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Here are a
few of Kenn's stories. I cleaned them up a little.
Smokey's son Chester attended Rice Institute in the early 1930s.
For his degree Chester had to take a foreign language. Chester asked
his father for advice.
"Take English," Smokey told Chester in German. "They are starting
to speak more of it around here all the time."
One day a car came through Fredericksburg
traveling way too fast down Main Street, so Smokey pulled the speeding
vehicle over at the edge of town. The lady driver and her female
passenger sat quietly and respectfully as the sheriff walked to
the car and leaned in the window.
"Where are you women from?" he asked in broken English.
"We're from Philadelphia," one of them replied.
The sheriff gave them a suspicious look. "Well then, if you're from
Philadelphia, why do you have Pennsylvania on your license plates."
Smokey once paid his respects to a man whose brother had died.
"Herzlich beileid, (My heartfelt sympathy,)" Smokey said.
"Viel'n Dank. (Many thanks.)"
"Aber, es het schlimmer seien koennen, (But it could have been worse,)"
Smokey added.
"Wie denn? (How's that?)" the man asked Smokey.
"Das koennte mir seien! (That could have been me!)"
Smokey got a call from the state troopers that Bonnie
and Clyde would be coming through Fredericksburg.
The outlaws had started back towards Austin
after laying low for a while at the Dabbs Railroad Hotel in Llano.
"Get yourself up," Smokey said in German to deputy Henry Molberg.
"That damned wild bunch is coming through here again. This time
we'll catch 'em."
Deputy Molberg started the patrol car and revved the engine. Smokey
jumped in and pulled his hat over his head. They took off in hot
pursuit.
But the car had only gone a block when the engine began to sputter.
Smokey cussed. The motor died. The car rolled to a stop. Smokey
cussed some more.
The sheriff and the deputy walked back to the jail, missing the
chance to capture the most famous desperadoes in America.
Smokey
spoke mostly German. When he tried his hand at English, he sometimes
got his wires crossed.
During WWII
a couple of soldiers had too much German soda water and got tossed
in the county hoosegow for fighting and disturbing the peace. Later
the sheriff started wondering if he had jurisdiction over the soldiers.
Deputy Buck Danz suggested Smokey call Sheriff Owen Kilday over
in San Antonio. Sheriff
Kilday had several military bases in his county. He dealt with military
matters all the time.
"Just let the Court-Martial take care of them," Sheriff Kilday suggested.
After Smokey thanked him and hung up the phone, he turned to Buck
Danz and said "Buck, do you know Kurt Marshall? I know Edgar Marshall
from here and Victor Marshall from Harper.
I know Bill Marshall from Mason.
But I don't know a Kurt Marshall."
One eventful evening several women spent the night in the local
jail. Early the next morning one of the ladies demanded to talk
to the sheriff. She discreetly asked for a well-known brand of feminine
hygiene product.
"No way," Smokey replied. "You'll eat Post Toasties for breakfast
just like everybody else."
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