"The Apathetic Foxes" ..... a parable for all times

Foxes are like humans in many ways. Few folks realize that foxes once lived in this country under organized governments of their own and attended their own schools just like human folks.

Many years ago the first red foxes were brought to America to supply the hunting needs of wealthy Virginia planters. The red fox thrived and and multiplied and soon Virginia became overcrowded with red foxes. So, on one warm and sunny day during April 1795, a few families of red foxes left their Virginia dens and started for the Ohio country. They had often listened to wandering fox scouts and when returning from far trips into the western forests tell f the abundance of fat rabbits, partridges, and delicious game of many kinds. "Enough to feed a million foxes," they boasted.

When the Virginia foxes the Ohio country they discovered beautiful Pawpaw Ridge hidden deep in the wilderness. Here did they find food in abundance. And then and there they decided to make Pawpaw Ridge the capital of their commonwealth. More and more foxes continued to arrive from Virginia until there were firmly established red fox commonwealths through all the Ohio Valley.

For several years Pawpaw Ridge remained the seat of government for all the red foxes living in the Ohio country. Later the red fox capital was moved elsewhere, but for many generations all the foxes for two hundred miles around had great reverence for Pawpaw Ridge.

For years foxes in countless numbers brought their entire families from miles away to visit Pawpaw Ridge, where they proudly pointed out to their wives and children the entrances to the old dens where the head foxes of pioneer days gathered and enacted laws to create and govern the first fox commonwealth in this land of plenty.

The fox families who still lived ion Pawpaw Ridge were delighted to see the visiting foxes come to view the now sacred fox holes of their first capital. The tourist foxes brought and killed more game than they could carry away. So, much food was left behind for the residents of Pawpaw Ridge to eat. Always the visiting foxes bought more food than they took away.

The Pawpaw Ridge foxes were proud foxes. They were proud of Pawpaw Ridge and its historic past. But they were smart foxes too and knew a good thing when they smelled it. So they kept the ancient and sacred fox holes clean and intact so they could show the visiting foxes with pride in their voices as they pointed out the sacred holes.

Even at the entrance to the first fox-cub school and at the entrance to the first shrine to Saint Reynard a few scholarly foxes had dragged flat rocks on which they scratched in scholarly fox language accounts of the founding of the school and of the shrine.

The hole which led to the underground chambers housing the first seat of government caused the most trouble because as the fox population grew a larger government hole had to be dug and thus destroyed the original hole leading to the chambers of the first capitol. But the neat pile of rocks (forming a fence of sorts) from the original hole was left standing on the original spot, and several generations of red foxes pointed out with much pride to visiting foxes as being part of the original entrance to the first capitol.

But as the years went by the foxes of Pawpaw Ridge became apathetic and lost much civic pride. Still, to entice visitors to Pawpaw Ridge their civic groups continued to send out barking foxes to all the other fox commonwealths for miles around boasting of the sacred places to be viewed on Pawpaw Ridge.

Each year the barking foxes barked louder and louder but the red foxes of Pawpaw Ridge really cared less and less. The inscribed stone in front of the hole to the first fox-cub school was stolen but no one seemed to care. Then some unthinking fox destroyed the inscribed rock in front of the original entrance hole to the shrine of Saint Reynard, but even the worshippers of Saint Reynard did little about it but bark.

Finally the clever foxes who headed the government of Pawpaw Ridge decided to move the original pile of rocks which stood in front of the fox hole which had housed the first capitol. A few Pawpaw Ridge foxes complained with barks and howls, but most of the complainers only whimpered in private. The Pawpaw Ridge board of governors explained how the pile of rocks could still be pointed out with pride to visiting foxes. They explained, "We'll simply move the pile of rocks to another place," and to the head of the board of governors wisely commented, "Too many are living in the past."

Soon visiting foxes became fewer and scarcer. And it was not long before Pawpaw Ridge became just another community. Traveling foxes did not come to see the historic sites anymore. The historic sites had all disappeared. The Pawpaw Ridge foxes gradually lost all respect for their glorious past and thus lost much of their dignity too, as well as much food touring foxes would have left during tourist seasons.

A fox crossing Persimmon Bottoms only half a mile away was asked why he didn't visit historic Pawpaw Ridge. His curt and foxy reply was, "The residents of Pawpaw Ridge don't care for their historic past. Why should I?" Then with a flick of his bushy tail he trotted in the direction of Possum Flats.

Moral: Even foxy foxes can out-fox themselves sometimes.

Alonzo Finley Kercheval is a penname occasionally used by the late folklorist David K. Webb [as well as Erasmus Foster Darby].

This whimsical yarn - reprinted from the July 1959 issue of the Ohio Historical Society Quarterly - was written in an effort to save the last remaining portion of the original fence for the public square in Chillicothe; preservation of the fence apparently was in jeopardy at that time too.

For obvious reasons, the tale "The Apathetic Foxes" is being reprinted again, now, January 1989. Enjoy it!

- Printer John Webb, Chillicothe, Ohio

In a copy of the July 1959 original story (in volume 68, number 3) someone had noted that the line "Too many are living in the past" was a direct quote (made by Nick Holmes) from a city council meeting.