Bear Grease - Ep. 463: This Country Life - Allis Chalmers and the Callapalooza

Episode Date: June 5, 2026

Summer is just heating up and Brent's talking about duck hunting. Actually he attended an event in the Rice and Duck Capitol of the World in Stuttgart, Arkansas. He's gonna share how that event, "The Callapalooza", was started and detail his involvement. He's also sharing a listener story about an old tractor that'll warm your heart. All that and more on this week's "This Country Life" podcast. Take the listener survey: themeateater.com/grease Thank you to our sponsors, Case Knives and Stor-Mor. Shop This Country Life Merch Connect with Brent and MeatEater MeatEater on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, and Youtube Clips Subscribe to the MeatEater Podcast Network on YouTube Shop This Country Life MerchSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Welcome to this country life. I'm your host, Brent Reeves. From Coon Hunting to Trotlining and Just General Country Living, I want you to stay a while as I share my experiences and life lessons. This Country Life is presented by Case Knives from the Storemore Studio on Meat Eat Eaters Podcast Network, bringing you the best outdoor podcasts the Airways have to offer. All right, friends, grab a chair or drop that tailgate. I've got some stories to share.

Alice Chalmers and the Collapalooza. One of the first installments of this weekly endeavor had a story in it about a tractor. And this one is no different. But instead of happening in South Arkansas, this isn't is way up yonder in New York. Now, once we navigate that nostalgic tale that I know you're going to enjoy, I'm going to catch you up on a recent event of the place that I attended just this last weekend. I'm going to tell you all about it. So join me at the fire.

Let's get started. This week's opening tale comes from this country life listener, Ryan Marti. The story takes place way up yonder in Carthage, New York. I'd never heard of Carthage, but according to Google Maps, Fort Drum is just up the road, and a little over 30 miles as the crow flies northwest is Canada. You remember Canada, of course you do. That's where our brothers and sisters to the north live with the second best Olympic hockey team. Anyway, Ryan's grandpa Jim was as country as cornbread, worked at a machine shop and farmed a truck

patch on the side. And here's a glimpse into Mr. Jim's life in Ryan's words using my voice. My paternal grandpa was a humble man. He worked hard for what he had and didn't. on the thing that he hadn't earned. He took pride in what he had, even if some of those possessions were considered antiques by the turn of the 21st century. Besides his wife and grandkids, the two things he took the most pride in were his barn,

which looked like it could have fell over if you looked at it wrong, and the quirky little tractor that called it home. Now, the tractor was an Alice Chalmers G with a serial number two, 2.509, dating it to between 1948 and 1949, one of the first years of production for this particular model. Its Persian orange paint was sunburned and chipping, and the faint outline of the Alice Chalmers decal that had long since disappeared from the hood spoke to how much work this tractor had done over the years. The Almas Chalmers G was a small tractor, specifically designed for

vegetable gardens and truck farmers. Its unique rear engine and tubular frame design allowed farming implements such as cultivators and mowers to be mounted beneath the tractor, enabling the operators to easily see the implement working on the ground. The bright Persian orange paint only added to its quirky appearance. Designed for small-scale farming, these tractors came with a variety of implements, including sicklebar mowers and cultivators. single row cedars.

Over its seven years of production, nearly 29,000 units rolled off that assembly line. Alice Chalmers ended up under my grandpa's ownership sometime in the mid-1970s when he bought it, along with several implements from someone in the next town over. After the cash had exchanged hands, he drove it to five miles back home, where it spent the rest of its working life

cultivating the nearly two-acre garden that produced vegetables that were sold at roadside for extra income during the harvest season and plowing snow in the wintertime. And while that tractor was a tool that my grandpa used, it was more of a novelty to me as a kid. Summertime found my family spending most weekends at my grandparents' house. With the warmer weather, it came tractor rides around the small property that did and my grandpa called home. Everyone knew a ride was inevitable, but my grandpa never came out offering one. Instead, he waited for my sister and me to tiptoe into the living room and ask the same question each and every week. In short order, we would all be filing down the front steps and climbing into the old

plywood wagon, attached to the drawbar of the tractor. Because the tractor was rear engine, the exhaust blew directly back toward us passengers riding on the wagon. Still, to this day, I don't think I have inhaled as much exhaust as I did during those rides. The real fun began when I started to learn how to drive it. The very first time I was allowed behind the wheel, I did everything I was instructed to do except one thing correctly. I was told to push the clutch in. I did as I was told. I was told to shift it into first gear.

and I did it like it was second nature. Then I was told to let the clutch out slowly, and I dropped that clutch like a bad habit. Being rear engine, that wasn't much weight on the front axle. The front tires jumped off the ground, and the tractor began to buck with me hanging on it for dear life. I said, slowly, let it out slowly, my grandpa holler. I slammed the clutch and the breakdown instantly,

and within just a few more minutes of practice, I was moving through the gears with all four tires. firmly planted where they belong. At the end of the ride, after everyone had gone back into the house, my grandpa and I pulled out the old age-worn tractor manual, and I was given a crash course on the tractor's gear pattern. There on those yellowing pages, my grandpa scribbled a crude diagram of the shift pattern with a little nub of a pencil that sat in the drawer of his workbench.

To me, this was my initiation into the imaginary, Alice Chalmers G Driver Society that I had conjured up in my head that night. Over the years, as my grandpa aged and slowed down, so too did the tractor. He began doing less work that required the steady use of it, and we grew up, making tractor rides seem lame and a thing of the past. Looking back now, there are a few things I wouldn't give to be on that wagon again, getting carted around the yard behind the tractor with my grandpa at the controls. My grandpa passed away in October of 2014,

and at the graveside service, my dad and I joked that we should have politely declined the use of the hearse and used the tractor in a wagon to carry my grandpa's casket to the cemetery. My grandma decided that the tractor would eventually go to me. As the years passed, it was used. less and less until it ended up setting for several years beneath an old canvas tarp. That is where it remained until this past spring, when it made the trip across New York State to me on a trailer behind my dad's truck. It just so happens that a group of men from my church get together every other week and work on

projects in one of the guys' garages. When they heard that I had a project on the way, it was immediately decided that the tractor would become what we would start working on. Within a couple of weeks, it was rolled into the shop, and the tired old tractor that had been sitting, for the better part of a decade, was being brought back to life. After a couple of hours, the four spark plugs had been replaced, and a new battery was installed to provide ignition power for the engine.

Then it was time to look in the gas tank, and one sniff of that tank proved that the fuel had long since gone bad and turned to varnish. inspections showed it was full of vizca substance reminiscent of the maple flavored corn syrup found in a bottle of Aunt Mama on the local grocery store shelf. Once the tank was drained and fresh oil at it, it was time to turn it over. With the pull of the ignition rod, a hooked piece of metal protruding through the rear fender behind the driver's right hip and a couple shots of ether, that engine was awakened from its slumber. smoke belching from the exhaust filled the garage and left a fog-like haze hanging through the room remnants of sunflower seeds and other organic matter shot from the exhaust pipe and littered the floor i took that tractor for its first drive since it had been parked and in typical fashion the front tires went skyward as i let out the clutch all i could think of was my grandfather chuckling while shouting the same phrase i had first heard nearly twenty years

years earlier. I said let it out slowly. I never made it far on that first ride because the clutch hung up, leaving me unable to shift without grinding the gears. We have since fixed that by evicting a family of mice that had made the transmission bell housing their home. Every time I work on this tractor, I can't help but think about a part of my grandpa is still there in the corner of that garage, watching with his little chuckle in a a look of contentment on his face, knowing that this tractor is being brought back to life. Maybe someday, I will heed his advice and let the clutch out slowly. And according to Ryan Marty, the Empire State's own Alice Chalmers test pilot,

that's just how that happened. Well, Ryan, I appreciate you sending that story in, man. There's something that's good. about having something tangible that you can reach out and touch, that you know it's got the fingerprints of the past. Thank you, buddy. Now, just like that old tractor, there are traditions everywhere. But I challenge you to find one with more of an impact on a community that spills out all

over the world like what takes place every fall in winter in Stuttgart, Arkansas. The economic impact of duck season is estimated to be between one. one and five million dollars a day locally and regionally throughout the season with as much as three hundred million dollars coming into the state with a large portion of it funneled through Stuttgart. Stuttgart is one of two county seats sharing those responsibilities with D-Witt that actually sits near the center of the aptly named Arkansas County some 26 miles to the southeast down Highway 165. 21 miles south from DeWitt down that same highway lands you at Arkansas Post.

A fur trade and locale founded in the summer of 1686 by a handful of stinky Frenchmen, eager to swap goodies for beaver pelts. 97 years later in April of 1783, a Revolutionary War Battle was fought at Arkansas Post. It is one of two battles fought west of the Mississippi. River. The other happening in St. Louis. And the one here was the last one on this side of the big muddy that occurred five months prior before England hollered calf rope and started leaving us alone. Now get back on your horse and head back north. Halfway between Arkansas Post and deal with is the community of Gillette. That nugget of Arkansas goodness is the home of the

world famous Gillette Coon Supper. I talked about that event back on episode two. 2017 when I described how to cook a coon. I'm sure I'll talk about it again someday, but all of that American history is and has been taken place in Arkansas, specifically Arkansas County for the last 340 years. That's 90 more than a celebration of America that's taken place later this summer. And all of it, the perilous trip across the ocean that the exploring Spaniards endured. the hardships of the French trappers, and every noteworthy event from then until last Friday

is all led to me being in Stuttgart last week at the Rich and Tone Duck Call Shop as an invited judge for the Duck Blind Breakfast cook-off. And when I think about it that way, my responsibilities as a judge take on a whole other level of historical significance. Of course, I may be the only person looking at it, that way, but who cares? Anyway, Preston Nowland and Blake Fisher, both employees at Richentone

Duck Halls run the cooking competition portion of the event. This is the fifth year for that competition and the second time I've been asked to judge. Last year, I had a scheduling conflict, so I was happy to get this year's booked early when Preston invited me again. The cooking competition is just part of the calla pelusa that has been an annual event since the grand reopening of the call shop in 2019. In 2016, the call shop had been damaged by a devastating fire, and they built back bigger and better. And to celebrate their literal rise from the ashes, the calla pelluzza was born. Now, as I made my way along the hour drive from Casa Day Reeves to Stuttgart, I thought about all the interactions I'd had over the years at the old R&T call shop.

That place wasn't big enough for a cat to swish his tail around and not get it in the gravy. It was adjacent to the old Max Sport Goods location at the corner of North Grand and Highway 79. There, Tim and I would buy shells and clothing and gear, and we'd go at least twice a week as new clients came in to hunt with us. We'd see and talk to Butch Richembach, the man who started Rich in-tone duck calls, in 1976. He'd be there visiting with folks or around the corner in his shop, making and tuning calls. One instance that comes to mind, anytime I hear Mr. Butch's name in passing or R&T for that matter, is a day that Tim and I took a grandfather and grandson from Wisconsin there were hunting with us to Max.

The grandson was our guest and hunting with us through the Hunt of a Lifetime Foundation, an organization dedicated to parent children up to the age of 21 who have terminal illnesses with outfitters and guides to hunting fish. R&T had moved from its original spot and it was located in the structure that would eventually catch fire in 2016. But as we walked around inside looking at all the calls, Mr. Butch walked in. He was small in stature but big in personality and he struck up a conversation with the young. man and his grandfather. Now in short order that conversation turned to duck call. He reached inside a display case and pulled out a hundred dollar duck call and began giving our guests calling lessons. Then he gave that teenager the call and disappeared into

the back down a hallway and out of sight. I'm sure he'd done that many times before and an untold number of times afterwards until he passed away in 2015 just 12, days before his 69th birthday, but that's how I remember Mr. Butch every time. It's impossible for me to think of Stuttgart and not think about duck hunting too, and for many it's the same way with duck hunting and rich in tone calls. John Stevens purchased the business for Mr. Butch in 1999 and has grown it into what it is today. Recovery from that fire was hard, but 10 years later, you wouldn't know it ever happened. It was my first time in the new place.

My trips to Stuttgart have been somewhat limited since Tim and I retired from the guiding business. I go through there now and drive right on by. I hadn't bought a new duck car in over 25 years. I have a small collection of them, but most of them that I have are ones that I used at some time in my life, so I admittedly wasn't stopping to see what all had changed or had been updated. But I pulled in and I parked and before I could get out of my truck, the familiar sounds of Stuttgart were seeping into the cab. Someone was away from the gathering crowd off by themselves and absolutely wailing on a duck call, obviously prepping for the first round of the calling contest that were slated for later in the day.

Hearing someone blowing a duck call in Stuttgart is like living close to the airport. After a while, you don't notice the racket. It just becomes ambient background noise or disappears completely from your receiver until someone points it out, or you hear something really good or really bad. What I was hearing was par for the course, a calling competition hopeful, whose intended focus was demonstrating his ability to produce and control sounds that stressed peak performance and the mastery of the instrument, the duck call, not actually calling a duck. They're practicing a multi-stage routine that to the untrained ear would make you think an actual duck could or would ever make those same sounds, at least not in that pitch or tone.

But in this contest, the contest are calling judges, hidden from the view to impress them and how they control what comes out of that call. But I wasn't there to judge duck callers. I was there to judge duck blind groceries. A familiar refrain to some of you listening would be my response when I got there and someone asked, are you hungry? And I responded with, what's hungry got to do with it? That was a favorite of my father's when meal time came around. If the food's ready, we're going to eat regardless.

Now, the mission was that four two-person teams had 30 minutes to cook up what we would call a duck-blind breakfast, eggs, bread, and meat. like normal breakfast food, but with a bag of surprise ingredients that the chefs would find out about when the 30-minute timer started. They were also cooking on small blackstone grittles like you'd find in a duck bline or in the woods. Eggs, bacon, sausage, bread, and for the first round of day one, our outdoor chefs would have to incorporate the following into the meal. Potato chips, pop tar, pretzels, cheese, cheese, apples, oatmeal cream pie, hard candy, and viny sausages.

Most folks probably call them Vienna sausages, but I've addressed that debate here before. Tomato, tomato, who cares? The point is that through two rounds on Friday with the qualifying rounds, each having surprise ingredients through each of them, the two best teams would compete for the championship the next day, which was Saturday. I would be remiss if I didn't mention my two. esteemed in fellow judges, first up is Mr. Jim Stinson of Stinson duck calls.

Mr. Jim is a callmaker who learned from the one and only legendary and my friend, the late Alvin-Alvin-Taylor, Mr. Alvin made Taylor-made duck calls in Clarendon, Arkansas, and Mr. Jim learned how to make calls from him, much in the same manner that John Stevens learned from Mr. Butch, who, in turn, learned from Mr. Chick Majors. It is a legacy gift from one generation to the next that's not given lightly. It's earned through patience, trust, and respect. Mr. Jim is retired now and living in Hot Springs, entertaining grandkids by the bush of basket load,

but relocating every duck season to his place in Clarendon to hunt and sell calls. Our trio was completed by Anne-Marie de Ramos. Anne-Marie has been a friend of mine for several years now. She has the distinction of being the first woman to be appointed to serve a full term as a commissioner for the Arkansas game and fish. She's now at the end of her seven-year appointment, and over her tenure I have watched her work hard for the betterment of wildlife and habitat in this state. I'm proud of her work and even more so to be your friend. So it was a pleasant surprise to see that we would be spending the better part of two days together, laughing, eating duck blind food, and passing judgment on what we were eating.

On Saturday, the final match between Friday's qualifiers, there were two differences. The cooking time was extended to an hour, and my baby girl, Bailey Suzanne, came along to try the vittles and helped me judge. The last place I'd have expected her to want to go early on the first Saturday after school led out for the summer, was under a tent in the Arkansas humidity with her pappy while. while the den of duck calls in bacon permeated the air with a racket and the sumptious aroma of sizzling pork. But there she was, hair and a ponytail, walking across the parking lot with me like she'd done this every day of her life. Another good friend of mine, and duck calling and hunting legend, Jim Bo Ronquest, walked up to her, stuck out his hand and said, Hey, Miss Bailey, I'm Jim.

And I could see her grinning and thrilled and yet still a little surprised when and people know who she is before meeting her because of this podcast. She embraces it. She isn't shy. She's confident in social situations and represents her generation and our name with manners and grace. She'll be 14 before the summer's over and in the blink of an eye in and out of college. But today, she was with her daddy and took a spot on my left side. the same side that she'd crawl on to when she was just a toddler,

sitting in my lap as we rocked away the day before there was school or dance or any place she'd rather be than right where she was. To most of that we're in attendance and probably her as well, it was just Brent and his daughter sitting at the judge's table laughing, trying food prepared by strangers with off-the-wall ingredients, each vying for the title of Best Duck Blind Cooking Team. But to me, it was one more of a thousand mornings sitting in a rocking chair, squeezing every available second of time from a clock that seems to tick faster with every passing year.

She tried every bite I did, even the cornbread that had a hint of sardine oil in the mix after the much maligned canned fish was among the listed items of the final mandatory ingredients. We laughed, we ate, we enjoyed the company of our old friends and making new ones. And all the credit goes to a random invitation to attend an event whose roots are woven into the tapestry of her family's legacy as well. How can you not like a gathering that promotes paying tribute to those that came before us, celebrating the present, while educating those that will carry the torch into the future? So thank you, Rich and Tone Duckawls for putting together an awesome event and adding another opportunity for generations of folks and family to gather.

It's good stuff. All right. I need some help, and I want everybody that can just take a little time and take a survey from June 1st to the 14th. We're going to run this survey, and you can participate it, and we want to hear from you. Go to the meat eater.com forward slash grease and fill it out. Now, it'll take you five minutes to do it at the most if you're slow, but you've got a chance to win a $500 gift card to the meat eater store. Respond by June the 14th to make sure your voice is heard. Reeva's going to put the link in the show description, and we're all going to share it on our social media.

Help us out if you can. Now, that's a wrap for me for this week. And until next week, y'all be careful.