Pride and Shame in Lakeside Alabama
Self-discovery, KKK armories, family politics by a hand-carved lake
“There was enough explosives inside to level a city block. They were expecting a full war. It was all hate.”
As the sun rose to warm the cold morning air, I jumped into the cool water of B Mountain Lake. Don had the same idea a while later.
“Yeah, ‘bout time I got wet and washed up. That’s what the lake’s for”
I swam out to where the “channel cats” live.
My dad at spoken of the large catfish sad at the bottom of the place, whatever fell down to them — including little boys who couldn’t swim. He summoned the channel cats any time we swam deep — in the unclear waters of Lake Erie, or out past the breakers of an oceanside.
The night before, I cut around Birmingham to the lake.
The civil rights tourism thing lost its appeal after the Greensboro experience. My mission cam back into clarity. The places and people in between, those the media does not cover — they were my focus.
I found a trailer for rent near B Mountain Lake. Sanford, the owner, guided me into the landing where the trailer sat. Don lived there and looked after the lake. His self-built cabin’s sun window glowed with a string of fat-bulbed Christmas lights.
We shook hands in the early darkness, and agreed to meet the next morning. I prepped the tiny camper and drifted off on the cot inside.
Just before daybreak, a pair of bowhunters hiked by the open window, starting their tracking for the hunt that day. I rose slowly and stood outside as the sun lifted itself slowly up over the still lake.
As the sun rose, we sat and talked on lake and family history
The Lhele family had “carved this lake out of the wilderness“ themselves. They had literally dug out and built their own lake, formed their own peace of America for their family.
They turned moonshine into cash, and cash into land. They “got religion” in the Pentecostal movement.He saw the church turn away from what he sees as Christian living, succumb to greed and domination by selfish and divisive factions.
He left home at 17 with $100 from his father to make his own way.
“I put you through 12 years [of school] — you oughta do better than me” his dad told him when he left
He knew he could always return. He had a place to truly call Home.
He knew how to take care of the lake his family dug out of the hills.
They used the natural flow of the water. From the hills, it ran into their dammed (blessed) valley — and then continued on its way to join Shades Creek, which connected to Cahaba River in the south.
He knew how to live and adapt there. It gave him purpose.
“People say ‘oh, poor Don, he has nothin’. I look around me and think ‘look at how wealthy I am’.”
His philosophy on life was simple — maybe too simple, near to the point of confusion:
“Whatever you’re doing is what you shoulda been doin’…It my as well be if you’e doin’ it anyways.”
Don saw family politics and conflicts create strife. Greed overpowered family values. Unkind disputes and selfishness trumped the bonds of blood.
His family had always worked for themselves, built their own roles. Their mentality and rivalries were at odds with a greater principle of self-made freedom.
As a carpenter, Don built things from scratch — buildings and places still serving people.
His work continued past his presence.
Lhele family roots bled back to Cherokee blood.
A family secret — more a theory than a documented lineage — came from the Trail of Tears. The original settlers, his Cherokee great-great-grandfather escaped the death march and persecution of Native Americans. He founded this piece of Alabama — and claimed status as a free, white man.
Alabama Shame and the physical weapons of racism
On the road, anytime someone asked, he would say he was from Florida.
Birmingham was a war zone; Alabama was backwards.
It wasn’t a lie. He had lived in Florida for 10 years. Alabama was his home though, where he was destined to return to — called back by the lake and a rediscovered pride in his home land.
When he was boy, a man paid his dad to park a huge tractor-trailer on their land. After a few months, the curiosity got to him and his brother.
His brother showed him he could break a lock. The doors fell open to reveal a mobile armory of the Ku Klux Klan.
The KKK had stored enough guns, bombs, and ammunition to wage the all-out Race War they saw coming.
Birmingham was ground zero. The Klan was ready to kill, destroy, divide — whatever it took to keep and expand white power.
They harassed the family and threatened to kill his brother — if they didn’t testify a certain way.
His father responded simply “You have guns, I have guns — my boy’s going to say what he really saw. He always tells the truth ‘cuz that’s what I taught him.”
I handed Don a bag of trail mix — to mix up both our diets — and shook his hand goodbye.
“Keep all four wheels on the ground, young man.” he said as I started the Buick.
A young couple pulled in as I pulled out. Don strolled over to greet them and point out the best spots for catfish or perch.
On the highway near Birmingham, I thought of where I had chosen to rest most nights.
The last few weeks were in the country when the sun fell. Looking up at the stars each night, feeling mostly damp soil beneath my bare feet. It was an almost-guilty escape and adventure at the close of each day.
Without running data or water, my reflection game was on point. There was nothing else to do, nothing to distract.
