Caledonia Argus

The Saga of Jens Thompson

Posted: 4/30/02

By: Aggie Tippery
continued from last week..............

July 22nd, 1937, it was hot that July day as Jens Thompson took the cream into Albert Lea for his mother. Returning to his motherís farm, he went out and shocked grain with his brother Erling. At noon they returned to the house for dinner with their mother. ìWhat is the matter with you, Jens, you are acting so excited about something.î ìAinít it hot enough for you out there?î Erling asked as Jens got up and paced the kitchen floor, sat down and ate, them hopped up and paced about again. ìAinít nothing wrong with me, I guess Iíll get out there and shock some more grain,î Jens said as he grabbed his 22 rifle and left the house.

Erling looked out the window in time to see Jensí 1929 Model A Ford leave the yard in a cloud of dust. ìI wish that boy wouldnít be reading so much of those communistic papers and all the time his nose in the Bible.î ìHeís slow in his mind and those things just confuse him,î Mrs. Thompson said to Erling, as she removed the dishes from the table. ìMa, I know. Well, Iím going to rest awhile before I go out to the fields.î Erling said as he prepared to lie down on the day bed in the big farm kitchen. Jens had plenty on this mind. His hatred for the Foley family was all he could think of lately. When he saw them in town, earlier in the week, they had taunted and teased him just has they had since he was sixteen years old.

At thirty-four, he still felt like a dumb kid whenever he was around the Foleys. What they did to him when he was sixteen should never have happened. He felt that he could never find a girl and get married. It was all their fault and they wouldnít leave him be, when he met up with them. The Bible even said it was a sin and an abomination. ìAfter today, they ainít gonna bother me again.î He thought. It was 1:30 when Jens drove up to a filling station at Myrtle and got a tank of gas. He drove back toward home, and then stopped at the John Foley Sr. farm. He got out and asked Mrs. Foley where John, Sr. was. She told him that John was gone to the garden. He then drove to the Ed Foley farm, three-quarters of a mile east. He stopped on the road near where Ed and his son, Mike and neighbor Billy Pell were harvesting with a binder and a tractor.

John Foley, Jr. had just driven into the field with another binder and tractor. He jumped off and was oiling the binder when Jens stopped. Jens stepped out of the Ford with his rifle in his hands and without saying a word, took aim at Ed. The rifle spoke and Ed, shot through the right temple, fell off the seat of the tractor to the ground.

He was dead. Jens grinned as the thrill of seeing his enemy dead sent a shiver through his body. He quickly turned the rifle toward John, who was still at the side of his binder. A bullet struck him near the right temple just above his eye. As he turned, another bullet struck him in the left breast below his shoulder. Death came instantly. As young Mike Foley took a step toward Jens, he shot him in the chest. The bullet went into his lung and came out his back. As he lay there bleeding, the neighbor, Billy Pell and two small children watched it happen. Billy walked toward Jens. ìThey did me wrong, now beat it, before you get what the rest received,î Jens ordered. Billy and the children ran across the fields to Ed Foleyís farm. ìGet me a shotgun, the Foley boys have been killed!î he yelled. He got the gun and jumped in a car standing in the yard, but couldnít get it started. He ran into the house and rang the sheriffís office in Albert Lea.

Meanwhile, Jens drove to the field where Tom Foley was helping L.F. Strouf harvest grain. He jumped out with the rifle and shot Tom in the head, killing him. Jumping in the car, Jens drove off, his mind at rest for the first time in eighteen years. He was sorry that he didnít kill the old man Foley, because Foley knew what his boys did to Jens. He frowned for a moment at the thought of young Mike Foley; he had nothing against him, and hadnÌt meant to kill him. Jens came to highway sixteen and turned toward the East, a grin of satisfaction on his face. In Hokah, it was just another hot, dry summer day. We knew nothing of the killing near Austin, not yet. (To be continued)

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