{"id":13347,"date":"2021-05-11T08:00:41","date_gmt":"2021-05-11T15:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=13347"},"modified":"2021-05-10T18:23:10","modified_gmt":"2021-05-11T01:23:10","slug":"a-childs-world-of-animals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/a-childs-world-of-animals\/","title":{"rendered":"A Child\u2019s World of Animals"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Childhood on the Ranch<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Private Papers<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

 Part Two<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Was my Dad a militarist? Hardly. He was a farmer and junior college administrator, who hated war and swore to me once when I turned 18 and waited for my lottery number: \u201cNo one in this family ever volunteers and no one is ever going to refuse the draft.\u201d I nodded.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We crawled, ran, and ran through acres of grapevines, plum trees, and majestic walnuts\u2014squirrels, possums, hawks, crows and snakes everywhere. The town was still almost three miles away. If we saw a turtle or perch caught in the pipeline, as he washed down from the Sierra, we were told to \u201cPut the poor fellow back where you got him.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

I, a few times, dove into the July stagnant pond to catch bull frogs and usually ended up with ear and sinus infections at Doc Nielsen\u2019s office in Fowler. He looked cross and then jabbed me with a shot of penicillin in one of those reusable steel injectors. Sixty years later the sinus surgeon who drilled my passages out said, \u201cMan, you have the narrowest sinus passages I\u2019ve ever seen.\u201d No kidding\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At seven my twin and I were human retrievers. My dad shot doves and quail (always in season and in limit). Doglike we scrambled to \u201cfetch\u201d them back. Once we climbed under the neighbor\u2019s barbed wire. He was a lunatic and bully. Once he just happened to be out hunting himself at the same time and pointed a shotgun at us as we tried to find a downed dove. He\u00a0\u00a0screamed at us (the \u201ctwinnies\u201d my grandmother dubbed us two) to \u201cget the hell off my property, you trespassers, before I blow you to smithereens.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We skedaddled back to our side of the fence sans the doves and yelled to dad, \u201cThat guy wanted to shoot us.\u201d Big mistake. Dad was then about 36. He  was 6\u20193\u201d, 210 lbs. of muscle, a big Swede  who was said to have been a good boxer by his friends. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

After 40 missions in a B-29 over Japan, just\u00a015 year earlier, he didn\u2019t much care about his own safety and had sort of a terrifying WTF nihilist courage to go to the limit if wrongly crossed. In a second, I guess he thought he was back on mission 33 to Kobe or crash landing on Iwo, and so\u00a0\u00a0stalked over with his 12 gauge, pointed it at the bully, \u201cSo you got a gun pointed at my two boys. Ok I\u2019m not six like them, so let\u2019s see who is a brave man now.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The neighbor, well, put this way, he just left. Said nothing and left. And the only time we ever heard of him again was when he\u00a0stuffed nasty notes in our dogs\u2019 collars if they strayed over when his bitches were in heat, like \u201cHey Hansons, chain up this dog\u001f\u001f\u2014or else.\u201d Some tough guy\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We took off home ahead of dad and sobbing ratted our hero out to mom (some gratitude for our deliverance)\u2014the housewife Stanford JD whom the neighbors ridiculed with \u201call that education and still home in that little house with those kids.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We thought at least she might sympathized with our melodrama. No such luck. She smiled! Smiled no less! And she said \u201cWell, glad that was over. But served that criminal right, terrorizing you 6-year-olds. And what a fool he was to cross your dad.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ Private Papers  Part Two Was my Dad a militarist? Hardly. He was a farmer and junior college administrator, who hated war and swore to me once when I turned 18 and waited for my lottery number: \u201cNo one in this family ever volunteers and no one is ever going to refuse […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-3th","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":11947,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/how-robert-orourke-became-beto\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":0},"title":"How Robert O\u2019Rourke Became \u2018Beto\u2019","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 14, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review A\u00a0\u00a0great deal of controversy has continued the past few days over Robert Francis O\u2019Rourke\u2019s longtime use of a nickname given to him at birth (albeit temporarily jettisoned while in prep school) \u2014 especially in the wake of his recent sensational and unfounded charges that\u2026","rel":"","context":"Similar post","block_context":{"text":"Similar post","link":""},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":9588,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-election-fables-of-2016\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":1},"title":"The Election Fables of 2016","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 8, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"\u00a0 by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review Clear choices on the issues in 2016 have been far more distinct than in 1960, 1968, or 1992. Most of what we read about the election of 2016 was untrue. Here are the most glaring of the election fables. Hillary would have been\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Clintons"","block_context":{"text":"The Clintons","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-clintons\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":392,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-game-changes\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":2},"title":"The Game Changes","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 19, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Usually after a presidential debate, both sides spin the results. But after the first face-off between President Obama and challenger Mitt Romney, Obama\u2019s exasperated handlers made no such effort. How could they when most opinion polls revealed that two-thirds of viewers thought Obama\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Election 2012"","block_context":{"text":"Election 2012","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/election-2012\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3418,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/america-through-the-looking-glass\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":3},"title":"America Through the Looking Glass","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 26, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media President Obama yesterday praised Brazil for its new offshore oil industry and said he wants to buy as much oil as possible in this new win-win partnership \u2014 although we have piled up $5 trillion in new debt, curtailed new petroleum exploration off shore\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Punditry"","block_context":{"text":"Punditry","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/punditry\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":830,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/campaigning-on-grievances\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":4},"title":"Campaigning on Grievances","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 17, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services In 2008, a mostly unknown Barack Obama ran for president on an inclusive agenda of \u201chope and change.\u201d That upbeat message was supposed to translate into millions of green jobs, fiscal sobriety, universal healthcare, a resetting of Bush foreign policy, and racial unity.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Campaign 2012"","block_context":{"text":"Campaign 2012","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/campaign-2012\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3797,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/americas-big-fat-advantage\/","url_meta":{"origin":13347,"position":5},"title":"America’s Big Fat Advantage","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 28, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services For all the Obama-era talk of decline, there is at least one reason why America probably won't, at least not quite yet. \"Peak oil\" and our \"oil addiction\" were supposed to have ensured that we ran out of either gas or the money\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "America's Future"","block_context":{"text":"America's Future","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/americas-future\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13347"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13347"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13347\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13357,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13347\/revisions\/13357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13347"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13347"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13347"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}