Buck Baker

Twelve and thirteen year old boys are and goofiest creatures on planet earth.  I should know.  I was one.  From birth to age five, boys are cute and wonderful.  By age twelve, they have devolved into adolescent freaks of nature.  Me?  I was buck-toothed and wore thick-rimmed glasses on my hulking seventy pound frame.  My metal-braced teeth entered rooms inches before the rest of my face.  Awkward doesn’t begin to describe me at that age.  The only hope for a twelve year old is that time will propel him on to manhood. 

At age twelve I belonged to a scout troop in Utah that was connected to our ecclesiastical unit, or ward.  A man on military assignment moved into our ward.  I’ll call him Buck Baker.  I’ve changed his name to protect the guilty.  He was appointed to a leadership position in our clergy.  In his civilian occupation he was a full-bird colonel in the Army and commanded considerable respect among his colleagues.  As scouts we didn’t much consider his rank or profession.  He was quite funny and he made an instant impression on us.  For reasons I do not recall, and to my embarrassment now, we nicknamed him “Twinkie.”  He was in good shape, all man, and had a commanding presence.  Nothing about the word Twinkie seemed to fit, but that’s what we called him in our immaturity.  Did I mention that we were twelve and thirteen years old?

After being in our ward for just a few months, Buck asked us if we liked to hike and camp.  We lived for it!  Olie Sharpe and Jim Fingerloss (their real names) were our scout leaders and they spent a lot of time with us in the mountains.  Having cleared his plans with our scout leaders, Buck offered us a deal that we couldn’t refuse.  He would take us into the mountains for 4-5 days.  He would cook for us and feed us like kings if we would haul his gear to the campsite.  This was before the days of two-deep leadership in scouting, and Buck would be the only adult.

Not wise enough to ask meaningful questions – we were slightly less intelligent than tree stumps – the offer was eagerly accepted.  The worst part about hiking and camping at twelve years of age is eating your own food.  In fact, every pancake I ever cooked as a scout was black on the outside and raw in the middle.  We would usually just end up drinking syrup.  But this time Buck would cook for us!  How could we miss with this offer?  Of course, what Buck was really doing was preparing a tutorial that none of us scouts would forget.

There is nothing quite as exhilarating as hiking in the pine and aspen studded Wasatch or Uinta Mountains in Utah… unless you made a deal to haul Buck’s gear.  His “gear” consisted of a pickup truck bed filled with items!  He had a stove, a tent, a table, a camp cot and mattress, pots and pans, a chair, coolers, water and of course, our food.  Although the campsite was only a couple of miles from where we parked, it was a steep hike up, and the six of us scouts made the round trip three times.  Most of that first day was spent hauling Buck’s stuff to camp, and Buck camped in style.  Buck himself only hiked the first leg to the campsite; no round-trips.  Besides a backpack, about the only thing he carried on his assent was a .40 caliber pistol strapped to his hip and a shotgun over his shoulder.  As we were about to begin our last round trip to the truck and back, Buck told us he would have a full meal ready for us upon our return.  We knew we would be more than ready for some good chow.

Within minutes of arriving back at camp in complete exhaustion with our final load, Buck announced that his favorite cooking knife was missing.  What’s more, he had already seen it and knew that it had made it to camp.  “Who stole my knife?” he calmly but firmly asked.  None of us answered from our resting positions on the ground.  “Get up,” he said, “and look for my knife.  Someone is a thief.”  All of us slowly arose.  All of us that is, except Doug.

As boys, we were a tight-knit group and we all knew that no boy in our group had stolen the knife, but we would go through the motions of searching for his knife.  Doug just sat there exhausted.  At this point Buck drew his .40 caliber pistol from its holster, looked at Doug who was still sitting on the ground with his metal mess kit positioned between his legs ready for food.  He once again told him to get up and look for his knife.  All of us stared in wide-eyed disbelief at the scene unfolding before us.  Doug called his bluff and didn’t budge.   He told Buck that he hadn’t seen his knife.  Furthermore, he reminded Buck that he had made three roundtrips to haul Buck’s gear to camp and that he wasn’t budging until Buck came up with the promised food.  BOOM!  Buck put a bullet dead-center through Doug’s mess kit… right between Doug’s legs!

Doug had new life!  We all had new life!  Holstering his weapon, Buck sauntered back to the confines of his tent as we were running around pretending to look for a knife we knew we wouldn’t find.  We got off a few whispered words to each other; words like “Help!” or “We’re gonna die!” or “Got to get off the mountain!”  Seconds later Buck calmly emerged from his tent with his knife.  “Sorry boys,” he said matter-of-factly, “The knife was in my tent.  Food will be ready in ten minutes.”  The stew was delicious and most of us ate out of our mess kits.

Buck established some camp rules that evening.  No one argued... or called him Twinkie. There was a designated trash bag.  No trash was to be seen anywhere in camp except for in the trash bag.  At one point during the week I threw a pop can towards the general vicinity of the trash bag.  Buck’s hand went quickly and deliberately towards his holster.  I jumped up and ran to correct my error.  Just before reaching the pop can, the .40 caliber cannon thundered again from behind me and the pop can sprang into the air.  I dove to the side and looked back in fear at Buck who was casually holstering the weapon of terror.

The camp was positioned by a pristine lake with steep slopes.  Snowpack still clung to the northern slope and swept down to the water’s edge.  At one point during the campout, we dared each other to slide down the 100 yard snow run into the frigid lake.  With tennis shoes and swimsuits each scout took a turn sliding at breakneck speed into the lake.  The sudden impact into the icy water would have killed anyone with a weak heart.  We would laugh our heads off as each scout came to the surface of the water gasping, and in shock due to rapid onset hypothermia.  One try was all that our scrawny bodies could endure.  Once out of the ice water we ran back to our pup-tents.  Modesty was not a priority and the tents did not offer much space to change clothes.  Shivering, and in all of our masculine glory we began to change out of our swimsuits in the open.

I was already putting on dry clothes when I saw Buck smile, un-holster his revolver, and look at Leland who was standing stark naked outside of his tent in the process of changing clothes.  Leland’s eyes met Buck’s.  Pointing the gun towards Leland, Buck only said one word with calmness and a wry grin, “Run.”  Terror struck, Leland dropped his clothes and began running into the woods as Buck fired several shots intentionally off to each side of Leland.  We lost sight of him through the trees.  The rest of us scouts laughed until tears were running down our cheeks.  Leland came back about fifteen minutes later snaking his way through the forest and finished changing.

By the time the week was coming to a close we had found new respect for Buck.  In fact, we hated to see the camping trip come to an end.  I don’t think he ever lost his knife on that first day.  We never called him Twinkie again.  He was a great cook and he told us that he would take us camping again and feed us… if we didn’t tell our parents about some of the incidents with the guns.  I don’t think any of us said a word to our parents about the mess kit, the pop can or about Leland’s romp through the forest.  Buck wasn’t crazy… well, not certifiably so.  Although, anyone who volunteers to give up vacation time to spend with twelve and thirteen year old scouts has to be a little crazy.  He was a molder and shaper of characters.  Most days and weeks of my life have slipped from memory.  Thanks to Buck, that week will never leave me.