Norm Ives, The Snake Man

 When someone posted one of Norm Ives' poems on Facebook, I remembered writing this article when Norman moved to the Wellsville Manor. His family asked if I would spend time with them and write about The Snake Man. I'm not certain of the date.

            No spin or slant can bend this truth:  things change, eras end.  In Wellsville, Norman Ives, The Snake Man, has changed his life and ended the era of his reptile show. He will not drape Beauty or any of his other soft, smooth friends over our shoulders again. Someone else will buy the mice, feed the snakes and encourage benevolence toward creatures that glide through fields feasting on rodents and laying their eggs in warm, damp places.

            Norman has loosely scheduled days now, days of visiting and remembering. He watches red squirrels raid a hummingbird ball outside his window. Sometimes he recites poetry or talks of murals, drawings, photos or carvings he’s made. Norman Ives’ life is woven of family, nature, animals, poetry, teaching and art so that’s what we talked about one day in June of 2007 with 6 of his family members in his room at the Wellsville Manor.

            Norman was born in Wellsville on March 7, 1923. His mother died when he was a tot and his brother, Elvin, was just 5 days old. Their father was working in the salt mine near Genesee and couldn’t take care of two little ones on his own so they went to live with their aunt and uncle on a hill top farm in Alma.

            When Norman was in elementary school, he occasionally got into trouble. “If you don’t stop drawing and start writing and studying,” the teacher would tell him, “we’ll keep you after school, Norman.”

            He stopped drawing often enough to keep the teachers happy and to graduate from 8^th grade. As part of that process, he had to take exams in Genesee and that’s where he met Lela Ellsworth. Norman remembers Lela telling people that every time she looked up Norman Ives was staring at her.  As he remembers it though, every time he looked up Lela was staring at him. After 8^th grade, Norman “took off for Salem County, New Jersey.”

He spent 4 years there with another uncle and came back to Wellsville with a high school diploma. He worked in an oil field and on a farm and then joined the Army for 3 ½ years as a medical technician. He planned to become a registered nurse but he dated then married Lela so his Dad helped him get a “temporary” job at PreHeater. He and Lela wanted to be financially set before he went to school. He worked and they built a “beautiful little house on the hill in Alma.” The temporary job lasted 38 years.

Norman worked in the element division and then was in charge of inventory and distribution in the plant and finally traveled the country to check on how the elements were functioning in use. 

Lela was pleased to look at Norman but not at snakes. Once when he was working the yard, she screamed so he came running to her. An Eastern Milk Snake was sunning on the back step trapping Lela in the house. Even after he moved the snake, Lela wasn’t sure she’d ever enjoy using those steps again. 

            While she fretted over the snake, Norm measured it. It seemed awfully large for an Eastern Milk Snake. Sure enough, it was a full 40 inches long. Norm called the DEC and they verified that was the longest Eastern Milk Snake ever reported in the area. Norm has kept track over the years and as far as he knows that snake still holds the record.

            Norman and Lela had 3 children – Laran, Richard and Norlene.  (Laran was born on Columbus Day so Norman wanted to name him Laran Christopher but Lela filed his name as Laran Norman.)      

            Norman was a member of PreHeater’s Bowling team for 53 years. A nasty landing on ice a couple of years ago ended his smooth bowling stride as well as his annual hikes in the Ridgewalk. His community activity also included decades of work with the Thelma Rogers Historical Society, Creative Writers, Wellsville Art Association, Allegany County Bird Club, the Keystone Reptile Club and others.

            Through all the years and all the children and grandchildren (Valerie, Richard, Hillary, Christopher, Michael, Jason and Kaelene) and the community involvement, Norman rescued animals.  That’s what most people know about him.

            The DEC gave him permission to raise a pair of stranded red-tailed hawks. He found them parentless when he was hiking and took them home. He caught or bought mice and rats to feed them and then put up a large cage to train them for release. Betsy Brooks in Alfred banded the birds and he released them with hope that they would adjust to the wild. He learned that the female died two years later in Alabama but there was never any word on the male.

            Norman’s porcupine story can’t be beat. He was crossing a road and found a female porcupine – road kill. The impact of a car had torn her body open but her young was still alive so Norman tied its cord with a shoe string and took the little guy home naming it Needles. Needles was gentle and friendly and had the run of the house for about two years.

            One night, Norm came home and found that Needles had yanked plants from their pots and had started to generally destroy the house so Norman and Needles went for a long hike but only Norman turned around to come back. Needles took off with nary a thank-you glance and he’s not been seen again.

            Lela died when Norlene was only 6 so Norman cared for animals with the help of his children, grandchildren and sister-in-law, Joann. Joann isn’t any fonder of snakes than Lela was but she drove Norman and his crew to reptile shows willingly until a snake got out and crawled up from under her car seat. Snakes roaming in the car are not her cup of tea.

            The reptile show had a lot to do with Beauty who came to Norman by chance after he watched a Black Rat Snake lay a clutch of eggs in sawdust in a field. He took a photo of 14 eggs and went back the next evening to see how the nest was faring. It wasn’t. A bulldozer had leveled the area and destroyed all but 1 egg. He wrapped that egg in his handkerchief and took it home.

            He set up an aquarium with sawdust, dampening it every other day and waiting for 66 days. On August 16, 1978 Beauty hatched. Just a few days ago, Norman gave Beauty and the others to Pennsylvanian herpetologist Dixie Lixie and then he “cried like a baby.” The end of an era hurts.

Through his life Norman has written poetry - winning awards and being published. He has ribbons and certificates for his drawings, carvings and photos. His poetry, art and his reptile shows have always focused on what is admirable in nature. For 32 years he has been The Snake Man. He has taken snakes into more schools than he can remember – always without pay. He has gone to fairs, festivals and almost everywhere he has been invited because “There’s a lot I can teach about the value of snakes and the natural world,” he said.