“A lesson from lige for the Candidates” By Dan Bosserman and Lige Coleman
If Lige Coalman, legendary man of the mountain-who climbed Mt.Hood 586 times and was known to his dying day for his honesty and integrity- were alive today, he might have some advice for today’s politicians. The following story from The Story of Lige Coalman, by Victor H. White, would have provided an excellent object lesson.
Lige attended public schools for no more than three or four grades, so he found himself especially eager to gather knowledge wherever available. As a boy he read continually, and that helped him make many of life’s decisions, but practical experience was always factored in, as well.
In his boyhood, Lige spent a great deal of time with the pioneer Nelson family, who had two boys named Ned and Be. The Nelsons once taught him a practical lesson in honesty that he never forgot.
The Bull Run River was an excellent trout fishing stream, although Lige claimed the fish would not take bait there until the weather had warmed a bit. The stream, fed from Mt.Hood by melting snow, never warmed enough for good fishing until along in May.
It ran through a piece of property known as “the Tavelli Homestead,” where two Italian homesteaders had taken claim in the mid-eighties. Having lived there long enough to obtain title, they became discouraged from further effort by a forest fire that swept the property in 1889, burning the buildings and fences.
The Travellis had found employment in Portland and had not been back for seven or eight years to do more than visit the place and look around. One bright day in May of 1894, Ned and Be Nelson stopped at the Coalman place and invited Lige to go fishing with them.
The three boys proceeded to the Bull Run River, where they soon caught enough fish for their needs and started home rather early across the vacant Tavelli Property. There they found a patch of yellow daffodils bravely blooming in the grass.
One of the Nelsons said, “I bet mother would be happy to have some flowers like that at home.”
“Let’s dig some up,” Lige suggested,”and take them to her. Cattle will just walk on them here.”
The boys found a crumpled bucket in the grass-covered ruins of the fire, and some iron prongs to dig with. The digging delayed them, and when they arrived home with the flower bulbs, Mrs.Nelson was about ready to put the evening meal on the table.
Mrs.Nelson was just coming to the house with milk, and Lige knew the Nelson boys should have been home earlier to drive the cows in from pasture. But it was not about the lateness that Nelson scolded his sons. He asked where they had obtained the flower bulbs.
“There were lots of them growing in the old Tavelli place,” they explained. “We brought some home for my mother.”
“It was nice for you to think of your mother,” Nelson said. “But that doesn't change the fact that we have taken property that does not belong to us. The law would call that stealing. I want you to take the plants back and plant them just as you found them.”
Mrs.Nelson suggested, “Can’t the boys eat first? Everything is ready.”
“Put the food back on the stove,” the father insisted. “Keep it warm until they return from putting the flowers back.”
Lige walked back with the two boys and helped them replant the bulbs he had made the mistake of suggesting they take in the first place. The distance was six miles each, for a total of twelve miles in the dark. It was midnight when they returned, to find the Nelsons sitting up waiting for them.
Lige says in his memoirs, “We did mighty full justice to the warm meal Mrs.Nelson put before us, and I had learned a lesson I never forgot.” Of course, in those days, a man could be hanged for stealing a horse. We're a lot more civilized nowadays.
