April 27, 2025 • 41 mins
When Paul Foshee says a good coon dog "don't run anything but a coon," he's speaking from decades of midnight adventures tracking through Arkansas backwoods with his faithful hounds. The second part of our conversation with Paul delivers pure storytelling gold as he recounts tales that few modern outdoorsmen will ever experience firsthand.
Picture this: Paul and his hunting partner Don tracking their dogs through miles of soybeans and woodlands, completely disoriented, only to discover they've crossed all the way to Hattieville Lake (Lake Cargile). Or the night they stood flipping quarters for hours while their dogs caught four raccoons without the men moving an inch. These aren't just hunting stories—they're windows into a vanishing culture where outdoor skills and camaraderie shaped men's characters.
Paul's adventures extend well beyond coon hunting. His whitewater canoeing experiences on Arkansas rivers and creeks reveal a man who embraced challenge and calculated risk. The storytelling comes alive as he describes navigating massive waves with his son Randy, their canoe filling with water, or nearly getting swept into a dam when a boat motor failed at exactly the wrong moment. "Put your life jacket on. If we get to the dam, get on it," was his practical advice in the face of potential disaster.
What makes these stories truly special isn't just the adventure, but the relationships woven throughout. When Paul speaks about the original TJ Virden (our host's great-grandfather), his voice softens with genuine emotion: "He's about as good a man as I ever knew." The story of TJ helping the young couple set up their first home without accepting payment reveals how these outdoor communities supported each other in ways that transcended mere friendship.
As Paul reflects on his life's journey, his philosophy emerges with simple clarity: "You don't ever own any property. You think you do, but you don't." He understands we're all just "dust in the wind," temporary stewards passing through. Yet his final wisdom encourages boldness: "If you don't try new things, you ain't never going to accomplish very much."
Listen now to experience these authentic stories from a man who's truly lived the outdoor life. Follow us on Instagram @natobpodcast or find us on Facebook at Natural Obsession for more content celebrating the human connection to nature.
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What is the Natural Obsession Podcast all about?
Growing up, we all had those moments in nature that stuck with us—whether it was a quiet walk in the woods or a grand adventure. On Natural Obsession, it’s our desire to bring those moments to life. As we talk to people from all walks of life we will learn how they fell in love with the outdoors, the different ways they enjoy it today, and explore how we can work together to ensure these spaces are around for years to come. It’s all about sharing memories from the outdoors and ensuring future generations can make their own.
To find out more about Natural Obsession and hosts, Daniel Emison and TJ Virden, visit our website at https://www.natob.co/.
If you have questions about episodes or have guest recommendations please email us at info@natob.co.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
TJ (00:02):
Welcome back to the second half of our two-part episode
with Paul Foshee.
Previously, paul talked aboutbeing a barber, a stonemason,
and how he got his start in thepecan industry.
He also shared a few of hisfavorite coon hunting stories.
Today we will hear a few moreof those tales, along with some
others about quail hunting,canoeing and more.
Come along with us as we do alittle laughing and glean some
wisdom from Paul along the way.
(00:23):
Hi, this is TJ Virden, this isDaniel Emison and this is the
(00:50):
Natural Obsession Podcast.
It looks like Randy's pullingdown trophies over there.
Is that from your dogs?
Paul (01:00):
That ain't near all of them.
I gave some of them to the kidsand I guess they just destroyed
them.
Daniel (01:05):
So what makes a good coon dog?
Randy (01:08):
fourth place in the state .
Paul (01:09):
Well, a really good coon dog don't run anything but a
coon.
Me and Don had litter mates andour dogs were a year old and
they'd run a coon to Haddablewhere that lake is.
Over there One time we tradedfour coons and they all went
north and we wound up atHaddable.
John said Paul, where are we?
(01:31):
I said we've been going northhow far do you think it's
Hattieville?
That's what I did.
Daniel (01:38):
Did y'all start from here
Paul (01:39):
, right over where that culvert is.
We went through Kaufman, hadsome soybeans all through there
and that's where our dogs wererunning most of the time in the
soybean and we waited soybeansalmost all the way over.
They just wanted to go andfinally we just got after them
(02:01):
and just wore them out for itand they finally quit.
But they got to want a tree ofthem out for it and they finally
quit.
But they got to want the treeof coon more than the roe deer.
TJ (02:10):
Daniel hadn't heard the story Tell him about when Don
was whipping the snakes.
Paul (02:16):
Oh man.
He ain't right.
I tell him every once in a while.
I said, don, you're crazy as aloon He'd get a stick.
I'm talking about a big snake,now cottonmouth.
He'd get a stick and he'd gethis attention over here.
Well, he'd get him by the tailand he'd pop him.
Man, that's the dumbest thing Iever seen.
(02:39):
One of these days it's goingback for him.
He's right in the face, yeah,and he was popping the heads off
of him.
TJ (02:42):
Yeah, day that's going back for him.
He's going to bash you right inthe face.
Yeah, and he was popping theheads off of them.
Yeah, he's more of a man than Iam.
Paul (02:47):
I said, don, if anyone bites you, I ain't carrying you
out and I was going to put ahandkerchief or something on a
limb.
This is where Don died.
He climbed a tree one time.
We'd tree just come about twoor three times and he'd go up
the same tree and we justdecided we couldn't climb a tree
(03:08):
, didn't have a limb on it.
We're way up there and it was agreat, big tree.
Well, it had a knot on it thatday.
Come off side of it.
Well, finally it was a bushGrew up, got right there at that
knot.
Well then I said, finally itwas a bush Grew up, got right
there at that knot.
(03:28):
Well then I said God, you climbthat bush, lean over in that,
get on that knot and you go.
He looked at the door and hesaid I believe so.
So he got up, that bush, and hewas leaning over towards that
knot and that bush broke downhere.
It didn't break up there, itbroke down here.
Here he comes, whole tree.
(03:50):
He warped the ground and left aprint of him, his butt here and
his head here, and he couldn'tbreathe.
He's up there flopping around.
I got to laughing at him and he,when he got to where he could
(04:11):
talk.
He said what makes you thinkit's funny?
I said I watched how it workedpretty funny to me.
He said it was funny.
But anyway, I said Don, youmust round and get your butt up
that trigger at that coon.
He said I broke the limb.
You try it?
I said I can't time.
(04:33):
We we just left him up there.
So we went over at one time whenit was it snowed while we was
over there, and I think it wasthat same coon.
They, while we was over there,and I think it was that same
coon, they caught it.
One of the dogs had caught itfor a minute and I don't know if
it was the dog or the coon wasbleeding.
(04:54):
You could see blood drippingthrough the snow and they
finally caught him, done him in.
We went over there one time, meand Don and Fess.
We went over behind Cargo Lakein kind of a swamp spot and we
couldn't hardly hear our dogs orthe frogs.
(05:16):
They were just bellowing.
Fess said we'll go back over atnight, we'll take this little
boat, we'll get there.
We killed 52.
52 frogs.
Did y'all eat them all?
I don't know who got them, Idon't know.
TJ (05:32):
They didn't go to waste, probably.
I like frog legs.
Yeah, we had some awfully goodhunts.
I went with Billy Jack Stoball one time.
He said it was a good dog butevery tree we got to there was
no coon and we walked forseveral miles and never found
one tree where he said there wasone.
(05:52):
But I haven't been a part of agood coon hunt.
Paul (05:56):
It's a dying art.
Me and Don have been on somegood ones.
Randy (05:58):
They tell you what they like to do when there's coon
hunting at night.
I don't know.
they like to flip quarters.
TJ (06:06):
I didn't hear that part.
You had to tell us that one
Paul (06:09):
being the dixon boys and Fes Gunderman and I don't know.
We've flipped quarters allnight and our dogs caught four
coons.
That night you could hear themsqualling.
They'd go on, go on somewhereelse.
We could hear them all night.
We never left.
TJ (06:25):
Y'all just stood there flipping quarters, huh.
Paul (06:27):
Yeah, Finally, I was down a whole bunch.
I forgot how many, but anyway,they finally got to doing dollar
bills before daylight and Isaid I'll do.
I think I got five or six orsomething.
I'll do until I lose them andI'll quit In a little while.
(06:52):
I was up about $2.
I got to winning for a while $2or something Flipped on that
for $2.
$2.
TJ (07:02):
You guys were going every night at one point in time,
weren't you?
Paul (07:06):
Oh, four or five.
Daniel (07:08):
How did Carolyn deal?
with that.
Paul (07:10):
I don't know, you were coon hunting! I never talked to
her about that.
Maybe if I talked to her aboutit she wouldn't like that.
Yeah, we had some good times.
Daniel (07:24):
If you were wondering, Carolin is Paul's wife of over
50 years.
Paul and Carolin met choppingcotton and before Paul was even
out of high school, they gotmarried.
He joked that he never reallyasked her about coon hunting
five nights a week.
It was a lighthearted moment,but one that says a lot.
The truth is, behind everythingPaul's built, carolyn's been
right there.
They've been a team through itall and it's clear that none of
it would have been possiblewithout her support.
(07:45):
The long nights, the hardseasons, the risks and the wins
she's been part of it every stepof the way.
Their story isn't just aboutfarming or hunting.
It's about building a lifetogether, one season at a time.
Paul (07:58):
We couldn't hunt for 25 years I guess, and then I just
kept cutting, timber out andfinally our dogs died out.
I said, don, let's get somebird dogs, let's see if we like
that.
We'd hunted a little bit withother people.
So we got some bird dogs.
I got one off of Pat Roberts, apup out of him out of his dog,
(08:23):
a pup out of him out of his dog,and he was a blowing and going
dog.
He'd go around a 40-acre blockreal quick, like if there was
any birds around there.
He'd find them.
Anyway, don had a dog thatwouldn't hunt hard.
(08:44):
He'd hunt with him you know,just just buzzing around.
So he didn't like my dogbecause mine was, that he's gone
half the time, you know.
But we could, we could kind ofsee where he's going.
He pointed lots of birds andthen, uh, later on after that I
had a dog that David Russellnamed him.
(09:06):
He named me Fudd.
He kind of looked like Fudd andhe was a good dog anyway, he
was a pup out of the other dog.
So me and Don was hunting and wewas over kind of close to Doc
Crothers place.
My dog pointed at Covey Birds.
(09:29):
He was about like his daddy, hewas hunted hard.
He pointed at Covey Birds andhe was at least a quarter of a
mile from us.
We could see him and he said,polly's, just like his old daddy
, look at him, look where he is.
I said, yeah, kind of like thatdo you?
(09:53):
Nope?
so we go on up there to him.
He ain't moved a muscle,standing there like a statue.
His dog run in there andflushed him.
Oh man, I said what's thematter with your dog, Anyway?
that's how we were.
(10:14):
That's how we operated Afterthey died out here, me and James
Alexander, donnie, part of thetime we got to going to Texas
and there was lots of birds outthere.
When we started it and it waswide open you could just shoot
any direction you wanted toshoot and lots of birds.
(10:35):
But there was places out therethat there was many sand birds
you couldn't hardly hunt a dogin.
We got to put boots on them.
You put your boots on a dog.
It ain't acting nice.
Yeah, me and James Alexander,Eddie Tackett, we bird hunted a
lot and he shot one of my dogsall to death.
(10:57):
I mean he shot him hard upclose and I thought he was going
to kill him and I thought hewas going to kill him.
There's an old pond of a thingthere and it's more mud than
water but it had a little bit ofwater in it and he was just on
(11:18):
fire.
Hugh couldn't feel any of theshot in him.
They went deep.
He was too close and Eddie wasjust, oh, he couldn't understand
it.
Yeah, close, and Eddie was justboy, couldn't understand it.
Yeah, and I figured I fed himand he ate.
I figured in the morning he'dbe dead, in the morning he would
went hunting really but wealready had him loaded.
(11:42):
we We'll come home.
I took him to Tommy and Tommysaid Paul, that shot ain't going
to kill that dog.
If it hadn't already killed him, he ain't going to die.
He lived to be a little over 13.
TJ (11:58):
Wow, Now you used to have some good squirrel dogs too,
didn't you, when you and Nathanused to go hunting and stuff.
Paul (12:10):
I had one that's called Bob.
Yeah, I remember bob and I Ikilled three coyotes that was
chasing him.
Yeah, I figured coyote got him.
He just vanished and I neverknew where he went.
I bet you a coyote got him.
But anyway, me and nathan waswalking back towards eddie's and
down on the road with and theywas trellis tears.
By the way, I just got my gunloaded.
I had a Browning automatic.
(12:31):
I just put some shells in and acoyote come out.
That dog went on down the roadand that dog didn't know what
was about to happen.
That coyote was one of these inthe kitchen and I shot him and
I broke his jaw.
He eased over and looked at it.
He's just a little boy.
(12:52):
I bought him a BB gun.
He had a hard time loading it,but he's cocking that gun, he's
shooting.
I could hear him hitting it too.
We walked up there to it.
I said you want to shoot him?
He said, yeah, I do.
So I just held my gun out thereand he pulled the trigger.
(13:13):
I hit him just right.
I killed him.
I don't know how I done that,but I did and I said is that the
first child you ever killed?
He said, yeah, it's the firstone I ever saw too, me and Randy
and Jerry and Nathan.
Nathan went with me and it wascold as a dick.
(13:35):
It was a big old frost, I mean,just looked like snow almost.
We walked around the fish lake,didn't we?
And him and Jerry walked onaround it, way on around it,
deer hunting With a muzzleloaderaround the fish lake maybe.
And they, him, him and jerrywalked on around it way on
around deer hunt with amuzzleloader and I took some
sugar and I drank a bunch ofcoffee and I I just had to pee.
(13:56):
I just started peeing and therewas a deer standing down there.
I said I think I'll just shoothim.
I just, I just still think'm,just still thinking I shot him.
I shot him and I said you know,shoot that.
He saw all the smoke ofBellerin.
You know he thought, boy,they're going to kick him to
death.
He said I know I don't shootthat thing.
Randy (14:16):
He was five years old, though he was very old.
TJ (14:19):
Yeah, how old was he when the coyote?
Was that about me?
About five then?
Paul (14:23):
I don't know, he's probably four, maybe well, I'd
give him they'd be good.
That's funny.
We walked way on through thereand my dog treated up a viney
thing, just a bunch of vines,and I jerked on him vines and
that is a great squirrel.
He jumped out and jumped rightover nathan.
He just barely cleared him andI said why didn't you kill that
(14:45):
one, why didn't that thing jumpover your head?
And he said why didn't you?
Well, I couldn't shoot for you.
But I couldn't hit him.
Daniel (14:58):
Yeah, I saw a squirrel out here while we were going
down to that.
I'm like that's a bravesquirrel, that's a little one.
He don't know any better, he'sat the wrong place.
Randy (15:05):
He's got a bad address, doesn't he?
Yeah, he does.
So he's got a side shed outhere that's got a window in it
and we use it with a shootingbench so we can set guns in and
stuff shooting into the bankover there.
So the holes go out thebackside of the building out
there.
So through pecan season well,pecan season kind of come to an
(15:26):
end and he took some of thoseholes and spread them in the
ditch where the wash was outthere.
He come in one day.
He said, come out here and killa squirrel.
He just had a retina surgery onhis eye so he couldn't shoot
but anyway, I'm out there injust a minute and I shoot, kill
a squirrel.
Just a second later I killanother one right there.
I mean just bam, bam.
(15:47):
I come back in here.
A few minutes later he goesback out there and calls me.
I go back out there.
The two of us have killed 15squirrels out that window in
just a matter of a couple hours.
So we called Joe Dixon and gavehim the squirrels
TJ (16:01):
now, paul's got a lot of good hunting stories, that's for
sure.
We're just scratching thesurface.
But that's not the only kind ofoutdoor experiences he's known
for.
Believe it or not, Paul alsoloved whitewater canoeing.
As a matter of fact, hisstories are part of what got me
into kayaking.
Before I had the money to buymy own equipment, Paul was
always good to loan me a canoefor my own adventures.
Let's listen, as Paul shares afew accounts from his paddling
(16:22):
days.
Daniel (16:24):
I know you did a lot of stuff on the river with Randy
and everybody canoeing.
Yeah, how'd you get into thatspot?
Paul (16:29):
Me and Ray Snowball.
We floated a lot together andme and Randy, we got to going
together Instead of floatingwith Ray all the time.
He'd get me a partner and I'dget Randy my partner, and Randy
was young and lean, He'd be inthe front and I'd be in the back
(16:50):
.
We had some good times doingthat
Daniel (16:54):
Any memorable trips stick out at you.
Paul (16:57):
there I remember one time we went way up Middle Fork on
Illinois Bayou.
We went way up there.
It was deep, and it was steepand boy, it was just rained, and
rained and rained, it was justzoom.
Randy (17:13):
We didn't work that day laying rock because it was
coming a thunderstorm.
It was coming a thunderstorm upthere, a big one.
I mean big rain, so just to putyou in perspective.
So when we drive up there youcan see waves, but it just quit
raining.
Paul (17:28):
Ray had a canoe that didn't turn up very good and
they just rolled down the creek.
I bet they turned over 20 timesMe and.
Randy, we stand and floatpretty good and we got to where
there was a two streams cometogether and when they come
together it just rolled up a bigold wave there, probably as
(17:51):
tall as that door.
We didn't go through that one,we stuck that wave, but it
filled it up, it didn't it justdied over, it just went in we
had a we had a terrible timethat time.
Randy (18:07):
So when we come out of that wave I'm going to give you
my view of that.
I'm going down through thereand we had one paddle left
because we gave all our extrapaddles to Audie Ray and his
partner there, eddie Joe Gwynn.
Paul (18:25):
Yeah, that's who he was.
He never floated, again,
Randy (18:29):
anyway we're going down through there.
Well, the creek, the big treeson the bank are in the creek, so
there's limbs out there.
So the first limb I come by Iwas holding that paddle, knowing
I had to keep up with it.
I grabbed that limb and it justsucked me down under the water
when the pressure of the waterdid even with the life jacket on
.
And so I let go of that andpopped up and went on down the
(18:52):
creek a little bit and directly.
I come kind of a little curveand eddy and I grabbed the limb
there and I was able to kind ofpull myself up on top of the
water.
Just about the time I got overto where I could get up on top
and get out of the stream alittle bit, my shorts come loose
and had to spread my legs outto keep my shorts from coming
off.
When I spread my legs out Ilost one of my tennis shoes.
(19:13):
I let go, obviously, at thatpoint and got my shorts.
I went on down probably another100 yards or so, got my shorts
kind of pulled up and the creekfinished making that bend a
little bit and had a good eddyand I went into that eddy and I
got out.
Well, he still hasn't come bywith the canoe.
I didn't know where the canoewas.
I'm trying to make my way upthis bank looking for him and
(19:36):
here in a little bit here hecomes in the canoe, just
whizzing by me, himself in thecanoe, and and, uh, I caught the
canoe and and pulled it overthere and we kind of got our
breath and bearings again andthen we took off again.
But he was in that wave withthat canoe and that canoe and
(19:57):
him would, would he'd hit thebottom.
He said it wasn't very deep andthat canoe would hit him
against the bottom and it madethree or four loops.
Paul (20:05):
It was just like that Smooth, it was rock and I had
that canoe in front of me and Iwanted to kick that off and get
away from him and I hadn'tbreathed for a while and finally
I got it off of him and my lifejacket popped me up and I
caught the canoe and went byRandy's stop over was that the
(20:30):
same day?
TJ (20:30):
you guys were on the water when that lady passed away.
Randy (20:34):
I wasn't actually with him on that trip as another trip
, but yeah, that was up on thebig piney that you and has a big
group of them there.
Daniel (20:44):
Yeah.
I think that y'all ran Tammyoff of a kayaking on one of
those two.
Paul (20:50):
We were in her.
We was in Little Piney then.
Randy (20:54):
We went on a float in Little Piney just not too long
after me and Tammy got married.
Paul (21:01):
It was three of them in my canoe.
Randy (21:04):
Three in our canoe too.
Paul (21:05):
Her and Gwen, wasn't it?
Her and lee pitterd one of thepitterd yeah and uh they
pittered anyway, neither one ofthem would help me a bit they
didn't know how to, if they justpush us off the banks?
Daniel (21:22):
you know
Paul (21:23):
that would help
Daniel (21:23):
, but they're pretty green though, aren't they?
Randy (21:26):
I don't know that they wouldn't help, they just didn't
know how to help.
That was he was used tocanoeing with me and you know
when we, when we canoe, we kindof knew what each other was
going to do.
It was because we can do one.
One summer, every time itrained, we went canoeing,
sometimes a couple times a day.
We can do 27 times, 20different, 27 different or 27 no
(21:47):
, 28 different trips in onesummer.
TJ (21:51):
Oh, one summer.
Okay, you know different littletrips.
Randy (21:53):
Some of them were small, like there's three different
sections.
You can float on Big Piney andwe did that one day.
You know three differentsections, but that one with Lee,
pittard and Tammy and Timmy andRenee, right off the bat when
we put in there was a canoewrapped around a tree.
(22:14):
We saw it just right after weput in and then we didn't go
very far until it was just a logjam.
There was no creek to goanywhere, just water rushing
through a big pile of logs.
And when we was trying to getout around that and stuff we
flipped over and tangled a ropearound that tie-dye chest around
Tammy's neck.
She was under the canoe.
(22:35):
Dad flipped that over and gotit off of her and then her and
lee walked the bank.
They wouldn't, they wouldn'tget back in the canoe.
Paul (22:43):
They walked the bank you know, what they didn't realize,
that they could just bid any,get bid any time, with a cotton
mouth or a or a copperhead sothey didn't realize what danger
they was in.
Randy (22:56):
Tammy liked to never get Renee to get out of the canoe.
She was holding on to the canoewith both hands.
It was stuck up in them logsand we needed to get it out of
the logs to carry it over thelog pile.
Finally he just kind of had toyank her out of the canoe and
put her on the log pile and wedrug it over then and got it out
.
We come to to the highway andwhen we did we stopped.
(23:21):
There was kind of a gravel baroff to one side.
We pulled up on that gravel barand dad said get in the canoe
with me and we'll run down thereand get the truck and we'll
come back.
It won't take, take us any time.
You mean you can do this quick.
And tammy grabbed her, me andwrapped her arms around me and
started crying you'll die,you'll die.
Tammy grabbed me and wrapped herarms around me and started
crying you'll die, you'll die,you'll die, and she wouldn't let
me go.
(23:41):
So Kimmy wound up going withhim down there because she
wouldn't let go of me.
We had a lot of trips where wedidn't have any problems, but
that one was a pretty tough tripthere.
Daniel (23:51):
Yeah, that makes the most fun canoe trips, though
when it's rough, If you'rewalking the whole time, that's
not super fun.
Paul (23:57):
Yeah, we've been on some where you just paddle all the
time.
Daniel (24:01):
I don't think she's ever went on a trip with us has she?
Randy (24:03):
She went one time, I think, or two times, on Big
Piney since from Longpool downto the bridge, which isn't much
of a float.
Paul (24:19):
Me and Randy and Ray and Kim, we went down, a little tiny
, a big tiny, and there's a spotthey call a mother and it's a
real bad spot Devil's elbow.
And most of the time there'ssome canoes wrapped around the
rock and that's what happened tothem.
And Ray finally got out of itand left it.
(24:42):
And Kenneth, he walks way downthere and he's crawling down on
the back like a drunken rat.
He's crawling down on the back.
He didn't realize he didn'thave a canoe anymore.
He was around that rock wow hewas free there yeah, they don't
pop back up like a kayak we.
Randy (25:02):
We floated that section several times.
One time there was 11 canoesaround those rocks.
Wow, when we come through there, 11, so it's, it's a.
It was it's the last time wewent through there, though it
wasn't as rough as it used to be.
Something had changed a littlebit about the crew.
Paul (25:17):
I went to do it with Mike Thomas and there was not very
many people on the river thattime.
It was pretty rough.
Well, we'd passed a couple, atime or two and she was a really
pretty girl and he said I thinkI love her.
(25:39):
We passed a time or two andevery time he got fell in love
with her.
That guy, he looked like a bear.
So me and mike got a spot wherewe couldn't come out of it.
We got swamped and he said theyain't gonna come through that
(26:01):
either.
They're gonna be swamped justlike we did, and I'm gonna save
her.
You watch, that's what happened.
He waited out there and shejust wrapped her arms around him
, legs and all.
Oh.
He smiled like a opossum.
He waited out with her and thatguy went on down the creek and
(26:24):
he said I believe l'll just keepher.
He was carrying on that'sanother one smoked a lot oh yeah
, got him.
Yeah, me and mike was was goingto.
There's a house right up abovethere.
Anyway, we left our truck rightthere.
(26:45):
That guy come down there andtook a stick and let all the air
out of our tires.
I just maddened fire when Ifound that.
So me and mike, we walked upthe road trying to find somebody
to come help us a little bit.
We run into a guy.
He said I got air tank, I'll goup there and help y'all.
I know who done that.
That guy lives across the creekover there.
He does a lot of people likethat and somebody told me later
(27:08):
he just went over and shot hisdoor down.
He said he shot his door down.
He said he ain't doing me thatway and getting away with it.
Anyway, that guy, he come overand helped us a lot.
He just knew who had done itand he said I'm right the
opposite, I'll help you.
Well, he got her going again
Daniel (27:27):
Between the rough creeks , high water and a few
characters you wouldn't want tomeet twice.
Paul had no shortage ofadventure, but he wasn't out
there alone.
Most of these floats were withfamily Randy included or good
friends, making memories theystill laugh about today.
Of course, floating wasn't theonly thing he loved about the
water.
Some of his best stories comefrom fishing the Arkansas River,
and let's just say it wasn'talways smooth sailing there
(27:49):
either.
TJ (27:51):
What about that time?
You almost got washed into thedam when that motor wouldn't
crank.
Randy (27:54):
Me you and Jeff yeah,
TJ (27:56):
I've heard that story a couple times.
Paul (27:57):
I told them put your life jacket on.
If we get to the dam, get on it.
TJ (28:01):
Yeah, bad deal, huh.
Paul (28:02):
Boy.
I stood up and I was giving ita fit.
I guess, I flooded it probably.
Randy (28:08):
Jeff was actually holding the anchor rope by the hand.
Paul (28:11):
It wasn't tied off on the boat trying to get it to hang
anymore, wouldn't touch anymoretowards the dam.
It got deeper, didn't haveenough rope.
I was reeling poles in.
Randy (28:20):
Everybody handed me their poles, I'd reel your dad's in a
real mine in started to reelhis in when it started.
He just opened the boat up andit ripped the whole gears and
everything out of that pole whenit left because it was hung up.
TJ (28:31):
He just didn't care he didn't care.
Randy (28:33):
No, it tore his reel all the pieces when we took off so
they finally started.
That's halfway they was blowinga whistle at us and all kinds
of stuff.
They could see we was trying tostop it, but we couldn't stop
it from a minute there when Ifirst started fishing you could
tie up at the dam if you had thenerve.
Paul (28:50):
I've done it.
Tie up at the dam, but you gotto have a motor that'll start
quick, because when they blowthat horn you better move.
Yeah, because they don't know.
You don't know what gatethey're going to open and they
can't see it, so they don't knowwhere you are yeah, which is
why they changed the rules.
Randy (29:08):
If we'd got to the dam, we'd have been on it until
somebody come picked us up.
That's that for sure.
Paul (29:12):
So we might not ever got there because that damn was
running pretty good and I thinkI think that hydraulics of it
would swamp your boat.
Me and don and his brother bugs, we fished together a lot and
one time he tore his reel up andme and don was just catching up
(29:33):
all right and and he'd run histhumb in them and get them in
the boat.
Before the day was over helooked like he sandblasted his
thumb I bet anyway and he saidif you guys was worth a flip,
you'd let me use one of yourbodies for a minute let me catch
(29:56):
one or two.
I said, we are taking people wejust take that good guy.
TJ (30:04):
Yeah, that's funny.
He's still fishing every day,isn't he?
Paul (30:08):
or he's still fishing every day if he can't fish
you might as well put him under
.
Yeah something bad wrong withhim
Randy (30:13):
Yeah, so they were fishing.
I was a little kid then theywere fishing a lot then Catfish
stuff.
You can tell them aboutcatching your fish with your
last minute.
Paul (30:26):
We was catching more minutes and we had a whole boat
full of fish and I found them.
We didn't have any more menace.
I found one that had beenstepped on or something and I
wormed him on my hook andthrowed him out there and I
caught me a big catfish and wecaught Bug sold a fish.
(30:48):
He sold them and we had enoughfish out of that to buy us all a
13-foot pole and reel oh, wowthat's how many fish we had that
day.
TJ (31:03):
That's funny
Paul (31:04):
.
I'll tell you another storyabout about his brother steve.
He couldn't walk a foot log ifit had water around it.
He'd fall off every time, butif it was on dry lands he could
walk it.
I said what's the differenceabout it?
I don't know.
So we went down, we went wayover the bottoms and we come to
(31:26):
a log jam and I looked it wasall floating too deep.
I looked it over.
That's going to save us a mileor so walking.
I looked it over and there'ssome pretty big logs you could
walk on.
I said I want to go across it,don.
(31:48):
I looked it all over and therewasn't a snake on any of them,
so I just pitter-pattered acrossthere.
If you stay on one log it, so Ijust patted across there.
If you stay on one log, it'sgoing to roll over with you.
So I didn't give it a chance todo that, I just went.
I said Don, you saw how I wentacross there.
Come on, okay.
He tried to bear with me.
(32:10):
Here's Steve.
He said you know good and will.
I can't do that.
I said you saw I done it.
You saw don done it.
Now you know how to do it.
I'm coming, but I don't believeI can make it sure enough.
(32:31):
He got out about the middle ofit and he stepped on one and he
just stopped there, just actlike he wanted to fall off of it
and he did and he went plumbdown to where he caught that log
with his hand.
Instead of hitting the bottom,he just caught it.
Oh he's mad.
He said I hope them snakes getme.
I said when you get out ofthere they'll have one on each
(32:54):
leg.
Oh, he was cussing bad Me andDon sober laughing.
He said he just startedcrawling across logs.
He finally got over there bycrawling.
You know he's sopping wet thatold crud.
(33:14):
He's hanging on him.
He wouldn't even walk with us.
He'd stay way back behind us 50yards.
He's not still laughing.
He'd be big enough, I bet.
TJ (33:35):
Now, what you don't know is Paul Foshee and I have always
had a special bond, and that'snot because of anything I've
done, but because of therelationship that he had with my
great-grandfather and namesake,tj Verdon.
Paul looked up to him the sameway I look up to Paul.
When I was born he said, if Iturned out to be anything like
my great-grandfather was, I'd bea great man.
Those are words I'm stilltrying to live up to today.
(34:00):
Here's what Paul had to sayabout the original TJ Verdon.
I was going to ask you to tella couple stories on my grandpa
so I could have them on record.
Paul (34:06):
I'll tell you what I think about him.
He's about as good a man as Iever knew.
He just had a little countrystore.
He had a gas station and allkinds of groceries in there
canned groceries and whateverand he had sticks of bologna,
(34:28):
chicken loaf, bacon.
He'd slice you up whatever youwanted.
Wrap it up get to you and hedidn't have a chair in that
building.
You couldn't walk in there andsit down.
You know them coke boxes.
They were wood and you couldturn them up and you sat on them
.
That was our chairs.
We'd buy our stuff from him andgas and all A month would be
(34:52):
about 40-something dollars.
40-something dollars won't evenget you a meal.
I was barbering and he'd say,paul, bring your tools home.
I need a haircut.
I said I'll be, out here withthem.
I'd bring them home every day.
He'd get out there between thegas station and his door.
(35:14):
Here one time I found an oldpickup that I wanted to buy and
they wanted 300 for it and itwas a 57 model chevrolet pickup
and it had boy.
It had some really rough tireson the back of it.
If it spun three times youain't going to be gone.
(35:35):
You had to dig a hole.
But anyway I said he borrowed$300.
When the bank opened I paidmoney.
So he had money behind.
Every day he'd come back to.
He dug around here and thereand he'd go get some more.
He had it get some more.
(35:57):
He had it everywhere in there.
Anyway, he wound up with $300.
He wrote on the ticket $300,paul O'Shea.
Of course I could go back moneyand give it to him.
Yeah.
He trusted me that much.
Randy (36:11):
What about when you and Mom got married.
Paul (36:14):
Carolin had a list.
Hell, we didn't have any money.
We were just hanging by athread for a long time.
And Carolin had a little list,kind of get it started a little
bit, and he never even looked atit.
He just went to gathering upstuff all around, piling it up
there.
I said, Mr Virden, we ain't gotmuch money.
(36:39):
You have to charge it if we, ifyou overdo us.
He never even listened to me.
He just kept piling stuff up.
He'd bring a mop and a broomand just everything that you
want to start off with.
I said write it down, I'll payyou when I get some money.
And he said no, after the firstround I'll give it to you.
(37:01):
So that's what he did.
That's the way he was.
TJ (37:09):
You might have noticed a slight quiver in Paul's voice at
the end of that last bit.
He's always been one of thetoughest men I've known, but as
we talked about my grandfatherand a couple of his friends that
have passed on, you could seehow moved he was.
One thing stood out while wetalked to Paul all of his
stories included people hethought the world of.
They played a big part inmaking him the man he is today
and just as they are part of hislegacy, he will be part of ours
(37:29):
as we bring this episode to aclose.
Here are a few last nuggets offrom Paul Foshee .
You said that you gotpermission to hunt that one
guy's property for coon andstuff and I know it used to be a
lot easier.
You feel like people postingproperty and putting up fences
and stuff.
Does that really kill a lot ofthat?
Paul (37:48):
you know you can't.
You can't hunt anywhere, youwant to anymore I did a long
time yeah that cross fencesnever think about it.
Nobody would ever give a flipabout it.
But now you cross a fence you'dought to get shot at.
TJ (38:03):
Yeah.
Paul (38:05):
It's terrible.
It's getting worse instead ofbetter.
Randy (38:08):
Yeah, but you like to see it like it used to be.
Paul (38:12):
Yeah, I'd rather have it like that.
There's so many people whodon't want a footprint on their
property.
I'll tell you one thing youdon't ever own any property.
You think you do, but you don't.
If you're getting abstract, youlook at that abstract and it
goes on and on and on and on.
There's lots of people on itbefore you did.
TJ (38:30):
Yeah.
Paul (38:30):
And they thought they owned it.
You're just dust in the wind.
Remember Kansas singing thatone yeah.
TJ (38:35):
Dust in the wind.
Paul (38:36):
That's true.
That's all you are.
I never thought about that whenI was young, crossed my mind
now.
Daniel (38:43):
You've wore a lot of hats in your life.
What do you think has shapedyou the most out of all those?
Paul (38:49):
I imagine being in the pecan business.
Yeah, I worked really hardtrying to keep my family going.
And when Sheila started theschool, phyllis was in school,
randy in computer classes inLittle Rock , I couldn't work
enough to keep them going.
We all had cars.
I'd go to Walmart and just getme a whole bunch of stuff,
(39:14):
change oil on it.
I just couldn't hardly makeenough money.
And Randy, we went to Pine Bluffto borrow your money.
The girls didn't owe any money.
I kept them up, but his was$440 a month, besides vehicles
(39:35):
and stuff.
I couldn't keep up with it.
And, when it's all said anddone, carolin went to college
after Sheila went to school.
Heck, everybody's in school butme and, by the way, I wound up
being the dumbest one in thewhole doggone bunch.
Daniel (39:52):
What do you hope your kids and grandkids carry on, not
in just your work and workethic, but how they live?
Paul (39:59):
They can't work like I did and live like I did.
It don't exist anymore.
Daniel (40:06):
Do you feel like you've lived the kind of life that you
were meant to live?
Paul (40:10):
Heck Who knows?
Who knows that one?
I don't.
I've made a lot of mistakes inmy life, but I don't know.
You know I went to barbercollege and then quit about
three years, three or four years.
I couldn't stand it no more.
So that kind of wasted sometime of my life.
(40:34):
If you don't try new things,you ain't never going to
accomplish very much.
If you just sit around waitingon somebody else to do something
, that's it for this week'sepisode.
Daniel (40:49):
Thanks for hanging out with us.
If you like the show, you canfind more at natob.
co or follow us on Instagram atnatobpodcast, or find us on
Facebook at Natural Obsession.
We'll see you there.
Welcome back to the second half of our two-part episode
with Paul Foshee.
Previously, paul talked aboutbeing a barber, a stonemason,
and how he got his start in thepecan industry.
He also shared a few of hisfavorite coon hunting stories.
Today we will hear a few moreof those tales, along with some
others about quail hunting,canoeing and more.
Come along with us as we do alittle laughing and glean some
wisdom from Paul along the way.
(00:23):
Hi, this is TJ Virden, this isDaniel Emison and this is the
(00:50):
Natural Obsession Podcast.
It looks like Randy's pullingdown trophies over there.
Is that from your dogs?
Paul (01:00):
That ain't near all of them.
I gave some of them to the kidsand I guess they just destroyed
them.
Daniel (01:05):
So what makes a good coon dog?
Randy (01:08):
fourth place in the state .
Paul (01:09):
Well, a really good coon dog don't run anything but a
coon.
Me and Don had litter mates andour dogs were a year old and
they'd run a coon to Haddablewhere that lake is.
Over there One time we tradedfour coons and they all went
north and we wound up atHaddable.
John said Paul, where are we?
(01:31):
I said we've been going northhow far do you think it's
Hattieville?
That's what I did.
Daniel (01:38):
Did y'all start from here
Paul (01:39):
, right over where that culvert is.
We went through Kaufman, hadsome soybeans all through there
and that's where our dogs wererunning most of the time in the
soybean and we waited soybeansalmost all the way over.
They just wanted to go andfinally we just got after them
(02:01):
and just wore them out for itand they finally quit.
But they got to want a tree ofthem out for it and they finally
quit.
But they got to want the treeof coon more than the roe deer.
TJ (02:10):
Daniel hadn't heard the story Tell him about when Don
was whipping the snakes.
Paul (02:16):
Oh man.
He ain't right.
I tell him every once in a while.
I said, don, you're crazy as aloon He'd get a stick.
I'm talking about a big snake,now cottonmouth.
He'd get a stick and he'd gethis attention over here.
Well, he'd get him by the tailand he'd pop him.
Man, that's the dumbest thing Iever seen.
(02:39):
One of these days it's goingback for him.
He's right in the face, yeah,and he was popping the heads off
of him.
TJ (02:42):
Yeah, day that's going back for him.
He's going to bash you right inthe face.
Yeah, and he was popping theheads off of them.
Yeah, he's more of a man than Iam.
Paul (02:47):
I said, don, if anyone bites you, I ain't carrying you
out and I was going to put ahandkerchief or something on a
limb.
This is where Don died.
He climbed a tree one time.
We'd tree just come about twoor three times and he'd go up
the same tree and we justdecided we couldn't climb a tree
(03:08):
, didn't have a limb on it.
We're way up there and it was agreat, big tree.
Well, it had a knot on it thatday.
Come off side of it.
Well, finally it was a bushGrew up, got right there at that
knot.
Well then I said, finally itwas a bush Grew up, got right
there at that knot.
(03:28):
Well then I said God, you climbthat bush, lean over in that,
get on that knot and you go.
He looked at the door and hesaid I believe so.
So he got up, that bush, and hewas leaning over towards that
knot and that bush broke downhere.
It didn't break up there, itbroke down here.
Here he comes, whole tree.
(03:50):
He warped the ground and left aprint of him, his butt here and
his head here, and he couldn'tbreathe.
He's up there flopping around.
I got to laughing at him and he,when he got to where he could
(04:11):
talk.
He said what makes you thinkit's funny?
I said I watched how it workedpretty funny to me.
He said it was funny.
But anyway, I said Don, youmust round and get your butt up
that trigger at that coon.
He said I broke the limb.
You try it?
I said I can't time.
(04:33):
We we just left him up there.
So we went over at one time whenit was it snowed while we was
over there, and I think it wasthat same coon.
They, while we was over there,and I think it was that same
coon, they caught it.
One of the dogs had caught itfor a minute and I don't know if
it was the dog or the coon wasbleeding.
(04:54):
You could see blood drippingthrough the snow and they
finally caught him, done him in.
We went over there one time, meand Don and Fess.
We went over behind Cargo Lakein kind of a swamp spot and we
couldn't hardly hear our dogs orthe frogs.
(05:16):
They were just bellowing.
Fess said we'll go back over atnight, we'll take this little
boat, we'll get there.
We killed 52.
52 frogs.
Did y'all eat them all?
I don't know who got them, Idon't know.
TJ (05:32):
They didn't go to waste, probably.
I like frog legs.
Yeah, we had some awfully goodhunts.
I went with Billy Jack Stoball one time.
He said it was a good dog butevery tree we got to there was
no coon and we walked forseveral miles and never found
one tree where he said there wasone.
(05:52):
But I haven't been a part of agood coon hunt.
Paul (05:56):
It's a dying art.
Me and Don have been on somegood ones.
Randy (05:58):
They tell you what they like to do when there's coon
hunting at night.
I don't know.
they like to flip quarters.
TJ (06:06):
I didn't hear that part.
You had to tell us that one
Paul (06:09):
being the dixon boys and Fes Gunderman and I don't know.
We've flipped quarters allnight and our dogs caught four
coons.
That night you could hear themsqualling.
They'd go on, go on somewhereelse.
We could hear them all night.
We never left.
TJ (06:25):
Y'all just stood there flipping quarters, huh.
Paul (06:27):
Yeah, Finally, I was down a whole bunch.
I forgot how many, but anyway,they finally got to doing dollar
bills before daylight and Isaid I'll do.
I think I got five or six orsomething.
I'll do until I lose them andI'll quit In a little while.
(06:52):
I was up about $2.
I got to winning for a while $2or something Flipped on that
for $2.
$2.
TJ (07:02):
You guys were going every night at one point in time,
weren't you?
Paul (07:06):
Oh, four or five.
Daniel (07:08):
How did Carolyn deal?
with that.
Paul (07:10):
I don't know, you were coon hunting! I never talked to
her about that.
Maybe if I talked to her aboutit she wouldn't like that.
Yeah, we had some good times.
Daniel (07:24):
If you were wondering, Carolin is Paul's wife of over
50 years.
Paul and Carolin met choppingcotton and before Paul was even
out of high school, they gotmarried.
He joked that he never reallyasked her about coon hunting
five nights a week.
It was a lighthearted moment,but one that says a lot.
The truth is, behind everythingPaul's built, carolyn's been
right there.
They've been a team through itall and it's clear that none of
it would have been possiblewithout her support.
(07:45):
The long nights, the hardseasons, the risks and the wins
she's been part of it every stepof the way.
Their story isn't just aboutfarming or hunting.
It's about building a lifetogether, one season at a time.
Paul (07:58):
We couldn't hunt for 25 years I guess, and then I just
kept cutting, timber out andfinally our dogs died out.
I said, don, let's get somebird dogs, let's see if we like
that.
We'd hunted a little bit withother people.
So we got some bird dogs.
I got one off of Pat Roberts, apup out of him out of his dog,
(08:23):
a pup out of him out of his dog,and he was a blowing and going
dog.
He'd go around a 40-acre blockreal quick, like if there was
any birds around there.
He'd find them.
Anyway, don had a dog thatwouldn't hunt hard.
(08:44):
He'd hunt with him you know,just just buzzing around.
So he didn't like my dogbecause mine was, that he's gone
half the time, you know.
But we could, we could kind ofsee where he's going.
He pointed lots of birds andthen, uh, later on after that I
had a dog that David Russellnamed him.
(09:06):
He named me Fudd.
He kind of looked like Fudd andhe was a good dog anyway, he
was a pup out of the other dog.
So me and Don was hunting and wewas over kind of close to Doc
Crothers place.
My dog pointed at Covey Birds.
(09:29):
He was about like his daddy, hewas hunted hard.
He pointed at Covey Birds andhe was at least a quarter of a
mile from us.
We could see him and he said,polly's, just like his old daddy
, look at him, look where he is.
I said, yeah, kind of like thatdo you?
(09:53):
Nope?
so we go on up there to him.
He ain't moved a muscle,standing there like a statue.
His dog run in there andflushed him.
Oh man, I said what's thematter with your dog, Anyway?
that's how we were.
(10:14):
That's how we operated Afterthey died out here, me and James
Alexander, donnie, part of thetime we got to going to Texas
and there was lots of birds outthere.
When we started it and it waswide open you could just shoot
any direction you wanted toshoot and lots of birds.
(10:35):
But there was places out therethat there was many sand birds
you couldn't hardly hunt a dogin.
We got to put boots on them.
You put your boots on a dog.
It ain't acting nice.
Yeah, me and James Alexander,Eddie Tackett, we bird hunted a
lot and he shot one of my dogsall to death.
(10:57):
I mean he shot him hard upclose and I thought he was going
to kill him and I thought hewas going to kill him.
There's an old pond of a thingthere and it's more mud than
water but it had a little bit ofwater in it and he was just on
(11:18):
fire.
Hugh couldn't feel any of theshot in him.
They went deep.
He was too close and Eddie wasjust, oh, he couldn't understand
it.
Yeah, close, and Eddie was justboy, couldn't understand it.
Yeah, and I figured I fed himand he ate.
I figured in the morning he'dbe dead, in the morning he would
went hunting really but wealready had him loaded.
(11:42):
we We'll come home.
I took him to Tommy and Tommysaid Paul, that shot ain't going
to kill that dog.
If it hadn't already killed him, he ain't going to die.
He lived to be a little over 13.
TJ (11:58):
Wow, Now you used to have some good squirrel dogs too,
didn't you, when you and Nathanused to go hunting and stuff.
Paul (12:10):
I had one that's called Bob.
Yeah, I remember bob and I Ikilled three coyotes that was
chasing him.
Yeah, I figured coyote got him.
He just vanished and I neverknew where he went.
I bet you a coyote got him.
But anyway, me and nathan waswalking back towards eddie's and
down on the road with and theywas trellis tears.
By the way, I just got my gunloaded.
I had a Browning automatic.
(12:31):
I just put some shells in and acoyote come out.
That dog went on down the roadand that dog didn't know what
was about to happen.
That coyote was one of these inthe kitchen and I shot him and
I broke his jaw.
He eased over and looked at it.
He's just a little boy.
(12:52):
I bought him a BB gun.
He had a hard time loading it,but he's cocking that gun, he's
shooting.
I could hear him hitting it too.
We walked up there to it.
I said you want to shoot him?
He said, yeah, I do.
So I just held my gun out thereand he pulled the trigger.
(13:13):
I hit him just right.
I killed him.
I don't know how I done that,but I did and I said is that the
first child you ever killed?
He said, yeah, it's the firstone I ever saw too, me and Randy
and Jerry and Nathan.
Nathan went with me and it wascold as a dick.
(13:35):
It was a big old frost, I mean,just looked like snow almost.
We walked around the fish lake,didn't we?
And him and Jerry walked onaround it, way on around it,
deer hunting With a muzzleloaderaround the fish lake maybe.
And they, him, him and jerrywalked on around it way on
around deer hunt with amuzzleloader and I took some
sugar and I drank a bunch ofcoffee and I I just had to pee.
(13:56):
I just started peeing and therewas a deer standing down there.
I said I think I'll just shoothim.
I just, I just still think'm,just still thinking I shot him.
I shot him and I said you know,shoot that.
He saw all the smoke ofBellerin.
You know he thought, boy,they're going to kick him to
death.
He said I know I don't shootthat thing.
Randy (14:16):
He was five years old, though he was very old.
TJ (14:19):
Yeah, how old was he when the coyote?
Was that about me?
About five then?
Paul (14:23):
I don't know, he's probably four, maybe well, I'd
give him they'd be good.
That's funny.
We walked way on through thereand my dog treated up a viney
thing, just a bunch of vines,and I jerked on him vines and
that is a great squirrel.
He jumped out and jumped rightover nathan.
He just barely cleared him andI said why didn't you kill that
(14:45):
one, why didn't that thing jumpover your head?
And he said why didn't you?
Well, I couldn't shoot for you.
But I couldn't hit him.
Daniel (14:58):
Yeah, I saw a squirrel out here while we were going
down to that.
I'm like that's a bravesquirrel, that's a little one.
He don't know any better, he'sat the wrong place.
Randy (15:05):
He's got a bad address, doesn't he?
Yeah, he does.
So he's got a side shed outhere that's got a window in it
and we use it with a shootingbench so we can set guns in and
stuff shooting into the bankover there.
So the holes go out thebackside of the building out
there.
So through pecan season well,pecan season kind of come to an
(15:26):
end and he took some of thoseholes and spread them in the
ditch where the wash was outthere.
He come in one day.
He said, come out here and killa squirrel.
He just had a retina surgery onhis eye so he couldn't shoot
but anyway, I'm out there injust a minute and I shoot, kill
a squirrel.
Just a second later I killanother one right there.
I mean just bam, bam.
(15:47):
I come back in here.
A few minutes later he goesback out there and calls me.
I go back out there.
The two of us have killed 15squirrels out that window in
just a matter of a couple hours.
So we called Joe Dixon and gavehim the squirrels
TJ (16:01):
now, paul's got a lot of good hunting stories, that's for
sure.
We're just scratching thesurface.
But that's not the only kind ofoutdoor experiences he's known
for.
Believe it or not, Paul alsoloved whitewater canoeing.
As a matter of fact, hisstories are part of what got me
into kayaking.
Before I had the money to buymy own equipment, Paul was
always good to loan me a canoefor my own adventures.
Let's listen, as Paul shares afew accounts from his paddling
(16:22):
days.
Daniel (16:24):
I know you did a lot of stuff on the river with Randy
and everybody canoeing.
Yeah, how'd you get into thatspot?
Paul (16:29):
Me and Ray Snowball.
We floated a lot together andme and Randy, we got to going
together Instead of floatingwith Ray all the time.
He'd get me a partner and I'dget Randy my partner, and Randy
was young and lean, He'd be inthe front and I'd be in the back
(16:50):
.
We had some good times doingthat
Daniel (16:54):
Any memorable trips stick out at you.
Paul (16:57):
there I remember one time we went way up Middle Fork on
Illinois Bayou.
We went way up there.
It was deep, and it was steepand boy, it was just rained, and
rained and rained, it was justzoom.
Randy (17:13):
We didn't work that day laying rock because it was
coming a thunderstorm.
It was coming a thunderstorm upthere, a big one.
I mean big rain, so just to putyou in perspective.
So when we drive up there youcan see waves, but it just quit
raining.
Paul (17:28):
Ray had a canoe that didn't turn up very good and
they just rolled down the creek.
I bet they turned over 20 timesMe and.
Randy, we stand and floatpretty good and we got to where
there was a two streams cometogether and when they come
together it just rolled up a bigold wave there, probably as
(17:51):
tall as that door.
We didn't go through that one,we stuck that wave, but it
filled it up, it didn't it justdied over, it just went in we
had a we had a terrible timethat time.
Randy (18:07):
So when we come out of that wave I'm going to give you
my view of that.
I'm going down through thereand we had one paddle left
because we gave all our extrapaddles to Audie Ray and his
partner there, eddie Joe Gwynn.
Paul (18:25):
Yeah, that's who he was.
He never floated, again,
Randy (18:29):
anyway we're going down through there.
Well, the creek, the big treeson the bank are in the creek, so
there's limbs out there.
So the first limb I come by Iwas holding that paddle, knowing
I had to keep up with it.
I grabbed that limb and it justsucked me down under the water
when the pressure of the waterdid even with the life jacket on
.
And so I let go of that andpopped up and went on down the
(18:52):
creek a little bit and directly.
I come kind of a little curveand eddy and I grabbed the limb
there and I was able to kind ofpull myself up on top of the
water.
Just about the time I got overto where I could get up on top
and get out of the stream alittle bit, my shorts come loose
and had to spread my legs outto keep my shorts from coming
off.
When I spread my legs out Ilost one of my tennis shoes.
(19:13):
I let go, obviously, at thatpoint and got my shorts.
I went on down probably another100 yards or so, got my shorts
kind of pulled up and the creekfinished making that bend a
little bit and had a good eddyand I went into that eddy and I
got out.
Well, he still hasn't come bywith the canoe.
I didn't know where the canoewas.
I'm trying to make my way upthis bank looking for him and
(19:36):
here in a little bit here hecomes in the canoe, just
whizzing by me, himself in thecanoe, and and, uh, I caught the
canoe and and pulled it overthere and we kind of got our
breath and bearings again andthen we took off again.
But he was in that wave withthat canoe and that canoe and
(19:57):
him would, would he'd hit thebottom.
He said it wasn't very deep andthat canoe would hit him
against the bottom and it madethree or four loops.
Paul (20:05):
It was just like that Smooth, it was rock and I had
that canoe in front of me and Iwanted to kick that off and get
away from him and I hadn'tbreathed for a while and finally
I got it off of him and my lifejacket popped me up and I
caught the canoe and went byRandy's stop over was that the
(20:30):
same day?
TJ (20:30):
you guys were on the water when that lady passed away.
Randy (20:34):
I wasn't actually with him on that trip as another trip
, but yeah, that was up on thebig piney that you and has a big
group of them there.
Daniel (20:44):
Yeah.
I think that y'all ran Tammyoff of a kayaking on one of
those two.
Paul (20:50):
We were in her.
We was in Little Piney then.
Randy (20:54):
We went on a float in Little Piney just not too long
after me and Tammy got married.
Paul (21:01):
It was three of them in my canoe.
Randy (21:04):
Three in our canoe too.
Paul (21:05):
Her and Gwen, wasn't it?
Her and lee pitterd one of thepitterd yeah and uh they
pittered anyway, neither one ofthem would help me a bit they
didn't know how to, if they justpush us off the banks?
Daniel (21:22):
you know
Paul (21:23):
that would help
Daniel (21:23):
, but they're pretty green though, aren't they?
Randy (21:26):
I don't know that they wouldn't help, they just didn't
know how to help.
That was he was used tocanoeing with me and you know
when we, when we canoe, we kindof knew what each other was
going to do.
It was because we can do one.
One summer, every time itrained, we went canoeing,
sometimes a couple times a day.
We can do 27 times, 20different, 27 different or 27 no
(21:47):
, 28 different trips in onesummer.
TJ (21:51):
Oh, one summer.
Okay, you know different littletrips.
Randy (21:53):
Some of them were small, like there's three different
sections.
You can float on Big Piney andwe did that one day.
You know three differentsections, but that one with Lee,
pittard and Tammy and Timmy andRenee, right off the bat when
we put in there was a canoewrapped around a tree.
(22:14):
We saw it just right after weput in and then we didn't go
very far until it was just a logjam.
There was no creek to goanywhere, just water rushing
through a big pile of logs.
And when we was trying to getout around that and stuff we
flipped over and tangled a ropearound that tie-dye chest around
Tammy's neck.
She was under the canoe.
(22:35):
Dad flipped that over and gotit off of her and then her and
lee walked the bank.
They wouldn't, they wouldn'tget back in the canoe.
Paul (22:43):
They walked the bank you know, what they didn't realize,
that they could just bid any,get bid any time, with a cotton
mouth or a or a copperhead sothey didn't realize what danger
they was in.
Randy (22:56):
Tammy liked to never get Renee to get out of the canoe.
She was holding on to the canoewith both hands.
It was stuck up in them logsand we needed to get it out of
the logs to carry it over thelog pile.
Finally he just kind of had toyank her out of the canoe and
put her on the log pile and wedrug it over then and got it out
.
We come to to the highway andwhen we did we stopped.
(23:21):
There was kind of a gravel baroff to one side.
We pulled up on that gravel barand dad said get in the canoe
with me and we'll run down thereand get the truck and we'll
come back.
It won't take, take us any time.
You mean you can do this quick.
And tammy grabbed her, me andwrapped her arms around me and
started crying you'll die,you'll die.
Tammy grabbed me and wrapped herarms around me and started
crying you'll die, you'll die,you'll die, and she wouldn't let
me go.
(23:41):
So Kimmy wound up going withhim down there because she
wouldn't let go of me.
We had a lot of trips where wedidn't have any problems, but
that one was a pretty tough tripthere.
Daniel (23:51):
Yeah, that makes the most fun canoe trips, though
when it's rough, If you'rewalking the whole time, that's
not super fun.
Paul (23:57):
Yeah, we've been on some where you just paddle all the
time.
Daniel (24:01):
I don't think she's ever went on a trip with us has she?
Randy (24:03):
She went one time, I think, or two times, on Big
Piney since from Longpool downto the bridge, which isn't much
of a float.
Paul (24:19):
Me and Randy and Ray and Kim, we went down, a little tiny
, a big tiny, and there's a spotthey call a mother and it's a
real bad spot Devil's elbow.
And most of the time there'ssome canoes wrapped around the
rock and that's what happened tothem.
And Ray finally got out of itand left it.
(24:42):
And Kenneth, he walks way downthere and he's crawling down on
the back like a drunken rat.
He's crawling down on the back.
He didn't realize he didn'thave a canoe anymore.
He was around that rock wow hewas free there yeah, they don't
pop back up like a kayak we.
Randy (25:02):
We floated that section several times.
One time there was 11 canoesaround those rocks.
Wow, when we come through there, 11, so it's, it's a.
It was it's the last time wewent through there, though it
wasn't as rough as it used to be.
Something had changed a littlebit about the crew.
Paul (25:17):
I went to do it with Mike Thomas and there was not very
many people on the river thattime.
It was pretty rough.
Well, we'd passed a couple, atime or two and she was a really
pretty girl and he said I thinkI love her.
(25:39):
We passed a time or two andevery time he got fell in love
with her.
That guy, he looked like a bear.
So me and mike got a spot wherewe couldn't come out of it.
We got swamped and he said theyain't gonna come through that
(26:01):
either.
They're gonna be swamped justlike we did, and I'm gonna save
her.
You watch, that's what happened.
He waited out there and shejust wrapped her arms around him
, legs and all.
Oh.
He smiled like a opossum.
He waited out with her and thatguy went on down the creek and
(26:24):
he said I believe l'll just keepher.
He was carrying on that'sanother one smoked a lot oh yeah
, got him.
Yeah, me and mike was was goingto.
There's a house right up abovethere.
Anyway, we left our truck rightthere.
(26:45):
That guy come down there andtook a stick and let all the air
out of our tires.
I just maddened fire when Ifound that.
So me and mike, we walked upthe road trying to find somebody
to come help us a little bit.
We run into a guy.
He said I got air tank, I'll goup there and help y'all.
I know who done that.
That guy lives across the creekover there.
He does a lot of people likethat and somebody told me later
(27:08):
he just went over and shot hisdoor down.
He said he shot his door down.
He said he ain't doing me thatway and getting away with it.
Anyway, that guy, he come overand helped us a lot.
He just knew who had done itand he said I'm right the
opposite, I'll help you.
Well, he got her going again
Daniel (27:27):
Between the rough creeks , high water and a few
characters you wouldn't want tomeet twice.
Paul had no shortage ofadventure, but he wasn't out
there alone.
Most of these floats were withfamily Randy included or good
friends, making memories theystill laugh about today.
Of course, floating wasn't theonly thing he loved about the
water.
Some of his best stories comefrom fishing the Arkansas River,
and let's just say it wasn'talways smooth sailing there
(27:49):
either.
TJ (27:51):
What about that time?
You almost got washed into thedam when that motor wouldn't
crank.
Randy (27:54):
Me you and Jeff yeah,
TJ (27:56):
I've heard that story a couple times.
Paul (27:57):
I told them put your life jacket on.
If we get to the dam, get on it.
TJ (28:01):
Yeah, bad deal, huh.
Paul (28:02):
Boy.
I stood up and I was giving ita fit.
I guess, I flooded it probably.
Randy (28:08):
Jeff was actually holding the anchor rope by the hand.
Paul (28:11):
It wasn't tied off on the boat trying to get it to hang
anymore, wouldn't touch anymoretowards the dam.
It got deeper, didn't haveenough rope.
I was reeling poles in.
Randy (28:20):
Everybody handed me their poles, I'd reel your dad's in a
real mine in started to reelhis in when it started.
He just opened the boat up andit ripped the whole gears and
everything out of that pole whenit left because it was hung up.
TJ (28:31):
He just didn't care he didn't care.
Randy (28:33):
No, it tore his reel all the pieces when we took off so
they finally started.
That's halfway they was blowinga whistle at us and all kinds
of stuff.
They could see we was trying tostop it, but we couldn't stop
it from a minute there when Ifirst started fishing you could
tie up at the dam if you had thenerve.
Paul (28:50):
I've done it.
Tie up at the dam, but you gotto have a motor that'll start
quick, because when they blowthat horn you better move.
Yeah, because they don't know.
You don't know what gatethey're going to open and they
can't see it, so they don't knowwhere you are yeah, which is
why they changed the rules.
Randy (29:08):
If we'd got to the dam, we'd have been on it until
somebody come picked us up.
That's that for sure.
Paul (29:12):
So we might not ever got there because that damn was
running pretty good and I thinkI think that hydraulics of it
would swamp your boat.
Me and don and his brother bugs, we fished together a lot and
one time he tore his reel up andme and don was just catching up
(29:33):
all right and and he'd run histhumb in them and get them in
the boat.
Before the day was over helooked like he sandblasted his
thumb I bet anyway and he saidif you guys was worth a flip,
you'd let me use one of yourbodies for a minute let me catch
(29:56):
one or two.
I said, we are taking people wejust take that good guy.
TJ (30:04):
Yeah, that's funny.
He's still fishing every day,isn't he?
Paul (30:08):
or he's still fishing every day if he can't fish
you might as well put him under
.
Yeah something bad wrong withhim
Randy (30:13):
Yeah, so they were fishing.
I was a little kid then theywere fishing a lot then Catfish
stuff.
You can tell them aboutcatching your fish with your
last minute.
Paul (30:26):
We was catching more minutes and we had a whole boat
full of fish and I found them.
We didn't have any more menace.
I found one that had beenstepped on or something and I
wormed him on my hook andthrowed him out there and I
caught me a big catfish and wecaught Bug sold a fish.
(30:48):
He sold them and we had enoughfish out of that to buy us all a
13-foot pole and reel oh, wowthat's how many fish we had that
day.
TJ (31:03):
That's funny
Paul (31:04):
.
I'll tell you another storyabout about his brother steve.
He couldn't walk a foot log ifit had water around it.
He'd fall off every time, butif it was on dry lands he could
walk it.
I said what's the differenceabout it?
I don't know.
So we went down, we went wayover the bottoms and we come to
(31:26):
a log jam and I looked it wasall floating too deep.
I looked it over.
That's going to save us a mileor so walking.
I looked it over and there'ssome pretty big logs you could
walk on.
I said I want to go across it,don.
(31:48):
I looked it all over and therewasn't a snake on any of them,
so I just pitter-pattered acrossthere.
If you stay on one log it, so Ijust patted across there.
If you stay on one log, it'sgoing to roll over with you.
So I didn't give it a chance todo that, I just went.
I said Don, you saw how I wentacross there.
Come on, okay.
He tried to bear with me.
(32:10):
Here's Steve.
He said you know good and will.
I can't do that.
I said you saw I done it.
You saw don done it.
Now you know how to do it.
I'm coming, but I don't believeI can make it sure enough.
(32:31):
He got out about the middle ofit and he stepped on one and he
just stopped there, just actlike he wanted to fall off of it
and he did and he went plumbdown to where he caught that log
with his hand.
Instead of hitting the bottom,he just caught it.
Oh he's mad.
He said I hope them snakes getme.
I said when you get out ofthere they'll have one on each
(32:54):
leg.
Oh, he was cussing bad Me andDon sober laughing.
He said he just startedcrawling across logs.
He finally got over there bycrawling.
You know he's sopping wet thatold crud.
(33:14):
He's hanging on him.
He wouldn't even walk with us.
He'd stay way back behind us 50yards.
He's not still laughing.
He'd be big enough, I bet.
TJ (33:35):
Now, what you don't know is Paul Foshee and I have always
had a special bond, and that'snot because of anything I've
done, but because of therelationship that he had with my
great-grandfather and namesake,tj Verdon.
Paul looked up to him the sameway I look up to Paul.
When I was born he said, if Iturned out to be anything like
my great-grandfather was, I'd bea great man.
Those are words I'm stilltrying to live up to today.
(34:00):
Here's what Paul had to sayabout the original TJ Verdon.
I was going to ask you to tella couple stories on my grandpa
so I could have them on record.
Paul (34:06):
I'll tell you what I think about him.
He's about as good a man as Iever knew.
He just had a little countrystore.
He had a gas station and allkinds of groceries in there
canned groceries and whateverand he had sticks of bologna,
(34:28):
chicken loaf, bacon.
He'd slice you up whatever youwanted.
Wrap it up get to you and hedidn't have a chair in that
building.
You couldn't walk in there andsit down.
You know them coke boxes.
They were wood and you couldturn them up and you sat on them
.
That was our chairs.
We'd buy our stuff from him andgas and all A month would be
(34:52):
about 40-something dollars.
40-something dollars won't evenget you a meal.
I was barbering and he'd say,paul, bring your tools home.
I need a haircut.
I said I'll be, out here withthem.
I'd bring them home every day.
He'd get out there between thegas station and his door.
(35:14):
Here one time I found an oldpickup that I wanted to buy and
they wanted 300 for it and itwas a 57 model chevrolet pickup
and it had boy.
It had some really rough tireson the back of it.
If it spun three times youain't going to be gone.
(35:35):
You had to dig a hole.
But anyway I said he borrowed$300.
When the bank opened I paidmoney.
So he had money behind.
Every day he'd come back to.
He dug around here and thereand he'd go get some more.
He had it get some more.
(35:57):
He had it everywhere in there.
Anyway, he wound up with $300.
He wrote on the ticket $300,paul O'Shea.
Of course I could go back moneyand give it to him.
Yeah.
He trusted me that much.
Randy (36:11):
What about when you and Mom got married.
Paul (36:14):
Carolin had a list.
Hell, we didn't have any money.
We were just hanging by athread for a long time.
And Carolin had a little list,kind of get it started a little
bit, and he never even looked atit.
He just went to gathering upstuff all around, piling it up
there.
I said, Mr Virden, we ain't gotmuch money.
(36:39):
You have to charge it if we, ifyou overdo us.
He never even listened to me.
He just kept piling stuff up.
He'd bring a mop and a broomand just everything that you
want to start off with.
I said write it down, I'll payyou when I get some money.
And he said no, after the firstround I'll give it to you.
(37:01):
So that's what he did.
That's the way he was.
TJ (37:09):
You might have noticed a slight quiver in Paul's voice at
the end of that last bit.
He's always been one of thetoughest men I've known, but as
we talked about my grandfatherand a couple of his friends that
have passed on, you could seehow moved he was.
One thing stood out while wetalked to Paul all of his
stories included people hethought the world of.
They played a big part inmaking him the man he is today
and just as they are part of hislegacy, he will be part of ours
(37:29):
as we bring this episode to aclose.
Here are a few last nuggets offrom Paul Foshee .
You said that you gotpermission to hunt that one
guy's property for coon andstuff and I know it used to be a
lot easier.
You feel like people postingproperty and putting up fences
and stuff.
Does that really kill a lot ofthat?
Paul (37:48):
you know you can't.
You can't hunt anywhere, youwant to anymore I did a long
time yeah that cross fencesnever think about it.
Nobody would ever give a flipabout it.
But now you cross a fence you'dought to get shot at.
TJ (38:03):
Yeah.
Paul (38:05):
It's terrible.
It's getting worse instead ofbetter.
Randy (38:08):
Yeah, but you like to see it like it used to be.
Paul (38:12):
Yeah, I'd rather have it like that.
There's so many people whodon't want a footprint on their
property.
I'll tell you one thing youdon't ever own any property.
You think you do, but you don't.
If you're getting abstract, youlook at that abstract and it
goes on and on and on and on.
There's lots of people on itbefore you did.
TJ (38:30):
Yeah.
Paul (38:30):
And they thought they owned it.
You're just dust in the wind.
Remember Kansas singing thatone yeah.
TJ (38:35):
Dust in the wind.
Paul (38:36):
That's true.
That's all you are.
I never thought about that whenI was young, crossed my mind
now.
Daniel (38:43):
You've wore a lot of hats in your life.
What do you think has shapedyou the most out of all those?
Paul (38:49):
I imagine being in the pecan business.
Yeah, I worked really hardtrying to keep my family going.
And when Sheila started theschool, phyllis was in school,
randy in computer classes inLittle Rock , I couldn't work
enough to keep them going.
We all had cars.
I'd go to Walmart and just getme a whole bunch of stuff,
(39:14):
change oil on it.
I just couldn't hardly makeenough money.
And Randy, we went to Pine Bluffto borrow your money.
The girls didn't owe any money.
I kept them up, but his was$440 a month, besides vehicles
(39:35):
and stuff.
I couldn't keep up with it.
And, when it's all said anddone, carolin went to college
after Sheila went to school.
Heck, everybody's in school butme and, by the way, I wound up
being the dumbest one in thewhole doggone bunch.
Daniel (39:52):
What do you hope your kids and grandkids carry on, not
in just your work and workethic, but how they live?
Paul (39:59):
They can't work like I did and live like I did.
It don't exist anymore.
Daniel (40:06):
Do you feel like you've lived the kind of life that you
were meant to live?
Paul (40:10):
Heck Who knows?
Who knows that one?
I don't.
I've made a lot of mistakes inmy life, but I don't know.
You know I went to barbercollege and then quit about
three years, three or four years.
I couldn't stand it no more.
So that kind of wasted sometime of my life.
(40:34):
If you don't try new things,you ain't never going to
accomplish very much.
If you just sit around waitingon somebody else to do something
, that's it for this week'sepisode.
Daniel (40:49):
Thanks for hanging out with us.
If you like the show, you canfind more at natob.
co or follow us on Instagram atnatobpodcast, or find us on
Facebook at Natural Obsession.
We'll see you there.
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