I wr—Hr nwing.Satarday, iwly 7,1979
14
Oxen
By JOYCE BUPP
Staff Correspondent
MANCHESTER
Remember the legends of
the mighty woodsman, Paul
Banyan, and his blue ox,
Babe?
York County has Its own
Paul, who’s one up on
Bunyan. This Manchester R 2
young man has not one, but
two, powerful oxen.
It was at the Woodsmen’s
Carnival, held annually at
the Potter County town of
Cherry Springs, that young
Paul Hoover spied a pair of
oxen for the very first time.
Paul and his dad, Glenn,
agreed that training a pair of
cattle pullers would be both
fun and a challenge.
In file Slimmer of 1974,
they took the first step
toward developing a team,
with the purchase of a pair of
“just weeks old” Holstein
bull calves from a Towanda
area dairyman.
Most of that first year was
devoted to raising and
taming Bill and Buck. The
following Summer, training
begaajß earnest for the boy
and file steers, all three
novices at this oxen
business.
“When I first started their
training, “recalls Paul, “I
could find no one who knew a
thing about oxen. So we read
lots of books about them.
Now, almost everywhere we
go, people come up to us and
say, *Oh yes, I remember my
father having a pair when I
was a kid'.”
One initial problem was
finding a yoke, the piece of
equipment Out “ties** file
two into a team. It’s not file
kind of filing you run down to
the local machinery dealer
and haul home cash-and
carry.
Again, the Hoovers tamed
to the boob, looked at
numerous pictures, tamed
on their imagination, and
buUt their own. It betters
Paul, though, that he’s still
never put a yoke together
that suits him just right. The
one presently in use is
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team raised, trained by York
fashioned from oak, with
bent hickory saplings that
attach the heavy wood
around the animals’necks. .
Now, once you have a pair
of oxen trained, just what do
you do with them in this age
of four-wheel-drive, diesel
‘ fueled agriculture?
First, you load them up
and haul the pair to the site
of the original inspiration,
the Woodsmen’s Carnival.
An appearance at the
popular northern Penn
sylvania festival was the
first public “coming-out” of
Bill and Buck.
The trio has also attended
the Grangers old-fashioned
exhibit at Williams Grove
Park and made some ap
pearances in York area
parades. The remem
berance of one Halloween
parade march through the
nearby town of Manchester
sends the entire Hoover
family into gales of laughter.
Hooked behind Bill and
Buck that night was a small
covered wagon carrying
Paul’s younger brother. Also
on the wagon were two
buckets, one for shelled corn
that was thrown along the
parade route, and one for
“clean-up purposes” behind
the team.
Suddenly, one exuberant
youngster dashed from the
sidewalk crowd to snitch a
handful of com. You guessed
it: he grabbed into the wrong
bucket and, needless to say,
came up with a fistful of
something other than yellow
grain.
From some contacts with against horse teams,
the few other oxen teams in Gentle as puppies, as Paul
surrounding states, Paul has puts it, his beloved Bill and
picked up various pointers. Buck now each weigh in at
One Maryland team owner the 2100-pound level. The two
taught him to put chains on have never been separated
the animals’ horns in place and are as attached to each
of halters. Different parts of other as Paul is tJfthem.
the country, he adds, ob
serve various local customs
on the placement of the
chain.
“It’s a sin to use a halter
on oxen,” grins Paul. So, like
all well-trained teams, Bill
and Buck readily respond to
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occasional gentle touch of a
lead stick. The two respond
tothe same commands used
on horse teams; “Gee” for
right, “Haw” for lift and
“Git Up!” for let's move
along, fellas’.
Teams of oxen are almost
unknown in Pennsylvania
and the surrounding states.
Paul is acquainted with only
one other pair in file state, a
- team of Ayrshires from file
Canton area. However, there
is a report of a team recently
brought into Lancaster
County.
In the New England states,
though, especially Maine,
oxen pulling competition is
on a par with the locally
popular tractor pulling
events.
“Raising and training
oxen teams is a major 4-H
project up there, like dairy
or beef is around here,”
explains Paul. “Each fair ,
has competition with ribbons
and cash prizes. They have
built long livestock pulling
barns, or housing stables, for
the many teams that enter
each fair.”
Pulling weights are
constructed from a flat piece
of iron, loaded with cement
slabs. Points are awarded on
distance and a time limit.
Teams are entered into a
category on their body
weight, with class breaks
every two hundred pounds.
And, according to Paul,
oxen pulling is a sport unto
itself. Hie cattle teams are
never put into competition
“It would be impossible to
ever separate them,’' he
acknowledges. “They’d be
lost without each other."
A massive, ripple-muscled
pair. Buck and Bill eat
mostly what the farm steers
(Turn to Page IS)
For Paul Hoover, his beloved oxen, Bill, on the left, ant juck, have been'a
dream come true. He raised'the animals, caring for them since he purchased
them as young calves. -
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