Piney Woods

How would you introduce yourself?

I would introduce myself as Lala Johnson, Army veteran, child of the Piney Woods of East Texas, a born singer derived from two singing families.

And what else would I say? Oldest sister, auntie.

For sure, auntie.

Um, [smacks lips] no.

It was, um, somewhere on, um, somewhere in the Piney Woods.

Um-

Yeah

This is Tales of the Texas Rangers, Episode 47, The Wheelchair Killing, first heard on NBC on October 7, 1951.

Joel McCree stars as Pearson, working with Sheriff Pete Saunders through clues that lead beyond Colby and into the Piney Woods, where talk of money hidden by the dead man adds another thread to the case.

The script was transcribed and adapted by Joel Murcott, with Stacy Keech directing and producing.

Now, back to the golden age of radio.

Case for tonight, wheelchair killing.

It is 8.40 p.m. May 1st, several years ago.

Colby, Texas, near the edge of the Great Piney Woods, is unusually crowded as several hundred young men from a nearby CCC camp have converged on the town to spend their monthly allowance.

In the office of Sheriff Pete Saunders, the sheriff and his deputy are standing by in case any emergency should arise.

but I've restored most everything and I'm back in action and we're here with you this week to bring you a great episode, episode 85.

And for this episode, I'm really excited, which was one of the reasons I was kind of bummed that this happened when it did, because now I get to share with you a great and fun leg of my wine journey that I took this summer when I ventured up to East Texas to visit a few fun wineries more in the Piney Woods area.

Now, before we get into the actual location for today's episode, I did want to share with you about a few events coming up for Texas Wine.

One of those is the Texas Wine Jam.

But I would say that many people are surprised to find out that there are reports of Bigfoot or Bigfoot type creatures, however people describe them, Sasquatch, uh, wild man, things like that here in Texas, especially the Eastern side of the state, which is an enormous forest.

So I've been fortunate to go out to the Piney Woods, the Sam Houston National Forest, um, and many of these areas that go along the Sabine River.

Um, and many of these places sort of have these cultural, um, localized names, the Sabine thing, the Caddo creature or Caddo critter, uh, Hollyhem, the Dayton monkey man.

Uh, and there's the list goes on and my buddy Lyle Blackburn, he put together a great publication called Texas Bigfoot, which really, uh, chronicles a lot of the different historical instances and these regional names that have been given to, uh, what otherwise people just know to be Bigfoot.

Um, these are all amazing places that I would say seem to harbor enough life already.

So I think that because many of these different places have a very lush environment, places that already harbor plenty of wildlife in general, it would seem to, uh, you know, elicit the notion that there perhaps are unknown species, whether they are to the effect of Bigfoot or something like that, that would be amazing.

And I think that, uh, one of the cool ideas is that Jefferson, Texas, which is part of the Piney Woods area has been declared officially, um, over the years, thanks to Craig Wooleater, um, and his dedication that not only has it been officially recognized as sort of Bigfoot weekend in October, um, it's become the Bigfoot capital of Texas, but also here a few years ago, it was declared a safe haven for Bigfoot, given that its existence is proven that it would be able to be a safe haven for their, um, environment through conservancy.

And I think that's amazing.

But, uh, This was in Texas, in an area called Tyler, Texas, which is very heavily wooded.

It's part of the Piney Woods, and there's been a lot of sightings there, Bigfoot over the years and things like that.

At the time, I didn't really realize that, but anyway, we go to this small cemetery, pretty normal.

I didn't even have a flashlight or anything.

And while in Hollywood, of all the things, while in Hollywood, he talked about his campaign being a campaign of the people, by the people, for the people.

Only if the people live in Hollywood, you're running to represent Baytown and Beaumont You're running to represent the Panhandle in West Texas and East Texas and the Piney Woods in South Texas.

And your money is coming over half of it from outside the state.

Almost all of that from California.

And while in Hollywood, of all the things, while in Hollywood, he talked about his campaign being a campaign of the people, by the people, for the people.

Only if the people live in Hollywood, you're running to represent Baytown and Beaumont You're running to represent the Panhandle in West Texas and East Texas and the Piney Woods in South Texas.

And your money is coming over half of it from outside the state.

Almost all of that from California.

Yeah.

And and the Piney Woods of Texas.

I think there are a lot of Texans who've never spent a lot of time in the Piney Woods.

The Piney Woods are absolutely beautiful.

I think you're exactly right.

It took me 20 years of living in Texas to see it and to even know it was there.