Getting the big television know-it-alls to tone down the sex and violence is like trying to nail jelly to the barn door.

I was watching some Congressional hearings where our national leaders were wailing, weeping and wringing their hands about how television needed to come to its senses.

I learned that a child in America will watch 19,000 incidents of violence by the time he or she reaches the age of 18.

I have tried to remember the first time I ever witnessed anything of a violent nature, and I guess it would have to be the days when my mother scooped up a fat rooster and wrung its neck so we could have chicken for Sunday company.

It was also good news to me when I came home after school on Fridays to see a half-dozen chicken heads in our yard near the bloody chopping block. It meant we’d be heading out for a fishing trip and picnic on Saturday.

In addition to chicken heads, there was also the American Legion-sponsored community rabbit hunts popular as social events and for fundraising in the 1930s.

My dad took me on one in the 1930s before I was old enough to handle a gun.

The hunters all met on the gravel road around some previously selected square mile area known to harbor rabbits. The hunters were divided into four groups assigned a mile stretch of road. The rabbits didn’t know it, but they were surrounded and their fate was sealed.

On signal, everyone started walking toward the center of the section and the rabbits scurried ahead. No shots were fired into the square because it was too dangerous for the stalkers. If a rabbit ran out of the square, then it was gangbusters. As the square became smaller and smaller, the rabbits were thick as pepper on a Stu Melby fried egg down at Cook’s Café.

Some tried to sprint away but were clubbed to death before they made it. Baseball bats and two by fours slaughtered most of the penned up rabbits. Many did not go gently into the good night, and squealed a mournful sound before another blow silenced them for good.

Those that did make it out of the human net were shot as they ran away from the closing square of hunters and clubbers. It was the job of kids like me to retrieve the fallen rabbits.

We grabbed them by the ears and lugged them to hay racks and wagons brought into the center of the section to carry away the harvest. We heaved them up on to the piles where they landed limply, one atop the other, all to be carted off.

I remember being amazed by the number of dead rabbits – jackrabbits mostly – in those wagons and racks. Hundreds, maybe thousands, were removed from just that one section of land.

I do not fault my dad and the other veterans who participated in these massive rabbit hunts. They were helping reduce the rabbit population during a time when every bit of every cash crop made a difference to some farm family, and indirectly, to those of us in town.  

It was also a social event that brought men and boys of all ages together to enjoy the hunt and the aftermath of camaraderie over hot coffee and donuts back in town at the Legion Hall. The rabbits were not wasted. They were sold for their fur and meat. The income went to charitable uses.

The hunt brought together those living in small flatland towns and on the neighboring farms. They taught us how to work together for the good of the larger community and a common cause.  

We learned to feel the pain and the anguish of suffering creatures, too. Back then it was a different kind of violence. We were shooting rabbits, not people.

If you’d like to comment, email the author at cfcecil@swiftel.net.