The Berry

Post

Debbie Barry

2 The Berry Post

Published by:

Debbie Barry

2500 Mann Road, #248

Clarkston, Michigan 48346

USA

Copyright © 2013 by Deborah K. Barry. All

rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced,

stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted

by any means without the written permission

of the author.

ISBN-13: 978-1490418575

ISBN-10: 1490418571

The Berry Post 3

The Berry Post

This is a story about my

grandmother, Zoa Townsend Fletcher,

as I heard it from her when I was a

little girl. Grandma Fletcher was a

great storyteller. She loved to tell

the stories of her own adventures to

her children and grandchildren. The

story of the berry post with its

related anecdotes was a great

favorite with all of her children and

grandchildren, and it was told over

and over again. My grandmother told

it to her children, and one of her

children grew up to be my Daddy, and

4 The Berry Post

now it is my turn to tell the story as I

know it.

~ * ~

The Berry Post 5

The Berry Post

Zoa Townsend lived in the

mountains in the middle of Vermont as

the 19th century was rolling over into

the new 20th century. Her name

wasn’t Zoa when she was a little girl;

6 The Berry Post

it was Azubah. That’s another story

for another time, but we will call her

Azubah because that was her name

when this story took place.

Azubah lived with her Pa, her

Ma, her brother, and her three

sisters on a prosperous farm in

Ninevah. Ninevah is a very small

community that is nestled among the

Green Mountains of Vermont, and it

was still a very rural place when

Azubah lived there. In fact, it was

not too much different from the way

it had been for a century or so before

that. Pa and Ma were Moses and Mary

Townsend, and their children, from

eldest to youngest, were: Bessie,

The Berry Post 7

John, Maggie, Azubah, and little

Mary.

Every year or so, on the farm in

Ninevah, Pa would purposely burn all

the grass and brush from a part of

one of the fields. He did this so

there would be no weeds or brush to

choke the blueberry bushes so the

field would yield more blueberries.

The blueberry field was behind

some trees, and it could not be seen

from the house. As a result, people

often stole blueberries, picking all

they wanted while no one was looking.

That was bad for Azubah’s family

because they sold most of the

blueberry harvest for money to help

support the farm. Pa put up paper

8 The Berry Post

poster signs saying "NO

TRESPASSING," but the berry

thieves did not care about the signs.

The thieves tore down the paper signs

and went right on picking the

blueberries.

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Frustrated that the paper signs

were not enough to stop people from

stealing his blueberries, Pa went into

Ludlow, which was the nearest town of

any size. He had "NO

TRESPASSING” signs printed on

cloth that would be much harder to

tear down than the paper signs had

been. Azubah and her brother and

sisters helped Pa nail the signs to the

trees around the field, especially

along the road.

One sunny, summer morning,

the blueberries were just right to

pick. Pa and Ma would bring the

children and the hired men to pick the

berries after the animals were

tended, but Ma sent Azubah to the

10 The Berry Post

field bright and early to check for

berry thieves. “Zewy, “ Ma said –

Azubah’s family called her Zewy – “go

on down to the berry field. I expect

lots of folks’ll come to steal the

berries this fine day.” Ma thought

the thieves would be picking the

berries as soon as the sun was up, and

she was right!

Azubah walked down to the

berry field. Sure enough, there were

people among the berry bushes,

picking the ripe, juicy fruit. Azubah

saw that the thieves had torn down

the cloth signs, just as they had

always torn down the paper signs.

Some of the thieves glanced up when

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Azubah arrived, but they all went on

picking.

“Hey, there!” Azubah shouted

as she emerged from the woods and

saw the thieves. “This is my Pa’s

berry field. All you folks get on out

of here!”

Some of the people picking the

blueberries looked up. A few laughed.

“We don’t have to go

anywhere!” one man exclaimed.

“Your land ain’t posted!” a

woman added, continuing to pick.

Azubah was angry. This was

her family’s berry field, and her Pa

worked hard to make it produce as

many berries as it could. Her family

12 The Berry Post

was counting on the income from

these berries.

“We posted this land!” Azubah

cried. “You thieves tore down our

signs!”

The berry thieves just laughed

again.

Fully frustrated, Azubah

decided to take a stand. “Fine, you

tore down our signs,” she said. “Well,

then, I’m the post! You all just get

out of here!”

The people were surprised, but

they knew that Azubah was right and

they were wrong. They all got up to

leave.

“You leave those berries, too!”

Azubah shouted. “Pa’ll get the law if

The Berry Post 13

you steal those while I’m standing

right here!”

There was a great deal of

grumbling, but the berry thieves set

down their pails and baskets and

walked away. Azubah gathered the

pails and baskets of luscious, ripe

berries. When Pa and the hired men

arrived with the wagon and the

baskets for harvesting the berries,

Azubah poured the berries gently into

her family’s own baskets. She put the

thieves’ baskets and pails in a pile

outside the berry field where their

owners could retrieve them; Azubah

was an honest girl, and she would not

steal the baskets and pails from the

14 The Berry Post

men and women who had been stealing

berries from her family.

Azubah was a very fast berry

picker. Once she had put the almost-

stolen berries in the bushel baskets

and had put the pails and baskets

outside the field, she took an empty

milk pail and started picking berries.

Soon, Ma and the other children

arrived to help with the picking. Even

little Mary helped pick berries under

The Berry Post 15

Bessie’s watchful gaze. Azubah filled

three large milk pails with berries all

on her own. The pails of berries were

too heavy for Azubah to carry them,

so one of the hired men took them

and poured the berries into a bushel

basket on the wagon at the edge of

the field. Azubah’s three pails of

berries filled an entire bushel basket!

A bushel basket holds 32 quarts,

which is a lot of berries!

By evening, all of the

blueberries had been picked. Pa

drove the wagon back to the house

and all of the berries were placed in

the cellar to keep them cool and dry

overnight. Early the next morning,

Azubah and her sisters helped Ma

16 The Berry Post

divide the berries into quart baskets

that were woven from very thin strips

of wood. Once they were sorted, Pa

and John loaded the many baskets

into the wagon.

“Azubah,” Ma said, using

Azubah’s real name instead of calling

her Zewy, as usual, “you’re big enough

this year to take the berry route all

by yourself.”

Azubah was very pleased and

proud to be old enough to go alone.

“Yes, Ma,” she replied dutifully.

“Take a notebook, Zewy,” Pa

said, walking into the kitchen, “and a

sharp pencil. I want you to write

down all the names of the people who

buy your berries. Mind you keep close

The Berry Post 17

track of the money they give you,

too.”

“Yes, Pa,” Azubah said, taking a

small, paper-covered notebook from

the shelf of school books near the

back door and getting a wooden pencil

with a dark lead from a drawer.

Azubah went out to the wagon.

Pa had already hitched up the horse

for her. She climbed into the seat,

placing the notebook, the pencil, and a

small, drawstring bag in the pocket of

her skirt. Remembering what John

had taught her that spring, she got

the horse moving and drove the wagon

out of the yard.

Azubah drove slowly along the

road that ran from Hortonville to

18 The Berry Post

Mount Holly. She stopped at each

house she came to, and at each house

she sold several baskets of sweet,

ripe blueberries. As each person paid

her, she placed the coins carefully in

the bag that she kept in her pocket,

and then dutifully wrote down the

name of the person and how many

quarts of berries each person bought.

As Azubah drove along, she

paused often, and she took the

opportunity of each stop to carefully

draw a map in her little notebook.

She drew each road on which she

traveled, and she carefully marked

each house at which she stopped.

Azubah loved to draw, and her

teacher had encouraged to draw

The Berry Post 19

detailed pictures with a pencil and a

ruler, so she very much enjoyed

adding details to her map. Many years

later, when she was married and her

husband was serving overseas in the

Army, Azubah would remember the

careful record keeping that she

practiced with the berries, and she

would use those skills to run her

husband’s lumber company in his

absence.

As Azubah drove along her

blueberry route, she came to the

home of one of her favorite

customers. The elderly woman was

Mrs. Baker, but many of the local

natives called her “Deef” Baker.

Azubah objected to this name,

20 The Berry Post

although she thought it might be

acceptable to call her Deaf Baker.

Mrs. Baker really was very nearly

deaf. She had a long, curved hearing

aid horn that she held in her ear for

others to talk into. Azubah thought

that the horn looked like an

instrument from Sousa’s band.

Mrs. Baker was sitting on a

chair outside her door, enjoying the

warm sunshine, when Azubah pulled

her wagon to a stop. A broad smile

split the old woman’s face. She called

out, “Ah, little Zewy! What brings you

so far from home?”

Azubah smiled and held out two

baskets of blueberries for Mrs. Baker

to see.

The Berry Post 21

“Ah!” Mrs. Baker exclaimed

with pleasure. “You’ve berries to sell,

have you?”

“Yes, Ma’am,” Azubah shouted

into the hearing horn. She liked Mrs.

Baker, and she was used to the

unusual means of communication. She

thought Mrs. Baker was a most

delightful person, and Azubah enjoyed

talking to her immensely, and she

looked forward to her visits with the

old woman. She was also quite

fascinated by the hearing horn,

although she spoke of it directly.

Azubah and Mrs. Baker worked

out the price of a basket of berries,

using hand signs as well as the curious

horn. When they had done so, Azubah

22 The Berry Post

apologized for such a short visit,

explaining that she had many

customers to see, and then she went

on along her route.

Several weeks later, Ma called

Azubah into the kitchen. “So, you’re

the post, are you?” she asked.

Azubah was startled. She had

not told Ma about standing up to the

berry thieves. “Y-yes, Ma,” she

stammered slightly with surprise.

Ma laughed at Azubah’s

confusion. She told her daughter

that the berry thieves had thought

the story of the berry post that was

a young girl was very amusing, and one

of the women had told the story to

friends in Ludlow. The story had

The Berry Post 23

circulated through town, and Ma had

eventually heard of the adventure.

Ma was amused, and she was very

proud of her daughter’s courage.

Many years later, Azubah, who

was now Mrs. Fletcher, told the story

of the berry post to some of her

closest friends at a bridge party in

her home. Her friends thought the

store was funny, too, and the women

laughed and laughed about the little

girl who was the berry post.

~*~

Now you know the story of how

Grandma Fletcher came to be the

berry post to protect her family’s

24 The Berry Post

blueberry crop. Grandma Fletcher

told this story to her children, and

one of those children grew up to be

my Daddy, and he told the story to

me. You can tell the story to your

children when you grow up, too.

The Berry Post 25

Debbie Barry and her husband

live in southeastern Michigan with

their two sons and their two cats.

The family enjoys exploring history

through French and Indian War re-

enactment and through medieval re-

enactment in the Society for Creative

Anachronism (SCA). Debbie grew up

in Vermont, where she heard and

collected many family stories that she

26 The Berry Post

enjoys retelling as historical fiction

for young audiences.

Debbie graduated summa cum

laude with a B.A. in dual majors of

social sciences with an education

concentration and of English in 2013.

The Berry Post 27

Also look for these titles by Debbie

Barry:

Books for Young

Learners:

Around the Color Wheel

Colors and Numbers

Stories for Children:

A Shattering Experience

Bobcat in the Pantry

Born in the Blizzard and

Freshet

Expressing the Trunk

Gramp’s Bear Story

Meeting with Wolves

When Mary Fell Down the Well

Writing Competition

Biographical Fiction:

The Wrong Race

28 The Berry Post

Wood Alcohol in Carmel

History and Genealogy:

Family History of Deborah K.

Fletcher

Grandma Fletcher’s Scrapbooks

Nana’s Stories

Property Deeds and other Legal

Documents of the Fletcher and

Townsend Families

Property Deeds and other Legal

Documents of the Fletcher and

Townsend Families, 2nd Edition

with Digital Scans

The Red Notebook

The Red Notebook, 2nd Edition

with Digital Scans

Zoa Fletcher’s Photos

Zoa Has Her Way

Debbie’s Art:

Debbie’s Vision in Art, Volumes

1-4

The Berry Post 29

Debbie’s Vision in Art (Hard

cover, published by Blurb)

The Heart’s Vision

The Heart’s Vision in Color

Other Topics:

A Journey Through My College

Papers: Undergraduate Series

Advantages of Brain-Based

Learning Environments

African Americans in Post-Civil

War America

American Students Are

Crippled By Cultural Diversity

Education

Analyzing The Yellow Wallpaper

A Personal Philosophy of

Education

Debbie’s Writing

Examining Gender in A Doll

House

Identity Within and Without

Indifferent Universe

Loss

More Than Just Monogamy

30 The Berry Post

Nature in Early American

Literature

Picturing The First Writing

Religion and Myth in English

Poetry

Responsibility to a Broader

Humanity

Speech Codes in Education

Symbolic Serpents

The Evil of Grendel