Does anyone else from the Sprigg Street neighborhood remember an African-Amercan man named Sam? He had mostly white hair from what I could see, although he always had on a hat with a droopy brim. He always had a pole with a gunny sack tied to the end thrown over his shoulder. I am guessing that the gunny sack had most or all of his belongings in it. He wore an old suit that had seen its better days. I usually saw him on Ranney Street walking in the 1200 block, minding his own business. I have no idea where he was going, if he lived in the area, or if he was one of the men who occasionally got off the train….my mom called them hobos. If he was a hobo, he must have come to Cape frequently because I remember seeing him on several occasions, always on Ranney Street. He walked as though he was on his way someplace, not just wandering aimlessly. He was never in a rush, just walking by at a measured steady pace.

We had hobos come to our house on Sprigg Street once in a while and knock on the door. My mother would always cook them something to eat and they would sit on the front step, eat their meal, then leave. I don’t think Sam ever came to our door though.

Some people called Sam by a racist name which I don’t wish to use. The reader can probably guess what word it was but I won’t publish it. I will instead call him Mr. Sam. There was a vicious story told about Mr. Sam back in those days which now I recognize as an outright lie but which I thought was true at the time because adults were the ones repeating it. It was this: Mr. Sam stole little children. That’s what he had in that sack on the end of his pole…….little children. Not just any little children though. Only little children who did not mind their parents. And Mr. Sam was going to take those little children home and eat them!

So, that was the threat……behave or your parents would call Mr. Sam to come get you. Like he was the boogy-man!

Now if that is not a purely evil made-up story then I have never heard one. Why on earth would anyone make up a horrible story to malign a man (most likely not an unkind man, by the expression I saw on his face) and to use that story to manipulate children to be good? If I could turn back time while at the same time knowing what I know now, I would say “Hi” to Mr. Sam next time he came walking by and smile at him and hope that he might smile back. Maybe I could have known him as a friend instead of running scared every time I saw him or every time someone said that they were going to call him to come get me. (Note: my mother never threatened to call him and she never called him by that name.)

I am quite certain that Mr. Sam is long gone from this world but I still wish I knew who he was and what his life was like…..did he live near? Did he have children? What kind of work did he do? Could he sing or play a musical instrument? What had his life been like? Would he have told stories? Would he have liked to have me as his friend?

I will never know the answer to most, if not all, of these questions. To me it is so sad that he was maligned without ever having deserved it, just minding his own business, probably doing the best he could to get by. This is yet another regret for me from those days…..a missed opportunity, a blessing missed possibly, both for him and for me. Maybe I would have learned important lessons from him. Maybe we would have laughed out loud together at stories he might have told.

If anyone reading this post has any idea who Mr. Sam was or anything about him, please leave me a comment or email me at spriggstreet@hotmail.com

I would be so grateful to know more about him.

P.S. I found an image that looks a lot like Mr. Sam by doing a Google search. The image is from another blog called Grumpy Old Ken. Here is a link to an interesting and entertaining story on his blog: Spring Hath Sprung. Here is the image: