In college, when someone would ask me where I was from, I always had the same answer.
While other students, in introducing themselves to each other, might claim Cleveland or Pennsylvania or Detroit or New York, I would just say “McDonald County.”
And the other person’s reaction was always the same: A bewildered look and a “so just where the heck is McDonald County?”
Understand, I didn’t initially attend a local college and most of the students there were from out of state anyway, so absolutely no one I met had ever heard of McDonald County, Missouri.
You probably haven’t, either. This, of course, is why I got a kick out of the absurdity of referencing it in an introduction. As if McDonald County was taking her place in the world. Well, I thought it amusing anyway.
Not long ago, someone asked me just where in McDonald County I was from. To those only somewhat familiar with the county I always tell them west of Goodman, off of B Highway. To those fairly acquainted with the land I say east of Tiff City and along Buffalo Creek. To those who really know McDonald County I simply say Beeman Hollow.
That was a rather long introduction to the real gist of this column, which is a Christmas recollection from a gentleman who also grew up in Beeman Hollow (note to the folks responsible for printing the road signs: it is B-E-E-M-A-N Hollow, not “Beaman.”)
