DOG TALES

Notes: ANNIE was collected from Marshall Roberts, a Berea College student in 1981. He heard the story from Alan Tench of Banks County, Georgia who had it from his grandfather, Hamilton Tench.

Notes: QUISLING was collected from Gwen McVicker in 1980 who has it from Andy McMahan of Louisville, Kentucky. David Macemon of Woodford County, Kentucky says he has heard a Science Fiction story about Thomas A. Edison inventing an intelligence test which he tries on a dog who scores “way off the top.” The dog then admits that he can talk and is killed by other dogs for giving out their secret.

Notes: IN THE LEAD BY A TAIL —see A Treasury of Southern Folklore, ed. by Botkin, New York, Crown Publishers, 1949, pp 128-129. Also in The Old Time Tennessee Orator by John Randall, pp 359-360.

Notes: HOT ROD HOUND was collected from SANDY COPLEN SMITH who got it from her roommate, Susan Adams who got it from her father in Coal City, West Virginia. I have heard the same tale several other times but the subject was a cat who was frozen in a refrigerator and revived with gasoline. This is a favorite of my grandson whose mother’s father, Red Harrison of LaFollette, Tennessee, tells the tale.

Notes: SS-FF was collected from Lewis Lamb of Paint Lick, Kentucky in 1975. Lewis learned this story from a co-worker on a construction project in Cincinnati, Ohio back in the 1940’s but, in retelling the tale he changed it from a horse to a dog. (see also COUNTING DOG, FLEA BIT, and RABIES SHOTS)

Notes: RABIES SHOTS was collected from Lewis Lamb of Paint Lick, Kentucky in 1980.  I transcribed the tale from a recording of Lewis’s telling of a true story. (see also COUNTING DOG, FLEA BIT, and SS-FF)

Notes: TRAINING YOUNG FOX HOUNDS was collected from Mark Rector of Madison County, North Carolina in 1981. This is a true event according to Mark.

Notes: THE BILLY ROUGH was collected from Dear Rathbone, a Berea College student from Haywood County, North Carolina in 1980.  Dean learned this from his uncle Miles Rathbone, also of Fines Creek. A subsequent letter from Dean says that this incident really happened in the Jerry rough.  Dean has written many stories from his home on Fines Creek. (see https://www.facebook.com/groups/1039030522847750/)

Notes: COUNTING DOG was collected from Lewis Lamb of Paint Lick, Kentucky in 1980. This tales is widely known and is one most likely to be told when one asks for a dog tale. Lewis’s setting in the mountains is unusual and is probably his own addition to the tale. He is a first rate yarn spinner as well as a champion fiddler. (see RABIES SHOTS andSS-FF).

Notes: RABBIT IN THE WELL was collected from VELNA KEY, a Berea College student in 1980. Velna heard the story from the father, John Key in central North Carolina and he got it from June Peele. Velna says she “grew up hearing such tales.”