The Odyssey of Joshua Robinson

Jeremiah Robinson, having once been a preacher, of the fire and brimstone type, it is not surprising, nor unusual, that after the hanging he was allowed to give the eulogy at the burial of Ephrom Jeffries, and true to character it was a passionate and stirring anthem filled with the powerful rhetoric and deep spiritualism that had made him seem both preacher and madman to all who knew him. It was never forgotten by those who heard it, and the black folks who so much respected and loved him for his fearless condemnation of a way of life that was repugnant to him, recalled that sermon constantly after he and his family had been driven away, saying to their children that it was filled with the power of the Lord. It was delivered as follows.....He knew the value of money, and the need for respect. He used to give pennies to the children whenever he had them, and always, always he had great hopes for their futures. He was born a long time ago, and acted in a manner that was different from the people of today. He was born twenty seven years before Gauguin died, nineteen years before VanGogh committed suicide. He was twenty seven when Thomas Wolfe was born, twenty three when Scott Fitzgerald was born, twenty six for Hemingway, and twenty four for Faulkner. The first world war started when he was forty three, he was married before the Wright brothers flew their first success, and had children before the turn of the century. When Henry Ford was toying with the idea of a car he was already a man. Abraham Lincoln was assassinated only thirteen years before he was born. He saw the century come and go. He was alive for Lindbergh's flight, and the death of Amelia Earhardt. He bought ice from the ice man, and walked his children to an outhouse. He never had a drivers license, never owned a car, and shivered through dozens of winters because he had no money for wood.....