Menu
Happy 99th Birthday, Paul Corbin!
When considering the life of Paul Corbin, one cannot help being staggered by the accomplishments achieved by this remarkable human being.
Businessman, archaeologist, historian, explorer, writer, humorist, library patron, bee keeper, Corbin's intellect, energy and ingenuity fairly boggle the imagination.
Born on Nov. 27, 1914 and reared on the banks of the Castor River in a 4-room house, which was regularly flooded by the Castor River, this man continued on to get an excellent, well-rounded education, using the materials at hand in his environment.
In an age when few rural children went to high school, Paul Corbin walked over five miles a day, one way, to attend school in the small hill town of Zalma, Mo. He is the only one of 13 graduates remaining alive.
When he was 13 and his brother Claud was 11, they built their own log cabin from the timber near their home, felling the trees with a cross cut saw and salvaging glass from an abandoned building.
Like his grandfather Daniel Boone Corbin, who came from Indiana in 1887 to harvest lumber, Paul Corbin has always shown an inventiveness that is larger than life.
There seems to be little that this man has not done. When he set out in business to sell Watkins' products, door to door, in the 1930's, he soon became the top salesman in the nation.
When he became curious about the history of the west, he and his wife Geneva set out to explore the trails which led west--the Chisholm Trail, Custer's Trail, the Oregon Trail, and--most importantly--the trail of the Lewis and Clark expedition.
Because of his first-hand experience, he was asked to be a consultant on the historic Red House in Cape Girardeau. This reporter recalls going to see him at his home one day several years ago, to find him drying wooden pegs in his oven for use in building the Red House, the replica of Louis Lorimer's trading post.
Somewhere along the way, Paul Corbin's interest and familiarity with the land led him to the exploration of the earth itself. He is one of the leading local experts on the remains of the Mississipian civilization and has donated two collections of artifacts to museums--one to the Bollinger County Museum of Natural Science, and a second one to the Cape Girardeau Nature Center, located between Cape and Jackson.
"I don't recall ever being bored," Corbin admits.
His curiosity has caused him to explore a wide variety of fields, resulting in some very interesting hobbies--beekeeping, building sundials, crafting items from the stones he finds on his travels, and making walking canes, to name only a few. He has even recreated Native American tools, including an atlatl (spear thrower), using the same methods which the Indians employed.
Corbin's early life has undoubtedly influenced the health and vigor of his later years. As a boy, he spent all his life outside in the woods and fields, hunting and trapping, running to school, living with nature.
As a child, Corbin remembers lying in bed at night and watching the stars through the cracks in the roof of his family's home on Cato Slough. The water bucket in the kitchen was frozen over on winter mornings.
In 2001, Corbin published his first book, "Reflections in Missouri Mud," which recounts the history of his family and tells of his own upbringing. Unfortunately, this modest man underestimated the interest which the book would spark, so the copies were limited. The book is now out of print.
Since that time, Corbin has dug into the depth of his impressive memory to collect more stories for the North Stoddard Countian, later compiling these pieces into a volume called "Fragments of my Fickle Mind." His friend Diane Runnels has helped him self-publish these recollections, so that copies of the book are relatively easy to come by.
Corbin has embraced the "new-fangled" inventions of this modern age as easily as he did the first Model T that his grandfather bought and left under the sycamore tree, when the price of gas went up to 15 cents a gallon.
He credits his love affair with the computer as having "saved" him, after the death of his beloved wife Geneva.
He has definitely made good use of the ever-changing technology of the computer, which sits in a prominent place in his room at the assisted living center in Advance.
Though his wrists will no longer enable him to write much, he still keeps up with his email and is able to print off stories to entertain and enlighten his fellow residents at the center.
Monday, Nov. 25, 2013 found him seated at a dining table with his brother Claud in the beautiful dining room at the new Advance Assisted Living Center in his beloved hometown of Advance, Mo., where he is looked upon as a community treasure.
Happy 99th birthday, Paul Corbin! May you enjoy many more!