FULL CIRCLE PART II OF V
Continued from the Jan. 28th issue. Please visit waynedalenews.com to read all previous parts.
Each family had its own heating and or cook stove. In the big downstairs apartment there was one of each, a wood burning flat-topped cook stove in the kitchen and a highly polished pot bellied coal or wood stove in the living room. The smaller apartments, up and down, each had one stove, a flat-topped wood or coal burner, which served for cooking and heating.
On washday (Monday) large copper boilers full of water heated on the cook stove, furnished wash water. Laundry was done by scrubbing clothes on a washboard in a big tub of hot soapy water. Laundry was done by scrubbing clothes on a washboard in a big tub of hot soapy water. Items were rinsed in a tub of clear water, wrung out by hand after bluing and/or starching; they were pegged out on a clothesline strung between two trees to dry. Doing a family wash often took most of the day and was done at least once a week. Housewives had a schedule those days: Monday was wash day; Tuesday, one ironed; Wednesday was mending day; Thursday, one began to clean the house and finished on Friday, and on Saturday, everyone bathed for the weekend. Only the most slovenly and ill-prepared homemaker deviated from that schedule!
My younger uncle, living upstairs with his family, sometimes worked driving a truck. He would haul most anything as long as he paid so he could pay his share of the rent and buy food and take care of the children. My father and other uncle took whatever work they could find to make a little money. At one time all three families were on relief even though my father unloaded coal cars at Hercules Coal Company and lumber cars at Fort Wayne Lumber Company. Uncle Lyman sometimes had to work with his brother but few people could afford to repaint a house or even have wallpaper cleaning done.
On relief we received cornmeal, prunes, navy beans, oatmeal and flour. Mother made a lot of what she called “pan bread” in a big black skillet on top of the stove. This was not cornbread but bread made with flour, and it filled out many meals. We did not make cornbread and cornmeal mush. The mush was eaten warm with sugar and a little milk. It was allowed to sit overnight in a square baking pan and sliced and fried for breakfast. Dad liked the fried mush with a little syrup over it; I never liked it that way.
If we were lucky enough to have a quarter or two, the man would walk downtown to the Perfection Biscuit Company on Pearl Street just north of Main Street west of Calhoun. The company is still located there. For a quarter one could get a really large sack of one-day-old bread and dinner rolls. If we were really lucky there might be a package of cinnamon rolls or cookies in the sack. In the winter this was quite a walk in cold weather about two and a half miles each way.
We were better off than lots of people because we had a large garden back of the houses. Since none of the men were employed full time, there was always someone there to tend the garden in which we grew potatoes, sweet potatoes, green beans, lima beans, pole beans, corn, spinach, tomatoes and green peppers. One year the gardeners grew celery, blanching it by pilling soil and leaves around it. The celery was enjoyed that Thanksgiving. Seed for the next year’s garden was saved whenever it was possible. The big old house had no insulation in the attic or sidewalls, so it was hot in the summer and almost impossible to heat in the winter. I do not recall any screens to cover the windows but three screen doors.
In our small bedroom there were two double beds. One for my parents, one for my brothers. An army cot against a sidewall was my bed. Many cold winter mornings I woke to find my covers stuck to the wall with frost. There was no heat in that room! Eventually, when the whole house was ours, my bedroom was this little room once shared by the entire family.
Looking back on those days, I’m amazed at the way my parents coped and actually made the three of us feel secure. Not only did we feel secure, but also our small home, with little comfort, became the place where my schoolmates gathered.
In warm weather the swing in the old pear tree was always in use. My brother’s sand pile was always full of friends. With Dad’s help they made a little golf course in the corner of the yard. My parents always had time to join in whatever we were doing. And always, everything else stopped when Mother or Dad picked up a book and asked, “Shall I read for a while?”
We listened to the Alcott stories, James Whitcomb Riley (one of Dad’s favorites), Gene Stratton Porter’s Girl of the Limberlost and Freckles. We heard about Tiny Tim and Bob Cratchit, and Dad could go Scrooge better then anyone ever!
We played checkers on the old game board. Dad was champion until one of my brothers really studied the game a bit! Of course, we played Tag, and Hide and Seek. But always, when we tired of everything else, we’d say, “Read to us, please!”
My brothers and I have talked about those days many times. And we recall only feeling secure and knowing we were loved. What few books we owned were treasured read and reread. Education was a must. Mother had been a teacher. Both families came from families of preachers and teachers. We were encouraged to do our best in school if a subject was difficult, we were told, “Work harder. The more you know and understand, the more you will enjoy the subject.”
Our fiercely proud father, with southern ideas and ideals, taught us respect for values, and we were given standards to live by. We were, after all, ladies and gentlemen and we were not to forget that, no matter what!
My brothers and I attended Miner School at the southwest corner of Dewald and Miner Streets. I began third grade with Miss Mabel Bailey. Don and Dale started kindergarten and both of them attended first grade with Miss Catherine Canode.
I remember fourth grade with Miss Alice Miller and sixth grade with my very favorite teacher, Mrs. Bess Klopfenstein. We had a traveling teacher I believe a Miss Schmidt who used to appear every few weeks. We all worked very hard for Miss Koons, I know I did. In Wauseon we had been writing with pen and ink in second grade but little emphasis was put on perfect penmanship, so I had to work especially hard. The first time Miss Koons stamped a big number “1” on my paper and added a pumpkin seal, I could hardly wait to go home with the great news!
Miss Schmidt, on the other hand, tried very hard to impress on the sixth grade the joy of classical music. I recall her rolling her r’s and making frequent use of the little pitch pipe. I’m afraid a lot of us weren’t up to her hopes! She left me with an abiding admiration for her hard work and I’ll never hear the Christmas carol “We Three Kings of Orient Are” without thinking of Miss Schmidt!
Mrs. Klopfenstein soon realized I had read every book available to me in the school library located on Broadway just south of Lincoln Avenue. The librarians kept chasing me out of the adult section though I was reading Peter B. Kyne, Zane Grey, James Oliver Curwood, Gene Stratton Porter, Goldsmith, Mary Roberts Rhinehart, and Charles Dickens at home.
Mrs. Klophenstein began bringing books from her own library for me. Rose Garden Husband by Widdemer and The Hermit of the Far End were two of my favorites. I’m still looking for a copy of “Hermit” because I do not recall the name of the author.
Except for my parents, I believe Mrs. Klopfenstein was the first person to understand my hunger for reading, and wanting to have books of my own. I never lost these desires, and moving from my home of fifty-seven years, I found the biggest problem was what to do with three thousand books. I knew I could not put all of them in an apartment and have room for any other furnishings but I felt I could not abandon the friends I had made throughout the years. Not an easy task, for all my books were old friends.
I had resolved, at age seventy, I should buy books for only my children, grandchildren, great grandchildren or friends not for myself anymore. I am forced to admit this decision lasted about six months! I do not buy as many books for myself as I should like but only because of lack of space prohibiting it.
Still, to this day there is no thrill quite like holding a new book meeting a new friend. I enjoy the book jacket, reading the synopsis and then just touching the actual cover. This, of course applies to a BOOK not a paperback but a proper hard bound beautiful book! I know the same material is contained in both the hard cover and the paperback, but in some way, the paperback is just not the same!
to be continued…
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