At first glance, the place had some charm. Gierman was a real town, not a suburb like Middleton. It had a town square with a statue in the middle and lots of old brick buildings.
Take a second look, though, and you’d see that nearly half of the buildings were empty and had plywood covering the windows. The Christmas decorations were even more forlorn and pathetic than the ones in Middleton.
We drove through town, what there was of it, to the campus of Gierman College.
Like a lot of small colleges, you could read the whole history of American architecture in the jumbled mix of buildings. There were some cool old buildings that could have been over a hundred years old, but then they were mixed in with more modern steel and glass buildings that looked like every other modern steel and glass building in the world.
There didn’t seem to be any plan. It was all “we need a new lecture hall so let’s knock together a copy of whatever is in style this year.”
Our new home was in the married student housing complex. This turned out to be a cluster of identical duplexes that would have felt at home on some army base.
We found our place on the end of a cul-de-sac. Dad dug out a key and we went inside.
Our new home wasn’t too bad; Lord knows I’ve seen worse. It didn’t smell especially disgusting and it even looked like it had been painted recently. There was some furniture in it that was actually in decent condition.
My room had a bunk bed and a small desk and, looking through the window I could see the skeleton on an ancient oak tree.
Lying on the top bunk I could look through its bare branches at the empty fields beyond.
A view!
We unpacked the truck with our usual efficiency and had all the boxes stacked neatly around the apartment in record time. We collapsed on the sofa and Dad passed around cans of soda.
Mom surveyed our progress so far. “Marc, we’ve got this pretty well under control. You can go exploring if you want while we unpack the kitchen.”
After three days of being crammed in the front seat of a moving van, a walk sounded like a grand idea.
“Thanks. Don’t mind if I do,” I said, standing up and stretching. “When do you need me back?”
Mom looked at her watch. “Dinner is at six. The traditional first day in a new place frozen pizza. Be there or be square.”
“Ah, the famous frozen pizza ceremony, can’t miss that,” I pulled on my parka, laced up my boots and was out the door. “Bye guys, don’t have too much fun without me.”
It was cold outside, but bearable. My breath made small puffs of fog as I crunched along the icy sidewalks towards the campus. But, being Christmas and all, there weren’t many people around the college.
I hurried on through the campus to downtown.
Up close, Gierman wasn’t as deserted as it had first appeared. Arranged around the town square, I counted three bars, two bookstores, (one for new books, one for used), a barbershop and a beauty salon, and a place called “Hair Today Gone Tomorrow” that offered “Modern cuts for men and women.”
Something for everyone in this town.
There was also a hardware store that looked like it had seen better days, an unlikely-looking clothing store, a couple cafés, and an ice cream “shoppe.” Nobody else was on the sidewalks though.
I crossed the street to check out the town square. It was a pretty bleak spot; some benches, snow-filled planters, some bare maple trees.
Actually, the place gets pretty lively come spring. The trees leaf up, the planters fill with flowers, and the townspeople and students hang around enjoying the sunshine.
But on that day, everything looked deserted.
Or so I thought.
I walked over to the statue at the center of the square and began to read the plaque aloud. “Henry Pierce Gierman, 1829-1900, Pioneer-Entrepreneur-Philanthropist…”
“…and all around son-of-a-bitch,” a voice behind me added.
I spun around to confront a grizzled old geezer sitting on a park bench. He was dressed in shabby overalls and what looked like some pretty disreputable long johns. On his head he had an old felt hat that looked like a truck had run over it a few times, and, despite the cold, he wasn’t wearing a coat.
But then the cold wouldn’t bother him would it?
Being a ghost and all.
“Excuse me?” I asked.
The ghost leaned forward on his park bench, shocked. “You heard that, didn’t you boy?”
“Not exactly,” I answered.
“You can see me too can’t you?” It sounded more like ‘Yuh cun see m’too caint-chuh.’
This ghost didn’t seem to be in full possession of all his teeth.
“Yeah.”
“Well I’ll be goed t’hell!” the ghost cackled. “How is it yer seein’ and hearin’ me and all and can’t nobody else?”
I looked around quickly. I was standing in the middle of the town square and I didn’t really want to be seen hanging around talking to an empty park bench.
“I don’t know. I see ghosts and most people don’t. You’re a ghost, right?”
“A spec-ter-al man-i-fes-ta-tion, yep that’s me. I may be dead but I ain’t necessarily gone. Hee-hee!” he cackled. “Not like some fancy-pants rich sumbitches what think they can own a whole town an’ ever-body in it.”
The ghost pointed at the statue. “That there Henry P. Gierman is dead as a doornail and a molderin’ in a grave just out behind the Presbyterian church, an’ I’m still sittin’ here talkin’ to ever-body what come passin’ by what a evil sumbitch he was, and there ain’t a damn thing he can do ‘bout it neither cause…”
I interrupted. “So who was this Gierman guy? It's like his name is on everything around here. For that matter, who are you?” Despite the cold and my reluctance to start off in this town known as the guy-who-talks-to-empty-benches, I was curious.
“Who am I, yer askin’? The name is Jeremiah Kratz, I used to farm out there south of Skunk Creek. Least-ways I did ‘til Henry P. Gierman’s own First National Bank had the sheriff come an’ throw’d me off m’own land.
“As t’who Henry P. Gierman’d be…he was the richest, meanest, greediest sumbitch what ever lived. He figured to own ever-thing an’ ever-body in this town, ‘cept me that is. Sumbitch tried, but I never gived in. I just sat here ever-day tellin’ any and ever-body come by just what kinda man Henry P. Gierman was. Ever-day, rain or shine, I sat right here.
“Oh he tried t’stop me, he did. Done had the sheriff throw me in jail fer sittin’ in a public park exercisin’ my rights t’free speech. Said it was fer m’own good, they did, on account of all the rain we was havin’. Kept me locked up ‘til the pneumonia took me, but I got the last laugh ‘cause here I am sittin’ right here talkin’ and there ain’t nothin’ Henry P. Gierman can do ‘bout it neither, ‘cause…”
I interrupted again. I was colder now and considerably less interested than I had been when he started his rant. “Look, Mr. Kratz, I’ve got to go now, but I’ll see you around, OK.”
The ghost looked disappointed. “I reckon you might, though I can’t say as much ‘bout anyone else. I been sittin’ here for nigh on a hunnerd years tellin’ the truth ‘bout Henry P. Gierman t’anyone’ll listen.
“Trouble is, don’t nobody listen.”
Since no one could see or hear him, I conceded that was probably true.
I waved good-bye to Jeremiah Kratz and made my way out of the town square, heading back toward the college.
Some months later, when the weather had warmed some, I’d come by the town square and ended up sitting around and listening to the extended version of Jeremiah Kratz’s history of Henry P. Gierman, the town of Gierman, and Gierman College.
Henry Gierman had made his way from a small town in Pennsylvania to California during the gold rush and had come back rich. Jeremiah doubted that he’d discovered gold, “More’n likely he just jumped somebody’s claim and stole their gold.” But Jeremiah didn’t really know that as a fact. It was, he figured, “just the kinda thing that sumbitch’d do…”
He got even richer during the Civil War “sellin’ rotten bully beef, shoddy uniforms an’ wet gunpowder…” to the Union army. After the war he invested in the railroads that were spreading over the country, bringing the farm products of the Midwest to hungry eastern cities.
“’Bout then old Henry P. figured he wanted to have him a town. He got tired of bein’ back east where some folks was richer’n he was an’ the guvment was just givn’ away land to the railroads. Henry P. Gierman fixed it so’s they just gived him most all the land ‘round here fer free.”
He started up his town, his college, his bank… The farmers around there may have owned their land, but if they wanted to sell their crops they’d have to use Henry P. Gierman’s railroad, and if they needed a bank loan to buy seeds they’d have to go to Henry P. Gierman’s bank, and if they needed any store-bought goods they’d have to go to one of Henry P. Gierman’s stores.
And if they couldn’t pay their bills…well just ask Jeremiah.
On second thought, don’t ask unless you have a whole afternoon to kill.
Gierman died within three days of his eightieth birthday. His huge house stood empty for nearly forty years because he was too greedy to leave it to anyone in his will and no one in town was rich enough to buy it.
Eventually it was bulldozed over and a supermarket went up in its place.
Walking through the college though, it wasn’t hard to find monuments to Henry P. Gierman. I walked past Henry P. Gierman Hall to the Henry P. Gierman Library. (There was another statue in front. I didn’t bother to read the plaque; I knew who it was.)
I saw that the library was open and, since I was nearly freezing and didn’t feel like going home right away, I went inside.
One of the few benefits of having a college professor for a father is that you get to know your way around libraries. I suppose that for most people that’s nothing to get excited about, but I happen to like libraries.
I like the old wooden desks, and the long rows of bookshelves. The quiet.
In Middleton, after school, I’d go to the Middleton College library and do my homework. Sometimes I’d just sit in one of the big comfy chairs and read. It was quiet, a lot nicer than our cramped apartment.
Stepping into the building, I had to say that I had to admire old Henry P. Gierman’s library.
The main reading room had a high ceiling held up by impressive stone pillars. There was stained glass on the wall opposite to me, and two rows of ancient wooden desks led down the middle of the room. Old leather couches lined the walls.
It was like being in a church.
I set out to explore.
There were hallways that led off of the main reading room where they kept all the books. The shelves were crammed together so there was barely enough space for two people to pass by each other.
Not that anybody was around or anything.
I wandered through the stacks, getting the feel of the place, when I saw a sign by the stairway, ‘Periodicals’.
Cool.
If you’re ever stuck in a library with time on your hands, a really good library, one that’s been around for awhile, check out the old magazines in the periodicals section.
The really old ones are usually bound together into big fat books; pull one off the shelves and it’s like entering a time machine.
I like the ads best, especially in magazines from the 1940s, World War II. There are pictures of tough-looking G.I.’s knocking back bottles of Coke, and smiling. Or: “When Lt. Elmo Fighterpilot needs a watch he can rely on, he turns of Hamilton.” And there will be a picture of a P-38 Lighting screaming out of the sky, guns blazing, with the pilot coolly looking at his watch.
OK, I’m weird, but I love that stuff.
I started up the stairs.
I came into a large room lined with hundreds of bound volumes of old magazines. I was planning on looking at some old copies of Life, my personal favorite, but I never quite made it.
An old guy, grey-bearded and wearing a French beret, was sitting at a table reading a magazine, probably a professor or something. He wasn’t taking notes, like me he was probably just killing time. Nothing remarkable in that.
No, the remarkable thing would have to be the ghost hovering in the air above him reading over his shoulder.