Several years ago I published a hunting story entitled "The Sniper." It was about an old Russian teacher that I knew in California many years ago. He was not a "sniper" as most people understand that name/word to imply, a military or police sharpshooter. Rather he was a sniper in a classic sense, how the name "sniper" originally came about!
For those who are unfamiliar, a snipe is a small, long beaked bird of the shore bird family that was always considered a top game bird among European sportsmen. It is called variously in different languages, becassine in French, beccaccino in Italian, bekazz in Russian, shigi in Japanese, and of course, snipe in English. But whatever it is called, it was a very popular game bird that is considered a delicacy on the table and an extremely difficult target for the hunter. Because it is such a difficult bird to hit on the wing, a hunter who is successful in hitting this bird with some degree of consistency was called a "sniper," an ultimate compliment for shooting prowess. Somewhere along the line, the name "sniper" was transferred to military marksmen to denote superior marksmanship. So there, a bit of trivia about the origin of the name/word sniper.
The old Russian teacher that I knew, being of old school, was an avid snipe hunter. Today snipe are rarely if every pursued by modern hunters. The bird is just too small and too difficult to hit. In today's world where bigger is better, such small quarry, no matter how sporting, is ignored. But back in the old days, in the 19th and early to mid 20th Century, sportsmen used to sing the praises of this small bird, everyone from Ivan Turgenev of the 19th Century to Ernest Hemingway of the 20th! But, be that as it may, this is not about the difficult winged target, but rather about the fascinating old Russian that I knew.
Many years ago, when Beatles were still performing as a group, I was getting ready to go off to graduate school to earn my doctorate in Comparative Literature. Since Russian literature was one of the subject areas of my study, I needed to brush up on my Russian reading and writing before going off to the East Coast to pursue my degree. I decided to audit some Russian classes at the local junior college rather than at the four year college. It was a lot cheaper to audit the classes at a JC than at a four year school, and money was very difficult to come by for a graduate student! So I approached the Russian instructor at Santa Rosa Junior College and asked him if it would be alright to audit his class. The old gentleman, who was in his mid 70s and somewhat frail at the time, said it was fine with him. So I began auditing his class that September, a year before going off to the East Coast.
I became very good friends with Vladimir Vorobey, the old instructor. We used to chat a lot during class breaks and after class, and I learned some fascinating things about him. He in turn learned about my passion for hunting and told me that he too used to be a hunter in his younger days, and especially enjoyed pursuing snipe. That is how we got into the whole thing of going hunting together, but back to the old man and his story.
Vladimir Vorobey was a short, bandy-legged Cossack. He was a Don Cossack and an officer in the Tsarist army during the Russian Revolution and the First World War. He fought in the war first, then when Russia pulled out of the war because of the revolution, he was detailed to guard the Romanoffs! He was in charge of one of the smaller details that guarded the Tsar's family. Then he was taken off the detail and sent somewhere else to fight the Bolsheviks. During his absence the Bolsheviks took over the palace and moved the Tsar's family to Yekaterinbug by the Urals. He was once more detailed to try to rescue the Tsar's family and after much difficulty, his detachment was able to reach Yekaterinburg, but too late. According to him the Romanoffs were all murdered and their bodies dumped in a mine shaft. He said that he and his troops retrieved the bodies and gave them proper burial in the woods, in a hidden location to keep Bolsheviks from uncovering the spot and desecrating the remains. He said it was one of the most difficult things that he ever had to do in his life!
When the Tsarist forces were defeated, like many other survivors, he fled Russia. Some went west, others, like Vorobey, went east. He ended up in China and the only employment he could get was to hire out as a mercenary to a Chinese warlord's army. He went to work for Chiang Tso Lin's army, the warlord of Manchuria! He was given a commission as a captain but was soon promoted to major and put in charge of training the warlord's army. He spent five years doing that, but got tired of soldiering and left the services of Chiang Tso Lin. He then attempted to make a living as a professional hunter, shooting mainly deer and wild boar which he sold on the market. He partnered with another ex-Russian officer and the two of them had a fairly successful enterprise going. But he tired of that as well. As he said, there really wasn't much of a future in being a professional hunter! He bounced around from one job to another, everything from being a policeman to a doorman at a fancy hotel. Then through sheer luck, he managed to secure a visa for the United States and ended up in America.
However, his arrival in America did not end his hardship! He arrived in the land of opportunity right smack in the middle of Depression and Prohibition Era! He ended up in San Francisco in a large Russian émigré community. He worked at all sorts of odd jobs, barely surviving. However, he worked very hard and managed to save some money, plus he had some savings that he brought with him, savings from his better days in China. He did not like being in the city, among other Russian immigrants. He told me that the immigrants were always squabbling amongst each other and he didn't like the crowded city life. So, he moved north, across San Francisco Bay to a small community called Healdsburg. He bought about 15 acres of land outside of Healdsburg along Mill Creek. There was nothing there, no running water, no electricity. But the land was cheap and he used his hard earned money to pay for it.
The first several months he actually "camped" on his property, lived in a tent. He built a small cabin first, all by hand, using hand tools. There were no power tools back then! In the meantime he worked at whatever job he could find to feed himself and to buy building supplies! In that fashion he built several more small cabins along Mill Creek, on his property. He also managed to get the power company to run some power lines to his cabins. He first supplemented his income by holding poker games on his property during the summer. I am sure there was also some illegal booze flowing freely at those parties! One of the participants in these card games was a local head of power company, so that is how he was able to get power lines running to his property!
Eventually, he was able to build a house above the creek and the cabins. It was amazing how he was able to build a house with no professional help, only friends helping out when they could. The house was a solid structure that was very comfortable, roomy, and built exactly to his liking! He lived in that house the rest of his life.
Once the house was completed, he decided that he would seek employment locally and landed a job teaching Russian at the local community college. He was a university graduate, but he did not have an advanced degree so he could not teach at a four year school. A pity, because he was an excellent teacher and many more students would have benefited from taking his classes if he could have taught at a four year school.
With the teaching job and completed house, life became more settled. He rented out the cabins during summer months so he had some supplemental income as well. He was doing well, so he married and they had a daughter. Eventually he cut back on his teaching and by the time I met him, he was in semi retirement, teaching only one class. He said he needed to keep that one class to stay young, to keep in touch with young people!
I left for the East Coast after that academic year. Before returning to California, I had secured a teaching job at Santa Rosa Junior College. I was to teach a class in Modern Japanese Literature and another in Modern Russian Literature. So when I returned to California I went to Santa Rosa JC to discuss my forthcoming semester with the Dean. I was somewhat taken by surprise when during our meeting he asked if I would be interested in teaching Russian. I asked if Vorobey wasn't teaching anymore and the Dean told me that the old man had passed away that summer! I was hesitant to take the class, it felt kind of odd taking over the old man's class. But the Dean said that they needed someone because the class had been scheduled already and that I would only teach until they found a permanent replacement. I reluctantly agreed and ended up teaching Russian for that academic year, my only time teaching a foreign language during my teaching career!
No comments:
Post a Comment