In Keister’s Ridge there has always been a distrust of what the rest of the world calls technology. Since the Geneti-Tech fiasco there has also been a secret embarrassment associated the very concept of technology. Even years ago when the first automobiles were clawing their way across the landscape people instinctively knew that the whole fad of motorized transport would die out by 1920. Electric lights were installed despite the fears of a few that excess electricity would leak out of empty sockets. Still, electricity was one of the few innovations that was met with anything that even barely resembled enthusiasm.
Certain members of the community were less impressed with scientific achievement than others. In fact, a few residents were down right hostile. A farmer named Hesikia Bartlett once took a pot shot at a World War I SE-5A biplane. He thought it was a large chicken hawk. Hesikia also thought that radio was the work of the devil. He never lived to see television.
One of the most staid people in Keister’s Ridge was Elmer Jensen. Elmer came from a family of folks who tried their darnedest not to change with the times. His father, Oliver Jensen, refused to buy a tractor until 1952, preferring to plow his fields with a team of mules. One day the mules refused to plow and just stood there looking at the barnyard gate with a certain kind of ambivalency that only a mule can have. Oliver decided then and there that no mule would take a holiday on his time and jumped into his pickup truck and drove directly to Keister Ford to buy a tractor. Actually, he had wanted to make the switch to gasoline for some time, but being a stubborn old cuss he was too proud to admit that the days of the mule drawn plow were over. The mule-mutiny was just an excuse to take the plunge to mechanization.
Oliver’s son, Elmer Jensen, took after his father. In fact he even saved the old mule harness’ and when the gas crises of 1973 hit he was the only one in Keister’s Ridge to be prepared. It came a quite a shock to the gang down at Malcom Ott’s Farm and Feed when one day, while buying Termatrex corn rootworm eradicator, Elmer announced that he was going to convert his chicken to solar heat.
A few folks in Keister’s Ridge began to think that Elmer was turning into some sort of radical.
In the chicken business Elmer is considered to be theking of Keister County. As a matter of fact, he was the single largest operator in the central part of the state. Thousands upon thousands, maybe even millions, of chickens over the years had made their way from Elmer’s coop to the soup pot. Even though he was a wealthy man, and had the reputation of being shrewd in business, Elmer did not immediately embrace the new things that science had to offer. In fact, this was indirectly related to his actual success as a chicken farmer.
Elmer never did believe in using hormones or drugs in his chicken feed. His feed was a formula developed by his father, Oliver, during the Great Depression while searching for a cheap way to feed the birds. When the natural food fad hit in the early ’70s Elmer cashed in with his Jensen’s Naturally Grown Chickens. With no added chemicals the poultry products from Jensen Farms were extremely popular in such exotic places as Southern California.
Elmer figured there had to be a cheaper way to heat his chicken coop than with the propane and electricity that he had been using. Of course, one must remember that this was no ordinary chicken coop. It was, in reality, a poultry growing facility, or PGF, as it is known in the trade. It was over two hundred fifty feet long and consisted of two buildings, each fifty feet wide. The fuel bills were extremely high, especially in winter. Summer was not much better because the facility had to be air conditioned.
Chickens like to be comfortable.
Elmer started reading all he could about solar heating. Eventually he made a trip to a neighboring state to look over a model farm. In the end he devised his own system for heating and cooling the coop. The long pitched roofs of the coop faced north and south. The walls were very short. On the south side he erected a framework that ran the length of the building. On top of the frame work he mounted a series of devices he called “heat boxes”. Each heat box was only a few inches thick and was painted completely black except for one side which was made of sheet glass. The heat boxes were bolted together and wherever two boxes joined holes in the sides allowed air to pass through. The heat boxes faced south and the radiant energy from the sun went through the glass and got trapped inside heating the air. A simple blower forced cold air in one end and hot air out the other. The hot air was ducted throughout the coop.
For the air conditioning system Elmer dug a deep trench. The bottom of the trench was down where the temperature of the earth stays the same all year around. He had a big spool of black corrugated tube left over from a field drainage project. He buried the tube in the trench. Another blower forced warm air in one end of the tube. The air was cooled underground and then ducted, like the heated air, throughout the coop.
Elmer ended up with very happy chickens. His utility bills dropped like rocks.
Eventually farmer Jensen went energy mad. He started using what little spare time he had on energy conservation projects. He renovated an old windmill and used it to pump water. He put photo cells on his roof and batteries in the cellar. He even built a wind generator out of old venetian blinds and Buick parts. It charged an electric golf cart in which he would scoot around is empire.
People in Keister’s Ridge thought Elmer Jensen was moving forward just a little too fast for their liking. After all, the owner on one building downtown, which had been once used by an automobile dealership, has insisted on keeping the Studebaker sign up “just in case.”
Then one day the outside world heard about Elmer Jensen’s marvelous energy efficient chicken farm.
First came an article in the Sunday edition of the KEISTER HERALD. That article was picked up by the wires. Then ENERGY MANAGEMENT MONTHLY wrote a full page story about the farm. But it wasn’t until MIDWESTERN FARMER’S QUARTERLY did a photo spread that Elmer became really famous. A few weeks later a committee from the United States Department of Agriculture and the American Farm Advancement Association visited the chicken coop. The committee looked, and the next thing that Elmer knew he was getting letters from the Secretary of Agriculture and a telephone call from the President of the United States! The Department of Energy placed a bronze plaque hear the front door of the coop.
Despite being known all over the country as an expert on energy management on chicken farms Elmer remained the typical down-home kind of individual that he had always been. He kept buying supplies at Malcom Ott’s Farm and Feed and got groceries at Rich’s Super Market. He even continued to by gasoline at Bart’s Richfield Service. And, of course, Elmer remained active in the Keister’s Ridge Volunteer Fire Department.
One summer MIDWESTERN FARMER’S QUARTERLY and the Department of Agriculture sponsored an international exchange program with the Soviet Union. A dozen farmers from the Mid-West were to visit the USSR while twelve of their people would tour the United States. Of the twelve visiting farmers four were in the poultry business and Elmer was asked to be their host.
The news that a group of farmers from the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was going to visit Keister’s Ridge was met with both excitement and suspicion. A small but vocal group could be heard during lunch at Fred’s Motel and Hungarian Restaurant saying that they didn’t want no gall darn Russians trotting around their town. One woman wrote a letter to the editor of the KEISTER HERALD linking the Ruskies with “the people who are trying to put flouride in the nation’s water,” and that “the next thing we will know is that they will park Commie tanks in front of City Hall.”
But, the majority of the citizens thought that it was a downright good idea to have the Russians visit. Mayor Graft instituted a cleanup campaign and delegated Arnold Obermeyer to be in charge. The town decided that they would impress their guests with American kindness and openess. The plan was to make Keister’s Ridge a Yankee-Doodle Dandy of a town.”
On Thursday afternoon the Soviet delegation arrived.
They were escorted by an equal number of American officials, and followed by a small group of reporters and FBI agents. The agents were there just to keep an eye on things.
The whole bunch had reservations at Fred’s Motel and Hungarian Restaurant. That gave Fred a full house, a rare item at Fred’s.
By 2:30 everybody had eaten lunch, the Russians having been exposed to an American-Hungarian salad bar for the first time. Interestingly, they all survived the experience. At three o’clock the Soviets were officially greeted by Mayor Graft in the Budapest room. The reporters dutifully took notes of the wondrously dull proceedings.
“Citizens of Keister’s Ridge, friends, and honored Soviet guests,” droned Mayor Graft, “I am pleased to be able to welcome you to our town.
“It is truly a privelege to be mayor of Keister’s Ridge at a time like this. To have our honored guests travel so many thousands of miles to visit our town is a great honor.”
There was a lot of honor running around the room. Unfortunately, Mayor Graft continued, “Of course, if it wasn’t for our own Elmer Jensen this event would not have been possible. Please note, that Elmer Jensen represents the best of what Keister’s Rider, and America, has to offer. Yes, it is, indeed, Elmer Jensen and his innovative chicken coop that we must thank. To Elmer we turn and say, ‘Thanks for the coop’.”
There was polite applause.
Elmer looked around the room. It was pretty near full of folks. He noticed that they all turned towards him. With a “Aw, shucks, t’wern’t nothin’ sort of grin he poked the tow of his right boot into the carpet.
After Mayor Graft’s speech the visitors from over the ocean went to their rooms to rest up from the effects of jet lag and bus travel. That evening they were to be guest’s of honor at a barbecue sponsored by the Founder’s Day Parade Committee over at the Volunteer Fire Department Fire Hall. There was a grassy area next to the fire hall that was normally used to wash the pumper truck and was the site of the Volunteer Fire Department Firemen’s Games every October. The Founder’s Day Parade Committee had arranged barbecue pits made from fifty gallon drums split in half and set up on legs. Picnic tables had been borrowed from the Keister’s Ridge Park Department and placed in long rows. The pumper truck and emergency rescue vehicle were in the driveway and polished so brightly that it almost hurt the eyes to look at them.
A stage had been set up and Billy BoBob’s Country BeBop Band from the Keister Inn was going to entertain everyone at the picnic.
It is a pretty good rule of thumb that in every group of Soviets touring overseas that there is at least one KGB tattle tale. Some of these people are obviously security agents, others spies, and some just informers.
The KBG person in the group visiting Keister’s Ridge was Svetlana Chekova. Comrade Chekova weighed in at 197 pounds. She was easy to spot, dressed as she was in a long sleeved calf-length black dress and solid black shoes. She was a no nonsense person who once stopped a potential defector with a well placed throw of a vodka bottle.
With Svetlana on this trip was a poultry collective manager named Andrei Markov. Sergei Domitriv was a feed specialist from Minsk who was trying to steal chicken food formulas from the West. Sergei did not understand why, when in response to a question at lunch, people laughed when he announced that he was working for, “better chicken feed.”
Last in the group was Dominik Romanov. The also was a commune manager and very quiet. He collected butterflies. At the picnic that evening Dominik discovered that at least one American in Keister’s Ridge shared his enthusiam
for butterfly collecting. Bart, of Bart’s Richfield Service, had collected butterflies for years. The Russian did not understand why people would come up to Bart and ask how the car wash business was going and then snicker. He really didn’t understand the concept of a “car wash” anyway. Silly Yankee luxury, a machine to clean a car!
At the picnic Comrade Svetlana kept an eye on her comrades as they mingled with the citizens of the town. The people of MIDWESTERN FARM QUARTERLY tried to keep an eye on all of the Russians, and the FBI agents in an unmarked car watched everyone. The children watched the FBI agents.
By Sundown Billy BoBob’s Country BeBop Band had the picnic jumping. Smoke from the barbecues filled the air and people wandered between the tables moving from group to group while holding paper plates filled with barbecued chicken and potato salad.
Elmer Jensen mingled with a few of the reporters who had discovered that he had quite a sense of humor. Elmer did not know himself that he had a sense of humor, and was surprised to find that he had attracted a little crowd while he told stories of the chicken business and the truth behind the GenetiTech incident.
Mayor Graft gave a short speech again. He almost hurt himself when he climbed up onto the jury-rigged bandstand and tripped on an electric guitar amplifier cord. Arnold Obermeyer said thanks to everyone who helped get the town ready for their new “Bolshivic friends.” Torx Torvald, Volunteer Fire Chief, reminded everybody of the bingo game the next week in the fire hall. It was a grand picnic, especially since Fred of Fred’s Motel and Hungarian Restaurant and Auntie Mabel of the Keister Inn had teamed up to do the cooking and were supervising a crew of eight from the Volunteer Fire Department Auxiliary.
Meanwhile, on the edge of town Hattie Thompson paused in her baking. She was making an apple pie when the telephone rang. Her two year old daughter was playing upstairs in a bedroom. Mr. Thompson was on his way back from Miller’s Falls where he had gone to find a tractor part. When Hattie went to answer the phone she put her pot holder on a magnetic hook that was stuck to the side of her refrigerator. The magnet let go after she had left the kitchen and fell down next to a burner that was heating a kettle of water. The pot holder caught fire. The flames spread to the pictures drawn by little Tina Thompson that were taped to the refrigerator door. Within moments the fire had jumped to the curtains. Hattie smelled smoke and slammed the phone down. She ran back into the kitchen, but it was totally engulfed and the fire was spreading to the dining room. Hattie ran back to the telephone and called 911.
The civil defense operator took the message. He reached across his desk and punched three buttons. Button number one alerted the sheriff’s department, button number two alerted the Keister Ridge Town marshal, and the third button signaled the Keister Ridge Volunteer Fire Department.
There was always someone on duty at the Volunteer Fire Department Fire Hall. Sometimes night duty could be lonely, but on this night Maynard the Hippie had a lot of company. The picnic was going full bore outside and members of the Auxiliary would pass barbecued chicken or corn on the cob to him through the open window. In front of him was the duty desk. Suddenly, Maynard’s trouble light came on and his red telephone started to ring. Civil Defense told him that the Thompson house was on fire.
Maynard pushed the beeper control button. Within a split second little black beepers on belts all over the county started to sound. In houses men and women jumped up from dinner tables and ran out the door. In barns and garages teenagers working on old cars ran for their father’s pickups. A wedding reception broke up when the groom dashed away because his beeper had gone off just as he was about to take a bit of the wedding cake.
At the picnic the chirping sounds from belt buckles startled the Soviets. But, when Maynard sounded the siren on the roof of the fire hall the Soviets out and out jumped. Svetlana thought that maybe her home country had actually fired its intercontinental missiles and that everybody was heading for shelters.
But, that was not to be. Instead, people started running. Torx Torvald ran into the fire hall. Seconds later he ran back out and got into his Fire Chief’s car. Dominik was talking to Bart when the siren went off. Bart dropped his plate and headed for his tow truck. Dominik didn’t know what to do, so he hustled after Bart.
Elmer Jensen’s wife, Edna, stopped talking to Comrade Svetlana. They were comparing life-style notes. Svetlana had made a few minor comments that Edna did not appreciate. The Russian lady was about to get a USA-patriotic blast when the emergency call came in. Edna turned and said, “Well, come with me, and I’ll show you how we do things in America!”
The two of them ran to the Jensen van. Elmer was already there. Edna pushed Svetlana into the back and pulled a blue light out of the glove box. She plugged the cord into the cigarette lighter and put the light out the window and on the roof of the van. Elmer put the transmission in drive and floored the accelerator. The acceleration almost tossed Svetlana over the back of her seat. As Elmer raced to the fire she held on to the arm rests for dear life.
Sergei and Andrei saw Svetlana and Dominik being driven off. They were talking to Arnold Obermeyer when he also started running. Arnold was the driver of the rescue vehicle and they caught up with him just as he was climbing into the driver’s seat. The rescue vehicle was a World War II vintage Dodge 6×6 ammo truck. Arnold had volunteered the use of the Body Shop and Dance Studio and members of the fire department had spent two months fixing it up. The truck was bright red with all sorts of lights, cables, winches, tool boxes, and even a generator. Andrei stood on the running board on the driver’s side and held onto a mirror. Sergei squeezed into the cab next to Arnold and another volunteer fireman. Someone else was on the passenger side running board.
Up and down the street people ran for their cars. Mustangs, Vegas, and even a motorcycle sprouted flashingblue lights. With the siren screaming and people running the Keister’s Ridge Volunteer Fire Department moved into action.
Torx Torvald, Volunteer Fire Chief, led the main parade with the red and gold Ford station wagon. Its light bar on the roof made it look like a rolling Christmas tree. The rescue truck with Arnold at the wheel followed. The pumper truck was next with volunteers hanging from its sides and back. Then came civilian vehicles, including the FBI car.
First on the scene was Elmer Johnson, Edna, and Svetlana. Smoke was billowing from the windows of the first floor of the white frame house. Elmer wheeled the van through the front gate and up the drive to the house. The sun had set and the last rays of light were almost gone. He parked the van so that its headlight would help illuminate the scene.
Bart and Dominik arrived next. Bart also parked the tow truck so that its lights would illuminate the house. Then he and Dominik ran around the house looking for a way in and to determine the extent of the fire.
Torx and others arrived immediately after. The volunteers leapt off the truck and headed for the door while others ran to the porch to smash in the door. Arnold and his crew started to set up their flood lights, Sergei and Andrei hooked cables to the generator.
Suddenly the door flew open and Hattie Thompson staggered out. She fell into the arms of one of the fireman on the porch who carried her down the steps and put her on the ground next to the Johnson van. An Emergency Medical Technician came over with his black bag and started checking her for injuries and treating her for smoke inhalation.
The situation was so bad that the volunteers could not get in through the front door. They were spraying water through the windows. Lines were being laid to bring water from the duck pond out back. The Volunteer Fire Department Auxiliaries arrived and set up a first aide station over near where Hattie had been taken. There was lots of yelling in both English and Russian.
Hattie was lying on the ground, an oxygen mask over her mouth and nose. She was being tended by an Emergency Medical Team. The team leader was Auntie Mabel’s daughter, Laura. Hattie grabbed the mask and pulled it away. She reached up and clawed at Laura’s blouse. Hattie tried to speak but couldn’t, all she could do was cough. Laura’s team tried to get the mask back in place, but Hattie wouldn’t let them. Finally, between gasps and coughs she aid one word, “Tina.”
Edna Johnson was standing near by. She heard Hattie say, “Tina.” Looking up to the second floor she saw little Tina Thompson staring down, out of the window, wondering what all the excitement was about. Edna felt faint, she squeezed someone’s arm and pointed to the window.
Comrade Svetlana felt Edna squeeze her just above the elbow. She looked in the direction that Edna pointed.At the top of her voice she bellowed, “Dere iz a child up in dot vindow!”
The volunteers froze, horror filled them all. Nothing is so frightening as a child trapped in a fire. Sergei pulled a ladder from their rescue truck and ran towards the house. They couldn’t get the ladder up because flames were shooting from the window just below the one in which little Tina stood. Torx shouted orders and hoses played water into the lower window.
Svetlana also ran towards the house. At the front door firemen were donning air masks , their associates had killed the flames near the door, but the foyer was filled with smoke. The volunteers were about to go in and rescue Tina. As two of them set foot on the porch Svetlana crashed into them from behind. Knocking one of them over the porch rail she pushed her 5’4″ 197 pound bulk through the door and into the smoky house.
As she disappeared inside flames closed over the entryway. Svetlana was now trapped, too. The firemen fought the flames at the front door again.
Arnold had his crew train the beam from one of their spotlights on the window that little Tina was standing in. Tina was starting to cry.
Dominique and Bart had tried to get in through the back door, but found the flames from the kitchen were too much to fight. The returned to the front of the house just in time to see Svetlana dash inside. The hose crew hadmanaged to dowse the flames from the window under Tina’s. Sergei and Andre were at their ladder again. This time they had help from some of the vollunteer firemen. They looked up and saw Svetlana looking back at them.
There was a crash and glass rained down around them. Svetlana had thrown a child’s chair through the window. The chair bounced on the lawn. Segei climbed up the ladder to the upstairs window. Andrei and a volunteer fireman held the ladder down below., Sevetlana tossed the little girl out the window and Sergei climbed down with Tina over his shoulder. As he ran with the child to the first aide station the flames in the dining room flared again and Andrei and the other fireman had to abandon the ladder.
Now Svetlana was standing in the window looking down. Again the hose crew moved in to battle the flames. Another hose crew had entered the house through the front door and were finally able to fight the fire from inside. The heat from the flames had started to melt the ladder left against the house. Svetlana was trapped, and the people outside could see her looking over her shoulder. They knew the truth, the fire was just outside the bedroom door.
Bart and Dominik found Elmer Johnson, he was helping a hose crew handle a 21/2″ line. Bart had a daring plan and they needed Elmer’s help. Bart’s plans never worked and Elmer was about to tell him off when he realized that maybe this was the one time when one of Bart’s wild ideas could pay off. The trio ran to the Johnson van. Using a ladder Dominikand Bart climbed onto the roof. Seeing what they had in mind, Torx ordered the hose crews away from the house.
Elmer drove the van across the yard with Dominik and Bart on top. He pulled the van up close to the house, and with two wheels running in the flower beds he drove along with his door handle just barely touching the shingles. He stopped the vehicle under Svetlana’s window.
Bart and Dominique stood at either end of the van’s roof. They waved to Svetlana and Dominik shouted in Russian. Svetlana squeezed through the window and dropped onto the roof, she landed in a sitting position. The damage was not too severe to Svetlana but the van’s metal roof sagged 3 inches. Elmer pulled away from the house clearing the area for the hose crews to finish their work.
If the picnic that the fire interrupted was a big one, then the picnic the following night was even bigger. Absolutely everyone in town was there, plus people from all over the county. Svetlana, Andrei, Sergei, and Dominique were not just guests of honor, but heros. In fact, everyone who was at the fire was a hero. Bart was embarassed because everywhere he went people slapped him on the back and told him what a super job he had done. Reporters from ABC, NBC,CBS, NPR, and CNN all were there. Even the Soviet news agency TASS showed up. Somebody counted eight different interviews going on at the same time.
International experts called it an example of multinational cooperation. Hattie called it a miracle.Tina Thompson was too young to call it anything.
When asked by a reporter, Edna Johnson said, “Well, friends always stick together and help each other out in a crises.”
Comrade Svetlana chimed in, “Da, dot’s right!”