It weren’t too long after Silas Boone was born that folk started calling him “Toothpick,” on account of his always flossing his teeth. Used his mama’s tooth to pick his banjo, too, which sure didn’t hurt the nickname none. Toothpick could carry a tune almost as well as he could brutally murder people, but he never did get a fair shake from the law no how.

Toothpick’s ma used to say, “There’s gold in these here hills. Why are you wasting your time with all that twanging?” In 1870, Toothpick was sentenced to life in prison for caving in his mother’s head with a banjo. In his lonely jail cell, the songbird wrote the classic tune If McGraw Lets Me Out I’ll Kill Him for Governor Bill McGraw. Governor McGraw was so plum dazzled at bein’ mentioned by name that he set the boy free. Such a charmer, that Toothpick. Toothpick celebrated by killing the town of Reno, Nevada.

The next governor, Ezekiel Perkins, ran on a “Do Not Let Toothpick Out of Jail” platform. It looked like it was the end for ol’ Toothpick. But with the hangman’s noose ’round his neck, Toothpick began to croon his new song Please Let Me Out So I Can Kill Again.

Governor Perkins cried: “Forget my dead parents and neighbors; this root-tootin’ Toothpick here has the voice of an angel!” Again a free man, Toothpick went to church to pray, set on reformin’ his ways. The Good Lord must’a said something sweet to him, because Toothpick shot the preacher dead and the choir never did sing again. And he weren’t near done yet. The Idaho River ran red til Rutherford B. Hayes was elected President in 1876 and personally clapped Toothpick in irons.

President Hayes’ “Seriously Do Not Let Toothpick Back Out of Jail” political sweet talk didn’t scare Toothpick none, but one thing did: Hayes was deaf as a fencepost and twice as stubborn. Poor Toothpick sang and he strummed and he scatted and he sobbed, but old Rud was deaf to reason, and to Toothpick.

So Rud fastened Toothpick nice and tight in that newfangled ‘lectric chair they been building out in New York City, and Toothpick got ready to meet his maker with his banjo in his lap. But blessed Toothpick was luckier’n a two-tailed dog at a bone pile. When President Rud threw the switch, instead of murderin’ Toothpick, they say the lighting shot back up the wire and turned the First Lady into a pile of dust and a blinkin’ pair of eyes. With all that distraction, Toothpick used his namesake to cut himself free and skipped town, flayin’ the skin off e’ry third person he passed. God bless that merciful Toothpick.

No one knows what happened after that, ‘cept that Hayes was found strangled by banjo strings the very next day. Some say Toothpick is still out there singing with a vaudeville show, and some say he’s killing his way through Guadalajara. Some folk reckon he’s up in heaven yodeling to God and stabbing all his angels with icepicks, which is a mighty comfortin’ thought.