THE IVAN AND VIVIAN DAUGHERTY FAMILY STORY
I guess this is probably the most important year of my life, beings it was when I was born. Or maybe it was the year before when I was conceived.  One never knows whether that event took place with intention to make a baby, or was the usual lustful expression of love between two committed lovers.  I’m told I was birthed at home---a farmhouse located about one mile south of Hastings Nebraska.  It was a plain country house—devoid of plumbing, (except for a sink with a pitcher pump) and of course no electricity, and heated by a space heater called a base burner. It was customary then to enlist the talents of neighbor women to attend the affair. My Maternal Grandmother, an 1870’s immigrant from Germany was most likely there to assist.  She lived in town. It being May, certainly no problems of extreme weather beset the birthing crew.  It seem births in our family took place in the summer and fall months, could there have been a bit of family planning afoot to bring forth the offspring at times of least stress?




















One other point on the subject should attend, my parents were 28 and 23 when they wed in 1914. They had courted for a considerable time,  a while by mail as ‘Pop’ was working the home place with the family, and ‘Mom’ working in Omaha for her sister Marie at some kind of dry cleaning establishment. They made their wedding plans by mail, and some of the house furnishings came from Omaha. I believe their wedding, on March 10, 1914 was a triple header.  Grandpa Litchenburg probably thought out that strategy by having three married off at once. The other two were Aunt Leah and Uncle Ben.  We never heard of a honeymoon, but the usual rural custom, a rite of passage so to speak, was a charivaree—(pronounced chivaree), when the whole neighborhood ganged up on the newlyweds and harassed them, sometimes on thru the night by stealing their car and hiding it, or as I witnessed once by pounding on the sides of the house until the crowd was appeased by treats of some kind. Another trick was to get some kind of wheeled vehicle such as a manure spreader and parading around town with the unlucky couple.  That custom died out in the thirties with the depression resulting in fewer marriages,  and those that did happen were most likely  ‘have-to’ cases.  And later many were hurried due to wartime hasty departures.                                                              

Since I was number two in the line of progeny, I entered  the domain where the firstborn brother had had his parents’  full attention.  This number one (by the name of Melvin) was almost four years old at the time of my arrival on May 12, 1921.  Then along came Ivan to muscle in for his share of family attention.  It was never discussed how come I was hung with the name ‘Ivan’.

Many years later we were aware that there might be some trace of Russian heritage in the maternal Litchenburg family tree. Later investigation has revealed that there was in fact a ‘Russian connection’.  In the eighteenth century, Catherine the Great, Queen of Russia, enticed a large number of farmers in Germany to migrate to Russia to promote their more enlightened methods of farming.  They were permitted to settle in colonies and preserve their culture and language.  They thrived and grew families.  As the hierarchy changed in Russia over the years, later rulers, the Czar recanted the earlier promises and imposed military conscription on the males. My Grandfather—Alfred Litchenburg, then 22, and his bride—Catherine—left Russia and proceeded to emigrate to the New World.  This was in the 1870’s.  How they came to settle in Hastings Nebraska is a matter of debate. We have learned there is an extensive culture in researching the migration of Germans from Russia—that’s what they call their genealogical organization.

Back to the question of the origin of my name, much later in life, after my Mother had died in 1953, my life’s partner (Vivian) was visiting with my Aunt Leah, then the only surviving sibling of my Mother.   The question of my name came up; since my heritage was Irish-German, how come a Russian type name?  Aunt Leah confided that my Mother had had a ‘boyfriend’ of Russian descent before she married my Father.  You can conjecture all sorts of causes—lost romance—etc. But I have no doubt she carried some kind of fondness for her previous paramour..
Our German heritage was plainly evident in the language characteristics, most of my Mothers family could speak the German language, and often did so when talking on the telephone.  This was to confuse the nosy neighbors who might be listening on the rural party line. Everyone heard your ring when a call came in and it was an open invitation to monitor for news, etc.

These early reminiscences are from a broad scope of family life from the beginning years. Life in the 1920’s was emerging from the horse and buggy times to the faster mode of the motorcar. While the wheels of the day was the Ford Model T, and quite a number of more sophisticated and faster makes, the ‘T’ ruled the universe of the working man. The four cylinder engine was coupled to the rear end with a planetary transmission. There was no clutch as such, but the pressure on the foot pedals applied a friction to the planetary ring and caused the torque to be transferred to the drive shaft. Every once in a while the owners had to ‘tighten the bands’ or replace them. There were no self starters then, you had to turn the engine with a crank out front to turn the crankshaft to start. The ignition was directed from a separate spark coil for each cylinder through a rotor or distributor to the sparkplug. A manual control caused the spark timing to be retarded so you wouldn’t break your arm if the cylinder fired before top dead center and you got kicked by the crank. The ignition was fired by a series of magnets on the flywheel, creating the electric energy to fire the spark coils. Old Henry Ford almost had a monopoly on the motorcar, he out produced and under priced every one else’s cars. He said you could have any color you want as long as it was black.





















  
Amenities or even small luxuries were non-existant.  No electricity, therefore no indoor plumbing and running water, with the exception of a sink in the kitchen and a pitcher pump to draw water from a cistern (an underground storage vat). This supplied water for the kitchen, which was then transferred to the ‘reservoir’, a water tank at the end of the cook stove which became heated when there was a fire in the stove for cooking. Heat from the cook stove warmed the kitchen comfortably. The other parts of the house were not normally heated in the winter for the sake of ecomony in firewood. The parlor had a large ‘potbelly’ heater used when necessary.  The bedrooms were entered off the kitchen so they were nominally heated for minimal comfort. A fire in the cookstove would not last through the night, consequently any liquid left standing would freeze.  There was enough residual heat in the stove reservoir to stay unfrozen This was the source of water for priming the water pump at the sink.  If someone forgot to drain the pump, which was done by lifting the handle far up to break the prime, it too would freeze and this caused a calamity. Lighting at night was either the kerosene wick lamps which burned a yellow flame. The other kind was a  type of mantle lamp which burned kerosene but at a higher heat level for a brighter light, this was called the ‘Aladdin Lamp’. Another more advanced lamp named the ‘Coleman gas’ lamp, burned gasoline in a pressurized tank which formed the base of the lamp. This produced a spray of vapor into mantles and burned very brightly. All of these required regular maintenance of one or another, cleaning and refilling with fuel. Life was tedious at the least. My belief is that this kind of culture prepared me for a greater appreciation for all the luxuries which are commonplace.. I think it also prepared me for a yearning for the better things in life, where just maintaining existence above survival level was the main priority. I don’t discount the honorable quality of life we experienced.  It was as good as you could expect as country dwellers. City folk had a few more niceties but they didn’t have the open nature based environment we enjoyed..





















                    
Although our farmstead was just a mile south of the edge of the city of Hastings, we were ‘country’ in every aspect . Our school was a one-room school located one mile south, then one mile west, then one-half mile south.These first four years before school-age is pre-memory for the most part.. There was no hard and fast rule for when you started school.. I must have been ‘home schooled’ to some extent as I had some ability for letters and numbers by the age of five. It is rumored that I was allowed to visit the school with Melvin, and the teacher was impressed with my talents and permitted me to enroll. Through the first eight years normally spent in the country school, I progressed through in seven years, being advanced from the fifth grade to the sixth mid-term for reasons not clear. I have always suspected that it was a way to separate me from a cousin in the same grade who was a slower learner. This allowed her to teach him at his level without holding me back.. The end result of this move was to allow me to graduate from high school with eleven years of schooling rather than twelve, and at the age of sixteen.. Graduating in 1937 is a whole ‘nother story—more on that later.

The family circle was to be completed in 1922 with the birth of brother Gerald in October. It was said that my Mother would have preferred a daughter rather than a boy in either my or Jack’s birth. It was a special joy in later years when one of us brought home a girl to join the family.  In fact all of us three boys’ wives were welcomed with the warmest familial love and they were blessed as a result.. Further recollections in the school years;  as we were 2 ½ miles from school, we walked in good weather, carrying our lunch buckets, and rarely ever any books. One benefit of a one-room school is the exposure of each grade level to the other higher grades being taught and rehearsing in the same room. The number of children in the one room school varied year to year, rarely exceeding 25, which for one teacher was a challenge.  Most teachers then were graduates of ‘normal school’, a fast track teachers course at the Kearney State College…The overseer was a County Superintendent. My Father, who we called ‘Pop’ had only a sixth grade education.  He was self educated to a higher level, one would not suspect he didn’t have at least high school level education. .He at times was a member of the school board, sharing the responsibility of hiring the teachers and keeping the school business in order.. When  weather would not permit walking,  Pop and Uncle Dean would alternate driving. It is difficult to visualize the drama of getting all of us in one car.. Uncle Dean had ten children, of course not all were school age at the same time as we three were.. There was time when the weather prevented driving a car and we would be transported in a grain wagon with scads of quilts and blankets. One can  only marvel at the dedication of these hardy parents in coping with the elements so that our education could go on. There would be times when the cold was so severe the car refused to start—the only towing service was a team of horses to pull the car until it started...Again, with these challenges—one could say hardships—we were products of tough times, and I don’t mind saying we were toughened as a result..It’s no wonder when it came time to bring our own families into life—we aspired to better standards of living.. This drive to provide a better life may be questioned as it has shielded our offspring from hardships we accepted as commonplace.. Each succeeding generation has this conflict as we grow up and have families. I have to believe that my parents had the same concern for making  their life together and that of their offspring a better quality. Pop was the oldest of twelve and Mom was the fifth of eight children..                                                            
I  want to devote a chapter to each of their family histories to round out the heritage from which I came.  As I said, my Mother’s parents were German immigrants, at their age of twenty-two and twenty-one.  They had their firstborn in arms, a son also named Alfred, when they embarked on their journey to a better life in America.  It is impossible to appreciate their experience as many thousands of people did what seemed best..Pack up and leave family and home for another way of life. Research places the family origin in a colony of Mennonites in central Russia which is named Walter.. . Grandfather Alfred was recorded as Helfrich Lichtenberg on a baptismal certificate into the Mennonite Brethern Church.. Grandmother Catherine maiden name was Melcher.. No record exists of their marriage…They traveled from their home in Russia to a seaport in northern Germany. They landed at the port of New York City on December 8, 1876.  Ellis Island, the gateway for so many millions, was not established until later, in 1894. They carried their sixteen month old son, also named Helfrich.. They were known as Russian-Germans, or Volga Germans, whose families had lived in Russia for about a century, but retained their own German culture and heritage.. In 1763,  Catherine II of Russia (1762-1796) issued a manifesto inviting colonists from foreign countries to settle in Russia and offering free land along the Volga River.. Catherine had been born in Germany, and she knew the German people to be hard working and industrious.  The Seven Years  war had left Germany devastated. Industry and commerce were at a standstill and much farm land was devastated.. The response from the German people was very enthusiastic and more than 29,000 of them emigrated to the Volga region.

By 1768, some 104 villages had been settled.  The provisions of Catherines’ manifesto were: the  immigrants were to enjoy complete religious freedom, but were forbidden to evangelize among the native Russians.. They were exempt from military service and were granted total autonomy in local governments, schools and churches.. There was free transportation from Germany to the Volga Valley, and each family was to be granted thirty dessiantines of land (about 80 acres). The government provided interest free loans of 500 rubles, and total tax exemption for a period of thirty years.. In 1874, the Russian government under Alexander II adopted universal military conscription.. In time, the Czarist government took away all the civil, social and political rights of the Volga Germans which had been guaranteed by the manifesto.

At about the same time, promotional information had been filtering into the colonies telling of opportunities in America.. The promoters were the railroads, land speculators, money lenders, and labor brokers.. Representatives from the colonies were sent to look over the new land, and they were impressed.. The first Volga Germans came to Nebraska in 1874. Five families arrived in Hastings in August 1876.. Eventually about 350 families were to settle here… Leaving Russia was often a difficult experience, and the harsh trip aboard ship left many immigrants with bad memories..

Helfrich and Catherine came from the village of Walter, near Saratov and the Volga River, about 400 miles southeast of Moscow. We probably can’t begin to imagine what grit and determination it took for them to launch into this long and arduous journey to the New World.. Of course they were young, she 22 and he 21, and at that age you don’t burden your mind with all the possible disasters you might encounter. On the other hand, there was a baby documented as 16 months old on arrival in New York. The mind can conjure up all kinds of reasons not to make the trip. Try to
imagine what land transportation must have been like in eastern Russia in 1876… Straight line mileage from Walter to Hamburg, Germany, their point of embarkation, is about 1200 miles and it’s doubtful their trip was straightline. How much was by rail—and how was the rest accomplished? Then think of caring for a 16 month old child—food, sanitation, illness and all that’s involved.  It boggles the mind. It may not compare with crossing the U.S. in a covered wagon, but it had it’s own difficulties.. Then after reaching Hamburg they still had to face a new set of hardships… Who knows whether they traveled in steerage, and how long it took? At least their ship, the S.S. Frisia, was a steamship, not a windjammer. A good guess for the length of the trip would be between two and three weeks.

Anyway, they landed safely in New York on December 8, 1876.  It is not known whether they had any command of the English language at that point.. From Helfrich’s obituary in the December 25, 1918 issue of Zionsbote, the Mennonite Journal, we know “they went first to Bluffton, Allen County, Ohio. Later they moved to Sutton, Nebraska, then in York County where they joined the Mennonite Brethern Church on May 17, 1879..In the 1880 census of Adams County, Nebraska which became their final destination, and permanent home, Grandfather Helfrich is listed on the debarkation manifest as a “workman”. Was he a young farmer back in Russia?  In any case, he undoubtedly launched into farming when they arrived in Hastings which had been officially established only a few years earlier (1872). They joined with the other “Rooshens”, which they were sometimes derisively called, to form a substantial part of the growing population of Hastings and vicinity.  Of the eleven children born, one was stillborn, two died after childbirth. Three sons and five daughters grew to maturity. My Mother Emma was born on January 16 1887.  She worked for a while as a housekeeper for wealthy families in Hastings, then moved to Omaha to work in the dry cleaning business owned by sisters Marie and Leah. On March 10, 1914 she married Chester Daugherty, a farmer who lived south of Hastings, whom she had known since childhood. Chester and Emma lived out their lives on the same farm. Earlier census records of 1900 showed she was living at a farm two miles south of town with her Father and brother Ben.  Grandmother was listed as living in town with the other children.  This venture into farming was successful as land records show they purchased that farm on June 27, 1902. The purchase price for the quarter section was $6,400.  They sold it nine years later, in 1911 for $19,200 .. They also owned land west of town. . At the age of 55, Alfred sold the farms and moved to town, in a two-story brick house built by son John, who was a bricklayer.. Mother recollected that Grandfather had diabetes at some severe degree, as he died in 1918.  Diabetes has continued as the family curse to this generation.
























The Daugherty Story



























To be Irish is to be part of history shrouded in strife and hostility since the time of Christ.  The clans were either fighting off invaders or fighting each other.. The principal enemy after about 1600 was the British who never stopped trying to incorporate the island into the empire.  In 1922, the southern portion was given limited freedom and became the Irish Free State, but part of the British Commonwealth.. The Protestant majority had the support of the British government.  The county of Donegal (part of the Free State), is the stronghold of the O’Dochartaigh clan.. As with most peoples of the ‘old world’, the search for freedom and opportunity uprooted families and the drive to resettle began in the 18th century.  And so our ancestors came to America in the late 1,700’s, and proceeded to Indiana county of Pennsylvania, a small county 35 miles northeast of Pittsburg, and is the source of census information beginning in 1840.. Hugh and Mary Daugherty appear with no children.. This could be an oversight or an error in census taking, as in 1850,  there were eight children listed, of which our forebear George was shown to be 15 years old and was the sixth child.. George’s birthday is shown as September 1836.  Nothing is known of George until his marriage to Mary Ann on August 23, 1859.. George had a military hitch, during which two sons were born.  After being discharged, a third son—James Chester was born August 9, 1864. In the fall of 1864, George and Mary Ann moved to Mason County, West Virginia..James C. was only a few months old.. Five more children were born later.

James C, who is my paternal Grandfather married first in 1882 to Sarah Jane,  who died in childbirth in May 1883.  J.C. remarried to Mary Rosanna  Ehrfeldt on November 30, 1884.. Mary’s parents were born in Germany.. Their first child was a son—Chester Arthur (my Father)—born August 5, 1885.. Although little Chester was not George’s first grandchild, he exercised his carpentry talents to build a wooden cradle with rocker base.  This cradle is in possession of brother Jack in Tulsa at this writing.

The story of J.C. and Mary’s move to Nebraska raises questions on how he chose to move there. It is known that Grandfather came first, and later either returned for Mary R and Chester or they came alone probably in 1887.  So, Hastings has been the ancestral home of the J.C. Daugherty family since then. Great grandfather George died in 1889. His wife, Mary Ann moved to Nebraska along with all but one of their children, Hugh..  Census records for 1900 show James and Mary had seven children by then, the youngest was Dean at age two.. By 1910, the census showed all twelve children living,, the youngest was Morris at age 3, and all were living at home.



















Farming and truck gardening provided the main occupation for the large family and they prospered. In fact J.C. was probably the most prosperous farmer in the county. By the time of the depression in the 30’s, he had outstanding loans to numerous business people in town, and even had a mortgage on the County Fairground property.. James C. died April 2, 1949 and Mary R. died November 21, 1945.  In addition to the 12 surviving children, there were two infants who died. My story picks up with the life of my Father Chester, and his relationship as part of the large family. First a brief comment about the ‘Grand Father’ of the Daugherty family.
























There is no doubt my Grandfather was a good manager and business- man. He invested in the early foundings of the ‘Nebraska Consolidated Mills’--- a group of country grain elevators---and he became a Director of the Board as a major stockholder. His holdings were bequeathed to all his heirs in the form of stock in the company later to be known as ‘Conagra’, one of the worlds largest agricultural companies. The family operated as a corporation so to speak. Each child when married received ownership or control of a farm which they would later inherit. There were times when I recall Grandpa telling someone he could write a check for $100,000.  Yet at times during the depression, he would complain that was ‘land poor’, having trouble with paying property taxes. As I have alluded, my Irish name belies my ancestry. My father being ½ or less Irish, and my Mother being full German, adds up to only a fraction of Irish blood in my genes. So, that’s where I come from, fifth generation down from the ‘OLD COUNTRY”  ‘ERIN GO BRAGH”  or ‘May the tribe increase.'                                                                   

As you know, my father—Chester was the ‘firstborn’, and came to Nebraska at about the age of two. By then, the train service had replaced the covered wagons that had served the early pioneers through the 40’s & 50’s. After Grandpa had come west to establish a home, no doubt he went back to arrange the move. That is assumed, not known for sure. The Paternal digs were at the second mile line south of Hastings. As sections lay, it was at the southeast corner. The family grew fast, expanding by another birth in nearly every two year interval. No question about it, James and Mary intended to grow their dynasty with the help of offspring. We don’t know what the early home looked like, but when the time came for permanent construction, it was a classic square two-story five bedroom house. On the front, facing the road, there was a full screen porch extending both on the first and second story.  I’ll begin using our familial names—Father was ‘Pop’ always  during his lifetime, and now as we refer to him—he is still ‘Pop’.

Pop probably carried an extra share of the family effort in making a living and growing the family fortune. He was an avid photographer,  which gives us a  great insight into our history. We know he was interested in music as he was involved with the music team at the country church known as the Bethel Church, two miles southwest of his home.  This church was a ‘Brethern Church’, associated with the Mennonites,  and later became part of the United Brethern Church which we as a family worshipped in from my early memory.  Pop made his decision to accept Jesus Christ as his personal savior in that country church, a fact we know from a  decision card we have in our album. Pop was a mild tempered man, never profane—at least in our presence—maybe swore at the horses if they needed it when they got lazy or ornery.

Pop had other ambitions than being the faithful farmhand. He was involved with the local military Guard probably between 18 and 23. About that time, we know he must have become restless as he left home without his parents knowledge. We have a postcard he wrote from Kansas City apologizing to Grandma for doing that—as he wrote ‘ if I had asked you wouldn’t have let me went’. He was headed for Florida, we know, as he joined up with Uncle Pearl who had gone to lay claim to some land at LaBelle Florida. Pop also had some travels into Colorado and New Mexico in later years where he worked as a farmhand. Not that he was a ‘prodigal son’, but it probably took this experience to sort out his values in wanting to be around his family for the rest of his life. There was no doubt the reality that if he ever as to settle down with a wife and raise a family it had better be where there was a support base   

So there had to be a homecoming and a reestablishing of his place in the family. We know he must have had an early acquaintance with my Mother—who has always been ‘Mom’ to us. She at one time lived on their Litchenberg family farm located a mile west of the Daugherty corner. There probably was some early church and country school relationship too. We do know that prior to their marriage, as I said earlier, Mom was working in Omaha, as they wrote to each other planning their wedding in 1914. Their first and final  home was a ten acre plot in the SE  ¼  of the NE ¼ of the same section as the “Home Place’. This placed us about a mile south of town.

During my years up to 10, I recall numerous occasions when our family would gather with some of the other Uncles’ and Aunts’ families on Sunday night at ‘Gramp’s’, and we would set quietly and listen to the ‘elders’ discuss the affairs of the times. Some of the young’uns needed slapping down on ocassion to maintain civility. Often there was leftover food from the Sunday meal that we could snack on. There was a quiet ‘love of family’ going on that nurtured our psyches.  One of the highlights of these Sunday night visits was our introduction to the wonders of radio broadcast. One of the enterprising Uncles had obtained a ‘crystal radio’, which he could tune in a station with the ‘whisker’.  Actually a firm hard wire called the ‘cat’s whisker’  touched the crystal at the right place to demodulate the signal coming over the antenna. It was no toy,but did work without vacuum tubes—that was to come later.

Our first exposure to the outside world via radio came in around 1929 with a regular cabinet and loudspeaker radio which used a 6 volt car battery and a 3 volt dry cell ‘C’ battery. There was a local radio station on the air then and we could pick up WSM at Nashville for the Saturday Night Barn Dance program. Pop was into music programs so he could learn the newest songs. There was the afternoon kids programs—‘Jack Armstrong—the All American Boy and Little Orhan Annie to entertain us.  We had to conserve the battery in between trips to town on Saturday when Pop would take the A battery in to get recharges. The electricity service wasn’t to come until the early 30’s. With this afterthought, on approaching the modern world—the next chapter will cover the 30’s, with the dust storms and depression and all that stuff.


































































































































MY LIFE---SO FAR---SO GOOD
Year 1921 and so on
Chapter One
This was me at about 11 months of age
No year identified—the horse was no doubt
‘Old Colonel’—the Litchenburg Carriage horse.

He was ‘in retirement’ as Mom wouldn’t let
Pop work him.
Ivan and Melvin
Caption: 1925 at Grandpa’s, baby
rabbits we found in the field
Grandma Catherine Litchenberg
Click here to add text.
Grandpa Alfred Litchenberg
Grandfather James C. and
Grandmother Mary R.
Daugherty
THE CRADLE
Grandfather James C. Daugherty
Aug 9,1864---April 2,1949
Ben            John                  Alfred  II         Marie           Leah         Kate

Dana         G-Pa Alfred         Sammy    G-ma Catherine w/Lena      Emma

The Litchenberg family--the year unknown
Faye is not included—maybe prior to his birth
The Daugherty Family---around 1915
My Family---Fathers Day 2001































I am still a little amazed that with all the hardships of the thirties, the depression, drouth  and other problems, that we could afford to pay for a family portrait. As I said, Pop was an avid photographer, he liked pictures, but I have no recollection of him pursuing his hobby during these years. So I guess the only option was to have it done. I know this was 1937 as I got my suit for graduation from High School in May. I suppose Jack had one by then too, or they borrowed one for him. I can’t think of any occasion when we would ‘dress up’ with a suit and tie, other than one like this.

The ‘thirties’ started off with a history making disaster. If any one in our family refers to ‘the cyclone’, we know they mean the May 8 twister that ripped  through Hastings and our farm south of town. I have stored clear impressions of the day and evening. As school dismissed that afternoon, we stood on the porch and watched funnel clouds on the western horizon, which we guessed would have hit Juniata, a small town 10 miles west of Hastings, the weather was warm and humid. As evening approached , dark clouds gathered and gusty wind kicked up dust. As darkness fell, we had finished supper and Pop said we should get ready to go to the cave, but first he wanted to go out to the shed where he had been shelling corn for seed, to place more cover on the corn as it had started to rain. The cave was located about 40 ft south of the house, an easy run, but we kept waiting until suddenly the windows were sucked out and the door flew open as complete darkness engulfed us. My last impression was a dull thud or bump on the head. Sometime later, I regained consciousness and was laying on the ground under a tree, hanging on I guess while the rain continued. I could hear Pop and Melvin talking a short distance away, saying something about insurance.  Where Mom and Jack were during the blow, I don’t remember. Mom was severely injured with broken ribs as she was hit by the falling  bricks from the chimney, which toppled as the house shifted off it’s foundation. Had we stayed in the house, we would have been safe from injury. Mom and I were taken to the hospital, I was a mess with mud and blood caked in my hair. My injury was superficial , a cut on the top of my head at the rear of my crown. They sewed me up, but I still have a dent in my skull as a souvenier.

Mom stayed in the hospital several days, but Jack and I being too young to help in the recovery were taken in by our Aunt Kate and Uncle Nick for the summer. They lived two miles west of the District 60 school we attended. I can barely relate to what Pop and Mom was confronted with, the devastation—no barn, the fields in a shamble with cyclone litter everywhere, how did he ever get any crop planted or get organized to get the family back together. I know we had a new barn being built very soon. It was a roof over our heads, as we actually lived in the hay loft with the new house in progress by late summer. That was a monumental feat itself, as we moved in by Thanksgiving time, none too soon as cold weather and ‘barn life’ didn’t go well together.



















This picture shows the barn demolished and the house partly destroyed. The tree in the center was where I lay during the storm. Our new house was built just to the north of the old one. I think we all grew up in that year, learning how to cope with adversity and deprivation. I’m sure we did our share of complaining, but who was there to hear that wasn’t experiencing their own share and more of life’s bad cards.  The economy was hitting the skids, following the famous stock market crash of 1929. I don’t know of anyone who lost money on the stock market, but the secondary effects of people retrenching in their spending brought about the depression that ensued in the thirties. More people were jobless in the cities, and prices for the farm products fell as a result of tight money. With the election of Roosevelt in 1932, the banks were already in deep trouble as they  were calling in loans that were delinquent, and the collateral value of foreclosed property wouldn’t pay off the loans, banks were short of cash and couldn’t meet demands for withdrawals. One of FDR’s early acts was to declare a bank holiday to stop the run on people demanding their money. Banks were either closed forever or offered to settle accounts for a fraction of  their value. This caused panic in the streets in Smalltown USA. There was no FDIC which guaranteed your money. The depression didn’t bring on the drouth, but when we didn’t raise crops for several years, and what did grow like calves and pigs couldn’t be sold for anything near their worth. FDR did instigate government programs to buy the livestock that was virtually starving. Some of it went to processing for distribution to people who had no money, some of the livestock was slaughtered and buried in trenches as a humane way of eliminating the surplus. The Work  Progress Administration (WPA) and Public Works Administration (PWA) was begun. Men were given work for $1.00 a day doing less than meaningful jobs. My own Father was reduced to joining these work gangs to bring money into the house.  We knew we were poor, but so was everyone else it seemed. I have mentioned that Grand Dad had loaned money to various businesses in town. One of these was  the Lovell’s Grocery store, where we were permitted to shop for necessities which were then credited as payments to Gramps loan balance. Another was a dentist where we could go for dental work. The only tooth I have missing from my mouth was pulled by this dentist, he could have filled it to maybe save it, I took his word that it had to come out.

To compound the misery we were living in, the drouth caused so little forage to grow and be plowed back into the soil, the soil became barren and began to erode. Dust storms became regular, not only in Nebraska but Kansas and Oklahoma and Texas began to move in on us. You could see a wall of dust coming over the horizon, rolling with the wind. Soon, and I mean in minutes, it would turn from daylight into a darkness which was smothering. You couldn’t see with the dust clouding the eyes, and couldn’t breathe without a dust mask, a wad of rags to filter the dust worked as well as possible. The dust filtered into the houses, even with our house being new, the windows didn’t have the stripping that was needed. Consequently it was a daily battle to clean up the dust that piled up beneath the windows. Mom would try to keep a clothe over the table until we sat down to eat to keep the plates clean. The air was just full of silt constantly. About the only thing that would grow was a thistle, to maybe two feet in diameter. In the fall they would uproot and blow. Some called them tumble weeds, we called them Russian Thistles. They would pile up at the fence rows, then the dust would pile up, leaving the fence completely covered. Any livestock could just walk over the fence and did. It took years to plow out the fences. As farming became less and less profitable, many farms were foreclosed by the county for taxes  The ‘Dust Bowl” became the subject for John Steinbeck’s  novel, ‘The Grapes of Wrath.




                                












Here is a shot taken in front of the new house, I’d guess in about 1932.  As our album shows a lack of a lot of pictures, it must be because film and developing was an expense bordering on a luxury. Speaking of luxurys, my parents had the foresight to wire the new house for electricity when it was built in 1930. Along about 1932 or 33, the City of Hastings offered to extend their distribution lines out as far as our place for no initial expense. We ‘hooked up to the juice’ and had light in every room—no more lanterns, no more gasoline fired irons to press the clothes.  All kinds of new appliances began appearing. We were years ahead of the curve on Rural Electrification which was another ‘New Deal’ program permitting rural cooperatives to borrow money  at less than cost, to build lines where private companies couldn’t invest with no hope of return on their money. Uncle Dean’s—who lived across the field—actually nearer to town, also got hooked up on the same deal. Somehow, they beat us to the punch and bought an electric radio before we did.. Notwithstanding the other things we had that they didn’t—we were definitely upped on that one. It didn’t take long for Pop to get wires run out to the barn, no more milking by lantern light. Oh what sweet victory over the dark ages.  We had electricity, but had to give up the telephone, the old crank model and the multi-party line, for only the monthly cost of $1.75. So we had to economize wherever possible.

One of the business ventures Grandpa got into was lending money to a local entrepreneur by the name of Fred Tjaden. He had built a factory to make products with the trade name of ‘Goldenrod’. These included a pump oil can, tire pumps, air handling equipment for water cooling systems, etc. The Tjaden factory was in danger of folding for lack of cash flow. Gramp was at risk for his loan, which was in default, so he advanced more operating capital, and took the reigns of the business to see if there would be a way to save the equity he already had. My guess is his strategy succeeded as they never closed. And Pop got a job as night watchman, a steady income for those lean years. There are a multitude of vignettes crowding in my mind for a place on paper.  My goal here is to portray those happenings that shaped my attitudes and hopes for the future. Certainly, my family life places first in this influence on my life. School probably comes next. As I have said, I finished the country school in seven years, graduating to High School and the ninth grade at the age of 12. In 1933, I boldly entered into a competition with the fast track town kids, not realizing I wasn’t physically or mentally ready for this battle. Somehow I made the decision to avoid the competitive sports, saying I had to go home after school to do chores, and many of the courses that I should have taken for college prep were avoided in lieu of shop classes. I invested my time in learning to work with my hands instead of only with my head. Woodworking, auto mechanics, sheet metal,  mechanical drawing, some for more than one year became my interest.  My teachers had a large influence on me as they exhibited a pride in succeeding at manual tasks, and training the youth in achieving at work with dignity. I constructed numerous items some of which I still have.  The main product is the cedar chest with cedar lining and walnut  veneer on the outside. A foot stool made of walnut with turned legs, among other items. Working with wood captured my vision of future handiwork, hence cabinet work and some house building in later years.  I don’t recall my grade point average at graduation, but I’m certain with my curriculum I’d never have gotten into college, no matter how hard I’d have tried.



















Graduating at 16 in 1937 was hardly a ticket to success. One job I had with Mike Kent working on truck engines was doomed for failure as he didn’t pay me what I earned, claiming poor business income. As the winter of 1938 came on, I looked for a different opportunity as there wasn’t any farm work that would pay wages. Pop had to inform me he could handle what work there was to do. In the depth of the depression after high school, one opportunity I had dreamed of would not materialize. My Uncle Merle had been in the Navy for years, and was discharged about this time, came back and lived at home, but was a hell-raiser—getting drunk –one memorable scrape was tearing around at night in the 1934 Ford Tudor Gramp bought him—going down the roads and sideswiping mailboxes. Anyway I tried to enlist in the Navy, but was disqualified due to color blindness. The Navy used the color dot test that was infallible, I could not see the numbers the dots formed. Also, I tried joining the CCC (Civilian Conservation Corps), a sort of youth work and training camp run by the Army. I think the age minimum was 18, at this time I was 16 or 17. The CCC was to become a fast track into the Army as those boys could volunteer for service when the draft began.

My cousin Bud and a friend named Bob Davis prevailed on me to join them in a bold venture of going to California. We didn’t work out any agreement for financing the trip. I had some money in the sock, enough for what I should have needed, but I failed to foresee their scheme of  mooching on my stash before the trip was hardly commenced. My agreement was to start ahead by hitch hiking to Oklahoma City and waiting there at the State Capitol building to proceed from there. I think I waited a day before they arrived. We headed west but soon learned that three was too many for a ride to stop. We split up, my first ride was with a Texas rancher named Brillhart. He offered me a job on his ranch in the Texas panhandle tending to his cow herd. Hindsight tells me I should have taken his offer, but then I would have missed the better part of my education of hoboing on the road. Somehow we got to California, Bob Davis had relatives there in a Los Angeles suburb. That  left Bud and me to seek shelter, which we did in a small Japanese hotel. My money was dwindling rather low. Our ventures out into the orange groves to find work as we expected, was thwarted by Mexicans throwing rocks at us, so we gave that up. On a Saturday night at the hotel, Bud said he was going out to ‘get some dough’, and when he came back and knocked on the door I was to hide in the bathroom. This went as planned, he had picked up a ‘queer’—or homosexual as we say today.  I could hear what sounded like a fist landing a few blows, then Bud came to the bathroom door and said he and his victim was going out to get some money. That was the last I saw of him on that trip. The next day—Sunday, I suspected he was in trouble so I went to the Police Station, sure enough he was in jail on suspected kidnapping charges. In California then, that was a capitol offense. The cops said I should come back tomorrow as they wanted to talk to me. I went back to the hotel and collected my stuff and headed out of town hitch hiking towards Pomona and points east, mainly Nebraska. I reached Pomona that night and stayed at the Salvation Army hostel. The next day I got a ride to Palm Springs. There, the police saw me walking with my suitcase and picked me up. Rather than booking me as a vagrant, they gave me a ride to Indio, some 25 miles away where I could catch a frieght, they said.

This commenced my odyssey of riding freights starting at Indio I rode to El Paso. Then I caught one going to Ft Worth, a 26 hour trip. From there it was short hops by way of Topeka on to home. Bumming across country included knocking on back doors asking for handouts, joining the gang in the hobo jungle to stand by the fire and accept whatever was cooking. Traveling in the winter wasn’t wise, overnights in a city jail, tearing paper lining off the inside of boxcars to roll up in,  other emergency measures seemed to work—doing what I had to do. One very risky ride was on an oil tanker, standing on the walkway, riding into the night and it started snowing—somewhere in Kansas. All this wasn’t by design, just doing what I had to do to get back home. I arrived home in the middle of the night to a dark house and was welcomed with open arms. I soon made plans to return to Texas to take that job on the ranch which paid $2.00 a day and board.

This time I would travel by bus, arriving in Perryton Texas to join a crew of six men which had gathered to work for the summer. Most of them were single men from Oklahoma.  A lot of the work involved driving a tractor to plow ground, harvest wheat, etc. Some work involved herding cattle in roundups. As I learned the ropes in working with other men, I matured more through that job, learning the ways of the world. By fall, and cold weather, I decided the open range was no place to spend the winter, so I took my summer savings—some $200.00 and headed home.

As winter approached I decided to make a trip to Washington D.C. where Melvin was working for the Government Printing Office. He had taken that job while attending the University of Nebraska. Also he had changed his military involvement from the National Guard in Lincoln to the Marine Reserves at Quantico VA. With the impending war clouds forming in 1939, Hitler had invaded Poland and other stuff happening, I knew he would be called up to active duty and as I hadn’t seen him for almost two years, that was a way to leave home again with a purpose. I holed up with Mel until I located work at a gasoline service station in NW Washington DC.             

Mel did go into active duty later, but didn’t go overseas until later as he was still at Quantico as late as January 1942 , but that is a major happening to be part of the next chapter ‘the 40’s  My Uncle Morris—‘Pete’ as everyone called him had lived in Washington for a while. His first wife had died and he remarried to a lady who worked for the Government. So I wasn’t alone entirely, I worked mostly the night shift servicing the taxicab trade throughout the night. My wages then was $16.00 a week. Figuring that I had my own board and room to pay, I hardly had enough to live on, much less to save than working on the ranch in Texas. But then I could find all kinds of diversions to excite the curiosity of a country boy in the city. A few of the living costs then were—bread .10, milk .50 gal, gas .20, minimum wage .25 hr.

I lived in a furnished room in one of the row type houses on ‘M’ street Northwest, about 2 blocks from the station where I worked. This was a far cry from the wide open spaces of Texas. I was glad to have a job and look for what the future would bring.. The war in Europe was coming to a boil, the U.S. was holding out from getting involved as 1939 came to a close.

My pursuit of happiness was soon to become a reality as the 40’s rolled around.  Working the ‘graveyard’ at the gas station was not without risks. One night in the early winter of 1939-40, a guy came in to get warm, as I sat watching out the window he jabbed me in the back and said ‘this is a holdup—give me all your money’, I had on coveralls for warmth when working outside, and I kept the company money in the outer pockets, he got that and my changer, then told me to lay down on the floor in the restroom for 15 minutes. I complied but doubt I waited that long to call the police. This was 2 to 3 AM. I didn’t call the boss for some reason. The next morning he was really upset with me that I hadn’t called him. Later I went to the police station and looked through their mug shots and found my robber. Eventually he was found and tried, I testified but never found out what happened to him. I doubt he had a gun, he could have saved himself some trouble with a slug into my head as I laid on the floor.

Back home, the ‘dirty thirties’  and the drouth was easing up, still not normal by any means, but my existence in the city was more to be desired than life on the farm. I’m sure I could have found work  if I had returned home, but I had no desire to do so. At nineteen I’ had the world by the tail on a downhill pull’.

Next—the 40’s and my transition into full-blown adulthood. Exciting times—those. Wasn’t it Pogo who said ”Things ain’t what they used to be—and they never was” ?.







































































































Chapter Two
MY LIFE---SO FAR--- the 30's
Ivan             Pop                      Melvin                   Mom                      Gerald
What was left of old house
Life went on there in the nation’s capitol, no doubt the world situation bore into my consciousness knowing that the ‘draft’ had begun for military service. I remember becoming unsettled with working with the blacks at the station. On the one hand they were friendly and did their work. I had a leather jacket with dark wool pile trim, my Mother had bought this for me as a special present—birthday or graduation or something. Anyway I prized it highly. I wore it to work and hung it in a  changing room. One day it disappeared, I complained to the boss but he didn’t seem concerned, saying some people couldn’t be trusted. That must have triggered my move to find other work.

On one day off, I visited where my Uncle Pete worked, as a delivery man for a dry cleaner named Ted. I must have been moaning my woes as  it was mentioned they heard the telephone company was hiring men. If ever you think any incidental chance happening isn’t providential, I look back on that as my turning point as it affected the rest of my life. So I went to apply for a job at the age of 19. I progressed as far as the physical and was disqualified for a condition called a varicosele—which is an overgrowth of veins in the scrotum. They said I was overly susceptible to injury if ever I was bruised in my testicle. This is not a common problem, but was no doubt a condition brought on by a severe bout with the mumps when I was about 15. Anyway, I decided to correct the problem, which only involves tying off some of the feeder veins to reduce the overgrowth. I had Pop draw my savings out of the bank and send it to me for doctor and hospital bills. The operation worked as they later accepted me for employment. I guess they thought I would be a good bet after going to the effort to get the problem fixed. So I started work on March 28, 1941 for Chesapeake and Potomac Telephone Co. in downtown Washington D.C.

I was inducted for training on the job, working with another ‘foot installer’, whose name was Bryant Hanback—which meant we walked from our dispatch center to install phones in a three to four block radius. We worked orders for residence phones and businesses that didn’t involve multi-line systems. I learned the routine by watching and doing, finally getting up to speed to handle orders on my own. We carried our tools in a pouch with a shoulder strap. Then we had to carry the necessary equipment to install—phones—wire—etc. My first foreman was Paul Rauscher. He counseled me with job ethics which included the five cardinal sins which could  potentially get me fired. One of those ‘sins’ made working for the telephone company a matter of conduct on and off the job, wherein any behavior that reflected badly on the company would not be tolerated. That covered a broad area, but needless to say,  you always thought twice before getting out of line. He also said if I did my job and ‘kept my nose clean’, I’d probably have a job as long as I wanted it, and have a pension when I was old. I felt in high cotton with a starting wage of .45 per hour. That was $18.00 a week! When I left the gas station I was earning $16.00 a week. Not much incentive to change, but there was a benefit package that came with seniority such as sick leave, vacations, regular raises. There was an employees union to bargain for benefits but then it was not affiliated with any other group.

My proficiency in understanding the principle of converting sound waves to electrical impulses that traveled over wires, and then be converted back to sound improved gradually. The company began technical training classes for new employees and some of us older types got trained too, in the theory of what different components inside a telephone instrument did in interacting with each other to produce the desired results. It did lift the veil of mystery  regarding how that stuff works. This also increased our ability to think through a problem when something didn’t work to remedy the problem. With steady progress in productivity, I advanced from ‘station installer’ to multi-line key equipment systems. This involved learning the color coding of multi-conductor cables and connection cords serving the key switches and multi-line phones. This was considered an ‘elite corps’ of the working force. This capability led to working with switchboard equipment. In the space of 18 months, before I was drafted into the army, I had accomplished a fairly complex understanding of telephone work, which also do me well as a soldier in the Signal Corps. Although working out of the main office building at 12th & G Street in the heart of the city, I continued to live at 1829 M Street  a walk of 12 blocks to work wasn’t enough of a burden to justify moving closer to work. Other roomers in the house included a guy named Don Carter. I didn’t get well acquainted with him until one day I was hanging around the house on my day off, shooting the breeze with the landlady whose quarters was in the rear part of the first floor. As I stood by the door the phone rang so the lady said, “Answer it”. I did. The call was for Don Carter. A girls voice queried me, I guessed she thought I was Don disguising his voice. She wanted to know my name, I thought I’d string her a little so I said,  “Billy The Kid.”. Having lived in Texas I had become possessed with a line of BS when the occasion fit, I’d produce a little bull. She didn’t believe me and later told Don to bring me around to prove the voice had a body. Don prevailed upon me and even took a bottle of wine as a peace offering to his girl friend.

As we lived in the Northwest quadrant of DC, and she lived in the Southeast section, it was about a 45 minute bus ride with one connection change to get there. It must have been the next day or a later day off , maybe it was about Labor Day 1941. We arrived at their apartment to meet this girl named ‘Ola’ together with her two room mates, Ruby and Eckie. The hospitality atmosphere was loosened up with a little wine. Don was putting on a demonstration of balancing the bottle on his head to entertain the rest of us.. Ola decided to get better acquainted and came across the room and sat beside me. That seemed rather forward but then there were no ‘chaperones’ to keep the party decent.

Beyond that memory, I don’t know how it happened, but soon I was into visiting Ola on my own. I seem to remember Don wanting to move on in his pursuits, so there wasn’t any crowding in on him that I remember. Our social life continued with frequent phone calls and all  the nightly bus trips I could manage to work in as the work load was picking up and they frequently had us working overtime. Sometimes not so much for the work volume but to accommodate customers who didn’t want workmen around their offices in the daytime where we would have to work with pulling cables into conduits and attaching equipment to desks, etc. Often we would have to disable existing systems as we converted to new.

Needless to say, if my casual  meeting soon turned to ‘courting’ in the usual sense without any verbal commitment, I know for my part, our relationship was an exclusive involvement as I had not sought to pursue the girls before that chapter in my life. I was to learn later that there was another lad from down in the mountains, where in fact Don had come from also, a place called Green Cove. The guy was Fred Necessary. I was to become her main squeeze by choice or process of elimination or sheer dominance in over coming the competition. Here I am a flatlander from the West in the big city, and she a girl from the mountains of southwest Virginia. An unlikely match to say the least, but it seemed nothing stood in the way of our becoming ‘a couple’, as steady daters were referred to.

The fall season progressed into winter. Without expressed intentions to become serious, nature had taken it’s course and along about Christmas Eve, I believe,  I ‘popped the question’. There certainly was every evidence of emotional bonding as we sat in a restaurant one evening with a meal setting before us and neither one interested in eating. From that time, as it was December 1941, the world had become embroiled in war. Pearl Harbor was already going down as the most momentous occasion to make us choose up sides with the rest of the free world..We were realistic enough to know there was no way to escape the oncoming grasp of war on our lives. We knew that our long term relationship would last through any forced separation, but as we knew we ‘belonged together’ there was no real reason not to make a commitment for the rest of our lives—whether it would be a few years or many. We set a date for the last day of January 1942 for ‘getting hitched’.

One further observation—when we went to get a marriage license, I had to sign my name as Ivan G., not the ‘Billy’ as I had become known as, and I was to learn that my ‘Ola’ was really Vivian, with the Ola a nickname for Iola. Oh well, so much for flying under false colors. Our hitching  immediately stalled out  as I wouldn’t be legally marriageable until May when I turned 21, so I had to write home for permission from my parents. Wasn’t that a cause for concern?. No matter—they gave their blessing by mail.                                              

As plans progressed for our wedding, I must have conveyed all the details to Mom and Pop, as my Uncle Pete and Aunt Verna became our family witnesses present, and at the last minute here come brother Melvin from his Marine base at Quantico VA. I later learned he had gone awol for the weekend to be there. We were married by the Pastor of the Congress Heights Baptist Church where we had been attending.  Viv was a ‘born again Christian’. I didn’t know what I was then, but later came to know that I had not yet made a decision to accept Jesus as my personal saviour, therefore I was not a believer. The Bible plainly states that we are ‘not to become unequally yoked together’. My conversion was not to happen for several more years. Dr. Richardson did not make an issue of that or question either of us as to our belief in Christ. We made our vows before God and man and believed we were obeying our moral decrees. While no one I know will talk about their wedding night, suffice it to say briefly, we both being virgins, it was strictly ‘Amateurs Night’.

                                                                  





                                               

















                                                                                     The Newly Weds –January 1942

We had gotten a walkup apartment in Northwest DC, on Columbia Road near Dupont Circle. This was a one room plus a converted bathroom serving as a kitchen. The place wasn’t cleaned adequately before we moved in together, and I think we spent a lot of our next day in scrubbing the place down. We didn’t have any time off, so we went back to work on Monday. Viv worked as an information operator doing split shifts. With both of us working full time, we managed to put $40.00 a week into the budget.  Our life settled into a routine, work and enjoy our time off together. With my having a year service by March 1942, I became eligible for a vacation by summer. We took time off to go on vacation, we treated as our honeymoon, with a trip to Nebraska. This was only possible as Pete and Verna provided the transportation.Bringing home the girl I married was a great experience, as I was the first to do that. I mentioned earlier that our wives were warmly and lovingly welcomed as daughters of the household.  It was never said, but I’m sure Mom would have liked to have had a girl as one of her children. So, this trip made it official, we had made our departure from each of our own family shelter, and became our own family, as the Bible says  ‘leaving Mother and Father and cleaving to one another’.

Back home in Washington D.C., we were able to plan ahead for better living arrangements. A couple living in the same apartment house named Harold and Delores Scholerman from Iowa, and us got together and located a house out in the Northeast section of DC. We moved out there and shared the house, a more decent kind of life style. It made commuting to work more of a problem, but again, the tradeoff was worth the cost. We had to rely on the bus for moving about, cars were a luxury beyond our grasp. Somewhere in this era, I had registered for the draft, and anxiously waited for each drawing to see what numbers came up. It was like a lottery, chance selection of your number meant you got your ‘greetings’ from the President.  In this period during mid 1942, brother Jack got a job in DC with some department of the ‘gummint’. We offered him a spare room in our shared house. His rent was added into the grocery kitty to buy the supplies for the house.

                                            

                                                          
















                                                                                     Ivan and Jack at 12 Burns St NE

We enjoyed our organized life for a while, until the fall of ’42 when I got my greetings to report for duty in October. With all the wisdom available then, we decided that we should give up the house and Viv would go live with my parents until I had gotten inducted and trained for service. We had no inkling then what was in store for our future. During the summer of ’42, Viv’s sister Stella had married Chuck Casto, a soldier stationed at Bolling Field Air Base, just outside Washington DC. He was a Master Sergeant in the Air Corps, in charge of the Photo Lab. He said he knew the Master Sergeant of the Signal Corps detachment which operated and maintained the army owned telephone system on the base. He said the MS was interested in getting me stationed there as he needed experienced telephone men. All he wanted was my army serial number. I held little hope for any intercession, but I went on to the induction center at Camp Lee VA.

Several weeks went by, most of the others I came in with were ordered out to their basic training centers, I waited for orders and suddenly realized I was going back to DC to Bolling Field. It was bittersweet,  realizing we could have kept our life together—together, instead of splitting up for eventual separation by my going overseas. I proceeded to settle in at Bolling Field with the 851st  Signal Corps Detachment, wearing the insignia of the Air Corps and the Signal Corps. My experience earned me the status of doing technical work, but going more than a year before I earned a stripe for my uniform. Being a ‘Buck Private’  wasn’t a problem except for the pay grade. I resented doing work that should have merited at least two stripes. But, I knew what I had going for me—stateside service for the duration was better than coming home in a body bag.           



                                         



                                         










                                                            Vivian –during her stay with my parents—November-December 1942                           

Frequent correspondence with my ‘honey’ back in Nebraska, brought about some plans to resume our life together. Our good fortune was to take over an apartment that Viv’s cousin Pat had, not over a half mile from the base. Pat’s husband was in the Navy and had been sent to Florida. She wanted to join him but keep the apartment in her name in case they ever came back to DC. That worked out great, as Viv came back and we resumed our life together with as much time off as I could manage. If there wasn’t any extra duty to pull such as ‘standby’ for night calls, I could get weekend passes, and do some overnights in between. That went really well. The Top, as First Sergeants were called, soon learned that my wife was an  experienced telephone operator, and had her report for work at the Signal Office. She became an operator on the switchboard which was like a PBX in front of the internal dial system.  We made a good team working for the Army.





                                                  














                                                                                   Number please—at Bolling Field switchboard

Our sudden  reunion in January resulted in pregnancy. I guess it was inevitable as were married for just a year then in January 1943 and our firstborn came to us in October.  We named him Stuart Wayne. Our good fortune was that Viv’s Aunt Laura lived in the other ground floor apartment in the six-plex. I don’t remember when we decided that Aunt Laura could assist as regular baby sitter, but Viv went back to work at the base.  Maybe by that time I had qualified for off base quarters that paid an extra $75.00 a month.  I still had a bunk in the barracks as I still had to pull the standby duty, and I could go to the mess hall to eat. There were other perks as I finally got some stripes. The irony of it all was that I never had gotten the usual basic training most everyone had to endure. I considered myself a ‘civilian soldier’. Several other comrades in the group were also C&P employees who by one way or another were stationed there too.

                                      

                                      




















                                                                                      The ‘bride’ and the ‘buck private’---1943

As the cost of living would often exceed our income, I sought to supplement with moonlighting work on my nights off. I had several jobs as opportunity came. The most enjoyable was  driving streetcars for Capital Transit. I would go to the ‘barn’ at the end of the Lincoln Park route. I would get my schedule for an all day Saturday, through the night and do the’church run’ Sunday morning, then go home and sleep until time to stand reville the next morning. This went on for several months, I was informed that the War Department had issued an order that white off-duty soldiers were not to hold jobs that could be filled by minority people. That was a blow, having reverse discrimination put me out of a job. I worked in the bus maintenance shop for a while, but the hot weather did me in. I couldn’t hack the night work out of the airconditioning that I enjoyed driving the cars. Other jobs included working in a bakery, but there too—the heat did me in. Also, as my availability was sporadic, I couldn’t do a definite schedule.

Life in the military wasn’t anything to complain about. Brother Melvin had survived several South Pacific campaigns ( nice word for bloody-murderous invasions of the islands held by the Japanese), after  being sent to Australia for R & R, also I think me had contracted malaria and needed treatment. While there, he took up with an Aussie girl named Jean Morris. Like with most war time romances, they became a couple. I don’t know if they got hitched over there, I guess they did as he had to leave and eventually got back to the States, and she was able to follow later with the many ‘war brides’, to join him in DC. They resumed their life together and have lived there ‘happily ever after’.

It seems that we were able to work in a vacation in December 1944 to come to Nebraska for Christmas. Our travel and visiting with my parents, under stressful circumstances gave pause to ordinary concerns. Our daughter Linda was born nine months later on September 7. She was our double blessing, now with two






                                                 





                        









                                                        This was in November 1945, with Stuart Wayne age 3 and Linda age 2 months,
                                                                             Also my Mother and Viv’s Dad—Granddad Butch

children, we really buckled down to raising our family. By that time I had four stripes—a Staff Sergeant no less. By process of elimination, I rose on the table of organization to fill the allotted slots of rank. I suspect they had an ulterior motive in promoting me as my eligibility for discharge rose by December and I was ready to ‘muster out’. They dangled the carrot to get me interested in staying in, with a promise that I could walk out later and continue in the Army Reserves. I had a job waiting for me back at the C & P Telephone Co, so I took a walk, rather headed for the door on a dead run. I think it was Dec 7, 1945 that I went out to Andrews Field to get my discharge. I have neglected to mention the end of the war in Europe and the South Pacific, those events are history. I didn’t contribute much to winning the war. I have no war stories, except we rookies jokingly said we should have ribbons for the ‘Battle of the Potomac’. I could do the rifle drill, march in formation, salute smartly and answer Yes Sir and No Sir, and shoot my rifle expertly. Nuff said.  Anyway, I hung up my uniform that week and went back to C & P to reclaim my job the next week.

Everyone was surprised that I wasn’t going to take time off to ‘get adjusted’ to civilian life. They didn’t believe I had never really left it those 38 months. As promised, my seniority was extended to qualify me for the wage rate paid to four years service. When I left in 1942, I think my 40 hours earned $28.00. With four years plus, I began work at nearly double that amount. What with war time raises and progression, it was a bonanza. Don’t ever think I felt undeserving. Even then, $1.40 per hour was a good wage.. My coming back into the company which was undergoing a downscaling in business, lots of layoffs in the government temporary ranks, I was assigned back into the walking station installer category. The worst part was that my location was 7th and F street. This was on the east edge of the business district and from there on east it was residential, to say it better—the ghetto began there. I worked orders in places I wouldn’t let a dog live in. This disillusioned me greatly. I had done my time for the war effort, to come back and find the good jobs I had expected were not forthcoming. Nevertheless I had a job, which a lot of returning service men didn’t have.

Shortly after leaving the service, we looked for better housing as our borrowed apartment had only one bedroom. Also, Viv’s cousin ‘Pat’ was coming back to DC and we had to relinquish the apartment.  My enterprising wife found out about an opportunity being offered to returning service men through the GI Bill. We could ‘buy’ a house with no money down, the one we went for was the end unit in a ‘row type’ house in Anacostia, at 1322 Talbert Terrace. It set about 500 feet higher than the main arterial—Nichols Avenue which led from Congress Heights into the city. We went to look it over late one evening, and decided we couldn’t lose on the deal. A nice two bedroom, two story with basement, and a fenced back yard. We actually had a great view, at night you could see the panorama of the city lights.

When we moved in we discovered we were on a through street leading between the black community on Nichols Ave and another area on beyond in the other direction. There was a steady stream of blacks passing by. It seems we were one of the first white families to move into that neighborhood. That didn’t diminish the comforts we enjoyed in our new house, but we didn’t enjoy the surroundings.  Although, by March I had achieved the five year seniority level by virtue of having my military time credited.. It was customary for the boss, my foreman named Walter Felt, to take me out to lunch  for my anniversary. He gave me my five year pin, a lapel pin with the Bell System insignia and one star for the five years. One of the extra benefits I learned about, was that I could move my service credit to another company. Needless to say, this started my mind to working. If I couldn’t work up the ladder again in my present job, I could pursue other opportunities.

That summer, in 1946, we went to Nebraska for vacation, in July. I prospected the telephone company in Hastings, my hometown for a job. They would give me the salary level for my experience but wouldn’t give me seniority. I went to Grand Island to check out my chances for a transfer. The Company was the Northwestern Bell, an associated company.  They would give me full benefits and a job doing what was available to the whole work force. The main difference was I would have a truck and be an ‘installer/reparman’. I hadn’t done any repair work per se, but agreed to go back to C & P and request a transfer through the proper channels. I pondered this as we returned from vacation in August. It didn’t take long to arrive at a firm decision. I approached Mr Felt and said I wanted a transfer. He thought I meant to another work assignment in DC. He said ‘don’t we all want out of here’? I surprised him with my plans to leave Washington and move to Nebraska to work for Northwestern Bell. He gladly arranged for me to make the proper application to be released and my records transferred to Omaha, the headquarters of NW Bell. It didn’t take long, a couple of weeks, and we were packing up to move. The house sold easily with the 100% loan under the GI Bill to be transferred to the buyer. This didn’t release me from the loan, in case the buyer defaulted I would be held responsible. We made enough on the sale to finance our move, so we bid farewell to friends and relatives in DC, and landed in Grand Island in October 1946.

There had been temporary war time housing for workers at the Ammunition Factory, some of them became vacant as production of bombs and rockets ceased. This was the only kind of housing available, a terrible let down from the comforts we had left. We had a hot plate to cook on, a wood stove to heat the house, better termed a shack, it was a trying experience with winter coming on. We shopped for a car, buying a 1937 Ford two door which cousin Beulah had traded in at Hastings. It was in good shape and only nine years old. I had to ask Pop to co-sign the loan so I could buy the car. It served us well for five years.  Being near to Pop and Mom was a good extension to our lifestyle. We visited frequently on weekends. I could help Pop with odds and ends work.

My assimilation into the work force in Grand Island was gradual. Again, I was tutored by a seasoned old hand named Leo Humpal in the art of repairing trouble. He especially was proficient in snooping trouble on rural ‘open wire lines’. I had no experience with that aspect of the system. He could hook on the line with his test phone and tell whether the short was behind or ahead of us.  More importantly I learned that ’breaks’ were an essential part of the routine. We would head out of the garage after the 8 AM briefing on trouble reports and any orders and head directly for the coffee shop. It wasn’t easy to understand this kind of dedication, but he was so proficient in getting troubles cleared, he could work in several breaks and not get behind in the work. Eventually, I became a free-lancer and got my own truck. Having had experience with complex systems didn’t put me ahead of the others doing that work. But in time I was able to get into the better work, helping some of the others with their jobs.

One of my work assignments was to remove ‘left-ins’. Phones that were disconnected without being removed until later, if they weren’t reconnected in a reasonable time. This involved running down a key from owners or real estate people. This put me in touch with opportunities to find rentable properties, so we could rise above the war housing we were in. We were able to get better housing in a few months. The first was a basement house on south Cherry St, which again we rented in the late evening, only to discover the next day it was adjacent to the city sewage disposal plant. It was more of a joke than a nuisance. Anyway, we moved again to a regular house on 12th street, a more comfortable situation.

In 1947, with wartime rules relaxing on labor relations, our union became a part of the nationwide ‘National Federation of Telephone Workers. They coordinated a nationwide strike against the Bell System for better wages. As a newcomer to the work force in Grand Island, I didn’t have any alliances with the ‘gang’, and I certainly couldn’t afford to lose income by striking, so I became a ‘scab’, and stayed on the job. The union said they would force a settlement in a week, but the strike lasted a month before the pressure got hot enough to get an agreement. The ‘union guys’ would come out to visit me after working long hours to try to get me to walk out. My argument was I had to feed my kids. This didn’t make me very popular with the gang and raised a barrier that lasted for years.

All these details might seem too meticulous, but they shaped the course of our life situation for years to come. Every corner we turned seemed to lead off in a different direction. Through 1947, into 1948, we continued to pursue a better standard of living. The field of telephony was expanding rapidly into radio and wireless telephony. I enrolled in a correspondence course to learn the field of radio communications. I was able to progress and had opportunites to discuss technical aspects with the bosses. Consequently, they selected me to go to a six week training school to get qualified for FCC licensing. There would be a need for trained technicians when the proposed mobile telephone system became a reality. I had to go to Omaha for this training , and then to Kansas City for the FCC exam for the license. I missed qualifying for the first class license by one question, thereby getting a second class operators license. This made it legal for me to have hands on control of any commercial radio station. This included the two-way car phones soon to be offered, as proposed. This didn’t change much of anything in my day to day work. Only when severe blizzards disrupted the town to town long distance service, did we take the portable radio systems out to set up connections to towns that were isolated by downed lines. The famous blizzard of 1948 was a classic, the army had to organize hay-lifts to feed cattle stranded out on the plains, by dropping bales of hay. I spent several weeks at Indianola running a radio link to McCook, holed up in a motel. The rest of the crew were out installing new poles and wire to fix the damage caused by the blizzard. This was a reversal of my school training to work with my hands instead of my head.

1948 was to be a milepost in life, on February 16, Pop died of a heart attack. We had come to visit on the weekend, a Saturday morning. Pop asked me to go to town to get some coal for the heating and cooking.  I used the old Buick which had been my car in former years, and Pop had cut off the body behind the front seat and put a pickup box on. I returned home and found Mom and Viv  had just discovered him lying on a cot in the basement, apparently dead. I rushed to the neighbor to telephone for help. The fire dept rescue squad came out and tried oxygen resuscitation, to no avail. He must have been gone 15 minutes or more by that time. Now we know 5 minutes with no heart action is always fatal or irreversible. I had known that Pop wasn’t feeling well, but in February there wasn’t much strenuous work. He had been having vomiting spells, which were symptoms of heart failure as the vagas nerve  has a sympathetic reaction and causes the vomiting. Jack was working away from home for the pipeline and had been home the night before, leaving early to go to work. Melvin was firmly ensconced in his work in DC, so we gathered to bury Pop in the    












                                           





family plat. This left Mom alone there on the farm. Being so close in Grand Island, I became involved with the farm work on weekends, using available vacation time to stay on top of what needed to get done. There was wheat to harvest, etc. I know I became more convinced than ever before that I didn’t belong on the farm. Pop had gotten by with mostly converted horse drawn equipment, he definitely wasn’t up with the progressive farmers in the area.. There being only the 100 acres across the road to farm, there was no way I could consider making a living on it. So we rented it to Clarence Rutt, the neighbor who had bought the 40 acres up on the hill. He was glad to get it and was able to convert most of it to irrigation using the well he had on his land. Mom kept the farm home and rented out part of it for extra income.

Losing Pop so suddenly brought me into examining my own mortality. I have mentioned that Viv and I were married by a Baptist preacher, and with her family heritage of being Baptists,  and having two children ready for their religious training, it was right and proper that we began attending the First Baptist Church. Little did I realize that my own religious training was to become a priority.  Partly for the reason that I was concerned that Pop was ‘right with the Lord’, and that I became aware through the diligent preaching from the Bible, and realizing the truth that belief in  Jesus is  really the only way to eternal life, I made the decision to accept Him as my personal Savior. I became ‘Saved’ from eternal hell, and was baptized and accepted as a member in the church on March 28, 1948.  As I grew in faith and knowledge of Jesus, I was elected to the position of Deacon. A Deacon is one of the spiritual overseers of the church.

After the summer crisis had passed, I became interested in building a house on a one acre lot I had bought in a rural acreage type development. I had used my  veterans bonus to buy it. I borrowed $900.00 from Mom to buy a dismantled war housing unit and have it delivered to my lot. I got a neighbor to help me pour a slab to put the house on, some 20’ X 30’ as a starter unit. Through the summer of 1949, we worked nights and every day off to get ready to move in by winter. That was our second time we had our name on a title to some property. Now we had the ‘country estate’ or beginnings thereof which we had longed for.

Another crossroad had occurred during the summer of 1949.  I was offered a transfer to the business office in Grand Island, doing work as an ‘outside rep’, the only male beside the manager. My job involved backing up the Manager in answering complaints, collecting the pay phone coin boxes, doing premise visits to collect overdue bills owed after the phones had been cut off.  I had done an outstanding job on the former work, doing some upselling  while installing phone systems. This probably caught the eye of the bosses gauging by comments among the girls in the office. I enjoyed the comforts of this work, especially during the winter when I would have been out there climbing poles, etc. And too, I saw myself as an older man, still installing phones as arthritis and rhuematism did its work. I didn’t like the prospect of aging out climbing poles so I was glad for the new line of work, except for having to wear a necktie.

So ends these tedious unraveling memories of the 40’s. Needless to say the coming 50’s would be not more of the same, but a lot of new mileposts and crossroads to make choices in direction.

Chapter Three
MY LIFE---SO FAR---the 40's
The first winter after moving to our new acreage in Stolley Park in the fall of ’49, we ‘made do’ without furniture in the living room, as that served as my workshop—complete with the power saw and resulting sawdust. As we progressed in finishing the interior, our first wall cabinets in the kitchen were orange crates. That was when they were made of wood, with a center partition, and when mounted vertically they worked out OK. And Viv even put cute little curtains over them to keep the dust out. The only room nearing any stage of finish was the bathroom, complete with tub and shower and an electric radiant wall heater. Our ‘central heat’ was a gas fired space heater which did the job with a fan to disperse the heat.  So we weren’t deprived of any necessities, just the niceties’. Our first building phase was a 20’ x 30’ flat roof with two bedrooms, living room and kitchen-dining room.

To get things better organized the next summer, I built an attached two- car garage for a workshop area. Our acre sized lot presented endless opportunities to pursue our gardening and orchard interests. There were no houses on either side of ours. The sub-division was platted around a small State Park. We enrolled our number one son, Wayne, in the country school. He was somehow tagged with the nickname ‘Mickey’.

In December 1950, our third child, a son we named Kenneth was born. He was born as we say today --as ‘developmentally disabled’, meaning that he would not develop along ordinary expectations. His genetic impairment was ‘an accident of chromosones’ a condition which is called “Down Syndrome’. The genetic analysis we sought told us this happens in one in 1,000 births with the mother at age 30. Our pediatric doctor gave little hope that he would live to adulthood, and we should consider the State Institution for his care and training. We saw no reason to follow his recommendation and  ‘Kenny’ became part of our family, a major decision to have reverberations in our short and long range life experiences.

Having changed jobs the previous year, I became intrigued with the aspect of serving the public with my wit and wisdom instead of doing things wimy hands. I gradually became involved with presenting movie programs to public groups, schools, churches and service clubs. Realizing my lack of finesse in handling resulting questions about the company, etc—I enrolled in a Dale Carnegie public speaking training class. This opened up my other side—where I had considered myself an introvert I could now stand before groups of any size and not freeze, thereby becoming more outgoing. As time went on, becoming more acclimated to the sales work—arranging complex multi-line systems and switchboards, I looked at better rated jobs in Omaha. In June 1952 I approached the General Manager of our company and asked to be considered for a transfer to the’Service Engineer group. As we made plans to move in July, we located a nearly new house within our income reach. Having invested three years of ‘sweat equity’ enabled us to make a substantial down payment.  Selling our little house outside of town was not difficult due to the three attractive elements of property value—‘location, location, location’.

As we made our move in the heat of July 1952, our 4th child was nearly due. Dale Eugene was born on July 28th. Since we had been settled from our move for less than a month, it was time for our first television receiver. So, those two milestones—a new baby and our first TV made the move to the big city memorable. Wayne was nine and Linda seven.                                      

My new job location was in the center of the downtown business district. I worked with a crew of about eight other men following up requests for new or additional service. The scheme was to try to ‘upsell’ what the customer had ordered, and arrange the best service for the money for the customer. I was soon assigned a group of accounts that included four banks, two hospitals, three large department stores, all in the downtown business district. Whenever one of those accounts called for more service I would arrange an appointment to establish exactly what to install. All of them had extensive switchboard and internal dial systems. The variety of work was always a challenge.

As we had become accustomed to attending church, we joined the nearest Baptist church, named the Parkside Baptist Church, so named after the four- square block Miller Park across the street. Our life in the city was more restricted than living in the country. And moving to Omaha meant moving away from the close proximity to Hastings where my Mother continued to live on the farm. She lived alone at 63,  the same age as my Father was when he died, her health seemed to become more fragile as she continued to strenuously diet to lose weight and battle the diabetes she had. In February 1953 she had a gall bladder operation. She never recovered from the surgery, as she lay dying when she should have regained consciousness. All the more ironic, she died on the same day in February as Pop. The doctor later said she had a coronary occlusion, something he couldn’t prove and we couldn’t disprove. So we accepted it as fate. Having had the seven years being near them since we moved to Nebraska in 1946, I was more thankful to have made that decision.

It became necessary to sell the home place, the 10 acres where they lived since marrying in 1914. We auctioned all the farm implements, household furnishings and the property all in the same day. With Melvin in Washington D.C.  Jack in Topeka, and me in Omaha, there was no possible way I could be responsible for overseeing the family home. We kept the 100 acres across the road which Clarence Rutt was farming , for the next 10 years. We received the usual 1/3 share of the crop as rent. That was a good decision as land prices more than doubled in those 10 years.

My work in Omaha as a Service Engineer broadened into sales work in what was called Private right of Way service. That was systems not connected to the basic network, and also included private two-way radio systems. Instead of just working in Omaha I had to travel out state and into South Dakota. This put me in line for future promotion also. As our family lifestyle became somewhat cramped and my yearning for ‘space’, I located a
big old five- bedroom house further on north from the Minne- Lusa area, to a suburb known as Florence. It was formerly a separate village, until annexed by the city of Omaha. The house we moved to was the former home of the Mayor of Florence. It was situated on an acre, being a quarter of an oversized city block. That gave all of us more necessary elbow- room.











               










                                                                                 North 39th Street—five bedrooms & three baths



This move in late 1954 was followed by the birth of our fifth child, a girl we named Cynthia Jayne. She was borne on July 3, 1955. We were accepted into a neighborhood of large families. As time rolled on, I was assigned to a special projects job, working in Omaha. This lasted for just a few months. Then  I was offered a promotion to Manager of the Business Office in Lexington Nebraska. My previous business office work in Grand Island was an asset, as well as my sales and public relations experience, which resulted in a move by  August 1956. As Manager, my office had two women employees called Service Representatives. The service area included the three neighboring towns of Elwood, Overton and Elm Creek As a first level management employee, I became salaried instead of hourly paid. That meant working more hours with no extra pay, for as much as the job required. Much of the work outside of the regular 40 hours involved attending public group meetings, hosting company principals from Grand Island and Omaha. It was expected that when they were working in my town I as Manager would provide some social activity such as eating out.

Our first dwelling in Lexington was a three bedroom older house on Monroe Street. A memorable venture was a family vacation to the Black Hills. I installed some extra storage space in the back of the station wagon and also had a top carrier for the tent and camping equipment. This was a great experience visiting Mt Rushmore and many other tourist attractions. We soon was able to find better living quarters on 17th street. It also was an older house, but more homey. On April 3rd, 1959, at about 2:30 AM, the house literally blew up. A gas leak in the outside main had entered the basement, I expect the thermostat probably called for heat and ‘ blam’! The force of the explosion actually lifted the house upwards and moved it several inches. Some rags and papers were captured in the space between the sill and foundation. A small fire began at the outside where the gas pipe ruptured. I attempted to start the water hose and I could have extinguished that small blaze, except the water line had also burst where it was attached. The fire progressed to completely engulf the house. Linda and Cyndi were sleeping in the other upstairs bedroom, they  got out in good time. The three boys were sleeping in the basement next to the furnace room where the explosion occurred. The partition was masonry tile, which resisted the blast. Wayne helped Dale and Kenny out through a basement window. Wayne was given a ‘hero’s citation’ by the Fire Dept later. The fire truck didn’t arrive for some 25 minutes. I later heard a rumor that the volunteers couldn’t get it started, which caused the delay. We were offered temporary shelter in the basement rooms of Roger and Margaret Anderson. In a few days we were able to obtain another house on 8th street.





                                                 














                                                                           Our Christmas picture December 1955 in Omaha

Since moving to Lexington, we had been renting instead of buying a house, mostly due to a promise I had from one of the Area level supervisors that I should expect to be moved back to Omaha in three or four years. We had rented out the house in Omaha so we would have it when we moved back. It seems the person who made the promise himself was moved to another job, so my hopes began to vanish. We proceeded to sell the house in Omaha so we could  settle into adequate housing, if we were fated to stay in Lexington. We purchased a corner lot at 13th and Park St, which at that time was on the edge of town. We began building in 1962 and finished enough to move in, in March 1963. At last in our own home again, facing a ten acre city park with a lake.                                                       

That last reference to building the new house leaps over into the 1960’s but was alogical continuance of the events that closed out the 50’s.

At about the same time as the fire, we had another ‘blowup’, the church we were in had some disagreement on church policy and  eight families decided to part company with that form of ‘Baptist’ church, one where the preacher was the sole and final authority on church policy and practice. We Baptists claim the congregation rules the church, so we started a ‘fellowship’ to begin organizing a new church. This effort bore fruit as in 1959, we became the Parkview Baptist Church. It has continued as our church home.

At about 1958, the State Dept of Institutions began a ‘pilot school’ in Cozad for trainable retarded children. As the public schools then had no special education for mentally retarded children. Kenneth, then was eight years old and should have been in school. His ability level was measurably below normal. The Cozad State School accepted children within the fifteen mile radius as day students. Several children from Lexington were accepted, so we car-pooled with the other parents. From the beginning it was apparent that our handicapped children were indeed trainable. The next level higher were termed educable, which Kenneth easily progressed to, as he learned to read and write during his Cozad experience. Within a few years, Ken was accepted for five day residence. This gave him the opportunity to learn self care, something he might not have been forced to do for himself at home. This new opportunity totally vindicated our earlier decision to not institutionalize him in early childhood. We had thought there would be no love in the care and training he would get away from home. The school at Cozad did include that component in directing their development. We were encouraged and grateful.

Somehow it dawned on us that we had been under providential watchcare, blocking our return to Omaha so that Kenneth would have that chance for schooling, the only school of it’s kind in the State. There is no denying that it was an answer to our prayers. The Director of the school was a political tiger. When the Legislature had the funding bills up for vote, she would herd all the available parents into the hearings at Lincoln so we could lobby for renewed funding. The pressure on the Legislature brought attention to the need for enabling the public schools to provide for classrooms in the local schools. Also, the crowded conditions at the State Home came under scrutiny. The parents movement for better education of retarded children had begun nationwide. It was called the Association for  Retarded Children—the ARC. The Governor of  Nebraska saw and heard of the need for better public law, and called for a citizen committee to advise him on the need. The Cozad School director named me as a candidate for this committee. This was my first step in being an activist and an advocate.

Our future seemed to be priority- focused there in Lexington, at least for the foreseeable future. Change was creeping into the art of telephony, direct dialing and pushbutton phones were being introduced during the period as well.  With the invention of the transistor at the Bell Labs in 1948 brought miniaturization and the demise of the vacuum tube in amplification of signals.                       

The introduction of coaxial cable brought  higher frequencies into use, expanding capacities beyond the copper wire methods long the norm in telephony. As an industry, the telephone business was a leader in new technologies, but at the same time was guilty of failing to try new services until they could be proved to be profitable. causing innovators of new inventions to accuse the Bell System of violating anti-trust laws, and stifling competition. There were rumblings that Ma Bell was too big and should be broken up. One anti-trust suit resulted in a consent decree, allowing interconnection of other communication systems into the ‘sacred network’. Some people gazing into crystals saw great change acoming. And they were more right than they knew as the sixties was to be revolutionary in more than technology, looser  morals and free love and flower children all were to appear over the horizon. Nonetheless, fifties for me, and my family were foundation building, we were all growing up together.











                                     











                                                                                    Easter Sunday in Lexington 1957

Edited 9-11-01


Chapter Three
MY LIFE---SO FAR---the 40's

Chapter Three
MY LIFE---SO FAR---the 40's
MY LIFE---SO FAR
Chapter Four---the 50's
Chapter Three
MY LIFE---SO FAR---the 40's

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