Dead Eagle

The dead eagle was a problem.

Before he called the sheriff’s office, a two-desk operation in our upstate New York town, my father laid a makeshift flag over its corpse. Under his breath, he mused that the eagle’s death represented the death of America. It was 1973, and he said it was even worse than the oil crisis that had him waiting all day at our local pump.

On the phone, the deputy informed my father that legally we couldn’t yet touch it. Not only was the eagle a national symbol, but it was about to be declared endangered. We knew the deputy well—he once helped us scrub a swastika off our garage—and he said he would come by to determine if the eagle had been murdered.

I asked my father if he thought the eagle had been murdered.

“Absolutely,” he said.

In class the next day, I asked my teacher, Mr. Glendon, if I could make an announcement to our fifth-grade class during the few minutes he allotted for Student News. “Can you tell me what it’s about, Harry?” He called me Harry at my request, which I always thought was better than my full name, Harriet.

“It’s about a dead eagle.”

Mr. Glendon said, “Hmmmm. I trust this won’t be like your last announcement?”

My last announcement had rattled Mr. Glendon because when I stood on my desk and told the class that I wholeheartedly supported the Supreme Court’s decision to grant women abortion rights, he had to stop Sean Franklin from trying to knock me onto the floor while calling me a “fucking-Jewbag-baby-killer.” I...