Slim Croyle & His Deer

This from W.D. Fish's Golly column in 1960:

Preston Croyle came in from Laurel Bottom Friday to the capital city of the Black Forest, and while here he dropped in at the Enterprise sanctum.

Laurel Bottom? You don't know the location of Laurel Bottom?

O.K. It is midway between Ole Bull State Park and Cross Fork on picturesque Kettle Creek.

Mr. Croyle is a nature lover. He is feeding a herd of deer as Golly feeds the birds, and just about as many. It might be said, however, that a deer eats more than the most ravenous Grosbeak.

During Golly's sojourn at Cross Fork – 1902-1906 – Ira Kinney, a Civil War soldier, resided in a small house at Laurel Bottom. Ira had gathered such metal as roofing and steel ceiling from the ruins of a fire at Cross Fork and covered the abode. He dubbed his house – or someone else did – 'The Tin House'. The name, Laurel Bottom, came from the dense growth of Mountain Laurel that grew in the narrow valley.

Quite naturally, the scene has changed in a half century... 

Friendly Deer In Potter County
Visitors to Potter County who can't find deer just haven't been looking in the right place!
Each day a few miles above Cross Fork between 80 and 100 deer turn out for their rations
of corn from sportsman Preston "Slim" Croyle. The deer come when Croyle
blows a whistle announcing feeding time. Some will take the corn right out of his hands;
others stand back and let it be tossed to them. But one, Teeny,
doesn't mind giving Croyle a smooch for an ear of the good golden stuff.
Croyle reports that Teeny has shown up year after year– nine times with a set of twins.
From Potter Enterprise, 1964

How many of us made the trip down the Pike to watch Mr. Croyle feed his deer in the 1960s? Locals and tourists alike lined the sides of the road (Rt. 144) night after night to watch the spectacle. And, of course, the pages of The Potter Enterprise were filled with stories of the deer and the watchers and Mr. and Mrs. Croyle and their Laurel Bottom deer feeding project. 

From May 1964:

Television cameras from the Lancaster station were here Sunday night to photograph deer feeding at Slim Croyle's place in Cross Fork. The pictures and accompanying sound track taken here are for a Saturday evening sports program mc'd by Harry Adelman.

Mr. Croyle said one of the scenes taken was that of Dolly, one of last year's fawns, who places a hoof in Slim's hand when asked, before she is fed.

August 1964,  from the Mills (Pa.) Correspondent

Twelve members of the Mills Youth Choir, accompanied by Miss Gladys Swetland, director, Mrs. Beverly Hess, Miss Kay Cole and Miss Edna Nelson, enjoyed a picnic at Ole Bull State Park Wednesday. After swimming and picnicking the group visited the Preston Croyle farm and watched the feeding of the wild deer. A climb to the top of the fire tower near Cherry Springs completed the day's outing.

Golly, January 1964:

Deer pictures– The Enterprise has published scores of 'em in the last few weeks but most of them were of dead deer. But last week there was a deer picture liked best of all by Golly – live deer!

More than 30 of the animals were shown in a picture with Slim Croyle, who makes it his business to feed and pamper the herd, three or four miles above Cross Fork on Kettle Creek. The count each day runs from 75 to 100 of the fleet-footed quadrupeds. Wonderful is the Black Forest!

From Del Kerr's pen, 1969

If anyone travels through Potter County and fails to visit Slim Croyle's deer feeding station, located between Ole Bull State Park and Cross Fork on Rt. 44, they have missed a real experience. Near six o'clock each evening, at the sound of a whistle, wild deer come down from the hills to frolic around Slim like calves in a barnyard.

We stopped to talk with the famous deer man Sunday evening. More than 20 deer were already milling around the grounds awaiting the nightly handout. Several deer were standing at the long line of tourists taking corn from the hands of children.

These are not tame deer. They will flee from the sight of man anywhere except the feeding station grounds.

It all started many years ago when Slim rescued several deer which had been stranded in deep snow and were near death. He placed the animals in his barn and brought them back to good health through careful feeding. After release to the wild, the deer scampered off, only to return at feeding time.

Each evening the deer would return. One day two fawns appeared with the does and quickly joined in for feed. Before long, Slim was feeding a whole herd of deer. He has had as many as 150 deer at one time.

Slim has the uncanny ability to walk among the animals. Some even take bread from his mouth. A few of the animals stand on their hind legs at his command, some reward him with a kiss. Most, however, depart for the woods as soon as the grain is finished.

The deer man has names for most of the animals and can tell them apart at a fair distance. "That's ol' Red's youngest" Slim said pointing to a yearling. "He's coming along in good shape." He walked over, waited for the animal to stand its full length in salute, then gave it a piece of bread.

All feed is paid through donations. "It cost $15 a week to keep the squirrels going last winter when the mast crop failed," he said. Then there is Elmer the chipmunk, the family of young raccoons, and a host of other animals that have found a friend in Slim. And all come for dinner!

Slim Croyle lost his wife in 1961 and ran into some legal difficulties as a bold hunter attempted to hunt near his property, which bordered State Forest, and fisticuffs ensued. Mr. Croyle died in 1974 after a long illness. Snippets from the Cross Fork news column penned by Harry Kinney give a glimpse of his sad final months.

June 1974: I stopped to see old Bill (Lehman) at the Black Forest Trading Post and Deer Park. He sure is making a mint with his crackers that he sells to tourists to feed the deer. Slim Croyle should have taken a lesson from Bill and sold crackers to feed his deer.  Poor old Slim. He is broke and sick int eh Veterans Hospital at Altoona and his deer miss him bad.

July 1974: I was up to see Slim Croyle tonight and I would say he needs help and quick. There are people that don't like Slim and there are people that don't like me too. You can't please everybody and don't try it. Slim has made a lot of little kids happy with his deer feeding and there have been thousands of pictures taken of him and kids. If Slim doesn't get help soon it will be too late. Let's see what the public will do for old Slim. Slim is feeding two dogs and I don't think he is feeding himself.

From the obituary ...

"Slim Croyle made friends of the deer in the woods near his home, and they would respond when he called them by name and come out into the fields to greet him. His fame as a deer caller attracted thousands of visitors to the area. A registry book he kept contained the names of visitors from most states and many foreign countries.

A few years ago he received an award from the Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals as Pennsylvania Humanitarian of the Year."

Appreciating Public Lands

From 1923

I grew up in a family that appreciated the outdoors. From my grandfather's beloved 'Golly's Folly' to spur-of-the-moment family picnics at Patterson Park to hiking, fishing and even hunting, we were outdoors often. And because we made do with few resources, the state parks and state forest land - free for all - were a haven.

In Potter County, we are fortunate to have many acres of public land to enjoy. Here are a few old newspaper clippings that detail how some of that happened.

From The Potter Enterprise, 1929
Attributed to State Senator Frank Baldwin*:

"The State should purchase all desirable cutover and waste lands for forestry purposes ... I believe that the waste lands of Pennsylvania will become reforested if fires are kept out, and I am strongly in favor of the department planting forest seedlings where natural reproduction is impossible. The state should lead the way in forest tree planting.

"There is another subject I would like to emphasize, the building of more forest forest roads and trails. While it is possible for the people of Pennsylvania to enjoy the beauties of scenic spots which are visible along the state highways, it is difficult for them to get off the beaten path and see the wonderful views that have not been made available due to lack of access. Foest roads and trails will bring more people into the forest and get them acquainted with the purposes of forestry. They will also be of great value for fire protection."

From The Potter Enterprise, 1930

The people of Pennsylvania now own approximately 1,500,000 acres of State Forest Land administered in their interests by the Commonwealth through the Department of Forests and Waters. In addition to the idea of building up thrifty forests on these once lumbered and burned-over lands, and thereby perpetuating a timber supply and protecting the streams of the Commonwealth, the intention was that they would serve the people as health-promoting environments and centers of outdoor recreation. From the very beginning of the forestry movement in Pennsylvania, wholesome recreation was recognized as a major objective in a well- balanced program of administration. 

The marked trend toward enjoyment of the open spaces has been significant since the development of the automobile, and with cars at the disposal of practically everyone today, the number of forest visitors has increased rapidly. That the State-owned forests alone should be the objects of more than a million and a half visits annually attests to their wide appeal, assert officials of the department.

from Senator Baldwin in 1929 concluding:

"I may say that the state forests of Pennsylvania are one of the best investments the state has ever made, and will be more so as time goes on..."

*Senator Baldwin, who claimed Austin as his home, served in the Pennsylvania Senate for 20 years and was Pennsylvania Auditor General for four years.

From the 1920s photo collection of W.D. "Golly" Fish

My Little Town, Part 3 Updated

Update: May 2026
Skeletal remains of a Coudersport Dairy truck
were recently highlighted on a Potter County social media site.
A camp owner from downstate came across the wreck on a hilltop
down in the Prouty area. Apparently it had been strung with wire
and used as a television antenna back when, if we were lucky, three or
four television stations could be coaxed into our homes by such riggings.
Scroll down to see this truck in an advertisement from the 1950s.

North East Street, the street where I lived. It's the street where my aunts and uncles and cousins lived too, in those 1950s days when families were a kind of clan.

I grew up next door to the Coudersport Dairy. The soundtrack of my childhood was spliced together with rumbling trucks backing into the driveway in early morning to deliver milk from nearby farms, empty milk cans clanging together, rattling glass bottles of milk in cases as the step trucks rolled slowly up the driveway on their morning trips around town. And Mr. Bradley's cheerful whistling - that's what everyone remembers about Mr. Bradley - Pete as he was known, though his name was Harold.

The Bradleys owned the Dairy and lived in the mansion-like next door house with its deep and shady front porch. Mr. and Mrs. Bradley had two teenage daughters, Judy and Carol, who seemed so beautiful and mysterious to me with their boyfriends and girlfriends coming and going. Their little brother was David, the same age as me, and then came Mike, the baby, some years later.

Isn't that a grand house! Still standing, it's unrecognizable since a fire and
extensive remodeling to accommodate several apartments.

The Dairy building was simple and still stands today tucked up against the flood control channel at the corner of Sixth and North East Street, silent since the Dairy closed in the mid 1960s. The driveway that seemed so long to this child is widened, taking away the yard where the wonderful, big sandbox used to be and the teenage daughters sunbathed on chaise lounges.

  

From Potter Enterprise, 1950

My friend Jeffrey lived on a dairy farm on Ford Hill, growing up having to milk the herd of Holstein cows twice a day. He imagined the milk making its way to a big, gleaming factory and was so disappointed to find the Dairy was no more than a garage when he made friends with David Bradley in elementary school.

The best part of living next to the Dairy was the room where Mr. Bradley kept a little box freezer, the kind with hinged lids that allowed access to the depths where there would be Dixie Cups and popsicles and other frozen treats. It was the honor system, just leave your nickel or dime on the ridge of the blackboard and go on your way.  It seemed so grown-up!

Sometimes I'd peek around the corner to the room where the milk was processed, warm, even in the winter. The cooler, its compressor insistently humming, was beyond. Sometimes there was a milky, watery stream circling down the drain in the main room where the trucks were loaded. And always the sweet, milky scent in the background. Whenever milk is warming on the stove for hot cocoa, the scent takes me back to the Dairy.

1964 advertisement

David Bradley and I played together nearly every day. That sandbox, safely behind a split rail fence to separate the yard and busy driveway was where we'd make elaborate towns and later lined up the toy soldiers to fight wars - though it felt a great injustice that there weren't any nurse figures like I wanted to be. Sometimes we'd play in the big backyard that stretched all the way to Seventh Street. Mr. Bradley hung a wooden horse, complete with a mane and tail made of baler twine, from two ropes tied on a limb of a maple tree. The Bradleys had a big garden back there and a barbecue fireplace. Sometimes the men from the Dairy would sit around the picnic table to eat their lunches.

On rainy summer afternoons, we moved our play to the front porch. It was furnished much like a living room with a full size glider and furniture that appeared every spring and went away in winter. I'd bring over my dolls and we'd play house. I was the Mommy and David was the Daddy and sometimes the dolls would cry and cry and sometimes they would be naughty and sent to the corner to repent. 

I did my best to try to stay overnight there when invited, enticed by the thought of staying in Carol's room with the canopy bed and little balcony porch. But after the popcorn and whatever program was showing on one of the three channels on tv, I always dissolved into tears of homesickness and my father would cross the driveway to carry me home in my pajamas and tuck me into my own bed, still shuddering from weeping.

There came the summer when the new garage went in, right on the line that separated my parents' property from the Bradley's. I watched the progress from the little platform hammered into the branches of a tall spruce tree in our side yard. That's where I stretched out to read - perhaps a Judy Bolton mystery or one of the teenage novels by Rosamond du Jardin or Betty Cavanna though I was far from becoming a teenager myself.

The garage not only housed the Bradley vehicles, the upstairs became storage space for a new, modern twist at the Dairy, soon to replace the thick milk bottles with their aluminum foil tops.

1964

And now we had a new play place - though the grownups would not approve had they known. We'd build tunnels and labrinyth-like paths between the cartons of cartons that reached to the ceiling.

But there was no stopping the change that made paper milk cartons ubiquitous in supermarkets as folks turned away home milk delivery. It wasn't too many years before the Bradley family moved away, Mr. Bradley taking a job in the northeastern part of the state. The Dairy, operating for a time under different management, was then closed and thus began the next chapter in the story of the big house on the corner.

 

Cleaning Up

 

I've been knitting dish cloths this winter - those colorful squares I mocked when Grandma made them, likely knitted when she was the age I am now.

Grandma knit us an afghan as a wedding gift and I still have it - somewhere. Big knitted blocks of color - red, turquoise, green, yellow, orange - all crocheted together and bordered in black. She created it in cotton yarn which I appreciated at the time and still do.

I see the afghan on the back of the couch in the old pictures – first in that apartment over the store and later in the little house when the children joined us. There are pictures of it stretched over a card table or couch cushion to make a fort with a little delighted face peeking out.

Knitting, creating something tangible, starting with those lovely wooden needles so smooth to the touch, and a ball of tangled color.  The neat, even stitches collecting across the needle, growing, then decreasing. Slowing my breathing, matching the rhythm of throwing the yarn over. Knits, purls, yarn over, casting on and binding off, untangling the yarn as I go.

And the stack of the square dishcloths grows. My dishcloth drawer is already quite full, most of the brighter colors faded from bleach I sometimes add to the load of kitchen linens when they're washed. And perhaps they're an unwelcome gift, much like my Grandma's were.

Would that I could begin to untangle my emotions and reactions to the chaos of our country since January 20 as easily as I have come to untangle those balls of yarn. Straightening out the threads tangled and knotted and sliced by those men who have grabbed the power in our little corner of this world. Their words, their actions leading only to more chaos and heartbreak for no good reason. There is no good reason.

And still I knit. Dishcloths to wash away mud, grime, feculence, filthiness, rottenness, sleaze and slime.

Minding Our P's and Q's

When you hear the phrase "mind your p's and q's" what do you think?

Most would use this definition: To mind one's p's and q's is to be on one's best behavior, to mind one's manners. 

That's what I thought until the last sentence in this news story baffled me. 

When my grandfather wrote this in his "Cross Fork News," in 1905, his use of 'p's' and 'q's' was the one he knew best.

I had to look far down on the Google and AI suggestions to find an explanation that makes it all clear - though I'm sure I could have posed the question to my typographer mother for the clarifying answer.

In the days of hot metal typography, the phrase was an admonition to trainee typesetters. Lower case "p" and "q" would be in adjacent trays - and the letters are mirror images of each other.

Now his choice of words makes perfect sense and I believe we could easily substitute "Donald Trump" for W.H. Sullivan and come up with an answer for how he was first elected and then re-elected - there were too many who failed take to the tall timber and watch their p's and q's.

Addendum: April 18, 2025

I came across this little rhyme today:

A kid was often confused,
When setting his p’s and his q’s
He was very keen on qleasing the pueen
Who wasn’t entirely amused!

Ice

There's a small army of trucks emblazoned with logos of an electric utility thundering past on the state highway outside my window, followed by the green of the trusty township plow and cinder truck. Likely they're making more permanent repairs to the grid after last night's power loss.

It went off here just as we were getting into the latest episode of All Creatures Great and Small on the television. Sunday night we settle in, dishes from dinner stashed away, leftovers refrigerated, for 60 Minutes and then the offerings on Masterpiece - it's just a comforting habit though now everything is available on demand. 

But Sunday evenings have always had their own rhythm even since childhood when some Disney program or another came on the Heimel family television and Dad would sometimes go down to the store and come back with a carton of ice cream and a can of Hershey's syrup. One of the older boys would carefully scribe the ice cream and slice through it with what my mother called an angel food cake cutter, taking great care that each portion was equal - most important in a family of seven.

These were the days when so-called "blue laws" closed all the stores on Sunday. We were exempt from that inconvenience as my father worked at the family's grocery store and he had a key. Other families had to plan ahead for a Sunday treat, but we were special, an interesting introduction to the concept of privilege. 

Raising our own family, we also enjoyed the Disney offerings and later it was Mrs. Fletcher solving all kinds of crime from her beautiful bungalow along the Maine coast. In those days, I had the ironing board set up adjacent to the action and Arthur was off in the other room ostensibly writing lesson plans or correcting papers but more often lost in musicland.

But last night, power blinked off and on and finally we were truly in the dark. I lit a candle - Yankee Candle Christmas Cookie - and used my phone's flashlight feature to fetch real flashlights from the laundry room cupboard. Arthur unplugged the kitchen range just for good measure even though the fancy breaker it was plugged into snapped it off at the first blink, and we waited.

No internet - no power and it was soon off to bed. Arthur read in the light of his headlamp and I used my Kindle, charged in full with a selection of reading material already downloaded.

Power returned in an hour or so but Arthur was already asleep and I couldn't bring myself to go down the stairs and reboot the system to go back to Skeldale House and then laugh with the Saturday Night Live Anniversary Special we had been looking forward to. It was just too cold and the bed was so cozy and warm. 

It's most certainly has been miserably cold, snowy, icy and windy outside- matching what's going on inside this old farmhouse- two colds to soldier through, accompanied by the icy disaster of this new presidency raining down on our heads with winds of most unwelcome change knocking these two septuagenarians off course.

-gany, -ghany, or -gheny?

Perhaps Golly* could have called on the President** to solve his editorial dilemma in 1940:

Here's something we gotta do something about! Should have done it long ago. The words Allegany and Alleghany and Allegheny.

Hully gee, but we've lost a lot of time looking in histories, atlases and on maps to learn the particular Allegany, Alleghany or Allegheny we want to use at the moment.

Even right now, after all the years we have been wrestling with the problem in orthography, we still don't know which is which nor why.

Just took a look at a map, an old-timer, and there we find "Allegheny" Township. Then to satisfy ourselves we scanned a list of townships sent out by the Commissioners of Potter County and there we find it "Alleghany."

It is far from our desire to call attention to any error made by that august body - if error it is – but by golly, we want to get to the bottom of this thing – not the river.

We'll have to admit that Allegheny is correct for the river of that name and the mountains, but why should a port on the Allegheny be spelled Port Allegany?

Allegheny County is in Pennsylvania and Allegany County, N.Y. is just north of us.

And there is the Allegheny National Forest in Pennsylvania and just adjacent to the north is Allegany State Park.

Seems to us, when we were considerably young than at present, Alleghany City was located in Allegheny County. Of course it is now a part of Pittsburgh.

If we could get our Allegany, Allegheny and Alleghany straightened out and put away in our mental file, it would surely be a great help in editing a country weekly. 

**The 47th President of the United States has issued a plethora of executive orders, among them a plan to rename a body of water and a mountain peak. This from a press release issued by the U.S. Department of the Interior

WASHINGTON, D.C. — In accordance with the President's  recent executive order, the Department of the Interior is proud to announce the implementation of name restorations that honor the legacy of American greatness, with efforts already underway.

As directed by the President, the Gulf of Mexico will now officially be known as the Gulf of America and North America's highest peak will once again bear the name Mount McKinley. These changes reaffirm the Nation's commitment to preserving the extraordinary heritage of the United States and ensuring that future generations of Americans celebrate the legacy of its heroes and historic assets.

*Golly is the pen name of my grandfather, W.D. Fish, who wrote a weekly column for the local newspaper for more than 40 years.