Dad's Writings

The Writings of my father, Henry Morgan "Toad" Butt

Here's a letter my father wrote to my dog Bandit. Dad and Bandit were the absolute best of friends.

In this letter dad calls him Reginal Marley. Here's Bandit.

This letter was written in about 1978. I had just moved to Nebraska. Dad and Mom were living in DeWitt, Iowa. The "Wood Chopper" he refers to is me. I had once started the fire place without opening the chimney...I smoked the place up. "Those three beautiful women" he refers to were my wife at the time and my two daughters.

Here's a list of places and people dad knew.

Above Dad mentions Lizzy Brockham. Here's a picture of her in front of her two story log house. Lizzy's buried in Hickory Grove Cemetery.

The road that runs through Canton now (The Caves Road -- in earlier days, known as The Ridge Road) has been changed considerable starting at about 30th Avenue (Buzzard Ridge Road - on which I live) going West and ending at about the Canton Cemetery. The stretch of road that was replaced WAS known as Black Hawk Road or Black Hawk's Road. There is currently an entrance South off The Caves Road to Buzzard Ridge Nature Area just to the East of where the road crosses Blackhawk Creek. Just North of there, perhaps a quarter of a mile or less, and just a hundred yards of so, East of Black Hawks Creek was where this cabin stood. That whole area was known as simply "Black Hawk".

Stories abound about Lizzy Brockham. She was surely one of God's finest creation. For many, many years there was a celebration in Canton, Iowa called "The Canton Homecoming". On that day, my father used to take us all to Grandma Hattie's place, load her in the car and we'd all go to the Canton Homecoming together. We'd spend the entire day and evening there. There was always a dance in the evening and Lizzy was ALWAYS there. She'd be pretty drunk by mid-evening or so and she's start to kick up her heels. Inevitably, she'd throw her skirt up in the back and right there in sight would be her underwear with three big red X's right on the seat. Dad would laugh and remind us all that she made her underwear out of flower sacks.

Dad also mentions the Goulds. This is Amby and second wife Elizabeth "Liz" "Lizzie" (Stauffer) Gould. Directly below is Adella (Della) (Adell) Victoria (Gould) Johnson, Amby's sister. She married Burt Johnson and they had a son named Squire Burt Johnson who is pictured below as well.

Adella (Della) (Adell) Victoria (Gould) Johnson and son Squire Burt Johnson.

Here's a poem dad wrote about Amby.

Here's one of my favorites. He just wrote his thoughts and it is wonderful. But, if you're offended easily with "back woods" jargon, you might want to skip this one.

Some family history. Note the name Bazil Baker Butt. This is what dad always called his gr grandfather.

Some family history. Note on page 2 he calls his gr grandfather Bazil Baker Butt.

Here are three newspaper articles about dad.

These two are from the DeWitt, Iowa Observer. E. J. "Bart" Bartholomew was well acquainted with dad and enjoyed his company very much.

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Goto John Butt, b. between 1/1/1788 and 6/30/1788

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