It was the summer of 1978 or ’79 and Jeff Eaton and I had summer jobs working at
the Miller Park par-three golf course in Campbellsville. We were the groundskeepers and “pro shop”
attendants. I put pro shop in quotes
because it was actually the former stripping room of an old tobacco barn that
came with the property and around which the course was built. The barn housed the tractor, mowers, a cinder
block bathroom and the stripping room-turned-pro shop.
If the mowing was caught up on a hot summer weekday,
business was apt to be slow. One such
day, Jeff and I were hanging around the barn when someone yelled to get our
attention and tell us a cow was loose on the course. We both ran toward the back side of the
course in the direction of the trouble. The
course was basically a rectangular property, the back of which was separated
from the adjoining farm by a 4-plank wooden fence, not unlike those you see on
the horse farms in the Bluegrass. As we approached
the 4th tee we saw Mr. Ivan Barnes clinging to the fence, having
climbed partway up to avoid the charging steer.
We deduced the steer had escaped with some effort from the
stockyards or a nearby farm enclosure as there was a swath of blood running
down the side of its head from one eye.
Needless to say, he was agitated.
Jeff and I, fearing course damage and possible injury to
golfers, took it upon ourselves to round up and contain this critter so he
could be removed from the premises. We
decided to close the front door of the barn and try to herd the cow into the
back door which we would then close, trapping him. I don’t think we really considered any
further steps to the plan.
In short order we herded/taunted the animal in the direction
of the barn and were close to number 3 tee.
As we circled the steer trying to control its direction, it charged at
Jeff. Nimble though he was, as Jeff
tried to change directions to evade the animal, he slipped and fell . . .
At this juncture of my tale, I pause to say that had Jeff
met his demise or suffered debilitating injury under the hooves of that steer
that day, the world as it now spins would be tremendously different for scores
of people with whom he has interacted these past 36 years. As a pastor of congregations in South Central
and Central Kentucky he has touched countless lives and gotten in the trenches
of ministry to support people at the highest and lowest points of the human
experience. He has ministered in places ranging
from duck blinds and deer stands to formal church. I’d like to say that Jeff’s congregants owe
their having a minister, and that his children owe their existence to some
brave act I undertook to save him from being trampled, but it happened in a
split second and all I could do was watch.
As the steer bore down on Jeff, it had to change direction
and also slipped in its effort to keep Jeff in its sights. Jeff scrambled to his feet and avoided
injury.
Ultimately, we failed to get the steer into the barn. It ran past the barn and down the hill toward
number 1 tee at the front of the course.
The front border of the course was separated from the road by a 2-board
fence, which the steer easily jumped. He
trotted across Saloma Road and into the field near where Trace Creek Softball is
today and we never saw him again. I
don’t recall even hearing later of its capture.
So, being from a rural community where a cow can make its
way across town or onto a road, I always get a little tickled, and nostalgic, (and
I suppose Jeff does too) when the local news reports that motorists need to use
caution because of livestock running loose in the greater Lexington area.
