The Great Cootsville Baccy Shootout
....© by D. Grant DeMan
Hooka tooka soda cracker
Does your mama chew tobacco?
If your mama chew tobacco
Hooka tooka soda crackerfrom GREEN GREEN ROCKY ROAD K & A McGarrigle, Garden Court Music ASCAP
When ya chew tobacco don’t spit on the floor
Expectorate in the cuspidor
Phut-ting sput-ting sput-ting sput-ting sput-tang!
Chew tobacco, chew tobacco, chew tobacco rag...Chew Tobacco Rag - Pee Wee King
Cheers rose from ragged spectators that day while a whirling wet ball of Prince of Wales chewing tobacco hung in the dry summer air. The suspense was awesome. Smiling, toothless Limey waited for sure triumph in this final Cootsville 'Baccy shootout, of which no one present could have predicted the surprising outcome. But let's go back to the beginning.
From time to time during my growing up Victoria years I'd visit the shanty town that lay somewhere between downtown Johnson Street and Pandora, for it was home to many of our finest characters, most of whom I had formerly encountered in DeMan’s North Ward Emporium. To those initiated souls of Government Street the place was known simply as “Cootsville,” and honored as a geezer paradise where men - and a few women - of worldliness could relax, and live out their lives of memory and action in peace, with a happy gusto and comradeship unequalled by any other society. Sometimes we'd go there and pitch pennies with Dynomite Dan or Limey, though we kept clear of the ladies, skin-blotched Appaloosa Alice and Splitlip Stella, whose dead-to-the-line marksmanship could break a kid's earnings with either coins or tobacco juice. You betcha, Cootsvillians were a wagering, winning lot.
That particular summer evening a large crowd formed a wide circle on cracker barrels and butter boxes, one or two soulfully playing harmonicas while others dust-danced around the fire, waiting on the boil of a steel can of mulligan stew. Some hobos sipped from gallon jugs of apple, blackberry and cherry jack, Bon Santé and Forty-five Per. Tensions mounted then as the combatants bit off a chew from their favorite plug of tobacco. A whole lot of moolah was riding on the results.
"I brought in this here Redman, special," bragged Dan as his tooth became stained with umber juice. "It maintains a certain firmness even while sailing in the breeze."
"Fer sailing ya can't beat Canadian Navy. This here won the war," claimed Peggy Magreggy pointing a peg wooden leg from beneath his kilt like a ship's cannon. A black patch covering his left eye socket gave rise to the fantasy he was a pirate straight from Treasure Island, a legend Peggy did little to dispel.
"Prince of Wales, old chaps - choice of The Royals - shall win the race," Limey chirped gumming down.
"It had better," I shot back. "I got four bits riding on you this time."
Alice generally shot her stream from the right side of a wide mouth between the two teeth remaining to her. "Arrow-gant! You damn Kippers are so arrow-gant, an' this here time a woman of substance is goin' to whip your pale white hide!"
Splitlip Stella was mighty quiet, chewing her bite like some hungry fish, mouth pressed against the inside of an aquarium. Chomp-chomp-chomp.
The game began. Each contestant was given three shots at a line drawn yonder some twenty feet distant; many arguments and measurements ensued though it was finally decided to narrow the winner's circle down to just two tobacco marksmen. Limey came up first in these finals.
And as I said, the shot was monumental, hanging there like the last winning forward pass of a Gray Cup Game, drifting slowly down to touch inside the line. The crowed roared and began to slap Limey's back and even to hoist him high in victory.
"Jest a damn minute!" The booming voice came from Stella. "You rats takin' away from a lady again? I got one more good shot in me, don't I? Jest stand back."
Silence once more swept the stands as Splitlip Stella, fists closed and arms doing the backstroke, wound up and let loose directly between both sides of that cleft mouth. I watched with fainting hopes. The trajectory was dead on, the wind held perfectly, and Stella's missile splayed itself right on, over and beyond that of the Englishman.
"You got it Stella!" the crowd roared. And although I lost my fifty cents we celebrated Stella's victory with verve and panache. Applejack and mulligan.
Later that evening I heard Limey puzzle, "It's that demmed double lip that gives her the advantage. I wonder…..????"
"Now don't you be goin' cuttin' holes in that beautiful face, darlin'," Annie whispered in his ear. "I gotta better contest fer you later on, don'tcha know?" She smiled, hugged him, and I'm sure Limey was also a winner that night.
Nevertheless, I still lost my four bits. Postscript: Final words of a dying rancher: “I’m mighty happy to be a-passing now, ‘cause I heard the government was a-making a new law against spittin’. Reckon I couldn’t live like that!”
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