Hamper McBee Transcript
HAMPER MCBEE - Well, here's what we're goin' do; this is our mash, and it's ready to run. So when we get everything, we'll take this cap off, and put all our mash in here, and the fire goes right around each side of it, and we'll have this covered with tin and dirt on top of it to hold the heat in there. And all this steam collection comes up into this cap here , and right along this steam line, and it comes right on down in here, down in there thumper, where we'll have mash down here in the thumper, and sort of reboilin' process there. And it come right on outta the , outta the lead here into this copper coil here, which is our worm, sittin' in this barrel here.
HAMPER MCBEE - Now, this will be full of water, and water run into it so it'll keep it cool all the time. And it goes on down to the bottom, and it comes out this little place right here. And that's you're finished product there, and that's what slaps you in the creek. And that's about all they is to it. And the only thing I know is we just, we 'bout ready to start.
HAMPER MCBEE - Hell, it's rainin' outside, but I don't know a thing in the world we can do about it. How in the hell's the TV crew this mornin'? Hope you ready to work, by God. Hell, they ain't no way in the world that a goddamn anybody that's lazy as hell can make whiskey. 'Cause the works done been turned on him when he first goddamn started to build that damn furnace. It's just a damn hard, it's a damn back-breakin' job. You gotta get in the woods and hide that bloomin' thing. The revenue will be out here, and they'll shore tear you down, and it means a difference in you stayin' out here and makin' money and goin' to jail, don't you know?
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - JASPER JAIL
Have you ever been to Jasper in the car with Bill Malone
And spent a whole damn weekend in a house that's made a stone
Well they's one thing sure and certain because I'm the one who knows
It'll cost you $15, ah, before they let you go.
Well, you see familiar faces when the jailhouse door they slam
'Cause they got 'em by the carload from the state of Alabam
And state line to Monteagle and a back along the way
And if you ain't got the money well, I know just where you stay
And he prowls along the mountains many hours of the day
In search of moonshine drinkers, in the ditch lines we do lay
He'll talk about the weather, or anything you say,
But when he parks the car, you can see the bars of the place where you're to stay
HAMPER MCBEE - I tell you, it's about a what's, I guess you'd call it, a lost art; it's gone. I tell you, I say in 15 years from now, they won't be a half a dozen moonshine stills in the state. I mean, all these small towns gettin' whiskey stores and stuff, and hell, you can buy it, and especially if, you know, when you buy this moonshine, you don't know what you're gettin'. Goddamn, you can't be getting some damned ole rot gut, you know, scrap iron and, goddamn, sometimes you hold it up between you and the sunlight and see plow points and trace chains and everything floatin' in it, hell. But I mean, I believe it's just, I guess it's just about gone.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - 100 GALLONS
Dippin' water and a choppin' wood, church folks say we ain't no good
But we run 100 gallon every day and the revenue said stop, well, we drowned him in the slop
Oh, we run 100 gallon every day
HAMPER MCBEE - Why we roll 'em down here in the creek where they'll swell up where you can't get no steam leakage from 'em. What we're gonna do is pour the rye meal in the barrel here and pour scaldin' water in it and stir it real good. It'll take about three or four days to sour it all. Then, and when it ferments, that's where you get your alki from. Let's go.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - CABBAGE HEAD,THREE NIGHTS DRUNK
When I came home the other night drunk as I could be
There's a horse offender stable where my horse ought to be
From near my little woman explain these things to me
Let a horse offender stable where my horse ought to be
You blind fool, you crazy fool can't you never see
Ain't nothin' but a milk cow your granny gave to me
I've traveled this wide world over, 100 times or more
Put a saddle on a milk cow I never saw before
HAMPER MCBEE - What was this old boy, he drunk, a drunkard from a worse way, and his old lady was doin' a little hanky-panky, and she's tryin' to pull some stuff on him. But when he got ready to go on to bed, then he did see somethin' that was unusual for him.
SONG (continued)
Then I came home the other night, drunk as I could be
There's a head upon the pillow where my old head should be
Come near my little woman explain these things to me
There's a head upon the pillow were my old head should be
You blind fool and crazy fool can't you never see
Ain't nothin' but a cabbage head your granny gave to me
I've traveled this wide world over 100 times or more
But a mustache on a cabbage head, I never saw before
HAMPER MCBEE - So, he wasn't hardly as dumb as he thought he was, but I guess he was drunk.
Phew, boy, I'll tell you what. Now, we've done about all we can do today. The mash is sourin'. It's in the box. They ain't another thing we can do till the mash gets right, and hell, let's just get the hell outta these woods.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - WAYFARING STRANGER
I'm just a poor wayfaring stranger
A travelin' through this world below
There is no sickness, no toil nor danger in that bright home to which I go
My father lived and died a farmer a reaping less than he did sow
And now I travel in his footstep knowing less than he did know
HAMPER MCBEE - We are standin' on what thisn's called natural bridge, and what we lookin' at about across this here, the far mountain you see there is what's called Jump Off Mountain, and the other side of that would be, but it's about several, 50, 60 miles to Chattanooga. And right down there, three or 400 yards from here is where I was raised. Yeah, it was a lot of fun playin' around here. They's all kind of places to play around a bluff. Of course, a lot of it's dangerous, but we didn't, you know, we didn't realize it. It was that dangerous. Of course, a lotta time, I guess Mama coulda wore us out with a limb if she'd a knowed we'd have been a climbin' these bluffs.
HAMPER MCBEE - Daddy'd come home; he'd miss the bridge, or gap one time. One time, he fell off right up here. And he didn't, I reckon he's pretty drunk so he didn't come in till after daylight the next morning, but he stuck a stob down right in under his thumbnail, plumb down to the second knuckle, where he fell, and he lost his sack of tobacco, and his belt was laying there next mornin'. I don't know how in the hell he lost his belt. And another time before that, on around the bluff here, he'd come a-stumblin' and fell off, and he fell off on the ledge, and off the ledge on down on the slope. He must have rolled 50 foot or more down through there and didn't get nothin' but a scratch that time. Of course, he was drunk. If he'd been sober, it mighta hurt him. You can't hurt a drunk nor a fool. You can't hurt 'em. Well, I was drunk.
CONVERSATION IN LIVING ROOM (between Hamper McBee, Jake, unidentified woman)
- Oh.
- Had a gallon of hooch.
- you've never been drunk in your life.
- [Hamper] I had a gallon of hooch hid over in the graveyard.
- Yeah. I had a half-pint bottle. I'd run over and fill it up every now and then. and we'll start talkin' about old songs and stuff.
- Jake, what did you think about Hamper when we first met him?
- I wouldn't ask you that.
- [Hamper] I told you; I told you how he'd put it.
UNIDENTIFIED WOMAN - I don't think it was accident 'cause I know I'd been wantin' to meet you, and I know I'd asked John Vaughn to introduce me to you, and he wouldn't do it. He thought you were too wild and wooly. Wouldn't be safe or something; I don't know what it was.
- What kind of reputation did Hamper have in the old days?
- Well, what this guy,
- Not the best, no.
- John Vaughn, who was a friend of Hamper's and a friend of mine
- He was drunk.
- said that Hamper is just like Blackjack Davey, just exactly. There's a song that just exactly describes Hamper.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - BLACK JACK DAVEY
Oh, Blackjack Davey come a-runnin' through the hills
Down to the valley shady he was letting sing till the wild woods rang
And he'd charm the heart of a lady, charm the heart of a lady
His Lord returned, and the lady did not and he asked about his lady
The servant said, she left you now went gone with Blackjack Davey, gone with Blackjack Davey
Last night, she slept on a fine feather bed beside a husband and baby
Tonight, she sleeps on the cold, cold ground beside ole Blackjack Davey
Side ole Blackjack Davey
HAMPER MCBEE - I didn't really drink that much till after I went in the Army. You know, out here you get drunk and you get drunk, and the next day, you get on a drunk again and then from then on you just drinkin' a little to get to see if you can't feel a little better, you know, keep from dyin', and sometime, it'll go into a week, two weeks. Sometime, hell, high as six weeks. And, hell, it's once you get on it like that, it's, you know, sort of hard to stop. Say you've been drunk for several weeks. You in bad shape. I mean, hell, you get nervous, and you can't do anything, and do it right. And you can't think far enough ahead to really do anything.
INTERVIEWER - How'd it feel when you were comin' down off those drunks?
- Oh that's, I, that's when you been on bad, when you get to DTs.
INTERVIEWER - Tell me about how's it feel to be on DT?
HAMPER MCBEE - Hell, I mean, it's just like it's there. Of course, after you've had 'em the first time, you really know they ain't there, but you can still see 'em.
INTERVIEWER - What's that? What do you mean; what's there?
HAMPER MCBEE- Hell, a frog or spider or snake or people talkin' and a-sittin' around all over the damn place, and they ain't a soul there, but you can see 'em just as well as I'm lookin' at you now. First time I ever had 'em, I thought I'd lost my mind completely. This frog, oh, he was big. He was big as a number three washtub. And he'd come in the room, and he'd jump up on my feet. Hell, you could feel the weight of him pushin' down on you. And he'd jump up on your chest, and an old big tongue just come out and just stick to your forehead and, you know, you can feel it pullin' on you. Then you go to fightin' with the frog. But as you get up, he'd go back out the door, and you sittin' there just about exhausted 'cause you can't lay down. And when I laid down on the bed and jumped back up, and he'd be peeping around the door. He never got on you unless you laid down. But just as quick as yore head hit that pillow, he'd be back in the room on you.
HAMPER MCBEE - All right, boys, let's get this pot together and get it in the ground 'cause the mash was ready to go. Ready?
- Mm-hm.
- Put that piece in here. The reason this coil, you steam, that gives you steam time to condense, to make the finished product. 'Cause you've got, you're sittin' in cold water, and cold water runnin' in on it all the time, and you ain't gettin' nothing but raw steam hittin' the top of your worm when it goes down into your flake stand. The steam goes on down the coil, then it condenses itself and comes out. Slap out. Ain't gonna be much caulkin' to these, Bear. That's it.
- Shew, you can run that today and get a pretty good turnout, but it'll be better tomorrow.
- This one?
HAMPER MCBEE - Line my stick up there on my blocks so if they's anybody fools with it or touches it, you know somebody's touched it. Well, we don't need to do nothin' else. From here, we just pack up this gear and git. Now, we'll see you out here in the mornin' bright and early.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - 900 MILES
Well if you miss the train I'm on you will know that I am gone
You can hear the whistle blow 100 miles
Well, my watchman must been drunk for he'd pawned my watch and run
Left me 900 mile from my home but if you say so, I won't railroad no more
I will sidetrack my engine and come home, I'll come home
I'll come home, I'll come home, I'll come home
I will sidetrack my engine and come home
HAMPER MCBEE - It's been a long time since I heard that the first time. Daddy used to sing that a lot when we was a little kid. Daddy, he used to sing a whole lot to us, you know, when we was a small kid. I always enjoyed anybody singin', you know? It always made me feel good to hear somebody sing. We in a hell of a place if train comes by, ain't we? Good thing they run at night. I flagged the train down up here one time, borrowed a dollar from a conductor to buy me a drink of whiskey. is conductor on a train, and I was wavin' up there, and he had 'em stop; "S'matter, Hamper?" And I said, "Hell, I'm goddamn gotta have "a drink of whiskey." So, he let me have a dollar to get me a half a pint. He said, I heared him tell somebody up there at the train, says, "The first time in his life he'd ever been "flagged down to borrow money to buy moonshine with." Hell, there's a first time for ever thing, though, isn't it?
HAMPER MCBEE AND FRIENDS CHECKING THE STILL
HAMPER MCBEE - It's tough down there. Run your head in there and check it. Let's put this thin cap on there.
- Come on, Bunkem, give me a hand here.
BUNKEM - I'll come help you.
HAMPER MCBEE - Wait a minute.
- He spilt more than I've ever seen. I've been to Bunkem's house. We'd be havin' a damn party over there.
BUNKHAM - Yeah.
HAMPER MCBEE - That back before Bud got married. We'd be havin' a damn drunk party, be 10 or 12 of us there, and have two or 300 gallons sittin' in the back room. Run outta whiskey, just go out and draw out a damn 'nother gallon. And hell, a party's sometimes two or three days. Goddamn thing about to kill me. Once we get this fire goin', it ain't gone be long this starts cookin'. And just like makin' biscuits.
- I don't know.
- So what are we doin' now?
- Pastin' around here, and let that steam cook it then keep it, it keep your steam from leakin' around it.
- Be long now.
- Have some smoke comin' out the bottom now.
- Huh?
- [Onlooker] Smoke's coming out of the copper.
- Yeah, but he ain't hit yet. You'll hear that damn thumper bellerin' directly.
- Boom.
- Sound like a dam. Sound like a voodoos and stars. I gotta make up another batch. I wanna get all the way around there.
- I don't think so.
- I'm gone get somethin' goin' over here a minute. That damn dirt on that furnace, aw, hell, it's leakin' heat up there. You can't get no goddamn instant whiskey. If you had, I mean, wouldn't have to hide in the damn woods. Hell, would? You better goddamn try to get some damn heat around that damn thing. Hell, it's coolin' back off on the damn line. Put some use to her, Bruce-ster. Goddammit, ain't enough damn heat in there. We got it now. Here's the kettle, Hamper.
- Goddamn, it's about time. Let's look at it. There it is, there it is.
- Hey, hey, that's it.
- [Hamper] Bet you'd like to have a bunch of that. That's Christmas liquor, isn't it?
- That's Christmas whiskey. Hell, here it ain't nothin' but October. What you think about it, Howard? You like it?
- Make your mammy slap your pa.
- Ah, don't you know. Ah, damn, Bud, that'll slap you in the creek.
HAMPER MCBEE (singing)
SONG - JACK OF DIAMONDS
A jack a-diamond, jack a-diamond well, I know you of old
You robbed my full pocket's of silver and gold
It's a-whiskey, you villain, you've been my downfall
You whip me, you beat me but I love you for all
And I go whoopie and I holler, gonna build me a still
And I give you a gallon for a five dollar bill
And they say I drank whiskey but my money is my own
And them that don't like me can leave me alone
Rye whiskey, rye whiskey, rye whiskey, I cry
If a limb don't fall on me, gonna live till I die
