Fall of 1988
We had just moved into a rental house in Hallsville, Missouri, just a few miles outside of Columbia. The house, a tiny, 2 bedroom ranch, wasn’t much to look at but at $250/month rent, it was within our budget. The house was just barely passable until the cold chill of early November set in. The house just would not heat. So I began to investigate. I soon discovered the duct system in the house was non-existent. The dilapidated furnace simply pushed tepid air into the crawl space of the house, allowing the dankness to ooze up through the vents in the floor. No duct-work at all! I pulled up a floor vent and stared straight down onto the dirt of the crawl space! So, I called my landlord—a slum lord for sure. His answer? He installed a potbelly wood stove in the living room. Well, we were cold and the quickest way to a warm house was not to move. So, I scraped together a hundred bucks and bought a used chainsaw.
The next weekend, Jesse and I were scouting the roads of rural Boone County looking for fallen timber. A downed tree here. A downed tree there. It was slow going until . . . jackpot!!
There, about 50 yards off of Mexico Gravel Road in a densely wooded area, was a big pile of logs and cut trees, stacked every which way, seemingly haphazardly–an eyesore, in my opinion. In an hour, we had a truck full of firewood leaving nothing but a few branches and sawdust. Later that evening we were all warm and toasty sitting by the stove feeling secure in the knowledge we were not going to freeze that winter and that we had made rural Boone County a little prettier in the process.
The next week, the Columbia Tribune police blotter had the following report:
The Columbia Audubon Society reported the vandalism and destruction of a bird blind off of Mexico Gravel Road. A $100 reward is offered for information leading to the arrest of the vandals.
I can only hope the statute of limitations has passed.
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