My friend Joe Murray, who was editor of The Lufkin Daily News when it won the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service, used to say that every crime story in East Texas begins like this: “Earl and Joe Bob was down at the icehouse drinking when one of them got an idea.”
Such are the origins of crime in East Texas.
In a note on the first demagogue (July 11, 2022), I mentioned that the democracy in Athens fell while Theseus was in hell for four years. The note said Theseus’s stay in hell was a story for a later day, and a reader wanted to hear it.
It’s an Earl and Joe Bob story. Theseus’s accomplice was a character named Peirithous the Lapith. The Lapiths and Centaurs were, in the eyes of civilized Greeks, primitive mountain folk. They were the butts of jokes. Centaurs were the subjects of scurrilous rumors about being overly fond of horses.
Peirithous was rustling cattle in Attica when Theseus intervened. Neither had seen such a fine specimen of manhood. They realized they were equals and became lifelong friends.
When both lost their wives, they got to thinking, probably at an ancient icehouse. Peirithos proposed that they go to Sparta and abduct Helen, the dazzling daughter of Zeus. Once they had her, they’d flip for her. Then they’d find another daughter of Zeus, a consolation prize.
Theseus won the flip, but Helen was only 12 so he had to hide her away. Peirithos was as low as a snake, as they say in East Texas, and so the two friends went to consult the Oracle of Zeus. The Oracle replied: “Why don’t ya’ll go down to Tartarus and just steal Persephone, the wife of Hades?”
Failure to recognize sarcasm is sometimes a problem among the criminal class.
So the ancient Joe Bob and Earl snuck into hell by the back way.To their surprise, Hades, god of the underworld, welcomed them warmly. He sat them in a seat of honor, the Chair of Forgetfulness. The chair immediately fuses with human flesh so that a person can’t get up without ripping himself apart.
For four years, the ancient versions of Joe Bob and Earl were tortured by snakes and Furies and were gnawed on by Kerberos, the hound of hell.
Theseus languished until Herakles rescued him. Herakles had the strength to separate Theseus from the chair, although most of Theseus’s butt was left behind. Just as the Hapsburgs, through intermarriage, had a distinctive jaw, the families that claimed descent from Theseus all had miniscule, underdeveloped glutes. Or so the ancient Greeks said. Inventive mythmakers solve all kinds of mysteries, great and small.
Ancient sources disagree about whether Peirithous got out. Theseus was never the same. While he was locked up, Helen’s brothers rescued her and a demagogue ended democracy in Athens.
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