By Heidi Zemach

Special to The Ridgway Record

 An estimated 75 people turned out Thursday to attend a Civil War Bean Dinner at the Johnsonburg Community Center, as originally served by the Women’s Relief Corp to benefit Civil War Veterans in the 1920s and 1930s.
The event was sponsored by the Johnsonburg Recreation Board, the Community Center and Flemish House Gallery, and proceeds will go toward renovation of the historic center. As residents enjoyed dining on baked beans, potato salads, pickles, cornbread and molasses spice cake. Kay Gnan, playing the concertina, and the Red Hat ladies provided entertainment, as the Red Hat ladies performed the Virginia Reel, played on a black vinyl record phonograph.
Gnan played popular songs of the era, including Yankee Doodle, Dixie, Beautiful Dreamer, and Old Gray Mare. Audience members clapped and sang along with the concertina music, and when they recognized the national anthem, stood and faced the flag, their hands over their hearts.
Except for the plastic trays and forks, the food was pretty much the same as the popular Saturday bean bakes served decades earlier in the old Johnsonburg City Hall by the Women’s Relief Corps during fundraisers for aging Civil War Veterans.
Few in attendance could remember the old bean suppers, held at a time when Civil War Veterans were still around to attend, some wearing their uniforms and medals. But some did remember their parents reminiscing about them. To put the event more into historical perspective, President Abraham Lincoln would have been 200, had he been alive today.
Civil war memorabilia, including civil war tidbits and transcribed diary entries, also were on display. One transcription mentioned Wilcox native Hiram Warner, killed in the battle of Antietam in the closing days of the war.
Another, told the story of Elk County Civil War Veteran Colonel A.A. Clearwater, (1848-1912). Clearwater enlisted as a drummer boy in the N.Y. Volunteer Infantry, Co. D, #156 when he wasn’t yet 14, the age by which boys are allowed to fight. He weighed just 96 pounds. But as soon as he could, Clearwater “threw away his drum and took up the gun.” He was eventually promoted to the rank of Sergeant for “conspicuous bravery.” Later, he was shot in the knee, and crippled for life at Port Hudson, Louisiana. All businesses closed down in Wilcox from noon to 3:30 p.m. for his funeral in 1912, as citizens remembered Clearwater as “a gallant soldier and citizen” who was “mourned with great sadness” — the brave drummer boy who gave up his drum for a gun!
Other display items included an old tin nutmeg grater, “jews harps,” an apple corer, clay pipe, eye cup, blue Union uniforms, and a period dress gown used in re-enactments. A wooden platter displayed food items commonly used by soldiers in the field. The mainstay of soldier’s rations was: coffee, Hardtack, Johnny Cake (or cornbread), beans, salted beef or pork, bacon, sugar, salt, vinegar, dried fruits or vegetables when available. If coffee wasn’t available, one of the substitutes suggested was ripe acorns. An old military manual of the time tells soldiers to wash ripe acorns in their shells, dry them and parch them until they open. Then take the shells off, and roast them with a little bacon fat for a “splendid cup of coffee.” 
Troops also roasted fresh eggs by standing them on end in hot ashes, or they boiled them hard, and carried them in their pockets. As for beans, General E. Lee, Commander of the Southern Army, allegedly declared that his soldiers loved baked beans so much that all he had to do to keep them happy was give them beans three times a day. Three songs were written about beans and sung throughout the war, according to the historical trivia provided.
Following the bean bake, Dennis McGeehan, a local photographer and historian gave a slide show presentation on Gettysburg, the Bucktail Regiments, and more history of local interest. Civil War history and reenactments are still very popular, and the name Bucktail can be seen all around the area, said McGeehan, who teaches history at Penn State DuBois. He makes sure to spend time talking about what soldiers ate, and the other things they did rather than focus on the fighting – which usually took no more than an hour or two of their lives. Most of their time was spent walking, eating and fighting boredom, McGeehan said. His students find themselves enjoying history a lot more than they expected, McGeehan said.
As every new semester begins, McGeehan prepares himself by subtracting 18 years to try and figure out what his college-age students might already know about. He realized recently that most of them weren’t even born when Ronald Reagan was President – and that kind of shocked him. In turn, the students are amazed to hear that McGeehan saw President John F. Kennedy in person. Some of them figure that their teacher must be ancient to have experienced that, he joked. But like the Bean Bake, the majority of his slide-show audiences usually tend to be older people. The older you are the more interested in history you are likely to become — perhaps because you’ve actually lived some of it, McGeehan said. Pointing around the community center gymnasium at the women dancing, and those eating their bean dinners, McGeehan said, “See, history is always with us. You just don’t recognize it as history today — but it will be.”