The Education of Little Tree

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It began at the Jericho Mine,

Jericho City, Tennessee,

in the year 1935,

the day after Ma died.

She'd lasted only a year after

Pa was killed in the army.

That's how I came to live with

Granma and Granpa when I was eight.

One time, Granma told me that

when you come on something good,

first thing to do is stare it

with whosoever you can find.

That way, the good spreads out,

we're no telling how far it'll go.

Which is right.

So I'm telling the

story of them days,

how Granma and Granpa got

me away from Aunt Martha

and took me to live

in their mountains,

where they'd raised

my pa before me,

and which I know now was the

secret heart of the world.

You stop, right where you stand!

I said no!

You ain't goin' off with no backwoods

white Indian so long as I got breath.

Sally was my sister

and she gave him to us.

Put a hand to it,

Henry, for Jesus' sake.

You can't waltz in here and carry

him off to some God-forsaken...

Martha, leave him be.

It ain't right.

It ain't right, by damn!

Wales, he's wearin' out.

Yeah.

Are you OK, son?

Take the light.

You ain't wakening

him his first morning?

Just giving him the option, is all.

Little Tree, are you

awake enough to hear me?

We're heading up to the corn patch.

Figure you might like to help.

- Wales!

- It's up to you.

Come on, now!

Well, now!

Go on, get off him!

They're heartened to see someone new.

They get plenty of Granma and me.

That's Blue Boy.

They the only shoes you got?

Bet you can't feel a

thing through them soles.

We'll take care of that.

To learn, you got to feel the ground.

All right... You'll stay!

She's coming alive!

Don't feel sad, Little Tree.

It's the Way.

The falcon caught the slow bird, so

it won't have no babies that are slow.

It helps the bird out, you see?

It's a lesson. Animals

know that, just look around.

Only the white man takes

more than his share.

He'll claim whatever he can,

no matter how much it is.

He'll run his flag up, saying,

"This stands for my right to more. "

Then there'll be a war

over it and men'll die.

Like your daddy.

You're saying, "Hold on there, I

thought Granpa was a white man. "

It's the truth. I was born

white, no doubt about it.

But, when I met your granma,

how young she was and...

...how she could dance!

We married and I began to see

the world through Cherokee eyes,

till I came at last

to understand the Way.

And so will you, Little Tree.

You'll learn you can't

change the rules of the Way,

even if you are

white, and that's that.

My ma was white.

As was mine.

Fine a woman as ever lived.

- As was mine.

- She was.

She pleased your

daddy, too. He told us.

Dictionary.

As he can't get to the

settlement every day for school,

a crying shame, nothing

we can do about it,

I plan to each him

myself. All I know, anyhow.

Look at the first word.

Can you make out what it says?

Aard... vark.

Aardvark.

Aard... what?

Large, burrowing, African mammal

that feeds on ants and termites.

That's his first word?

Tell me, when is the occasion going

to arise for him to employ this word?

- Can't never tell.

- Yeah, that's right, Little Tree.

You go to the settlement, you never

can tell what's going to come up.

You know, like,

"Little Tree's downcast.

Seems he lost his aardvark. "

"That's funny," says Mr. Jenkins.

"Miss Perkins is having

trouble with her aardvark, too.

"Had to go all the way to Knoxville,

up to hospital, have her whole

dang aardvark removed!

"She's resting comfortable

now, but... Them aardvarks!"

You can't never tell!

You'll stay!

How old are you going to

be on your next birthday?

- Nine. Come March 22.

- That's what I thought.

Then it is time you

started on a trade.

- That's her.

- What does she do?

She makes whiskey!

Ain't you ever seen a still afore?

This here's my trade.

Whiskey-making.

Been handed down on the Scots

side of my family for 200 years.

I'm going to hand it down to you.

Of course, when you get older,

you might want to switch trades.

Leastways you'll have

something to fall back on

when you're pressed

otherwise to make a living.

Times like these here, hard times.

Now, this...

...you call the beer.

What we're going to do today

is turn the beer into whiskey.

OK.

Pour away!

This here is pure corn.

Some fellows, and this is what

gives whiskey-making a bad name,

some fellows use potash or

even lye to make the mash quick.

Some put it through sheet

iron or truck radiators,

got all kind of poisons

that can kill you.

Now, these fellows ought

to be hung, in my opinion.

Then there's the other side, them

that say whiskey ought to be aged.

I tried that once. Set back some

fresh-made for a whole god damn week.

By the bye, there's a word you won't

find in your granma's dictionary,

so you probably shouldn't

try it out on her, OK?

OK.

Now... where was I?

You set some fresh-made

back a whole goddam week.

Week, yeah...

Didn't taste a damn lick different

from all the other whiskey I ever made.

I'm gonna raise the flame

on this a little bit.

See? You want to boil it, but

you don't want to scorch it.

What I could use is just one

more armload of good dry wood.

I'll get it, Granpa!

You be Little Tree?

Well, let's see what you brung.

Little Tree, this here's Willow John.

He has the magic.

- What do you reckon?

- Ain't you gonna taste it?

Well, this is what you call

your single. Damn near 200 proof.

We only get a couple of gallons of it.

You add water, start over again,

and that's how you get

your selling whiskey, see?

Still, a man ought to know

what his single tastes like,

seeing as how it's the

backbone of the whiskey and all.

That's out of the

early corn. Got a...

Don't know what you'd call

it, exactly. A kind of a...

- Bite.

- Bite.

Yeah, that'd be it.

- Have you told him of our history?

- Not as yet.

He should know.

- It's a hard tale.

- It is that.

But if you don't know your

past, you won't have a future.

Why don't y'all leave

it up to the boy?

This here's a story about your

ancestors Little Tree,

and how they come to be here.

Do you care to know?

I do.

Well, now...

...the Cherokee have lived in these

hills since the Doda put 'em there.

They farmed in the valleys,

made the winter hunts,

and taught themselves the Way.

But then the white man come

and the Cherokee made

a paper treaty with him.

They said, "These white men ain't

so bad. We could live together. "

Then government soldiers came and said

the paper treaty had changed its words.

Now the words said the Cherokee

had to give up their homes

and move far west, where the

government had other lands for them.

Lands that the white man

didn't want, of course.

While the Cherokee were trying to

understand, the government soldiers

found this big old valley and

ringed it in with their guns,

and drove the Cherokee

in there just like cattle.

And they filled up that whole valley.

Then they brought in mules and horses

and said they could ride out west.

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