Josh Eure - Catfish and Home

Southern Cultures 2011 Center for the Study of the American South

Published by the University of North Carolina Press

I was never much for baseball. It wasnt that I hated the sport. I simply had no skill for it. A pop-fly to my left field usually went uncaughtnever mind my batting. I was tall, arms hung apelike from my body, and my movements were too stretched out, languid flourishes that were useless. I wasnt built for it. But in Hertford, North Carolina, where baseball hung in every home, office, classroom, and service station, a boy like me had little else to choose from. Hertford was baseball.

Some would say our sleepy hometown fell in love with the game when America fell for Catfish in the 1960s and 70s. Jimmy Catfish Hunter, a local hero, pitched for the Oakland Athletics and the New York Yankees (helping them to three straight pennants), played in the World Series six times, made eight All-Star teams, won 224 games, and in 1987 was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fameall the while maintaining his small-town farming roots: his Hertford roots. His professional career spanned 1965 to 1979, and in that time, he became Hertfords Prometheus, our link to the gods. He played every game with the shotgun pellets from a childhood hunting accident lodged in his foot, the result of winter mornings in the woods, doe-urine-splashed boots from stalking prey until nightfall, and natives imagined he held a major piece of them in his cleats. When he came back home for good at the age of thirty-three, he was royalty. The winner of the Cy Young Award, pitcher of a perfect game in 68, the subject of a Bob Dylan song, a titan in our town. Because of Catfish, Hertford had a name. It would be remembered.

Hertford did have its own appeal, most of which was lost on me growing up. Its a simple town. It still retains a kind of calm, a repose all too swiftly fading (yet still lingering on southern back roads). Its one of the first permanent settlements in North Carolina, dating to the late 1600s, and home to one of the oldest buildings in the state: the Newbold-White House. Impressive Victorian and Georgian homes still mark the road winding along the Perquimans River. Tall, pillared structures framed by magnolias or weeping willows. Adorned in Spanish moss, cypress trees, melancholy and stoic, stand in the shallow water, osprey nesting in their limbs. An old 1950s-style malt shop thrives downtown. Dogbox-equipped flatbeds line the shoulders of various side roads, as hunters discuss the goings-on of whatever game is in season. Theres racial tension, to be sure, but it simmers quietlythe surface somehow mostly still. The air practically carries southern ease, a clich aura of small-town familiarity, as people meet and greet with smiles and how dos comfortable in their everyday routine.

And that mightve been image enough, but legislators and local business owners wanted to parade Hertfords quality. What would Hertford be without Catfish? A great mural now greets all who drive through downtown, homage to various aspects of our towns history and so-called progress. There is, of course, a

giant Yankees cap with a ball poised before it in the very center of the painted wall, a peculiar icon for a small, southern town if you dont know its history. Beside it stands a Civil War soldier saluting an imposing Confederate flag, the source of much debate today. A silhouette of two Pilgrim settlers in the foreground, and to the left a Native American perches on a cliff above the river, watching two boys play in metal buckets. From that river a famous log juts forth with three turtles sunning lazily atop it. A tacky and, to some, offensive masterpiece, no doubt, but it remains endearing to most localsevidence of context for a hero, proof the town exists.

We would see Hertfords hero around town at timesin the pharmacy, at the Hertford Caf or local ball gamesand he was usually pleasant. Catfish would smile and wave if he knew us, or simply tip his hat. But wed also heard tales, rumors like newspaper headlines. Catfish Fights with Parent at Soccer Game. Scandals were big news, of course, but they only served to validate him as truly one of usor them. To me, Hertford was a family I didnt belong to. Id been adopted at thirteen by a local man, and if you looked closely, the difference was plain. I was only a witness to the town, a watchful refugee.

I played Little League, because everyone did. The community hung on those games. Parents were usually frenzied by the final innings, as were the coaches, Catfish among them, and his presence undoubtedly played a role in the leagues significance. We worked for him. Dust filled the dry evenings as freckle-faced kids ground cleats into the sport that gave their hometown meaning. Big League Chew filled near every cheek, and younger boys and girls flitted about, mimicking players on teams they one day hoped to join. Even bench riders felt the distinction of those hard-earned plays, dugouts as alive as the bleachers. The town fell on each pitch, cried for each run scored. And it was the same for every baseball league up through varsity. Even I felt it.

Id struck out twice already one game, and with slicked palms, heaving a weighted Easton bat from side to side, I had no hope for better. I tried to chock the weights off by driving the bat to the ground, firm and confident, but I shook with the force. It took two tries. I approached the plate, watching a teammate march to first, bow-legged, and I prayed to be walked, too. Legs vibrating as I scuffed my cleats in the dirt, back and forth, bending my knees, bouncing, lifting the bat from my shoulder. I tried to look like other players, cool, ready.

Catfish stood by the other teams dugout, his face shadowed by the brim of his hat. I couldnt see his expression, but I knew he was watching me. I turned back to the pitcher. I saw his shoulder snap when he let go of the ball, like a famous bird-wing, graceful and fierce. I swung for Catfish, although I was certain I would walk to the bench defeated once more. I knew this. But I felt that strange buzz of connection, a crack to shiver the bat. I searched the clouds for a sign, proof of triumph, and there it wasthe ball sailing across the field, every head gazing upward, following my great hit. I hoppedeven skippedtoward first base, afraid to look away. As I hit the bag I saw the boy in left field, watched as my ball fell, not a bomb but a dud, and the umpire screamed my fate.