Get Yer Calcutta Monkeys, Just $29!

Good Luck at Boys Town, Charlie!

Hello, Bob, I’m a longtime listener and a first-time caller.

Um, buddy, this isn’t a radio call-in show.

Oh. Sorry, I just need to pick your brain. I’m writing a book about the wonderful people from Indiana, who grow up with all those fine Hoosier values. You know, honest folks, decent folks.

Sorry, I don’t subscribe to the notion that decency and honesty follow geographic boundaries. I think that’s a mawkish, misguided fantasy. But I’ll help you if I can. I grew up here myself, so I’m pretty decent and honest.

Thank you. Maybe to help illustrate those values, you could begin by talking about some of the famous people Indiana has produced back over the years.

Famous, huh? One Hoosier who comes to mind is John Dillinger. Everybody has heard of him. He was born right here in Indianapolis.

Technically, he was famous for robbing banks and killing people, wasn’t he? You know, he was a total thug.

Is that going to be a problem for your book?

Yes, I was hoping for someone a little more wholesome and appealing to write about. Someone who didn’t shoot quite so many people. Dillinger is dead, right?

Yes. He died suddenly, in 1934.

And what was the cause of his sudden death?

It was FBI agents chasing him down an alley and going BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! with their pistols, outside the Biograph Theater in Chicago. He’s buried here in Indianapolis, in Crown Hill Cemetery.

I just don’t think he’s quite what I’m looking for. Who else do you have?

Well, back in the 1960s we had this spunky, crusading clergyman who fought for the little people in Indianapolis. He was even appointed director of the Mayor’s Human Rights Commission, in 1961.

There! That’s exactly what I’m looking for. A grassroots local hero! What was his name?

Jones. The Reverend Jim Jones.

Hold the phone! Not the same Jim Jones who took his followers to Jonestown, Guyana, and nearly a thousand of them died drinking the Kool-Aid back in 1978? Is this that guy?

The very one! He was a minister here in Indy, for years. He had Indiana values out the wazoo, that guy did!

(Rev. Jim Jones, left)

I’m not so sure about this. It takes a lot of work to maintain a ministry. How did Rev. Jones manage to keep his flock afloat?

He imported monkeys from Calcutta and sold them door to door for $29 each.

No, he did not.

Yes, he did. Hard work. Hoosier values.

Goodness. I must say, my feel-good book isn’t turning out quite as I had planned. Please try to concentrate. I want someone with a truly upbeat back story.  

Okay, I think I’m catching on. Look at this 1949 headline from the Indianapolis News: Dream Comes True for Lad; He’s Going to Boys Town.

That sounds more like it. Is there a catch?

No, no catch. It’s about a local judge who took an interest in a troubled 14-year-old lad here, and helped get the youngster a coveted spot at the famous Nebraska Boys Town. Look at this newspaper picture of Judge Hoffman shaking hands with the beaming kid.

Finally! Very uplifting! Read me that photo caption!

It says here, Judge Hoffman shakes hands with Charles Manson and wishes him luck. Kinda gives you goosebumps, doesn’t it?

Charles Manson? You mean like the Manson Family? Sharon Tate? “Helter Skelter?” He lived in Indianapolis?

Yes. You’ve heard of him, huh? I hope I’m being helpful here. Shows what you can do with whole asteroid crater full of those Hoosier values.

Quite frankly, I had hoped your Hoosier values would have produced better examples. Look, the 20th century was a tough time for everyone. Maybe if we move on back to, say, the 19th century?

Well, we did have that boy who grew up here, named Henry McCarty…

I’ve never heard of him.

He also called himself William H. Bonney.

Not him, either.

Uh, Kid Antrim?

Sorry, I guess maybe he wasn’t as famous as you thought.

Oh. Maybe you remember him as Billy the Kid?

What the! No way! Stop the bus! Hold your horses! Billy the Kid was from Indianapolis?

Nobody knows where he was born. But for sure, he spent some very formative years here with his mother and brother, from around age five to age ten. He soaked up his Hoosier values living downtown, near where the Bottleworks Hotel is today.

The Bottleworks? That fancy boutique hotel? Very expensive!

Maybe that’s how Billy discovered he was going to need to get a lot more money in life.

This is just too much! If I remember my Wild West history, what brought Billy down was that the territorial governor of New Mexico, Lew Wallace, promised him a pardon in return for testimony, and then cheated him out of it!

That’s how I heard it, too.

So, the Kid’s Hoosier values were shot down by the shenanigans of this Governor Lew Wallace!

Um, well, Lew Wallace was born in Brookville, Indiana. His father was a governor of Indiana. Lew was a Hoosier, through and through.

Well, then, I’m guessing Wallace probably just never found Christianity.

Please. The man wrote “Ben-Hur.”

He wrote that Charleton Heston movie about chariot racing and Jesus?

Sigh. Yes, he wrote it even before it was a movie. He wrote the book.

So, Lew Wallace and Billy the Kid, big adversaries in New Mexico, were BOTH Hoosiers?

Indeed. Nobody ever knows what’s going to happen when Hoosier values go against more Hoosier values, especially once they go out-of-state.

Wow. Sort of like King Kong vs. Godzilla! Now, there’s a story worth telling! Maybe I’ll drop this Hoosier values thing and write about battling super monsters, instead…

I don’t see how you could go wrong with that. I’ll catch up with you on your book tour.

I’ll be the one with the smirk.