Sweet and Sour Pie: A Wisconsin Boyhood

The Century Run

81 l The Century Run In my dream I was in a belfry. The bell was ringing, and from the bottom of a long ladder, someone was shouting my name. Then I woke up. My windup alarm clock was clattering and Dad was calling me from the foot of the stairs. I opened my eyes and shut the alarm off. It was three thirty in the morning. I put on jeans and a wool shirt, laced up my boots, hung binoculars around my neck, and stuffed my copy of A Field Guide to the Birds into a back pocket. It was a Saturday in early May 1954, I was eleven years old, and Dad and I were going to win the Bird Breakfast birding contest. I’m not sure when Manitowoc’s annual Bird Breakfast got started, but in the early fifties it was a minor cultural institution, sponsored by Saint Paul’s Methodist Church. For a couple of years it was held at our house just outside the city limits. I don’t know why 82 TheCenturyRun we were chosen to host the event, but I suppose it was because we belonged to the church and had two bathrooms. The procedure was to arrive at dawn, eat an outdoor breakfast cooked on a Coleman stove, and then go birding. The competitors listed the species they saw, and those who had the most by noon won modest prizes. Scoring was on the honor system, so beginning birders who said they saw rarities like fulvous tree ducks or painted buntings got to count them. Some participants did not go birding at all, but instead hung around Dad and his big cast-iron skillet, eating bacon and eggs and drinking coffee. “My God, Dave, that makes three eggs I’ve had,” a man would say, and Dad would reply, “Five, but who’s counting?” This year, though, Dad was leaving the cooking to Mom. This year, I was old enough to do some fairly serious birding. Dad and I were going to skip breakfast, start out in total darkness, drive briskly from one hot spot to another, and rack up sixty or seventy species. This year, we were going to win. Mom, Dad, and I had no particular interest in birds until we moved to Manitowoc. But when we bought our house on River Road, we acquired Merle Pickett and Lillian Marsh as neighbors, and they were master birders—experts, sharks. They knew habitats, field marks, and songs and shared their knowledge with everyone. Under their guidance we became birders as well. Not masters, of course, but studious apprentices. And now, with three years of birdchasing under our belts, Dad and I hoped to be contenders for the father-and-son title. Down in the kitchen, Dad poured me a half cup of coffee and slapped butter on toast. “Eat quick, and let’s get going,” he said. “We’ve got a lot of miles to cover.” Dad planned our day as we finished our coffee. “First stop is the thrush woods,” he said. “We should get two or three thrushes and an 83 owl, if we’re lucky. Then we’ll drive out to Collins for puddle ducks and shorebirds. After that we’ll come back here and check out Rahrs’ farm. Then the cemetery, Lincoln Park, and the Little Manitowoc, if we can squeeze it all in.” Our beagles, Nip and Rip, yawned and stretched and kept an eye on us. They knew something was up and wanted to be included. Dad reached down and patted Rip’s head. “No, we aren’t going rabbit hunting and you aren’t coming along,” he said. “But don’t feel bad, boys—in a couple of hours there’ll be a hundred people here, and all the leftovers you can eat.” Outside, we paused for a moment in front of the garage. The moon was down, it was pitch dark, and there was a gentle breeze out of the south. From the black sky overhead we heard the faint chipping calls of migrating songbirds. We weren’t skillful enough to identify them, but birds were clearly on the move. Dad raised the garage door. It made its usual screech and was answered by the rasping crow of a cock pheasant somewhere down in the wooded ravine that ran along the east side of our yard. “How about that!” Dad said...