In nineteen forty eight, when I was a mere sapling of eight, I was reared in the provincial Buchanan Valley of Adams County, a rifle shot fromGettysburg, Pennsylvania, and some fifty years removed from Philadelphia.All elementary students in our valley were reluctantly incarcerated in a two room schoolhouse of eight grades of mostly mayhem named Strasbaugh School, full of tight fisted boys and precocious giggling girls; an environment wherein a six year old ruffian could enthusiastically learn thewicked ways of the eighth grade boys, and the six year old girls would . . . but never mind that now. Suffice it to say, this was not a setting approved by the "sorcerer of souls", Father Genovese, a demonic Catholic priest whose shepherdship invaded and pervaded every moral fiber of the valley's faithful residents. His actions and the directives of the diocese were vehemently opposed by a revered, crusty octogenarian named Monkey Kump, the other principal in this memoir, who was born shortly after his father fought at the Battle of Gettysburg, and was a cantankerous opinionated jokesmither, folkliar and soothsayer, whose addiction to alcohol, profuse profanity and a tendency toward insanity, instantly marked him as my mentor. Along the cherubic protagonist's barbed and brambles odyssey, he is raped at school by a female upper classmate, battered by a hurricane, accidently observes an adult lesbos love tryst, survives a torrid love scene with a comely adolescent Jewish queen, is excommunicatedfrom the Catholic Church, survives a brawl with the valley's venomous bully, and observes a violent homicide at the South Mountain Fair. This satirical, lyrical, irreverent and hilarious memoir is not for the faint of heart. Portions deal with profanity and romance in a slightly naughty and bawdy manner, in a raucous setting, during the innocence of the Eisenhower years. "And I alone escaped to tell thee."
About the Author: John Sauter was born in nineteen forty and raised in the Buchanan Valley, in close proximity to Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. The highlight of his youth was his attendance at a two-room schoolhouse, which incarcerated eight grades of mostly mayhem and misadventures. In his freshman year at Gettysburg High School, John exhibited a unique ability to negotiate his bale-bucker body into the enemies' end zone, and soon after moved to Philadelphia and attended Olney High School. Upon graduation, Mr. Sauter accepted a full football scholarship to Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, where he ran in the same backfield with comedian Bill Cosby, and also had the dubious distinction of being the only liberal arts English major on the 50 man squad! In 1964, he was recruited into employment by the newly formed United States Job Corps Program and was stationed on the Oregon Coast as an English instructor and head football coach. In 1969 he was recruited by the local high school as an English instructor and coached football, swimming and golf. During his twenty plus years in Oregon, his interests were elk hunting, steelhead fishing and competitive golf, and he was also a seasonal deputy sheriff for Tillamook County. He lives in Sierra Vista, Arizona, with his lovely wife Judith and is also the author of Elegy Epitaphs of Appleton.