Dave Wood

Note from Dave: I’ve written a version of this story previously, but because I recently found out that some movie producers are fighting for the rights to the historical record in order to make a Hollywood movie of it, I figured I should keep the true record straight for readers who missed it a couple of decades ago. So here goes:  

One of my degrees is in history, but it was several years after I flung my tasseled mortarboard toward the heavens that I learned my most important lesson in history. It happened in Whitehall, Wis. at the bowling alley where I took my morning coffee with a bunch of local wiseacres before heading to the newspaper where I was semi-employed one summer. 

Goodwin, the area’s ace artificial inseminator, was trying to implant a seed for a story in my brain when he asked me, “Woody, if you’re so interested in local history, why don’t you write about Hans Jacob Olson The Meanest Man in Trempealeau County?’’ 

“Sounds like a good story, Goodie; how mean was he?” 

“Well, old Hans sold firewood to the merchants in town. He took a dislike to B.K. Strand, a storekeeper on Main Street, and when Hans got an order from Strand, he went to work and drilled a hole in a log bound for Strand. He stuck a dynamite stick in it, plugged the hole, and delivered it to Strand’s store. One cold day, Strand threw that very log in his potbellied stove and KABOOM! Blew the hell outta the store, took a hunk out of Strand as well.” 

“What happened then, Goodie?” 

“The townspeople got riled up, so they organized a posse, rode out to Hans’s farm and hung him from a tree in the front yard ‘til he turned blue.” 

Guffaws rocked the bowling alley. “That’s the way we should treat those long-haired radicals who blow up buildings down in Madison at the University. You bet your boots!” 

“Ya, an’ guess vut happened den?” asked Carsten Linnerud, an immigrant from Norway, who then answered: “Olson’s vife vuss so glad she vuss ridda Hans dat she kewked caffee for da hangmen. Served kewkies too!” 

A great story thought I, as I raced to a word processor at the paper. So neat, whatta tale… Unfortunately, my editor wasn’t as enthusiastic. “What about the Olson family? You better do some checking, Woody.” 

So I headed for the public library and its various county histories, the file of the newspaper where I worked, and I interviewed Olson’s relatives who lived in the next town. What I discovered was much more poignant, more important than the grisly humor I had picked up the bowling alley. It turns out Hans did blow up Strand’s store, but what Goodwin and Karsten didn’t tell me was that Hans had been apprehended, tried and sent to the state prison in Waupun. When he returned to his farm his neighbors were understandably just a bit edgy, so a “delegation” (posse?) was formed to confront their neighbor.  They intended to perform a mini-drama in which they would pretend to hang him, sort of give Hans a preview of what might happen should he pick up another stick of dynamite. Unfortunately, the hangmen left Hans’s pretend noose on too long and when they cut him down, he was deader than a Saturday night in Waupun. 

Then how about the Missus and her coffee and cookies? Well, as you might expect after all the mayhem and Hans lying out there on the lawn as blue as a Democrat, Mrs. Olson was a tad upset, so she asked if one member of the “delegation” would stay overnight with her and her kids. A neighbor, embarrassed about the mock hanging which turned out deadly, agreed to stay. To reciprocate, a grateful Widow Olson treated the whole crew to cookies and coffee. Pretty civilized, eh? 

Today’s journalistic lesson: “If a story seems perfect and neat, watch out!”