Henry was his name, yes sir, he was a fine goat to have back then. When my brother was around 10 years old, he began thinking about getting a pet goat. The reason he wanted one was because he had heard my dad talk about the goat, Billy, that he had when he was a boy.
On Saturday mornings we liked to watch TV. We had three stations available – 2, 5 and 11. Our TV was black and white and you had to get up from your chair to change the channels, but with only three stations to watch, you really didn’t get up and change the station that often. There was a program named “Spanky and Our Gang” that was probably filmed in the late 1920’s. We all loved to watch it because it was about children playing and growing up in the Great Depression.
These kids had a playhouse and a pet goat. I can’t remember their goats name, but they had a little wagon that they took turns riding in the street.
It seemed like a lot of fun if you had a goat to play with. Now my dad had also told us that he had built a wagon for his goat so Billy could pull him around. The only thing was, when Billy got tired of pulling you around all afternoon he would take off to the house. He could pull himself and the wagon under the house so my dad would have to jump off so he wouldn’t get knocked off by Billy.
Well, my dad said he knew where some goats were. Sometimes on Sunday afternoon we would ride down to Stodgills or Fresh Air BBQ joints. They were both in Butts County and both places had real good BBQ and Brunswick Stew. Stodgills had a fire and their place burned down, but Fresh Air BBQ is still in business today. They have been making BBQ since 1929!
Anyway, we would ride down 42 South and there was this wonderful farm with a Gone With the Wind home on it that Mr. Asbury had built.
Mr. Asbury was from up north and built Asbury Farms. Later on, Mr. Ray Lambert bought Asbury Farms and continued to raise cattle and farm the land.
My dad called Mr. Lambert and asked if he would sell him a goat for his boy and Mr. Lambert said, “Doc, if you want one, just go see my foreman on the farm and pick one out.” He said the foreman was probably busy, but show him the one you picked out and he will bring him to you next week.
Well, a few days went by and the man brought a little white goat to our house and my dad thanked him and he drove away. My brother was excited, but we figured out it would be a while before anybody rode in the wagon (which we didn’t have anyway)! The goat would have to grow some first.
Now, my dad and all of us didn’t think about Mitzi, a full-grown German Shepherd dog that Mr. Mutt Brannan had given to us, and Mitzi was part of our family.
Needless to say, Mitzi was not thrilled with the goat and made sure that ole Henry knew that.
We were not prepared to look after a goat, and of course he ate some of our shrubbery and he kept chewing on the rope he was tied to. Then one day he got free and started to enjoy our neighbors shrubbery. If you don’t know, a goat will eat almost anything. In the south, they really enjoy Kudzu in the summer. Remember the episode of Andy Griffin when a farmer’s goat got loose and ate some dynamite?
Well, we didn’t have any dynamite, but we did have some apple and plum trees and Henry really liked eating them (The ones that he could reach!)
Unfortunately, the goat thing was not working out and we had to do something. My dad told my brother that Henry’s brothers and sisters were probably missing him and we should take him back home to the country.
Henry didn’t seem happy living in town, so my dad had the idea that we could take Henry back home. He called the farm’s foreman and explained the situation hoping the foreman would understood. There was just one problem – the man did not want the goat back and said “he had too many goats and didn’t need another one.”
My dad was in a tight spot and had to figure something else out. My brother agreed, but wondered how we would know which one was Henry when we went back to visit him. Henry looked like all the other goats, and I bet they had over 50 goats in that pasture.
My dad was really good about coming up with ideas to fix things. So he said, I’ll tell you what we are going to do. We will get some paint and paint polka dots on his horns. That way you can pick him out among the other goats. So they did! Now, back to the second problem. Remember the foreman who didn’t want Henry back?
A that point, my dad got a croker sack and put Henry into it. A croker sack was a very common sack used in the south on farms. Then we drove to Lambert Farms. At the time, it seemed like that farm was way out in the country. So my dad pulled up to the fence where the other goats were and looked around both ways on the road to make sure nobody saw him and opened the sack and put Henry back in the pen with the other goats.
Henry ran, jumped and kicked up his heels and went and found his family and was making these sounds that goats make when they are happy.
Well, the only person that came out of this deal was the farm foreman that delivered Henry to us. Where Mr. Lambert just gave the goat to my dad. Dad gave the man $20 to deliver Henry.
We don’t know if the foreman or Mr. Lambert ever saw the polka dots on Henry or not, but we made sure that nobody knew about Henry’s return home.
I guess you could say that the Lambert’s got our goat! Every time I ride by Lamberts Farm, I think about ole Henry. I’m sure he is in goat heaven eating shrubbery, kudzu, apples and plums and doing other things that goats like to do. I’ll never forget him!
“These times ain’t nothing like they used to be.”
