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Chapter 13

West on 66; Grampa dies

Summary

The Hudson turns west on 66. Ma tells Al she refuses to live ahead of herself — "it's jus' the road goin' by for me". At a run-down filling station near Paden the owner keeps asking what the country is coming to; Tom snaps at him, then sees the man's cheap clothes and dying corn and tells him he will be on the road himself soon. The family dog is killed by a passing car. Camping that night near Bethany, they meet Ivy and Sairy Wilson, whose touring car has broken down and whose wife is gravely ill. Grampa has a stroke in the Wilsons' tent, and Casy recites the Lord's Prayer over him though he says he does not know what he prays to. Rather than surrender their money to an undertaker, the family buries him with a note in a fruit jar and levels the mound. Casy says all that lives is holy. The two families agree to travel together.

Plates

Illustration style

West out of Sallisaw
00 West out of Sallisaw
Pork bones at the first clump of brush
01 Pork bones at the first clump of brush
The man in the silver paper helmet
02 The man in the silver paper helmet
Water, and what the country is coming to
03 Water, and what the country is coming to
The dog on the highway
04 The dog on the highway
Out through Oklahoma City
05 Out through Oklahoma City
Ivy and Sairy Wilson at the culvert
06 Ivy and Sairy Wilson at the culvert
Grampa dies in the Wilsons' tent
07 Grampa dies in the Wilsons' tent
The grave in the field
08 The grave in the field
Two families, one fire
09 Two families, one fire
West out of Sallisaw
00 West out of Sallisaw
Pork bones at the first clump of brush
01 Pork bones at the first clump of brush
The man in the silver paper helmet
02 The man in the silver paper helmet
Water, and what the country is coming to
03 Water, and what the country is coming to
The dog on the highway
04 The dog on the highway
Out through Oklahoma City
05 Out through Oklahoma City
Ivy and Sairy Wilson at the culvert
06 Ivy and Sairy Wilson at the culvert
Grampa dies in the Wilsons' tent
07 Grampa dies in the Wilsons' tent
The grave in the field
08 The grave in the field
Two families, one fire
09 Two families, one fire

Composition

Written: 5 July 1938 to 12 July 1938 Journal entries: #29, #30, #32, #34 Dating: from DeMott's editorial markers in Working Days

From the journal

5 July 1938, Tuesday, 11:30 — Entry #29

[…] is finished a goodly part of my life will be finished with it. A part I will never get back to. But now the time is here to get to work and so I go. All done* but I don’t know. I’m afraid of that chapter. Two [Ed.—Chapter 13] is of the family again on the road. Must get down […]

6 July 1938, Wednesday, 11:05 — Entry #30

[…] Make them live. But my people must be more than people. They must be an over-essence of people. Critics understand very little. They have to be taught the long hard way. But I am in the suck hole of work again. Immersed in it. And this chapter [Ed.—Chapter 13] will be a long one. It is the first day and […]

8 July 1938, Friday, 10:30 — Entry #32

[…] it’s time for me to go to work. Time to go and today I must get them camped. And the tent effect built. And the new people. And maybe a part of the history of this new couple [Ed.—the Wilsons]. Well, that’s done. The death of Grampa [Ed.—Chapter 13].

12 July 1938, Tuesday, 10:30 — Entry #34

[…] good but I’ll be damned if I’ll be another shirt front in a curious mob. I can’t go on this way forever. My hand today will steady down I think because I am calm. And it is time now. Chapter end. It was Book Two, chapter two [Ed.—Chapter 13]. General tomorrow. I don’t know which one.

Source: Working Days: The Journals of The Grapes of Wrath, 1938–1941, ed. Robert DeMott (Viking, 1989).