A Man Called Graveyard

By Leonard N Garrett

Born poor in the segregated south, LEONARD "GRAVEYARD" GARRETT thought he'd hit the jackpot when he was recruited by the Green Bay Packers. But reality struck like a linebacker's head-butt as glory on the football field gave way to juggling part-time jobs to make ends meet and being treated like a soulless chip in somebody else'

• Language: English
• Publisher: Novel Instincts Publishing
• Release date: Nov 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781792378607

Book preview

1 | Beating the love out of her

Silsbee, Texas, 1952

Our rickety old house kept no secrets. The screams and whimpers were my mother’s. My father beat her, every morning before he went to work at the Kirby Lumber Company, and many nights.

Sometimes in the dark before dawn, my baby sister’s cries would almost mask the sounds coming from the kitchen or their bedroom. But I could tell the difference, even at the age of five.

There were eight of us children now: Frankie, the oldest girl, then Merilyn, then me, and my younger brothers, Oran Wayne and Don Earl, the twins, Reginald and Raleigh, and the baby, eight-month-old Mona.

Eight of us crammed ourselves into two small rooms, my three sisters in one room, the five of us boys in the other, sharing two beds.

Some of us pretended not to hear the violence. Some heard, but claimed not to understand. Some knew, but prayed he wouldn’t come after us.

Every day.

Trains rumbled by near enough we could feel the vibrations in the floor. We heard their horns as they crossed the road, and the echoing crash of steel-on-steel as railcars were coupled in the seven-track switchyard just two houses away.

It was easy at first to mistake the abuse going on in the next room for the banging of railcars that shook the whole house on its cinderblock footings.

Thin frame walls and plywood floors with a flimsy layer of linoleum on top barely kept out the weather: the heat of summer, the chill of winter, the battering of hurricanes when they roared up from the Gulf every few seasons.

Roaches and rats skittered year round, especially when the lights were off.

We had no indoor plumbing. No kitchen sink, no tub, no toilet, not even a bathroom. Just a big Number 3 galvanized steel tub that served double-duty for laundry and baths. And an outhouse in the backyard. With flies and spiders. And disgusting smells.

Buckets lowered into an open well just five feet beyond the back door provided water for my mother’s cooking inside on a butane stove, and for bathing. But heating the water was another thing.

The family only bathed every other day, and we took turns using the same, increasingly dirty bathwater so as not to deplete the firewood supply for the woodstove, our only source of heat in the house.

There were no kitchen cabinets like you’d think of today. No refrigerator. Just an icebox that held giant blocks of ice, delivered to the house to keep what few perishables we had.

Toothpaste was a luxury we couldn’t afford, so I never brushed my teeth till I was in fifth or sixth grade. Didn’t know it was even a thing.

Fact is, for a long time, I didn’t know enough about the world beyond that house and our neighborhood to complain. I thought this was the way everybody lived, beatings and all.

Every day, I heard the screams and slaps, crashes and thuds against walls or floors or what little furniture we had. Sometimes I could see movement; there were no interior doors in the whole house.

One day my father caught me watching through my bedroom doorway. He was hitting my mother upside the head with his fist.

All I could do was watch, frozen in horror, afraid he’d hit me too if I said anything. I’d never seen anything like that. Didn’t know what it meant.

This ain’t none of your business, boy, he snapped at me. You just pay no mind.

My father would go to work, and when he came home, he’d beat my mother some more.

I wondered why he did it. What did she do today to make him mad? But I was too little, and too afraid, to ask him.

In my five-year-old mind I thought maybe she didn’t love him enough, and he was beating the love out of her.

Each time it started, my sisters would disappear into their room and huddle in silence. I guessed they didn’t want to attract Daddy’s attention when he was in a rage.

It scared me, but my brothers were all younger than me and were probably better at ignoring all the noises, including these.

Every day I watched or heard my father beating my mother. But she never called the police, at least as far as I know. I never saw them come to the house anyway. We didn’t have a phone in those days, so she would have had to use a neighbor’s, and I’m sure that would have made my father even angrier.

As time went on and the beatings continued, there were fewer screams and cries from my mother, despite the unmistakable sounds and sights of violence. Sometimes there was just whimpering, like a dog begging.

Nobody was ever invited to our house. Well, except for my mother’s mother, Grandma Pearl, who lived a block away. And even then, she only came to see my mother.

I don’t recall any words or gestures of affection toward us children from Grandma Pearl, or from either one of my parents as we were growing up.

Daddy, who went by the name Vandee Garrett, was cold and indifferent, when he was with us at all.

My mother—her given name was Azzie Lee, but we called her Ma dear—was simply unavailable, struggling all the time just to keep up with eight kids, a husband, and a ratty old house.

It seemed like she was always pregnant. Fact is, she’d had nine pregnancies in those ten years of marriage to my dad. The first was a miscarriage, and, looking back now, I wonder if she might have lost that baby from the trauma she endured every day.

Was that why Daddy mostly hit her in the head and face, never in the belly?

Although, for as little as he seemed to care about us, I don’t know why he’d grieve the loss of another mouth to feed.

Life was hard for my family. Every day was filled with chores for all of us, no matter how little we were. We did them, not to earn an allowance, but to make sure we had food in our bellies, and the place was decent, to have water in the house and firewood for heat.

Cleaning the outhouse was the worst chore imaginable. It was a stinky, two-stool wooden shed that offered almost no privacy, and no light when you had to go after dark. In fact, we just made a point not to have to go at night if we could hold it.

Meals were simple: mostly beans and rice, sometimes Spam or pork if we were lucky. Occasionally, we had wild meat such as squirrel, raccoon or rabbit. We got canned milk and cans of cane-sugar syrup from the government’s handout program for the poor. Breakfast usually consisted of oatmeal and syrup.

There was no lunch.

The ten of us took turns eating at a table with only four chairs. We never said grace or shared mealtime conversation. Eating seemed like just another chore.

Besides having no phone, we had no radio or television to connect us to the outside world or take us away from this life.

I couldn’t wait to start school. My oldest sister, Frankie was in third grade already, and Merilyn was in first. School, I thought, was a wonderful place where I could escape the monotonous, difficult, often terrifying life at home.

The beatings were mostly a private affair, though I suppose now that our neighbors must have heard the violent goings-on. Maybe they thought it was normal too. Maybe it happened in their houses the same as ours.

Still, I couldn’t imagine my mother doing anything awful enough to deserve that kind of treatment. He was hurting her, I knew that much. Every day. Except maybe on Sundays.

And even then there were exceptions.

I remember one hot Sunday afternoon, the work was done, and we were all sitting on the front porch, out in the open. I heard screaming inside the house, and my mother came running out, the screen door slammed after her.

My father followed out the door and yelled at her without regard to the audience he had. You get back inside this house and do what I tell you, he demanded.

She kept running, toward the edge of the porch and into the yard.

In a rage, my father reached down, grabbed an empty Coke bottle, and flung it at her.

Her arm exploded with blood. Stunned, she looked at Daddy, then at us. She grabbed her arm and watched the blood ooze from between her fingers.

You get back inside this house, Daddy shouted and pointed at the door.

She stared at him for a moment. Finally, she went inside. And we children, still wide-eyed on the porch, exchanged glances, too afraid to wonder aloud what that had been all about.

After a while, she came back out with her arm cleaned up, and nobody ever said a thing about what had happened.

That’s the way it was in my family: we just looked away, said nothing, did nothing.

Between the hardships of poverty and the fear of drawing Daddy’s wrath onto ourselves, our existence constantly hung by a thread. And there was no one to help us, so we just did what we could to make it work.

But I could feel the anger building inside me, even as young as I was. Sometimes I even hated my father for doing those awful things to my mother every day.

And then one morning, there was no yelling, no slaps or crashes. My mother fixed Daddy’s breakfast, packed his lunch and sent him off to work, without a fight.

It was a welcomed change from the distressing routine. Then I saw her in her bedroom. At first I thought she was folding and sorting clothes. But today wasn’t wash day. And her blue suitcase was open on the bed.

She was fitting just her own clothes and some baby things into that suitcase. None of ours.

I felt a twinge of panic. Where are you going? I asked.

Boy, go back to your room and play, she said.

I could hardly move, but I did as she said, though I could still see her packing in the next room.

When she finished, she latched the suitcase and set it on the floor.

She looked at me with hollow eyes. Leonard Neal, you have to be the man of the house now. I’m leaving. Take care of your brothers and sisters, you hear?

She put on her blue-gray coat and, with the suitcase in one hand and the baby in her other arm, she walked toward the front door.

Take me with you, I pleaded.

The rest of the children followed. She said to us, Tell your father I’m leaving and not coming back.

We continued to trail her outside into the cold and called her name. Ma dear, we shouted. Where are you going? Don’t leave! Ma dear. Please don’t go!

Still, she walked away, taking only one of us, without so much as a glance back at the rest of her children.

There were no tears from us. Just her name, called out over and over. Ma dear!

We watched as my mother receded down the narrow street toward the train crossing, then turned right and continued off, walking down the railroad tracks, with my baby sister and that blue suitcase, until her silhouette was swallowed by the low winter sun.

* * *

There was no food on the stove for dinner that night and we were all hungry. In fact, I don’t think we’d eaten all day.

When my father got home, his first words were, Where’s your mother?

Almost at once, we said, She’s gone and she’s not coming back.

Where? he asked.

I don’t know.

She didn’t say.

All right, he said. I’m going to find her.

He went up to Grandma Pearl’s house and found my mother there.

But he came back without her.

He gathered us all in the living room. Your mother is not coming back to live with us. She’s gone, he said. But we’re family, and we’ll make this work, together.

Then he fixed us some dinner.

The next day he went to Grandma Pearl’s house again to ask my mother to come home.

I’ve been married to you for ten years, she said to him, and every day has been hell. I’m tired of the beatings. And no, I’m not coming back. I’m going to file for divorce. I’ll take Mona. The rest of the children are yours and your responsibility. I want nothing else to do with you.

2 | Origins

As hard as my own early life was, I can’t imagine what it was like for my parents growing up during the Industrial Revolution, subjected to institutional slavery and cruel, Jim Crow injustice.

They were born into a time when the only jobs for blacks were picking cotton, working in the fields, or hauling logs—back-breaking, brutal work.

It was a time in America when small towns, especially in the south, treated their black citizens with disdain...and much worse.

Born in a small rural town called Broaddus, in San Augustine County, Texas, my father, Frank Vandee Garrett, shared his life with his parents, three brothers, and three sisters.

The town began as a railroad station on the St Louis Southwestern Railway, founded in 1904 when a Post Office was established there.

Frank grew up around cotton fields and country poverty and developed grit and tenacity by following his brothers, observing their actions, trailing in their shadows.

Although he dropped out of school after the third grade, when he wasn’t working the fields, Frank learned to read, write and count from his sisters. He also learned resilience from them.

He grew up to be a man of medium height, with strong bones. Hard, dirty jobs and a healthy work ethic were the legacy he inherited from his family to ensure he could take care of himself and his own family one day. That work ethic would serve him all his life, until he retired after 45 years of hauling pulp wood and lumber.

Family was of paramount importance to the Garretts of Broaddus. No matter how bleak the times, Frank remained close to his brothers and sisters, relying on them for his very survival. They were his shield of protection.

But that shield failed him late one night when he and his brother were hanging out in town and were approached by a couple of white boys spoiling for a fight.

When the insults turned physical, 21-year-old Frank stood up to the bullies. Fists flew as Frank went toe to toe with one of the boys, until one solid punch knocked the boy unconscious and none of them could revive him.

Believing the white boy was dead, and that there would be no justice for a young black man in Broaddus, Frank asked his family for advice. As hard as it was to lose him, they recommended he leave town and start a new life under a different name.

And that’s how Frank Garrett came to Silsbee, Texas and became Vandee Garrett.

The white boy in Broaddus survived, but they say he was never the same for the remainder of his life.

Fortunately, the police didn’t hassle Frank’s brother because they knew the attack had been provoked by the white boys, who had come into the black community looking for trouble.

As a young man living alone in Silsbee, Texas, Frank—now Vandee—worked several odd jobs until he landed a steady position at the local pulp mill and lumber company.

Silsbee was a logging and sawmill town from its very beginnings. It was originally named Mill Town until it was changed to recognize Nathan D. Silsbee, partner of John Kirby, owners of the area’s primary industry and lifeblood, the Kirby Lumber Company.

Vandee Garrett rented a room at a boarding house, one of several that accommodated workers who fueled the local economy.

It was hard work, but Vandee had grown up giving an honest day’s work for an honest day’s pay.

Slowly, and without complaint, he built a life for himself in Silsbee.

He had no transportation, but he was young, fit and able to walk anywhere he needed to go in town.

And one day, Vandee Garrett met the love of his life.

Azzie Lee Miller was a good looking, brown skinned woman living with her adoptive mother, Pearl. Her biological mother had died in childbirth.

When Vandee met Azzie Lee, she had already graduated Frazier Mathews High School in 1939 and was waiting for an opportunity to go off to college.

She and Vandee dated until January, 1941, when they were married at her mother’s home.

They bought a small, three-bedroom frame house just a block away from Azzie Lee’s mother. It wasn’t fancy by any stretch. In fact, it was almost primitive. But given the hardships of the times, it was a blessing that gave them their own place in the world where they would be free to live their lives and raise their own family.

And that’s where my story began, in that little house near the railroad tracks in Silsbee, Texas.

3 | One season in Newton

Newton, Texas, 1953-1954

After my mother left, my father laid down new rules. No talking to strangers, and no talking to anyone without my permission. You hear?

As strange as it seems now, I became the family leader, the one my father trusted to keep things in order. A five-year-old boy.

He would say, Leonard, take care of your brothers and sisters when I’m away.

He was gone all day working. And he was gone for the night more often than we’d like. But he always came back and made sure we had a little bit of food in the house.

In his absence, my siblings and I had no one to take care of us. So we figured out how to do for ourselves.

My sisters, being the oldest at seven and eight, took on the cooking and washing chores. Meals were often minimal. There were no eggs, bacon or grits. No biscuits. Not even oatmeal.

But we had powdered milk, and sometimes Spam. We just made do with whatever we had.

We continued our chores, chopping wood for the woodstove, hauling water inside, cleaning the house and outhouse.

Life was even harder without my mother, but we got used to that too. Meanwhile, I dreamed of starting school and living the carefree life that Frankie and Merilyn had, at least for part of each weekday, away from our hardscrabble existence.

Then one day, Daddy told us that his sister Mary, and her husband, Will Walker, had invited me and my two sisters to live with them for a season in Newton, Texas, about 50 miles away, to help pick their peanut crop.

They had two children, a daughter, Willie Mae, and a son from before their marriage, Johnny L. Garrett, who would later become a trusted advisor in my life. But in 1953, both of their children were already grown and gone, and they had no one to help with the harvest.

So my father agreed to send the three of us to stay with them and work their peanut fields.

And in September of 1954, I started first grade in Newton.

Sadly, the carefree experience I had imagined never materialized for me. Truth is, first grade was a disaster.

The school in Newton served black students of all ages, from elementary through high school.

And for reasons I never understood, the high school boys picked on me and bullied me relentlessly.

The school had no indoor restrooms. Students, and faculty too, I assume, used restrooms outside the school. But the high school bullies would not let me use even those facilities. They would keep me away from the men’s room and forced me to find a place outside to do my business.

Eventually, I learned to hold it until the boys were gone, or it was time to catch the bus for Auntie Mary’s house.

It was a frightening and humiliating experience, especially for a first-grader with no support network and no sense of how the world worked. So I put up with the torment from the older boys because I felt there was nobody I could tell. Nobody who would stick up for me.

The academic aspect of this school was equally unsatisfying. For reading lessons they assigned us first-graders Little Black Sambo, a racially demeaning book that Langston Hughes had criticized for its portrayal of blacks in pickaninny style.

As it turned out, school wasn’t a refuge from that hard life at home at all. It was just a different kind of hard life.

Throughout that year, my fear and disappointment showed in my sullen withdrawal from others entirely. It was just better for me to set my expectations low and avoid engaging others who were sure to hurt me one way or another if they noticed me at all.