ROCKED

      One day my dad was telling me about courting days back when he was a teenager in the 1930s in rural Kentucky where he lived.

      His brother, Morse (my uncle Morse Humston), had a girlfriend whom he thought was in love with him.  They would see each other at school and often Morse would walk Sarah Mae home after school—it was only three miles.

      Morse heard that another boy was going to Sarah Mae’s house on Saturdays trying to court her.  Being the jealous type, Morse asked two of his brothers to help him “rock” the boy who was trying to steal his girl.

      I asked dad, “What do you mean by ‘rock’?”  All I could picture was someone in a rocking chair, so it did not make sense to my youthful mind.  Dad quickly said, “In order to get back at someone for what they did or were doing we used to hide along the path that someone would take, and when he came along we would throw rocks at him.  In this case the boy was riding a mule, and the rocks hitting the mule caused him to run.  The boy had to hold on for dear life.”

      “But, dad,” I said, “In the Bible that is called ‘stoning’ and was sometimes used on a woman who had committed adultery.  In Bible times stoning was used to punish and/or kill someone for their crimes.”

      “Oh, no,” dad said, “We didn’t want to seriously hurt or kill the boy, but just scare him, so he would quit visiting Morse’s girl.”  

       Evidently this was a common practice in rural Kentucky when dad was growing up!