Mark Dunn - Ibid - A Life

3. Doctors were baffled.The third doctor to attend the child in his first weeks, Able Stanton, agreed with the other physicians that the extra appendage should pose few physiological difficulties for the boy. However, he differed with his colleagues on another point, writing in his unpublished memoir Three-legged Boys and Birdbeaked Spinsters: Fifty Years of Doctoring Freaks :

“It was my early estimation that young Jonathan would probably be walking much sooner than other children his age because the third leg would have a helpful stabilizing effect on the young man, much as a three-legged stool stands better than a two-legged one.”

4. Challenges presented themselves.Jonathan Blashette writes in his Early Memories of an argument between his mother and a local cobbler over the cost of making three shoes, Emmaline contending that she should only have to pay half again more than what she would pay for a pair. The cobbler, however, deemed the request a “special order” and tacked on a surcharge. Jonathan continues:

“Mother threatened to take her business elsewhere, only to discover that all the cobblers in town were related by blood and had somewhat of a rudimentary price-setting system in place, one which put her at a decided negotiatory disadvantage. In the end, Mother and the shoemaker reached a compromise. She bought me a pair of handsome boy’s lace shoes and the cobbler threw in, at only a nominal additional charge, an orphaned remnant from the previous year’s Thanksgiving pageant — a shiny black-buckled Pilgrim’s shoe which didn’t match the others by any stretch of the imagination but nonetheless had a certain historically evocative charm about it.”

5. And yet on the whole, Jonathan was generally well-regarded and with the help of friends and family adjusted easily to his unique anatomical circumstances.Several years were to pass before Thaddeus Grund arrived with his invitation for Jonathan to join his traveling circus and wild west show. This relatively quiet interstitial period in the boy’s life was disrupted only on those rare occasions in which a visitor to town might gasp or emit an unguarded, “Dear me! Three !” The only concrete exception to this “era of good feeling” for the boy came when Emmaline and Addicus were asked by indelicate roustabouts, many of whom Addicus would bring home for Sunday dinner, “If that’s where the third leg goes, where the hell’s the pup’s little willy?” Upon such occasions Emmaline would usually sweep Jonathan up in her arms and fly indignantly from the room while Addicus was left to explain to his uncouth guests that his son’s third leg branched off the left leg like the limb of a tree, “the willy hanging free like wisteria.”

6. Jonathan did not even seem to mind his “only child” status.According to Blashette’s cousin Odger, the boy made friendships quite easily. He was an outgoing child and had a healthy curiosity about the world unveiling itself all around him. By the age of three Jonathan was cantering eagerly behind Pettiville’s one-eyed blacksmith, Cletus Meeker, who took an instant liking to the boy whom he felt had “all the stuff, a spiffin’ smithy to make.” Odger recalls the story of the one exceptional morning in which Cletus showed Jonathan an uncharacteristic lack of respect: the blacksmith arrived for work in a bilious humor following a long night of binging after catching his wife sandwiched in bed between the Bellamy twins, bright-witted Henry and doltish Benry. That day he found fault with everything Jonathan did, and eventually hung an oat bag around the boy’s neck and deposited him beneath an active rainspout. As Odger tells it, Jonathan responded by looking up at the irritable blacksmith and inquiring in a tiny, tearful voice, “You don’t really mean to be doing this, do you, Mr. Horsy-shoe Man?” Meeker, stabbed by sudden shame and contrition, gently pulled the boy from the miniature cataract. Embracing him tightly, he blubbered, “Never again the oat bag! Never again the rainspout! Oh Jonathan, this foolish momentary lapse, please forgive!”

And Jonathan apparently did.

Later, a four- or five-year-old Jonathan joined milkman Roddy Chalmers on his early morning rounds. In an interview with Roddy’s great granddaughter, former exotic dancer Trixie Twirl, I learned that Roddy quickly developed a paternal fondness for Jonathan and sought to hire him even at this young age as milkman’s apprentice to spare the boy a life of exploitation at the hands of unscrupulous carnival sideshow proprietors “just waiting in the wings for the lad to reach an age at which he might be put on permanent tour and display.” Following my interview with Ms. Twirl, she sent me several pages of additional material on her great-grandfather who she claimed invented low-fat chocolate milk. Her thoughts are excerpted below:

“I know that the story of my great grandfather will constitute only the slightest of footnotes in your book, but I do want the record to show that there was someone early in the young child’s life who demonstrated a genuine and selfless concern for his well being. The fact that he did not succeed in preventing little Jonny from being swept into the demoralizing carnival life is no reflection upon the efforts my great grandfather made on the boy’s behalf. I have met few men in my life who have demonstrated such concern and compassion for a fellow human being. With only two exceptions, I believe that most men are snorting, rooting swine. The exceptions would be the following: my dentist who treats my mouth as a temple, and Harvey Spools, the man to whom I bore five beautiful babies before I boarded up my womb and moved to the convent .”

7. He sat on eggs like young Thomas Edison.Matthias Huber, Jonny of the Circus , Great Americans Every Child Should Know, vol. 32 (Chicago: Pete the Patriot Publications, 1968), 14. Huber reports that a full dozen eggs were crushed. Odger believes the figure to be closer to a dozen and a half. In any event, young Jonathan carried a mash of yolk and feathers on the seat of his trousers for the entire afternoon.

8. “Father let me place our order.”Jonathan Blashette, Early Memories , JBP. This particular trip to Claiborne’s General Groceries and Sundry Dry Goods must have, indeed, held special meaning for Jonathan. I found, carefully preserved among his childhood possessions, the very piece of recycled butcher paper upon which Emmaline had hastily scribbled shopping instructions to her husband. The letter sheds light on his parents’ close but no-nonsense relationship.

Addicus,

Jonathan has been looking forward to being a little man and placing the order for our weekly supplies for some time now. He takes the responsibility very seriously. So please do not let any of Claiborne’s mischievous spawn poke fun at him or, Heaven forbid, make light of his little extra leg. If he does a good job, or even if he doesn’t but shows conscientiousness in the task, please allow him to have some stick candy.

Here is the list. I have made a second copy for Jonny with pictures. Step back and do not interfere unless he makes a mistake that we cannot afford. You may exercise your good judgment here.

This week’s home needs:

1 lb. fatback

2 lbs. sausage

2 cans peaches in syrup

5 lbs. lard

10 lbs. flour

5 lbs. sugar

1 box Uneeda Biscuits

Small bag of ginger snaps (make sure they are not stale)

3 oz. nutmeg

3 oz. cinnamon (Xmas will be upon us soon and I need to be well stocked!)Bowel-stopper (paregoric)

Laudanum (If Mrs. Claiborne waits on you, she will make a jest, I predict it: “Lawdy! Lawdy! Why would a tyke need laudanum?” I have asked Jonny not to respond with, “Because you are a pain in the bottom, Mrs. C!”)