Diane Rusch Zinn, Summer Days on the Ninnescah

The Ninnescah River

The Ninnescah River is a 57 mile long tributary of the Arkansas River.  The name derives from the Osage Dakota tribe and means clear spring water.  The water I remember from my growing-up years was certainly not clear; it was a muddy, mossy brown.  But the river and our rustic cabin on its shores were our family retreat from the time I was  about four until my parents sold it when I was in my early twenties.

Access to it always mystified me.  Driving south on Broadway to Waco Wigo, where we bought supplies, then turning west somewhere and driving through what seemed to be a roadless area through trees and sand, the cabin magically appeared.  First we passed my aunt and uncle’s cabin (much nicer than ours with an antique fridge and a  separate bedroom).  We used a Coleman cooler for food, Coleman lanterns for light (we still have one or two of those), and a hand pump in the kitchen sink for water.  The cabin was screened in and had wooden awnings we opened for light and fresh air.  I remember no place to sit or what the beds were like.  Of course, there was the outhouse, always crawling with granddaddy spiders.

My parents loved to fish, and for this we strung trot-lines across the river, baited with crawfish.  My dad always tied an old cowbell to the line;  its ring meant we had a fish.  That bell is still around.  When Dick and I settled in Lawrence and our kids roamed our neighborhood, we rang that bell to call them home.  I painted it bright red.  It served its purpose for many years for us until Jenni, our youngest child, requested the bell to use to call her children home from their neighborhood play.  It still resides on her kitchen windowsill even though her youngest is twelve and they are living in a loft in Nashua, NH.

Preparing to fish was a family affair.  I helped with the tying and baiting of the trot-lines, but never had to help clean the fish.  We strung the line across the river, tied on both sides to secure branches.  The individual lines for fish were knotted in some fashion from the main line, weighted with a sinker, and baited with crawfish.  My sophomore year at East, in my speech class for a demonstration speech, I actually assembled a trot-line segment.  That’s also where I first met Gene Carter, the beginning of a life-long friendship.

For fun, of course swimming was a natural.  One time my dad and I floated the river in our inner tubes.  Target shooting with a 22 at cans stacked next to sand banks was a great pastime, and I loved to find schools of tadpoles in shallows along the river and check their development daily.  Exploring the sandbars, I looked for shells and one time came across a large, dead gar.

One year a huge rain caused the river to flood its banks and fill our cabin with a fine silt that was inches deep on the cabin floor.  With nothing but a shovel and buckets, the clean-up seemed to take forever.

In the eighth grade, I hosted a party.  We all rode down in a van, hung out in the river, and had a weiner roast as I recall.  Hopefully some of the kids who became classmates at East will remember the details better than I do.  Charles Briscoe did lead us in some singing. Mainly, we played in the river and had fun.

Left to right, back row: Marilyn Tompkins Bellert, Dianne Pope Kitch, Carolyn Wharton Holloway, a neighbor.  Left to right, front row: Charles Briscoe, George Palmer, Bob Kinzy, Jim Fugitt, Bob Wallick

Once I became a student at East, I did my best to avoid going to our cabin over weekends.  East activities and the social life were much more appealing than being alone with my parents.  The only condition for my staying home alone was that I had to have someone stay with me.  That someone was Carolyn Wharton Holloway; we had wonderful late-night times together at my house.

Other than a trip to Lake of the Ozarks when I was 10, we didn’t travel until I was 15, so the Ninnescah cabin was our sole get-away.  I remember it fondly and often wish I could retrace the drive and find it.  Of course, it’s not there anymore, but the memories remain.