Free The Year the Lights Came On by Terry Kay

dignity and as very important people was a most novel method of discipline.
    *
    In midafternoon, Margret Simmons arrived, driving the Hudson. Mr. Simmons interrupted our window washing and led us to the lunchroom, where Mrs. Simmons was spooning generous portions of home-cranked ice cream into soup bowls.
    “This is peach ice cream, boys,” Mr. Simmons announced, reaching for the dasher. “Now, you may not like it, but I do, and if my wife’s doing the turning, then it’ll be peach. And that’s something you boys will do well to remember: when you’re looking for a wife, find a woman willing to crank the ice cream freezer—or at least find one that’s willing to help you do it.”
    We laughed fully. It was the first time we had ever heard Mr. Simmons attempt humor.
    Mrs. Simmons spoke warmly to each of us. She offered oatmeal cookies. She praised us for working on Sunday. She playfully massaged my neck.
    I loved Margret Simmons.
    We enjoyed the ice cream, the ease, the calmness, the informality of being with our teachers. Wade Simmons was relaxed and—and unorganized. His voice was different—lighter, quicker, less official. And she—she was girlish, free with laughter, slyly playing sly games with her husband, telling him in her own language that she was proud of what he was doing.
    The mood was party, and even the question Wesley asked did not change that mood.
    Wesley said, “Mr. Simmons, did you have electricity when you was little?”
    Mr. Simmons laughed. “No, Wesley, I didn’t. And on that farm where I grew up, it’s still not there.”
    “You mean, you didn’t have electricity, either?” responded Otis, surprised.
    “Not at all, Otis. Not at all,” Mr. Simmons replied. “You know what I remember about electricity? What I remember most about it? You know what it was?”
    We did not know.
    “Well, it was reading a story. A story about a chicken in Kentucky. It was, I think, nineteen-thirty-eight or thirty-nine. Anyway, this chicken was raised in a hen house that had electric lights, and one day the chicken up and produced an egg shaped exactly like an electric bulb.”
    Freeman was amazed. “I don’t believe it,” he exclaimed. “Is that right, Mr. Simmons? A light bulb?”
    “That’s right, Freeman. That chicken was known as the Inspired Kentucky Pullet, but that was just a name. Pullets don’t lay eggs. Still, newspapers all over the world carried stories of that egg. It was even displayed in the World’s Fair in New York. That chicken had sermons preached about it. Yessir, there were some preachers who said it was a sign from God that electricity was hatching and, someday, electricity would be everywhere.”
    We were sincerely moved by the story of the Inspired Kentucky Pullet. Otis was very nearly converted, for he confessed openly that it must have been God’s work and he would give anything to see a picture of that egg.
    “I’ll try to find one for you,” promised Mr. Simmons. “Once, in college, I wrote a paper on the effects of electricity on farm families, and it seems to me I have a clipping of that egg.”
    “I’d be grateful, Mr. Simmons,” Otis said. “I surely would.”
    “Well, I guess I know how you boys feel about electricity,” Mr. Simmons continued easily. “Growing up the way I did, the way you boys are growing up, I used to wonder why we were always being put down, too. You know, it just goes to show you that people are curious. People are always and forever looking down on other people for the strangest reasons—like not liking somebody because somebody else said he came from a bad family, or not wanting to eat certain kinds of good, nutritional food because somebody else said it tasted awful, or not wanting to see other people do good because their nose is too long, or their eyes are brown, or their skin is black or red or yellow…”
    And we sat, listening and nodding agreement.
    Later it occurred to us that Wade Simmons had performed his noblest