatives from
the beginning, he found only six men
worthy of inclusion: Abraham
Lincoln, Thomas Corwin, Samuel Sullivan
Cox, James Proctor Knott,
"Private" John Allen, and
Frank Cushman.29 Of these six, two--
Corwin and Cox--were Ohioans. No other
state contributed as
many names to the list. Thus in the
number of her humorists and
in the quality of her humor Ohio is, as
Artemus Ward would say,
"ekulled by few and excelled by none." Her
contribution to
native American humor deserves more
attention than it has hitherto
received.
28 Portage
Sentinel, February 20, 1861. I am
indebted to my friend Professor
Lyon Richardson for this item.
29 My Quarter Century of American
Politics (New York, 1920), II, 185.
Specimens of Ante-Bellum
Buckeye Humor
By GEORGE KUMMER*
Native American humor, that is,
"humor which by reason of its
subject matter and technique possesses
an emphatic native quality,"1
flourished vigorously in the backwoods
of the United States for
several decades before the Civil War.
Produced by the folk and
recorded by rural doctors, lawyers,
preachers, and journalists, it
portrayed the comedy of character and
background as seen in various
parts of the country. From it, sectional
types like the Down Easter,
the Flush Timer, the Pike, the
half-horse, half-alligator Kentuckian
emerged to make their bows upon the
national stage and to become,
like other kings of the wild frontier, a
part of the American heritage.
Thanks to the labors of such scholars as
Constance Rourke, Franklin
J. Meine, DeLancey Ferguson, and Walter
Blair, the importance of
this body of literature is now generally
conceded. Coarse and crude
as such writings often were, they not
only prepared the way for the
masterpieces of Mark Twain, but also by
virtue of their realism
cast important light on the language,
attitudes, and tastes of the
common man.2
Scholars have written at length upon the
contribution of New
England, the South, the South West, and
the Far West to this
literature, but they have said less
about the humor of the Middle
* George Kummer is an assistant
professor of English at Western Reserve University.
1 Walter Blair, Native American Humor
(New York, 1937), 3.
2 Napier Wilt, ed., Some American
Humorists (New York, 1929), xi.
424