Pork Belly Smith

This old man, J. Cicero Smith, was known as Pork Belly Smith. He did raise pigs but that wasn't why he got the nick name Pork Belly. It was because he was so fascinated with the daily stock report on the radio station he listened to that always mentioned pork belly futures. He always knew the current numbers and presented them to who ever he was talking to, on a regular basis. Now I reckon y'all know that in the old days pigs were slaughtered on cold days for obvious reasons. It was usually done out of doors and needed to be done quickly and salted and stored in a smoke house right away. One day, as the story goes, Pork Belly was walking into Harper on a real hot day. A salesman must have felt sorry for him because he picked him up. This was back in the fifties and the salesman had a new car with an air conditioner specially installed under the glove compartment. Pork Belly sat there in a stream of cold air and after about a quarter mile asked the salesman to stop and let him out. When asked why he replied, "I didn't know it were gonna turn off cold. I got to get home and kill hogs."