The Legend of Luke Steel

© 2011 by Rell Webber. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

First published by AuthorHouse 07/22/2011

ISBN: 978-1-4634-2229-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4634-2228-8 (ebk)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011910961

Printed in the United States of America

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Contents

PROLOGUE

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23

CHAPTER 24

CHAPTER 25

CHAPTER 26

CHAPTER 27

CHAPTER 28

To my wife Sharon:

While my creative juices were flowing,

she kept the jug fresh

and fit for human consumption.

PROLOGUE

They came from all over the county—curious, afraid, dared, and double-dared—to view the old taxidermy shop in the small community where Luke Steel had once lived and worked, but had now vacated. Inside that worn-down cabin remained remnants of the past, ragged and dusty, covered with cob-webs, yet frozen in life-like positions that were so representative of his creations.

And should one be so bold as to venture close enough to peer through those nailed-up boards covering the cracked windows of the old cabin, if one could block out the light of the outside, just enough to strain far left and far right, through the darkness, it was possible to focus one’s eyes clearly enough to view the coiled rattlesnake mounted on the branch of a re-created tree, guarding the front of the room, ready to strike at the poor soul attempting to sneak through the east window. Near the corner of the west side of the shop, two large pit bulldogs with teeth snarling and eyes glaring could be seen waiting as if for some master who was hiding there in that dark room to give the command, Attack! From the rear window overlooking the basement door, a tall, proud, black bear stood upright with paws extended in boxer-like manner, reminiscent of those early years when bear wrestling matches were a popular sport throughout the south. It was said that the bear stood guard over the door of the cabin which led to a cellar where the famous taxidermist had his shop.

And so the legend of Luke Steel is told… .

Luke was the most skilled taxidermist in the northeast part of Mississippi because of his unique style of mounting. No other taxidermist could match Luke’s way of capturing the kill of a ten-point stag or the catch of a twenty pound catfish. People came from all around to have their trophies mounted by Luke Steel. As his fame grew, so did the legend surrounding him. Stories began to spread about his personal life—of his unusually violent temper, his love for moonshine whiskey, and continuous arguments with his nagging wife, most of which were due to her constant complaining about the amount of time he spent on his work. It seems that Luke’s young wife, having grown bored with the peaceful solitude of the countryside, had threatened to take their small son and move to more exciting surroundings. Her threat was never heeded by Luke and, so the legend is told, was never carried out.

As the years went by, Luke Steel became strangely eccentric and began to separate himself from the public. His obsession with mounting unusual animals( such as wild dogs, stray cats, and even the neighbor’s cow) took hold of him. Animals suddenly began disappearing from pastures and stalls during the middle of the night. Slowly, his popularity as a taxidermist began to fade. One night, while Luke was drinking heavily, his wife was said to have made one threat too many. Unaware that his young son was playing just outside the room, Luke murdered his wife with the same carving knife that he used to skin the hides of his victims. He then carried her body down to the cellar and stuffed it inside a large black bear that he had mounted during the winter. Just as Luke was completing his heinous stitch work and preparing to ascend the cellar stairs, he turned and found his son at the door staring, frozen in shock at what he saw.

Luke knew that his son must have surely witnessed his mother’s death and, in his drunken state, attempted to grab the boy. But the child quickly realized that his own life was in danger and fled the cabin. It is said that he found refuge with nearby relatives who were all too familiar with his father’s temper and drinking habits. In the end, no murder was ever reported, for in that little community folks were prone to just let a thing be, as long as it didn’t bother them. Their past history had taught them that if some wrongful act was reported to the law, the sheriff would say that it was just one less Negro to worry about. Soon afterwards, the boy was moved completely out of Mississippi to live with his kin up north. It is also said that Luke Steel went into hiding that day and was never seen again.

His cabin was left undisturbed for years, until one day a couple of neighborhood boys passed by and discovered two stuffed animals peering through the front window. The boys talked of going inside for a closer look, but neither could convince the other. The next day, the two boys returned to the cabin after having finally gathered up enough courage to step inside. Slowly the curious intruders crept down the hall and into the first room. There they found the four stuffed animals: a large rattlesnake, two pit bulls, and a tall, black bear. The rattlesnake was coiled in striking position, as if it would lash out at any moment. The two dogs, with their teeth snarling, held glaring eyes that were fixed on the two boys and seemed to follow their every step. But it was the big, powerful, black bear that made them want to back right out the door.

They had heard the rumor about how Luke Steel had brutally murdered his wife and had stuffed her inside a big, black bear. And now the two stood face to face with the animal. The bear stood almost seven feet tall, with its ugly grin and arms reaching outward as if trying to pull them within its grasp. But they were determined to inspect this bear and make a complete report to their friends. Slowly they approached the bear and examined it further. It had been neatly mounted—so neat, in fact, that one could hardly tell where the seams connected—but while the backside of the bear was hard and stiff to the touch, the stomach area felt pudgy and full . . . . as if the bear had just eaten!

Quickly the boys ran to tell others in the community of their discovery. Very few, however, were interested in confronting Luke Steel or his dead animals. There were some unbelievers who demanded that they see it for themselves, but when they arrived back at the cabin, the very animals the boys had seen earlier, so randomly positioned around the room, were now staring out of the windows as if daring anyone to enter. And no one did!

It was believed that the animals had been purposely placed at the entrance of each door and window by Luke himself, who was now residing as a hermit in the cellar of that old taxidermy shop. The two boys felt fortunate to have escaped with their lives. News spread quickly that each of the stuffed animals would surely spring back to life should any trespassers come around, and the cabin remained a quiet mystery for almost fifteen years.

It was then that Luke’s son, unable to erase the memory of seeing his mother killed and stuffed inside that big black bear, returned to Mississippi in order to avenge his mother’s death. The young man knew that in order to accomplish this, he would first have to locate the bear and produce his poor mother’s body. But if Luke’s son had expected a warm welcome back to his homeland, he was sorely disappointed, for the local residents wanted only to go about their lives quietly and uninterrupted. No one would even go with him to inspect the cabin, so he went alone. Except for the grass that had grown around the cabin, Luke Steel’s son found it to be just as he had remembered years ago. Through the broken window pane, he saw only a few stuffed animals sitting in the corner covered with dust. Slowly, the young man removed the wooden latch on the front door, entered the cabin, and descended the stairs leading downward into the dark, damp taxidermy shop. But he found nothing! No fierce staring animals, no bear . . . and no evidence of his father having been there for years.

Puzzled and disappointed, Luke’s son boarded up the windows and doors of his father’s shop and returned to his home in the north, leaving behind the unsolved murder of his mother and the mystery concerning the whereabouts of his father, the crazed taxidermist named Luke Steel.

Many a young man, on any given night, has accompanied his girlfriend to Luke Steel’s place, out on that lonely road in Clay County. There the legend is told and the dares begin: Who will go up to the window and take a peek? I’ll go if you’ll go! O.K. We’ll go together. What do you see? Nothing yet. Here, let me look. Quiet! Did you hear something? Wait a minute, I think I see the dogs. Yeah, there they are . . . Wow! Where’s the snake? Do you see the bear? You think he really stuffed her inside that bear?

Those who have been there several times will swear that the animals are mysteriously placed at a different window each night… except for the bear, which is always guarding the entrance to the cellar door. And so the legend continues drawing spectators to Clay County, even to this day, to that boarded-up old taxidermy shop where Luke Steel supposedly murdered his wife some thirty years ago and stuffed her inside the big black bear that stands watch over the cabin. Whether the legend is fiction or fact has become completely unimportant to those who wish only to promote it. Some of the more ludicrous embellishments were added by local teenagers in order to attract their girl friends out to the cabin’s desolate location.

There is, however, one for whom the truth holds dear, and it is I—who have searched through the hear-say, the folklore, and the documented facts—hoping to uncover the past and add truth to the legend which surrounds my family. For that which has been handed down is filled with many inaccuracies. Yet so much has been told that is untrue, with so much truth left unsaid, that it has been difficult, after these many years, to obtain exact dates and places. Only through exhaustive research—court records, interviews with family members, and my own recollections as a young child—can I now validate the events that comprise Luke Steel’s legend. Now I will tell them to you as they were revealed to me, in hope that those who hear my father’s name will remember Luke Steel, not for the distorted stories about him, but for that which he contributed to the beautiful art of taxidermy.

CHAPTER 1

I was four years of age when my mother, Arbella Steel, moved my two older sisters and me to St. Louis, Missouri. There our family resided in a fifteen-story housing project called Candlestick, which was located on the west side of the Mississippi River. Although it was not the most luxurious place for a kid to grow up, Candlestick was not far from that wonderful old Busch Stadium, where the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team played their home games. From the flat rooftop of our apartment complex, we could see the lights of the ball park and hear the crowd as they cheered for the Cardinals to pull another game out of the hat. We knew Lou Brock was going to steal another base, when the crowd began yelling, Lou! Lou! in unison. It was there atop Candlestick that I saw Roberto Clemente hit the longest home run ever in Busch stadium. Several years later, when I heard that the famed Cuban player had been killed in a plane crash somewhere over the Atlantic ocean, I felt as though I had lost a close friend.

Those ballpark experiences in my childhood while growing up in the streets of St. Louis were very special, and the memories will be forever with me. My mother had provided a happy life for my two sisters and me in St. Louis, and I grew up as a well-adjusted city kid. Yet there came a time, as I grew older, when I longed to know more about the place where I was born, about my relatives, and especially about my father, Luke Steel. His name was never mentioned around our household and I never inquired. Still, I wondered about my father and the family that Mother said lived in Mississippi. For the most part, all I knew of Mississippi consisted of what we were taught in school or what I heard from my friends who had been there. And these accounts differed greatly!

Some of my friends would travel down to Mississippi in the summer to visit relatives and would return with exciting adventures to tell. I loved to hear them talk of swimming in a water hole, riding a horse across wide, green pastures, and running through the middle of a corn row as the soft, freshly-plowed dirt tickled them between their toes. Of course I was given a more negative image of what life was like there from my school books: proponents of slavery, rebellions against equal rights for black people, and folks living in extreme poverty. These were the images that characterized the people living in Mississippi, where I had been born.

My first contact with my father’s family came about in a most bizarre way. I was fifteen at the time and had just arrived home from school to find my mother sitting at the kitchen table reading a letter. I could tell immediately that something was wrong. Mother looked up at me, trying to hide the tears in her eyes, then laid the letter on the table and walked away. Being quite curious, I put my school books down on the table and slowly moved the letter in front of me. Then I began to read:

January 14, 1970

Dear Luke wife,

I am deaf. Long time I want talk my brother. But I hear nothing. I worry my family long time not hear from. My mama die, Myself not know long time. Later, find out me. My brother other die too. He drink too much. Now Luke very sick, need you come here Una help him to better healthy. Please to come very much. Myself deaf hard talk hearing people. They take him bad place for crazy people. Please God to bring you help my brother name is Luke. Jesus Love you.

Luke sister,

Dorothy Steel

I looked up and saw my mother crying. From this letter bearing broken English sentences, Mother was learning that my father was very sick and appeared to have been taken away to some mental hospital. Mother, I asked, Is this Dorothy Steel my aunt?

Mother explained that