George and Rudy Talk about a Terrible Accident on a Farm

The year was 1964.

After what happened to Queenie, I was hesitant to go back the next summer to work for Daddy Fox at the gas station.  But in the end, I decided that there were still good times to be had and the money was also a consideration as I could make enough in the summer to carry me for many months into the school year.

A little over 7 months had passed since President Kennedy's assassination.  Lyndon Johnson was in the White House; the Viet Nam war was growing by the day and there was general unrest among the people a bit older than me at the time.

At 14, I was not really paying much attention to the issues but was very aware and upset about Kennedy. 

By the time June arrived and I was preparing to go to work for Daddy Fox I was focused on getting away for the summer and a much-needed break from my father.

Little did I know that this summer would introduce me to two of the most unusual and colorful characters to show up at the gas station in Guthrie. 

I was sitting on my usual metal stool on a hot afternoon in June hoping the old A/C window unit would work harder and not die. 

An old rusty pick-up rumbled up to one of the pumps and I walked out to greet the new customers.  As I approached the driver’s door it opened and a short black gentleman slid off the seat, put out his hand, and grinned,

“Young Mista Fox, I be pleased to meet ya. Your granddaddy told us you was workin‘ fo‘ him dis summer and we wanted to say hello.

“Oh, sorry, I’m George and that’s Rudy in the truck.”

The other door opened, and a tall, skinny white man stepped out of the truck, walked around the back, and stuck out his hand. His face was worn and rugged from obvious hard work out in the sun. His hand was large and rough with callouses, but he shook my hand with just the right amount of pressure even as I realized that the grip in that hand was barely being used. Pulling his hand out of mine and jerking his thumb toward George he laughed, “I’m Rudy and I just want to warn you not to believe anything that comes out of that man’s mouth.”

Both men wore the typical dress for that part of the country in the summer, bib overalls over white tee-shirts with worn work boots and baseball caps.  George’s said “Caterpillar” across the front and Rudy sported a dirty red cap with Guthrie Feed and Seed embroidered above the bill. George was short and stout but walked with a noticeable limp.

The most striking thing about George was the number of terrible scars that marked his face, hands, and arms.  I could not see the rest of his body but judging from the visible scars it was probable that it too contained as many or more. I was very curious about what could have caused this damage but tried not to stare. As George walked toward me, I noticed that he favored his left arm and seemed to be in pain. When he shook my hand I also noted several missing fingers from his right hand and the left arm was thin and withered. He did not have a strong grip.

George and Rudy bought some gas, a couple of RC's and hung out and talked.

I learned that George and Rudy had known Daddy Fox for years and had done odd jobs for him on many occasions. Over the next few days, George and Rudy came by several times to buy a little gas, cigarettes, RC cola and spend some time with me.  We would sit in front of the station on old metal chairs and talk about everything under the sun.  They would even help me if we got a little busy and were good with customers.

It was during one of these visits that I learned what happened to George. I never asked but he could tell that I was curious, and I am sure most people were who spent any time with him and noticed the number of scars and his obvious limp. It was Rudy who told the story. George did not like to talk about it as the memories were too hurtful. 

He just sat quietly and did add some comments from time to time. Both George and Rudy worked the farms around the area. They could do many different jobs having to do with crops, but they focused on the corn crops.  George could run the large corn pickers. They were called “combines” and were large machines on wheels or tracks with a cabin where the operator would drive the combine down the corn rows harvesting the corn and shooting it out the back into a large bin. Rudy had no experience with large combines and usually stayed back at the main farm where he would help George unload the corn after he was done in the fields.

On one of these days, George was busy out in the cornfield running the combine down the rows.  It was common that some other worker would ride with George. This was mostly for safety reasons as running a combine could be very dangerous. You can imagine that a machine that torn corn off the stalks and spit it into large bins could do a lot of damage to someone who got in the way of the rotary cutters on the front of the machine. George had a young man in the cab with him that day, a nephew of the farmer who hired George and Rudy each year. He was not an experienced farmhand, but George didn’t see a problem with him riding along to keep him company.

George has just completed a row of corn and was getting ready to turn back to the next row when he heard a loud noise from the front of the combine. He knew what had happened and he reached down to shut off the machine.

But then he remembered that they had trouble getting the combine started that morning and was afraid that they would have the same issue if he shut it off in the middle of the field. It was getting dark and they were almost done with this part of the cornfield, so George left the combine running as he opened the door, climbed down from the cab, and headed to the front of the machine.  The nephew stayed in the cab and watched George look into the rumbling blades of the front pickers. George could see that the problem was a large corn stalk that was stuck in the blades.  He could see that the bottom of the stalk was sticking out enough that he could grab it and pull it out.  But after grabbing the stalk and giving it a hard yank, the combine motor suddenly revved up and the cutters pulled the stalk into the combine along with George’s left arm. The young nephew looked on in horror as George was being pulled into the running combine.  He then quickly reached over and turned off the engine. 

It was suddenly very quiet in the cornfield.

Then the screams started.

George was a small man, and this meant that the large front mouth of the combine was big enough for his body to fit.  The machine had pulled his left arm in up to the shoulder and then latched onto his shirt and pants pulling his body in at an angle that crushed his arm, shoulder, and part of his upper torso. When the engine stopped George was hopelessly stuck and starting to bleed out from the damage. But what saved his life was the fact that the nephew had cut the engine before he was pulled completely into the combine.  Since they were at the end of the field it was not far from the farmhouse and the nephew ran screaming for help.

Rudy heard the screams from his friend and was already sprinting to the farmhouse kitchen to call for help.  The fire department and medical crews worked for hours to save George’s life and remove his body from the corn picker.  They had to use cutting tools and a blow torch to make enough room to pull him out.  He almost died on the way to the hospital, but the ER was alerted and reacted quickly to his injuries.  It was still a miracle that he survived. George was in the hospital for weeks and did eventually recover enough to go on with his life, scarred and crippled but alive.

It turned out that the scars on his face were not from that accident but from the many fights with fists and knives that George endured growing up a black man in a small southern Kentucky town.

George and Rudy continued to come around during all the summers that I worked for Daddy Fox and I never got to know them on a personal level other than the story of George's injuries. They loved to talk and laugh and joke around but were never interested in sharing much about the world around them or the personal things about each other. I am sure as best friends they shared a lot but others were really not welcome, including me. But that was ok as I could still call them my friends and in the end that was all that mattered.

Like Buford, I am sure that Rudy and George would have come to my defense and protected me from any bad things that could have come my way. Not just because of Daddy Fox, but because they truly liked me.