
          John Egerton. Generations: An American
Family. University Press of Kentucky, 1983.
          By Campbell, Will D.Will D. Campbell
          Vol. 6, No. 1, 1984, pp. 23-24
          
          For too long we have cataloged, systematized and categorized the
places and ways of learning. And too often we neglect, ignore or fail
to see resources near at hand.
          I sometimes spy on the Steeples by riding around in one city or
another surveying what the outside billboards and electronic marquees
are promoting. Aerobic dancing, weight watchers clubs, and Mother's
day out programs have been big the past few years. A few of them, the
better ones I suppose, announce that the Koreans also worship there,
though at a different time. (I saw one with the words: TEMPORARY
WORSHIP CENTER. I guess I knew what it meant but it seemed sort of
funny.) The other day I was riding from Fancy Gap, Virginia to
Mt. Juliet, Tennessee and asked my friend and driver to get off the
big highway and drive through one of the cities between Fancy Gap and
Mt. Juliet so I could do my research on the billboards in church
yards. "Marriage Enrichment Seminar" was the winner. Two were
announcing a series of lectures on Human Sexuality, to be given by
someone with several degrees behind his name, the most of which I
didn't recognize. I kept wondering where they got their material, who
the experts in those fields are.
          I have never been invited to conduct a seminar on marriage
enrichment nor give a lecture on human sexuality. It is highly
doubtful that I ever will. But if I should I would not begin by
researching the materials listed in the latest cataloging of those
subjects. I would begin by reading a passage from a book I have just
finished. Generations: An American Family, by John
Egerton, a man no more known for his expertise in those areas than
I. His words I would read are of a passionate love scene. Two lovers
are lying in bed, lying close together. It is a balmy Kentucky evening
and the room is dark and quiet. Suddenly the woman speaks.
          
            
              "Burnam, are you awake? I love you.
              
              There was no answer. Addie spoke louder: "Burnam? I said I love you."
              
              "Huh? What'd you say?"
              
              "You can't hear thunder! I SAID I LOVE YOU! I never did love anyone but you."
              
              After a pause, Burnam replied, "I love you too, Addie. I must have
loved you right from the first. You're the only one I ever did ask to
marry me."
            
          
          I would read those words because this marriage must have been
enriched from the beginning or gained enrichment somewhere along the
way for it had lasted seventy-nine years. The groom was 106 years old
and the bride ninety-eight. And certainly it was not devoid of romance
and sexuality. What could be more romantic than a wedding the day
after the first flying machine was launched at Kitty Hawk? And by the
time their thirteenth child was born one would begin to assume that a
healthy and conjunctional sexuality was part of the union.
          In the Seminar I would lead the participants back over the years as
Egerton does, across peaceful Bluegrass landscapes and hostile
mountains and rivers, out of the Yadkin Valley in North_Carolina, over
the Cumberland Gap and on into Cranks Creek in what is now Harlan
County, Kentucky where the marriage began and never ended. For though
the clinicians. finally declared one of the lovers dead it is not
within their power to say the marriage is over. To Addie, Burnam is
still "my husband." Not "late" nor "departed." Present Tense. These
two knew what it meant to be "married." John Egerton has written it
down and I would use it in my seminar on Marriage Enrichment as
genuine, unscientific reality.
          Or "Death and Dying." That's big these days and appeared on one of
the churchyard signs. Discussions groups gather. Theological schools
offer courses on it and preachers preach on it.
          
            
              "Everyone has told me how sick you've been, " I said to
him. "I'm glad you're better. It's a good sign that you're able to sit
up."
              
              He shook his head. "Uh-uhm. I'm not going to get well. It's time
for me to go home now, John. I 'm ready to go. I feel like I've done
all I can do in this world. I thank God for letting me keep my mind
right up to the end, but I don't want to stay any longer. I 'm getting
out of life now, before I get old and lose my mind."
            
          
          A 106-year-old man is grateful that he will never be old, knowing
that the mind is the core and compass of age and life itself. John
Egerton is not the detached and objective journalist. He has come to
love these two as he loves his own flesh and blood. He tries to
redirect his friend's thoughts. They talk of other things, tell funny
stories and look at the finished book John has brought him, a book two
lives spent more than a century in writing. All that time Burnam has
resisted death when it threatened, clinging tenaciously to life and
living, missing none of it, winning out over diseases, pestilence,
tragedy and misfortune of many kinds. Now a nurse comes into the room,
smiling, humoring, trying gently to win his acceptance of the pills
she has brought him, pills gladly accepted in other years and
times.
          
            
              "No more medicine! he exclaimed. "I won't take any more! No
more pills! I'm done with pills! They've been a curse to me! I'm
trying to die and go home! You tell that doctor not to send me any
more medicine."
            
          
          His tone is neither hostile nor maudlin. But emphatic, final and
convincing. He continues to talk to his friend and scribe when the
nurse is gone.

          
            
              "I said to her, 'Addie, I'm ready to go home, ready to
die. Are you ready to go with me?' She said she wasn't. So I asked
her, 'If I go on ahead and then call you to join me, will you come?'
And she told me she would. That put my mind at ease. I feel a lot
better now, just knowing that she would come if I sent for
her."
            
          
          That was almost a year ago and Burnam has not yet sell for his
beloved Addie. But we know that it won't be long.
          "Death and Dying." A course offered by Burnam and Addie
Ledford. I'm glad I signed up for it Genuine, unscientific reality.
          Despite all that, to suggest that Generations is a
book about Marriage Enrichment, Human Sexuality or Death and Dying
would be to deceive you. It is not. Yet if we have ears to hear and
eyes to see all those things are there.
          And a lot more. Egerton started out to write a simple story of a
little known American family. He has left us with a complex, detailed
and compelling history of the nation. While about it he learned that
the history of America is not the story of generals and admirals,
famous battles in big and little wars, assassinated Presidents, Monroe
Doctrines, Louisiana Purchases, invasions of Grenada. It is the
stories of the Ledfords of the land.
          But more than history. Sociology and Anthropology. Theology and
Geography. Conflict Resolution and Inter-group Relations. Civics and
Republican Politics. Philosophy and Folk Lore. None of those things
show up in the table of contents or index. It is not the kind of book
that needs an index. For it is a Romance.
          Read it aloud to someone you love if you like to see her laugh. But
don't read it aloud to someone you love if it bothers you to see him
cry. There is a lot of both in this good book.
          
            Will D. Campbell live in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee. He is the
author of Brother to a Dragonfly and The Glad
River.
          
        
