BEFORE THE GOAT ERA GOT STARTED
Late 18th Century
Some folks think goats are peculiar animals, some folks just plain don’t like ‘em, and then some folks figure goats work out better for everyone all around. Don’t think anyone jus’ woke up n’ said goats ‘er better than horses, ‘er mules, ‘er donkeys … yea, goats ‘er different – but I can say I’ve seen 8 goats’ get through work that would’ve kept 3 horses and 5 mules occupied till sundown, n’ the goats still had enough left in ’em to cause trouble after supper …… not ta mention feedin’ is jus’ easier. Way I see it is – A Schitt family keeps two or three (‘er more) ‘cause they’re cheap. Someone breeds them. Another relative takes a pair instead of cash for a debt. Somebody discovers they’re excellent for clearing an overgrown patch. Kids can manage them. Milk becomes useful. A move occurs and taking six goats proves considerably easier or more economical than getting horses at the destination. N’, wouldn’t ya know, in a lotta way, a goat that knows where home is has a peculiar habit of turnin’ back up there whether ya intended for him to or not. If I could say one word ta describe a goat — goats ‘er practical!
NOW, one practical decision reinforces another.
By 1811, the family isn’t choosing goats anymore.
They have become goat people.
Horses were valuable. Mules were useful. Goats were affordable, adaptable, numerous, and possessed of an obstinacy the family apparently understood.
No surviving family record identifies the precise moment goats became a fixture among the Schitts. The earliest references treat their presence as unremarkable, suggesting the arrangement was already well established by the closing years of the eighteenth century. Horses and mules appear periodically in inventories, travel accounts, and property records, but goats recur with unusual consistency.
Economics explains much of it. Goats cost less to get, required less improved pasture, reproduced readily, and could make productive use of ground that offered little encouragement to larger livestock. Several could be kept where the expense of a horse or mule might have strained a household, and losing one animal did not necessarily mean losing the family’s principal investment.
Temperament may have accounted for the rest.
Mules were famously stubborn. The Schitts knew this and respected them for it. Goats, however, possessed a different quality altogether: persistence accompanied by an apparently complete indifference to whether anyone had granted permission.
For reasons neither the family nor the surviving record adequately explains, this seems to have suited the Schitts remarkably well.
c. 1790s — Somebody Notices They’re Damn Useful
Now, ifn’ one er two goats can clear a patch, n’ heck a dozen er so can clear a pasture .. ya git more usable land, less obstacles, ….. jus’ more goats! That’s enough reason ta le the heard git bigger ….. just sayin ….
A neglected/brush-covered piece of property needs clearing. Instead of spending manpower cutting everything, somebody turns several goats onto it. THAT SCHITT WORKS! Not magically. Not overnight. But well enough that another Schitt does the same dern thing.
One household’s cheap livestock becomes another household’s practical solution. Maybe goats start being loaned for clearing, rather than merely bought and sold. The animal can belong to one family yet temporarily being kept on somebody else’s property ta do it some good. Folks, that is just the SCHITT way …
1795–1805 — Goats Become Currency-ish
Not literal currency, though I heard back then a banker may be willin ifn’ he had a need.
But they’re valuable enough and common enough that we begin seeing: “two goats and…” in settlements.
Someone pays part of a debt with goats. A daughter receives goats when getting’ hitched. Somebody trades a doe for labor. Kids are given ownership of a kid. A breeding buck gets shared among relatives. What works for one may not work for all, but this here with goats seem’d ta come out on top most of the time. Then because goats reproduce, a goat received in 1797 may stand for six or eight descendants several years later. Yea, gotta admit, squabbling over who gets which goat can be a fight er two, but it’s goats we’re talking ‘bout.
c. 1800 — The First Named Goat
Not every goat gets a name. Working livestock usually stays livestock. But every once in a while, one does, and that is usually a doosey. Course, Schitt’s have been namin’ goats for longer than I can remember, heck – long enough that I can’t even remember some of ‘em n’ that is a blame shame. As far as the first goat … ya figured already, depending on who ya talk to, a fight might break out — but as we say around here … records ‘er records … not really sure how many Boris had, but near as I can tell, I know he had a brown doe that was a bit scruffy ‘cause I seen that name a few times passing through the archives, so guess we can say the earliest named goat presently found in the surviving record for those folks bein’ picky!
1800–1810 — The Schitt Method
By now, several related households keep goats. Ya start seeing informal practices develop over n’ round goats:
Ownership marks. Ear crops, notches, slits and the occasional bell helped folks sort out whose goat was whose—or at least whose somebody claimed it was.
Breeding arrangements. Somebody owns the good buck; relatives bring does.
Loaning. Goats go somewhere for brush control and eventually return.
Children. Goat tending becomes a normal chore because children can manage them more readily than larger livestock.
Route memory. Goats know where feed, water, shelter and familiar animals are—and have an irritating tendency to return there.
1811 — THE GOAT ERA BEGINS
Now, yer readin’ n’ wantin’ ta know WHY we call it the goat era ‘round here. Well ….. kinda simple really — when ya have more goats then ya know what to do with – goats with names, goats with no names, goats yer sure belong to ya, goats ya think belong to ya, a goat er’ two yer jus’ not sure, but dangit, they’re here … that be a whole bunch a goats. In that year – Schitt families were countin’ goats, n’ every time ya turn around, the number was different. N’ I’m not talking bein’ off by a goat ‘er two, but lord have mercy, where did 12 more come from ….. an every family was in the same situation … more goats then they knew what to do with. Almost like, ya got more goats than ya got Schitts … and THAT is a countin’ problem, let me tell you!
Therefore the Archives only choice was to start then, n’ it jus’ happened ta be 1811. So there ya have it, ya end up callin’ it the beginning of the goat era ‘cause there were jus too blame many goats.
1811–1847 — THE GOAT YEARS EXPLAINED
1811–c.1820 — EXPANSION: “More Goats Than Sense”
- I’ve said before – goats have value, n’ plenty of goats have a bunch of value … but it’s hard to put a number on sompthin when ya can count the darn herd 5 times n’ git 5 different numbers. Heck, that’s a problem even ole Henry Ledger couldn’t solve, no matter how much sipherin he did, not ta mention, if a goat er two er ten wandered n’ got counted in several families herds — that is not a sipherin’ problem, that can be a fist fightin’ problem. We already know, Herds don’t expand because somebody has a great plan. They expand because goats reproduce and Schitts are reluctant to get rid of something useful, even when it starts eatin the house. The earlier mentioned “two goats and…” barter habit doesn’t disappear; now there are simply more goats available to barter, except ya can’t make change with a goat.Folks start noticin’ that Does with good milk production start being hoarded and kept. Certain bucks begin getting passed/loaned around because somebody realizes that one throws good kids. So ya see, goats become more than just a goat, they become a way to make life better. Aunery yea, but better. N’ along the way ya see that kids become normal goat- tenders. I’ll jus throw out ther — once ya got twelve goats, gittin ta twenty er thirty aint near the decision gittin from none ta one was, now is it.
c.1820s — SPECIALIZATION: “Not Every Goat Does the Same Schitt”
Schitts begin recognizing useful traits in individual animals and family lines. Schitt’s weren’t the only ones that see it, but Schitt’s had more goats than most so it was easier to spot I’m thinkin’. While I can’t speak for all the uses ya can come up with for a goat, here are the easier ones ta figure out …
Milk goats — does known to produce reliably; households with children particularly value them.
Clearing goats — the aggressive browsers. Put them on brush and leave them to their business. Goats were specifically used for browsin’ and helpin’ clear pasture and woodland. (Deep sneekin’ in with words agin.)
Breeding stock — somebody has a particularly sound buck and suddenly everybody’s does seem to spend part of the year visiting.
Travel goats — calm, manageable animals that tolerate being moved with a family or between properties. Some goats jus travel on their own …..
Trouble goats — not an official category, naturally. But everybody knows which ones they are. If ya seen one er had one, ya know exactly what I’m tellin’ ya! Most families had at least one. Some Schitts had several.
c.1820s–1830s — WHOSE DAMN GOAT IS IT ANYWAY?
Now, all this movin’, loanin’, breedin’ n’ wanderin’ sounds fine till somebody wants their goat back. Problem is, sometimes the goat had a different opinion ‘bout where it belonged, n’ sometimes it was hard to tell a goat apart from another …. Can’t say all goats look alike, but when ya got thirty of the blame things millin’ around, some look a whole lot more alike than they did when ya had three.
A Schitt might loan out four goats and git five back. Another might swear he sent six and only got four. A doe could wander over with one herd, drop a kid while she was there, then wander herself right back home. Now whose goat is the youngin’? Depends who ya ask, n’ probably whether they wanted the goat.
Ear marks helped. Bells helped. Knowin’ yer own goats helped. None of it helped enough. Namin’ em’ didn’t help neither, specially when the goat decided ta go deaf n’ not pay attention ta no one. It happens …..
Most of these things got worked out. Goats got traded back, swapped around, counted against another goat, or somebody finally got tired of arguin’. Sometimes a handshake settled it. Sometimes it took considerably more hand than shake. N’ hear tell, once in a while, the goat settled it. Then six months later another goat wandered back across the creek n’ they started all over again.
c.1828 — THE FLOOD MOVES THE GOATS TOO
O’ Course, all this goat business was goin’ along jus’ fine enough till 1828, when Mud Creek decided ta rearrange things. The Carter n’ Schitt places down on the lower ground got flooded bad enough that when the water finally went down, both families decided rebuildin’ in the same place wasn’t particularly smart. So everybody started movin’ northeast, beyond Goat Ridge n’ the Happens apple grove, up inta higher ground.
Higher, yea. Better? Depends what ya are.
That ground had thicker trees, more brush, sand n’ rock, n’ needed a whole lotta clearin’ before anybody was gonna make much use of it. The Carters didn’t have much money left after the flood, Johann Georg was helpin’ with materials, n’ everybody else was puttin’ in about all the work they had.
Now hanker back a darn minute — what’d we jus’ say goats were particularly good at?
Clearing rough ground.
So while folks were movin’ lumber, salvagin’ what they could, buildin’ houses n’ generally tryin’ ta put two families back together, the goats suddenly had plenty of work themselves, ‘er fun, considerin’ they were goats jus’ doin’ what goats do …. Brush that woulda taken people time ta cut became feed. Ground that wasn’t much use ta a horse was perfectly acceptable ta a goat, n’ keeping animals that could feed themselves off part of the problem made considerably more sense than spendin’ money nobody had.
The move also spread things out. New homes, new pens, new clearings, old goats learnin’ new places, n’ goats still rememberin’ some of the old ones. If figurin’ out whose goat was whose had been troublesome before the flood, movin’ everybody and everything didn’t make it any easier.
Henry Ledger was already keepin’ track of materials, quantities n’ money during the rebuilding, while Abigail Carter had the aggravatin’ ability ta remember names, agreements, amounts n’ who said what better than most anybody around. That mattered considerably more once everybody started movin’ property around — including property with four legs that didn’t always stay where ya put it.
The Flood of 1828 didn’t create the Goat Era. It gave the goats more ground ta work with. N’onst a few goats started clearin’, more joined in so as not ta miss the fun. Purty soon, instead of brush, thicket n’ undergrowth, ‘bout all a Schitt could see were goats — n’ good luck tryin’ ta tell which damn one belonged ta who!
c.1830s — Goat Abundance Becomes Normal
By the 1830s, havin’ a whole mess of goats around wasn’t much worth mentionin’ anymore, aside from the occasional fight over a goat ‘er so. Schitt families had milk goats, clearing goats, breedin’ goats, goats bein’ loaned out, goats comin’ back, n’ probably a few nobody rightly remembered where they came from. After the Flood of 1828 opened up all that rougher ground northeast of Mud Creek, there was plenty of room—and plenty of reason—to keep ’em.
What started years earlier as a cheaper, practical choice had become jus’ part of everyday life. Kids grew up tendin’ goats, families swapped ’em, does kidded, herds got bigger, n’ nobody stopped everything to write down every time another goat showed up. That’s probably important right there. Yea, records ‘er records BUT sometimes ya jus’ can’t keep up with a goat.
When somethin’ happens often enough, folks quit thinkin’ it’s unusual and start thinkin’ that’s jus’ the way things are. By then, a Schitt without a goat mighta been easier to notice than a Schitt with twenty, lessin ya think a few of those twenty are yours.
c.1840s — PEAK & TRANSITION: “The Goats Ain’t Goin’ Nowhere”
By the 1840s, there probably weren’t many Schitts left who remembered when havin’ goats around was somethin’ unusual. They’d been milked, traded, loaned, bred, borrowed, stole, counted, miscounted, argued over, brawled about, used ta clear land n’ occasionally showed back up somewhere nobody expected ’em. Goats weren’t replacing horses er mules — never really were. A horse could do work a goat couldn’t, n’ a mule could haul considerably more than a goat ever oughta try or wouldn’t. Folks used what worked for the job. But goats had one advantage that mattered more as families spread out — goats went right with ’em.
A horse was an investment. A mule was valuable work stock. A few goats could be divided among young whippersnappers settin’ up households, traded between relatives, moved ta another piece of ground, bred back into a herd, er handed over against what somebody owed. Before long, Schitt goats weren’t all gathered around one place anymore. They were spread out right along with the Schitts, n’ heck, a time ‘er two, ya couldn’t tell ‘em apart.
Course, spreadin’ the goats out didn’t necessarily mean there were fewer goats. Mostly meant ya had ta go farther ta count ’em. By 1847, what folks later called the Goat Era had about run its course—not because the goats disappeared, but because there wasn’t much of an era left ta notice. Goats had become part of the family economy, part of movin’, settlin’, tradin’ n’ everyday life, goats were as normal as …. Well …. Jus’ normal.
The Goat Era ended. The goats didn’t. Turns out, that distinction mattered.
1848-1868 — THE GOATS INHERIT THE SCHITTS
Young Schitts establish households. Older Schitts pass on. Property changes hands. Families move. Goats get inherited, adopted, bartered, traded and carted along. A goat line that once belonged to one household can now be scattered among several related homesteads. Ya figure, as long as the belly wus full n’ there wus fun ta be had … the goats went right along with it. Nobody writes any kinda rulebook because why the heck would they? Families been handling goats this way for fifty-plus years n’ no reason ta start doin’ sumpthin’ different now! Wut did make a difference wus Little Schitt’s Crossing. If’n ya ask me, it seems Little Schitt’s wus a playground fer a goat.
1869 — LITTLE SCHITT’S CROSSING
And now, something that has worked reasonably well among dispersed rural households starts getting put tagether into an actual working settlement. That is a whale of a change for a Schitt, no tellin’ how the goats took things …. Nobody knows and evidently the goats weren’t talkin …..
1870–1879 — Plenty of SCHITTS, oddles of GOATS, NOT ENOUGH RULES ta speak of:
Schitt’s, goats, land, n’ a platter of trouble.
More people. More buildings. More fences. More gardens.
More roads. More commerce. More goats. N’ still MORE goats
But families were still using customs put tagether when everybody knew whose damned goat was whose, n’ where that goat belonged.
Sift through enough piles of archival debris n’ ya start findin’ all sorts of things that, like it or not, circle right back ta the goats: — keep cider handy near by, ya gonna need it!
complaints, fence repairs, breeding disagreements, damaged gardens, unidentified kids, goats returned to the wrong household, competing ownership claims, even some bellerin’ fer lawyers ……. Now who wouda thought.
And eventually someone decides: We need to start writing this Schitt down.
Hello, eventually ya git the Caprine Register.
1880–1885 — THE WARNING YEARS
If’n a woman stops n’ tells ya that ya need to look at sumptin’ specially when ya know she ‘members a lot — ya just might want to heed her warnin! Ms. Abigail knew what she was speakin ‘bout!
She’d been keepin’ track of names, agreements, amounts n’ who said what since way back around the Flood. By now she’d also spent better’n fifty years watchin’ Schitts deal with goats. She didn’t need ta count every goat in Little Schitt’s ta know the old way of doin’ things wasn’t keepin’ up anymore.
Woman knew, n’ she saw it commin’ plain as rain:
Problem A — Numbers –There are simply more goats.
Problem B — Infrastructure – A fence, road, bridge, common, pen, gate or property arrangement has changed, fer people, not necessarily a goat!
Problem C — Behavior/custom – Things goats—and Schitts—have been doing harmlessly for generations are fixin’ ta come bite ‘em in the butt!
Nobody recognizes that A + B + C = 1886. … that is Henry kind of sipherin, but God rest his soul, he laid down ta rest in 1884.
1886 — THE GREAT GOAT INCIDENT: “Oh Schitt!”
Abigail had warned ‘em.
Course, warnin’ a Schitt n’ gittin’ a Schitt ta listen ain’t necessarily the same thing.
By 1886, there wus plenty of rules, understandings, marks n’ records ta tell folks whose goat wus whose. Problem wus, some folks had gotten pretty good at makin’ sure the goat said whatever they needed it ta say.
A borrowed goat might stay borrowed considerably longer than anybody originally agreed. Ear marks occasionally got “corrected.” Tags got replaced. A doe might leave home with no kids n’ somehow come back months later with no mention whatsoever of the eight or ten youngins she’d produced while she wus gone.
Pastures got borrowed too, sometimes without botherin’ the fellow who owned the pasture. Gates got left open. Fences had a peculiar habit of fallin’ over at convenient times, then gittin’ propped back up once the goats had finished whatever business somebody claimed they weren’t supposed ta be doin’.
Everybody knew it wus happenin’. Nobody agreed how much.
N’ everybody had a perfectly reasonable explanation fer their goat.
Problem wus, folks had forgotten a few things the goats hadn’t.
Goats knew where they’d been fed. They knew where they’d been bred.
They knew which herd they’d spent time with. They knew which gate usually opened.
They knew which fence had a weak spot.
N’ as we’ve already mentioned, a goat that knows where home is sometimes has its own opinion about where home happens ta be.
One day, the folks noticed a few goats movin, the next day they noticed MORE goats movin, n’ afore ya know it, a whole lotta goats were changin’ where they’d been stayin, n’ movin’ where they were gunna go …. Didn’t ask a single Schitt afore doin’ it either. By fall, the dern goats had rearranged themselves n’ there weren’t a darn thing a Schitt could do about it. Seems, once a goat made it’s mind up …. WELL —–
Seems once a goat made its mind up, convincin’ it otherwise wus a whole different matter.
Folks tried takin’ goats back. Some stayed. Some didn’t. A few wus returned two er three times before everybody finally got tired of walkin’ the same goat back n’ forth. Fences got fixed, gates got shut, goats got penned, n’ somehow a few of the stubborn things still ended up right back where they’d decided they belonged.
That’s when things started gittin’ uncomfortable.
A goat somebody’d claimed fer years went home with somebody else’s herd. Kids followed does they supposedly weren’t related to. Borrowed goats remembered pastures they’d supposedly left long before, n’ more than one newly marked goat seemed considerably more familiar with an old home than the paperwork suggested it oughta be.
Now, a goat can’t testify.
But it sure can walk.
Folks could argue over marks. They could argue over tags. They could argue over what wus borrowed, traded, owed, bred, promised, lost, found, stole, misplaced er misunderstood.
Harder ta argue with a goat standin’ in somebody else’s pasture refusin’ ta come back.
N’ by then, Abigail didn’t hafta say much. She remembered who borrowed what, who traded what, whose doe kidded where, n’ which explanation had changed somewhere along the way.
Seems the goats remembered some of it too.
BY THE END OF 1886…
Things wus different.
Folks suddenly got considerably more particular ’bout whose goat wus whose. Marks got looked at closer. Borrowin’ a goat started needin’ more than somebody hollerin’ “I’ll bring ‘er back.” If a borrowed doe kidded while she wus gone, folks wanted ta know whose youngins they were before there wus ten of ’em standin’ around waitin’ fer somebody ta decide.
Pastures mattered too. If the land weren’t yours, seems it became a mighty good idea ta ask afore turnin’ goats loose on it. Fences got fixed a little quicker, gates got watched a little closer, n’ an accidentally fallen fence started gittin’ considerably more attention than it had before.
Most important, folks started takin’ the records seriously.
The Caprine Register hadn’t suddenly appeared because of the Great Goat Incident. Schitts had been workin’ toward better records for years because there wus simply too much goat business ta keep straight anymore.
1886 jus’ gave everybody a reason ta quit fibbin’ in it.
Because 1886 broke the old system permanently.
Now, afore somebody gets all particular, no, a goat walkin’ someplace don’t make it legal proof of ownership. Archives knows that.
But when a goat that’s supposedly never been somewhere keeps goin’ back there, joins a herd it supposedly don’t know, n’ brings along six kids nobody claimed existed…
well, ya might wanna look at the paperwork again.
“The goats did not settle ownership. They settled several arguments.”