The aptly named Land\u2019s End RV and Trailer Park sits near the end of the island back off the road just before it hits the Head and slingshot back north again.\u00a0 The state park sends folks with travel trailers down there when they\u2019re full up, but that advice has ruined more than a few vacations.\u00a0 Johnny Reddick runs the place, mostly into the ground.\u00a0 Back in the late \u201870\u2019s it wasn\u2019t too bad.\u00a0 A dozen or so single wides were spaced out on concrete pads and an old caboose sat in there too.\u00a0 There was a small area for tents and some gravel for the RV\u2019s.\u00a0 Rents were reasonable and the public showers and toilets were kept clean and operational.\u00a0 The tenants, mostly elderly folks on small fixed incomes, were content down there even if it was the end of the road.\u00a0 In more ways than one\u2026.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
But old man Jensen had a stroke and Mrs. Jensen sold the kit and caboodle to Johnny in \u201982.\u00a0 Johnny was looking for an investment, something he could use a small inheritance to parlay into a substitution for working, and the trailer park seemed an ideal fit.\u00a0 Jack up the rents, pull a few more trailers in he\u2019d snagged cheap, collect the rents and drink the rest of the day.\u00a0 If Johnny hadn\u2019t been a bad drunk, things might\u2019ve worked out for everybody, but like a lot things on the South End, things went downhill.<\/p>\n
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Most of the original tenants left after the shootout in \u201988, just picked up their belongings and moved on, something they\u2019d been thinking of doing for years once Johnny leased half a dozen dilapidated RV\u2019s on the weekly or monthly basis.\u00a0 Dangerous looking men showed up in rusted vehicles with broken windshields and missing fenders and dogs they kept on chains outside.\u00a0 They never seemed to work, other than under the hoods of their jalopies, not totally uncommon on the South End, but their worried neighbors sensed whatever money they got was somehow suspect.\u00a0 Apparently the sheriff\u2019s deputies did too.\u00a0 Land\u2019s End became part of their drive-by route even before the gunplay.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Johnny says the gentleman in the last trailer was drunk when he knocked on his vinyl door to inquire about that month\u2019s rent.\u00a0 Johnny most certainly was.\u00a0 What Delores in Lot#6 testified in court as \u20183 sheets to the wind.\u201d\u00a0 When the door finally opened after prolonged pounding, Johnny was staring at his delinquent tenant wearing nothing but a pair of black briefs and pointing a small caliber pistol at Johnny\u2019s head.\u00a0 Apparently interrupted in a 3rd<\/sup> rate romance, the man was noticeably displeased.\u00a0 He suggested Johnny remove various anatomical parts immediately from his doorstep.\u00a0 Which Johnny did.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Maybe Johnny would have been wiser to go home, let things settle, collect the rent in the morning.\u00a0 Instead he went back to his own trailer, finished a 5th<\/sup> of Jim Beam, pulled a chrome handled .38 out of his sock drawer and hauled down to the last trailer with dogs snarling and barking, lights popping on, but before anyone could get to a window, shots broke the night wide open.\u00a0 Andy Watson called 9-1-1 and told his wife to get on the floor behind the kitchen counter.\u00a0 Still on the telephone, he watched Johnny stroll back to his own place, gun in hand. He was pretty sure he\u2019d killed the kid at the last pad.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When the first deputy arrived, the entire Trailer Park was awake and terrified.\u00a0 Bill Traxton, the cop, jumped out of his cruiser, gun drawn.\u00a0 He\u2019d called for back-up, but he knew that would be half an hour.\u00a0 Nothing moved.\u00a0 No one came outside.\u00a0 The only noise was barking dogs, have crazed.\u00a0 Bill Traxton turned his spotlight along the line of trailers, one by one, until he hit the last one where a man in his underwear sat on the step.\u00a0 \u201cDon\u2019t move!\u201d the deputy yelled.\u00a0 The man didn\u2019t.\u00a0 \u201cPut your hands where I can see em,\u201d he commanded.\u00a0 The man did.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Carefully, Bill Traxton approached him.\u00a0 Finally he saw the pit bull, bleeding beside the nearly naked man where Johnny Reddick had shot it point blank, hitting it in the shoulder.\u00a0 The dog was breathing hard.\u00a0 The man watched Bill watch the dog.\u00a0 Finally Bill asked, \u201cYou hurt?\u201d\u00a0 The man shook his head no.\u00a0 \u201cJust my dog.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The deputy took Johnny away, cuffed and swearing, in the back of the squad car.\u00a0 The man in the underwear took his dog in his pickup god knows where.\u00a0 No one at Land\u2019s End ever saw him or the dog again.\u00a0 Johnny got a $500 fine for animal abuse, same as the rent he hadn\u2019t been paid, and a year\u2019s probation for reckless endangerment.\u00a0 Most of the dog owners moved along pretty quick.\u00a0 Some of the single-wide folks stayed, but not many.\u00a0 And not because they wanted to.\u00a0 They just hoped, like a lot of us down here, things would get better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The aptly named Land\u2019s End RV and Trailer Park sits near the end of the island back off the road just before it hits the Head and slingshot back north again.\u00a0 The state park sends folks with travel trailers down there when they\u2019re full up, but that advice has ruined more than a few vacations.\u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5002","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-rantings-and-ravings"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5002","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5002"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5002\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5004,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5002\/revisions\/5004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5002"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5002"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.skeeterdaddle.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5002"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}