Dealing with Wyoming...Since 1856

   It was mid-afternoon when we pulled into Little America, Wyoming, for a quick bathroom break.  After all, they have the nicest restrooms around, with individual marble stalls.  A spot was open right next to the curb near the doors of the little gift shop and cafe.  Numerous children were thronging the playground, overseen by a huge statue of a bison.  Their parents were probably glad to let them stretch their legs and play before continuing their journey.
   We passed a man standing near the door of the gift shop as we headed directly to the back of the store to utilize those fine restrooms.  The entry to the store is a bit congested, with the cash register area to the right and a half wall, hung with numerous tourist trinkets to the left.  On the other side of the half wall were tables and chairs where folks could sit down to eat the food they purchased, but it is not visible from the entry because of the wall.  A number of people were standing there near the line to buy soft ice cream.
   The ladies room is lovely, with a small lounge area before the actual restrooms.  As I walked in, I smiled and said hello to an older lady sitting there with her cane.  The acoustics of the room were such that there was no such thing as a private conversation.  I heard a mother telling her child to wash her hands and another woman complaining that places like Little America should have emergency responders there at all times.  I thought it a strange comment since no one really lives there. When I went back through the lounge area, the lady with the cane was gone.  As we walked to the front of the store, I could see her sitting in the cafe area looking at the floor.  That is when I realized the people in the ice cream line were not really in line and the man by the door was watching intently for something.  I looked down at the floor and saw him..an older man with a beard, wearing shorts and sneakers.  His t-shirt was partially pulled up, exposing his belly.  A young woman in her twenties or maybe thirties was vigorously performing CPR on the man.  Suddenly the comment in the restroom made more sense.  Where DO you get emergency help in Little America, Wyoming. 
    After a few minutes we heard sirens in the distance.  As they pulled up in front of the building, the man waiting at the door waved them in to our location.  He mentioned it had been 18 minutes since they were called from the closest town of Green River.
    We didn’t stay to see how things came out but from what I saw, a positive outcome seemed unlikely.  We decided we’d help best by getting out of the way.
    Wyoming can take its toll on people and vehicles.  As a child, I never considered that as we drove through every other year when we went to visit our grandparents in Utah.  After the long drive through Nebraska, Wyoming was just another long, long time in the car.  I can think of only four positive highlights.  Whenever we got to Little America, we went in so everyone could get a 10¢ ice cream cone.  (Now they cost 75¢.)  It was before the interstate system, so at some point, out in the middle of nowhere, my  parents would pull over to the side of the road, open the doors and tells us to run and play out in the desert for 15 or 20 minutes before traveling on.  We enjoyed looking at sagebrush, which was foreign to us, as well as picking up bits of shiny mica.  We also watched for antelope and Burma Shave signs.  That was about it. Crossing the border into Utah was our biggest joy.
   I didn’t really pay much attention to Wyoming until some of our children moved to Colorado, which meant numerous trips through Wyoming to go visit in Colorado.  Suddenly the road became much more familiar.  Previously trips over that road had pretty much been in summer, but special occasions in Colorado meant driving it in other seasons, and some of those are not kind. 
    It should have been a warning…seeing the barricades along the side of the road with a sign saying to immediately exit the highway if the barricade was down.  Of course, we never saw them down in summer.  They just seemed like a some sort of useless road decoration.  I was pretty much in denial until that day when we checked the weather report to see the road conditions before leaving Colorado for Utah.  Conditions seemed doable, so off we went.  Shortly after leaving Cheyenne, the wind started to howl, causing near whiteout conditions from blowing snow.  We debated whether we should stop or not, but decided we were committed to continuing our journey.  We noticed that some large trucks had pulled off the road to wait out the gusts.  Maybe they knew something we didn’t know?  After Cheyenne there is really nowhere to stop until you get to Laramie, so we motored slowly and cautiously onward.  We were amazed that in spite of the road conditions, some trucks went speeding right past us.  Even a truck pulling a long horse trailer went whizzing past.  We decided to stop in Laramie to get gas before going on, but as we got to the exit to get gas, we discovered we had no choice but to exit there as the barricade was down.  They had pretty much shut the road right in front of us.  While getting gas, we chatted with the truckers at the truck stop who told us the road to the west was horrible, so we looked around and discovered a motel right there at that exit and went and checked in for the night.
   What is there to do in Laramie for most of a day while waiting for the road to open?  We went to the grocery store and got food for lunch and dinner.  Then we noticed an ad for a movie we had been wanting to see, so decided to do that.  On the way to the theater we toured the campus of the University of Wyoming and then went in to one of the most forlorn theaters I have ever seen.  I think we were the only customers, so we had our choice of seats.  We sat in the middle about two-thirds of the way back.  The row of seats about four rows down from us sagged badly in the middle.  I don’t know if the problem was the seats or the floor.
   When we returned to our motel we noticed the trucks lined up for about a mile along the road leading to the freeway exit with their engines running.  Clearly the truckers were planning a night in their trucks, ready to roll as soon as the barricade was lifted.
    By morning when we were ready to leave, the road was open again and the line of trucks had moved on.  Shortly after leaving Laramie, we saw some of the trucks and the horse trailer that had passed us the day before, blown off the road and on their sides.
    Another time the weather was okay, but shortly after leaving Cheyenne, the traffic was terribly backed up.  A check of the local radio station revealed that the pass leading to Laramie was closed by a horrible accident.  They had no idea how long the road would be closed.  A quick check of the map showed an alternate back road, so rather than sitting there for hours we decided to take the scenic route.  We were glad to have our lunch with us for the two hour journey to cover what usually takes about 45 minutes.
   If it isn’t one thing, it’s another in Wyoming.  Last October as we traveled through, the freeway was lined with emergency vehicles for about 50 miles.  Smoke was billowing across the road, causing reduced visibility.  We never saw the actual wildfire they were waiting to fight, but we were glad  to get past all the smoke.
   Of course there is more to Wyoming than traveling along I-80.  Sometimes we went to Yellowstone National Park and the Tetons.  As a child, Yellowstone seemed a magical place where mud bubbled, geysers spewed and bears mooched marshmallows from passing cars.  As an adult, it is still a place of wonder, but with a dark side.  Who would imagine that the whole area was really part of a vast,  ancient volcanic caldera that could threaten to blow up at any time?  It began to remind me of a scene from a Jonathan Edwards sermon called “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God”. 
   A few years ago we decided to do a bit of hiking in Yellowstone, so we first watched Old Faithful erupt and then set off through the geyser basin toward another geyser area where our ride was to pick us up.  As we walked we saw a wolf eyeing us from the other side of a small geyser and hoped that he was more scared of us than we were of him.  We made it a point to stop at Morning Glory Pool, a beautiful childhood memory, only to find it a dingy brown rather than the beautiful blue I remembered.

                                                                      Old Faithful

   All along the way, signs reminded us to stay on the designated paths due to the dangers of the thin crust in the geyser basins.  We were almost to our pick up point when the narrow path was blocked by two massive bison.  They were enjoying their place there and seemed in no hurry to leave.  We couldn’t walk out around them because of the danger signs.  We couldn’t walk near them because they didn’t seem all that happy to see us.  Eventually we had to do our entire hike in reverse and call our ride to get us at our starting point.  We didn’t see a single bear.
   Many years ago, my grandparents, Grant and Myrtle Stephens, homesteaded in a lovely mountain valley with deep, rich soil near Alpine, Wyoming.  They were married in November of 1908 and settled into their homestead the next Spring   The homestead was on the banks of the Snake River and included  land on each side of the river. The nearest post office was about 14 miles away and the nearest store about 20 miles either way, at Freedom, Wyoming, or at Irwin, Idaho.
   Grant says, "Before summer was through we had moved into our new house which we thought pretty nice. We lined it with lumber and covered it with shingles. I got the logs out and took them to the mill and had them sawed for $9 a thousand for the lumber and $5 for the shingles. We put in about 20 acres of oats. On our place there was many springs and several acres of high quaking aspens and of course along the springs were willows and the ground along the bottom was a heavy dark soil covered with big thick brush and was very fertile."
   By 1910 enough people had moved nearby that the Alpine area got a post office. Grant got the contract for carrying the mail for the first 5 years. He got $20.22 per month for making the 16 mile trip twice a week. In summer he rode a horse and buggy and sleigh or skis in winter. Grants says, "I had a lot of tough times while carrying the mail. Nearly every winter I would have to carry it on skis for several months. I remember one time I started out on the 2nd of January with a team and bob-sleigh. The snow was over 4 feet deep and snowing and blowing until I could hardly see the team so they could hardly follow the road at all." He eventually had to leave behind his sleigh and start off with just the horses. "I tied one horse to the other one's tail and started them for home. I was holding to the last horse's tail. It took me all that day to get home."
    Eventually their homestead was swallowed up in the Palisades Reservoir, never to be seen again, except in a painting Grandpa made from memory many years later.

                                                                Palisades Reservoir

                                                       Stephens Homestead Painting

   It should be no surprise to anyone in the family that Wyoming could be so treacherous.  It was in 1856 that our family first encountered difficulties there.  James Mellor was just 37 years old when he traveled through Wyoming with his wife, Mary Ann, and their seven living children as part of the Martin Handcart Company.  Their food supply was short and Mary Ann was still recovering from the birth of stillborn, conjoined twins during their journey.  They had no money for a team and wagon, so they  had only two handcarts to bring food and supplies for the journey.  Due to Mary Ann’s poor health, James and a ten year old, daughter, also named Mary Ann, pulled one handcart together.  Sixteen year old Louisa and 14 year old Charlotte Elizabeth pulled the other.  The rest of the children were too small to help.  At one point along the way, the mother became so weak and discouraged that she could no longer struggle along.  She sat down by the side of the trail and begged her family to go on without her.  When they couldn’t convince her to keep trying, Louisa stayed behind with her while the rest of the family trudged off along the trail.  Not knowing what to do, Louisa knelt and begged Heavenly Father for help.  As she walked back to where her mother was sitting she found a pie in the middle of the road.  She took it to her mother and fed a bit of it to her.  After a time, her mother felt enough strength to arise and try again.
   Their handcart company had left late in the season and was still on the high plains of Wyoming when winter weather came early, making the handcarts even harder to pull.  Their food supplies were almost gone. At night they slept huddled together for warmth.  One morning, Louisa found herself unable to rise because her long braids had frozen to the ground.  In their hurry to be on their way, there was no time to thaw the ground to release her braids, so someone just cut them off.  I suppose they are still part of the Wyoming landscape somewhere.  A rescue party eventually got them to their destination, but it was noted that 37 year old James, who started the journey with dark hair, arrived at his destination with hair as white as snow.

                                                             Louisa Mellor Clark


Seems like our family has been dealing with Wyoming…since 1856.

When I Go to Church

    One of our greatest joys in traveling around is when we are able to visit a local church congregation on Sundays.  The various congregations have the same beliefs and yet each congregation seems to have its own memorable differences. 
   According to local folks, I apparently spent most of my life in what they call ‘the mission field”.  I don’t understand this term since I have definitely seen missionaries here as well.  Maybe they just mean ‘far from here.’
   In addition to my home congregation growing up, which I have already written about, we frequently attended other Indiana groups as well whenever my father had to travel to them to speak.  Things in the outlying towns were definitely smaller and a bit more primitive.  In Martinsville, Indiana, where there was no local church building the local members met on Sunday mornings in the annex of the Seventh Day Adventist Church, because, after all, they didn’t use it on Sundays anyway.
    In Kokomo, Indiana, we met in a 2nd floor room owned by the Red Man’s Lodge which had no air-conditioning.  In the hot, humid Indiana summers that could be a problem!  It was just an empty hall which could be rented with wooden folding chairs.  A piano was also in the room but was not used unless we came  Then someone would meet Mom at the door to ask if she would mind playing.  For this purpose Mom kept a scrap of paper in her purse with numbers of the three hymns she knew how to play and that is what we sang.  The first floor was a pool parlor, so everything said and done in our meetings was to the clicking sound of pool balls hitting one another.  One day it was very hot.  That was apparently a problem for those wooden folding chairs.  It was about 110F and humid in that room which was enough to make the varnish on the chairs a little tacky which was entertaining when everyone tried to stand at the end of the meeting, only to find a wooden chair somewhat glued to their backs.
    One little branch met in a similar 2nd floor room, but instead of a pool parlor downstairs, it was the town’s volunteer fire department.  It was always exciting when the fire siren when off during a meeting.  There was no continuing when that happened.  We just had to stop whatever we were doing until the siren stopped sounding.
   As children we sometimes didn’t have any idea where we might wake up on Sunday morning.  Dad often had to travel to other areas for speaking assignments.  His areas could cover anywhere in central Indiana, parts of western Ohio and sometimes a town or two in eastern Illinois.  Mom would pack up our Sunday clothes and some breakfast food the night before and make up a big bed area in the back of our station wagon.  Sometimes we had to leave as early as 2 AM to arrive on time wherever we were going that day, so they’d just carry us kids to the car in our pajamas and tuck us in.  (Seatbelts were unknown in cars then.)  When it got light, Mom would feed us breakfast while Dad drove.  On arriving at our destination, she’d get us dressed and ready for church.  After the morning meetings we were often invited to eat dinner with one of the local families before returning for another meeting in the afternoon.  By early evening we would be headed home again.  After sandwiches, it would soon be dark, so Mom would tuck us in to bed again.  In the middle of the night we’d arrive back home and be carried into the house and put into our beds.  I never thought of it then, but now as an adult I wonder about my parents on these trips. They had to be leaving home about 2 AM and sometimes returning home 24 hours later at 2 AM again. Staying up and alert for 24 hours had to be hard on them….not to mention the fact that after returning home at 2 AM, Dad had to get up to go to work at 5 AM.  What dedication!
   When I lived in Germany I was not near any military bases, so I always attended one of the local congregations.  The first was in Krefeld in the Rhineland.  The family I lived with went to a different church, but were happy to drop me off for church on their way.  The father would take the children off to church while the mother stayed home to prepare their Sunday meal.  They dropped me off in front of a multistory apartment building downtown.  Only a small metal plaque near the door identified it as a church.  To get to church, I had to ring the bell.  Then whoever had gotten to church first, would release the lock from the church on the third floor for each person who entered.  That meant one church calling was listening for that bell and letting people into the building for church.  The meetings were actually held in a 3rd floor walkup apartment.  The main meeting was held in the living room area.  Then the various groups separated out to meet in the kitchen or bedrooms.  Probably 20 or 30 people attended.
   When I lived in Kiel, there was an actual church building, which was nice.  Conference Sunday was the only time church was in English if we wanted.  Most of the congregation preferred the German translation.  We were only able to hear one session of conference via some sort of radio setup.  The missionaries would listen carefully to see who was speaking, then sort through a stack of slides to find the picture of the speaker, and then project that picture onto the wall.  A rather scary Sunday was the one when another American friend and I were invited to speak…..in German.  It took me some time to craft my speech.  Then I had my German roommate go through it to correct it for grammar.  As a side note, I listened once to a speaker try to explain the difference between faith and belief.  It is a fine difference in English, but quite excruciating in German, since in German, faith and belief are the same word:  Glaube(n).
    One Sunday a group of Americans were visiting Copenhagen, Denmark.  We were all decent German speakers and one fellow also spoke Norwegian, but no one spoke Danish.  There was also another visitor who only spoke English and another who could do Danish and Norwegian but no English or German.  We all ended up on the back row and eventually arranged ourselves according to translation needs.  The Danish/Norwegian speaker interpreted to the Norwegian/German speaker who then interpreted to the German/English speakers who then interpreted for the English speaker.  What an adventure that was!
   After I was married we moved to Alaska.  As long as we stayed in the more populated areas, things were fairly normal.  There were a few quirks though.  I remember the puzzlement on the faces of the Primary children as they sang the song

“Oh What Do You Do In the Summertime”

Oh, what do you do in the summertime, when all the world is green?
Do you fish in a stream, or lazily dream on the banks as the clouds go by?
Is that what you do? So do I!

Oh, what do you do in the summertime, when all the world is green?
Do you swim in a pool, to keep yourself cool, or swing in a tree up high?
Is that what you do? So do I!

Oh, what do you do in the summertime, when all the world is green?
Do you march in parades, or drink lemonades, or count all the stars in the sky?
Is that what you do? So do I!

Verse one worked fine.  Alaskan kids certainly do fish in the summer.  At verse two things started to fall apart.  Keeping cool was not a problem.  In our town there was no pool at the time, so the kids had to learn to swim in a lake.  The lake was so cold that a bonfire was kept burning on the shore for the kids to warm up a bit.  Then came verse three where it got to counting all the stars in the sky.  With the long hours of summer daylight, stars were just not seen in the summertime!
   One Sunday I was asked to speak in another congregation which was about three hours away, so we got up bright and early and headed out to Glennallen, Alaska.  It was a small congregation, so they were happy to have outsiders come to speak once a month.  The other person on the program was coming from the town of Valdez in the other direction.  He never arrived at all since the pass between Valdez and Glennallen was closed due to weather, so one of the locals asked me what our topic was to have been then quickly prepared some remarks on the same subject.  When it was time to sing, the pianist hadn’t arrived, so I ended up doing that as well.  Since they knew there would be visitors that one Sunday a month, the whole congregation would meet after services for a potluck before they sent the visitors on their way.
   One Sunday we were on a family camping trip so decided to attend the nearest little church congregation.  We had directions to the place and a time, so off we went.  We were pulling our trailer which made getting ready a bit easier.  Once we were ready, we all hopped into our vehicle and took off.  Our directions soon took us off the paved highway and down a dusty, unpaved side road to Petersville, Alaska, an hour or so away.  Eventually we arrived, only to find that someone had forgotten to shut the screen window in the trailer, which meant the trailer was now full of dust!   Our directions led us to a small log building that was perhaps some sort of roadhouse.  The area is a winter playground, but we were there in summer, so things were pretty slow.  When we knocked on the door, we were greeted by a couple who ran the business.  They agreed that church was indeed held there and seemed happy to have us.  It seems that there were really only two families that belonged to this little congregation, and the other family was sick that day, so with our family of seven, and the Fishbacks, there were 9 of us there that day.   Since the Bible says, “For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.”  I guess we were okay. Once again we became the featured speakers.  The kids all liked the part where refreshments were served after meeting.
   The church building in Chugiak, Alaska, was interesting.  It had been built on to….several times.  I think it was originally an old railroad building, now repurposed as a church.  Whenever they added on, the level was not quite the same.  They never added on to the sides, but just made the building longer and longer, like a long, wide hallway with many levels.  It was very important to watch your feet to avoid tripping!
   In Willow, Alaska, they met for a time in the old community hall.  We visited there a few times to help with a children’s program.  The most noteworthy thing about that building was the restroom.  Remember, this was Alaska, complete with winter snow and freezing temperatures.  If you needed to go to the restroom during your time at church, you really wanted to think carefully how necessary that trip was, because to get there you had to go get your coat, boots, hat and mittens on before going outside to access the bathroom, which was not particularly well heated.  Later they built a beautiful log church there which apparently was the talk of some of the locals.  One man assured Roger that there was an Olympic size swimming pool in there…and he knew it because he helped build it!  Having been in the building a number of times, I am pretty sure he was trying to describe the baptismal font, which was nowhere near the size of a swimming pool of any kind.
   In our travels between Alaska and the Lower 48, we have visited churches in several Canadian towns as well….Whitehorse, Edmonton, Calgary and an interesting meeting in Winnipeg, Manitoba.  Saturday night we looked for where we might attend church in Winnipeg and found a couple of locations.  We set out in the morning to find one and noticed we were no longer on the outskirts of town.  We soon arrived at a lovely building and went in.  There were several notable events there.  The congregation had recently been divided into two congregations.  The one we were meeting in was abnormally diverse I think.  When I went to the women’s group, I found six languages represented there, so the women were busy translating back and forth so everyone would understand the message being given.  Since the leader seemed a bit frazzled in dealing with the music, I asked if she needed help.  She answered, ‘only if you can play the piano.’  Done.  I was the piano player for the group that day!  Our daughter also had an interesting experience, because it was Canada Day.  In the youth group she attended she got to learn the Canadian National Anthem that day.  One of our experiences there was not religious but certainly opened our eyes regarding the efficacy of the Canadian health care system.  One of the men came in excited to announce he would soon be having surgery.  When we asked about it, he said he’d started having severe heart problems about six months previously.  After medical testing it was confirmed that he needed bypass surgery.  A person needing bypass surgery in the US is pretty much set up for surgery within a week or less.  They are rarely allowed to leave hospital care until they have had the life-saving surgery.  This man, with the Canadian health care system, was told his surgery would be free, but they would schedule his surgery and let him know when they could do it.  Now, six months later, they had finally called back to let him know he was scheduled for surgery in just six more weeks!  I guess Canadian health care is free, but sometimes you get what you pay for!
   It is not uncommon when visiting another area, to find connections with local people.  At the time our daughter, Kristin, lived in Logan, Utah.  Our son, Blaine,  lived in Newburyport, Massachusetts.  We visited Kristin’s congregation a number of times and were acquainted with some of the members there.  One time when we were visiting our son in Massachusetts, we met some of our daughter’s friends from Logan, who happened to be visiting the same congregation we were also visiting in Massachusetts.
   It was dark on a Saturday night when we arrived in Marianna, Florida.  It is not a huge town and the church building was a bit off the beaten path, but we found it.  When we walked in we were asked how on earth we found them.  I told them we
looked them up on the internet.  One lady immediately said, “Well you must have googled for the friendliest people!”  The soft southern drawl was fun to listen to and let me tell you, that was a congregation that could sing!  They could easily put many larger congregations to shame!  Later, on learning where we lived, a sweet lady told us to be on the lookout for her grandson who was serving as a missionary in nearby Preston, Idaho.
   A week later we attended church in Sherman, Texas.  It was a missionary farewell for a young woman in the congregation, leaving to spend 18 months serving her Heavenly Father.  Where was she to be assigned?  Logan, Utah, of course.
   Like many congregations, the one we attended in West Virginia seemed almost as if there were assigned seats.  We knew right where to look for everyone on a Sunday morning.  This was a group that could compete with the one in Marianna, Florida, for being friendly. When we went back to visit 8 years after we left there, it was as though we’d never been away.
   Mostly we found that church is not a building.  Though we may have different cultural practices, in the end it is a group of people believing together and helping one another in their quest to live according to God’s plan. 
   

What Would Jane Think?

It was about 1865 when Euphemia  "Jane" Carter Freeman learned to make lace as a child in England.   When she was about 45 years old, she left England behind forever when the family emigrated to northern Utah.  Though the Freemans were city folks, in Utah they took up the farming life and lace making was left behind in England.  Now, that lace making legacy exists in the family again!

                                               Euphemia Jane Carter Freeman




Many years later, Jane's grandson, Kay Freeman, retired and took up the hobby of woodworking.  During a visit to a niece in Alaska, he noticed all the beautiful birch trees and coveted them.  Kay's niece (and Jane's great-granddaughter) lived in rural Alaska.  Kay choose a birch tree from their yard and they mailed him the tree trunk.  He used it for several special projects, but saved enough to make a beautiful picture frame for his niece.

                           Roma with her brother, Kay.  Roma is the mother of Kay's niece.


Years later, Jane's great-granddaughter found a teacher to show her how lace was made.  After some years of practice, she made a piece of sampler lace.  It took her a long time to make it, and there are many mistakes in it, but it was finally finished.  After all that time and effort, she wanted to make sure the precious piece of lace was kept safe, so she put it in the frame Kay made.

                                                  Finished and framed lace sampler

                              Pattern (called a pricking) and pins used to make the lace sampler


Now it is framed in the beautiful birch frame.  I wonder what Jane would think of it?

Writing Personal Histories

   As a teenager I loved to read stories of my ancestors who lived in Sweden, Germany, England, making shoes or bobbin lace, farming, and traveling by ship, wagon or handcart to get to their various destinations.  I wondered what motivated them to go where they did and make the life choices they made.
   I began to think it would be a good idea to write down a few of my life experiences for my posterity, so I began at the beginning.  As this was before the days of computers and easily inserting information, I soon realized that I had left out some things and had no good way to insert them into the narration, so I gave it up for a time.
   Some years later I was introduced to another method of writing a personal history that worked much better.  In a nutshell, I was told not to try to write the whole thing from start to finish, but rather just choose various stories and write them down.  The stories could be organized later. 
   In 1984, I heard of a class about writing personal history to be held at the Pioneer Home in Palmer, Alaska.  It was taught by Jessie DeVries. I think it was taught there to encourage some of the residents of the Pioneer Home to write down their stories, but none of them came.  Some I recall who attended were Elverda Lincoln, Diane Lucas, Louise Myers, Helena Myers and myself along with three or four others.  We only met for about six weeks, but ended with each of us submitting a story about how we came to be in Alaska.








                              Jessie, Helena, Louise, Nancy, Diane, Elverda

   One valuable lesson I learned in that first class was some good ways to come up with story ideas.  First we were asked to keep a small notebook or card with us so that whenever we thought of a good story, we could write down the idea.  That way we'd never have to spend much time coming up with something when it was time to write.  We would just consult our idea book or card, choose a topic and start writing.
   Second, we made a timeline of our lives and then added specific events to it.  On my time line there are both private and public events.  Some things on my timeline include the first man on the moon, Telstar, polio vaccine, a fatal explosion at the Coliseum where I took skating lessons,  Pres. Kennedy's assassination, births of siblings and children and getting glasses for the first time. I have written stories about all these topics.
   Third, we were encouraged to collect memorabilia related to our lives.  I used a large file box containing files labeled Early Childhood, Work, Hobbies, Children and others.  As I found pictures or other small items related to my life, I placed them into the correct file.  Whenever I was ready to write, I could just take an item out of the file to write about.  Using the various pictures and items as part of the story broke up the text and hopefully made it easier to read. 
   Fourth, we always shared our stories in class.  I was amazed how many memories came back to mind when hearing those stories.  Whenever an idea came while hearing a story, I would quickly jot down the topic in my idea book.
   There were some stories I'd heard about my life, but had no real memories of them.  For birth information, I interviewed my mother.  I had heard a story about a huge flood in Lawrence, Kansas,  the town we lived in when I was around two years old, so I wrote a letter to the newspaper in Lawrence to ask if they had any articles or pictures about such a flood.  A few weeks later, I received a large brown  envelope, not from the newspaper, but from the county museum. (The newspaper had given them my letter.)  It was crammed full of newspaper articles and pictures with plenty of details for me to write a decent story about it.

   A few years later a personal history class was taught by Kathy Hunter for a semester at the Mat-Su Community College. To her I am indebted for a list of rules she made for this type of writing since writing personal history sometimes requires some different guidelines than regular writing:


1.   Get it down.  Spelling and grammar are not as important.  You can always edit it later.
2.   Use “I” freely.
3.   Choose a title for your story that limits the topic and then stick to the topic.  Don’t ramble.
4.   Be confident.  Don’t be intimidated about writing.  It’s your story and you can do it the way you want.
5.   Be specific.  Use precise words.  Ex. not:  “It was a nice day.”  but rather “It was a bright June day.”
6.  Don’t skimp on paper.  If you are handwriting, double space and leave big margins so you have room for additions and corrections.
7.   Write to express, not to impress.  Be natural, be yourself, and tell the truth as you see it.
8.   Keep your notebook or idea book handy for writing down ideas to draw from when you are ready to write.
9.   Don’t preach.  Tell your story honestly as you’ve lived it.  Let the story tell whatever truth you want to convey.
10. Don’t waste time waiting for inspiration. The only way to write is to write.
11. Reading helps writing. Read autobiographies to see how others have written.
12. How to get unstuck? Pretend you are writing a letter to the person you love most, or the person who understands and loves you the best.
13. Keep it simple. Strive for clarity and simplicity.
14. Avoid overloading sentences. Use one thought per sentence, but vary sentence length and style.
15. Don’t change tenses.
16. Watch paragraphs. When you start a new idea, start a new paragraph.
17. Reread what you’ve written to see if you’ve left anything out.  Ask someone else to read it to see if they understand what you are trying to say.
18. Dare to be original.
19. Don’t forget who you are writing for and why.
20. Get people into your story. Describe, introduce, show how they influenced you.
21. Use complete sentences.
22. Content is ore important than grammar, but good grammar makes easier reading.
23. Link your life and times to history of that time…presidents, movie stars, styles, words.
24. Don’t overuse commas.
25. Get your feelings and values into what you write.
26. Don’t write a travelogue. Choose and focus on highlights.
27. Use active rather than passive voice.
28. Use exclamation points sparingly!!!!!
29. Plan on editing and rewriting.
30. Use a thesaurus.
31. Explain terms which may be unfamiliar to the reader.
32. Use picture words.  Describe.
33. Read what you have written out loud.
34. Spell out numbers 1-10 and use digits for numbers greater than ten.
35. Use numbers to talk about time.

   The members of the two classes had different expectations.  Some just wanted some writing experience.  Some wanted to share stories with their families and some wanted to actually publish books for profit.  Both classes used a similar format with a short discussion period with ideas for writing in the beginning and an opportunity to share the stories we’d written at the end.

   At that time, I was involved with the Family History Center in Wasilla, first as a volunteer worker and later as director of the center.  One activity sponsored by the FHC was a genealogy seminar every October.  The seminar consisted of an opening session and 4 one hour classes with lunch in the middle.  During each class period several different topics were offered for people to choose from.  Since personal history is very much a part of genealogy, or family history as we called it, we always offered at least one session on it.  Almost always, I was the presenter for that class.  During one of those classes, we discussed ways to stay motivated to keep writing.  As a result of that discussion, some of us decided to meet once or twice a month to share the stories we were writing.  We had a large table in the middle of the Family History Center, so we sat around that as we shared our stories.

We had some wonderful story tellers in that group.  Maybe some of them were a little too willing to share stories, so we soon implemented a couple of rules that worked well for us:
Anyone may attend class once just for the enjoyment, but after that each person had to bring a story written to share with the group.   Anyone who attempted to tell a story was told to stop.  They were instead asked to write down the story they wanted to tell and bring it to share with the class another time.

   We loved hearing the stories and learning about the lives of our class members.  We became quite a close group.  The initial group members were mostly from one particular church congregation, but later as that congregation split into two and then into three congregations, the group expanded.
   Some folks expressed an interest in being critiqued on what they wrote, but for the most part, people were satisfied with just having a deadline so they would get it done.  It eventually evolved from being strictly a writing group into a great time to get to know other folks in the group as well.

   One of my favorite stories of the group involved an older couple.  They had written their stories, but were intrigued with the way we were doing the stories with more details.  They wanted to change their stories from a short recitation of facts to something their children and grandchildren would love to read.  The man had a rather rambunctious youth, the type that involved knocking over outhouses with people inside, rolling boulders down a mountain and destroying a building with it, boxing, experiences in the Navy and eventually homesteading in Alaska.  His wife was a city girl who had some interesting experiences adjusting to rural Alaska.  They worked hard on their stories and eventually were able to get them bound into a book to gift their children for Christmas.  It all became worthwhile to them when a grandson, who was going through a difficult time, told his grandfather, “Grandpa, you were pretty bad when you were young, but you turned out to be a good man.  Maybe there is hope for me yet.”

   We had no idea what we were starting!  The group that started meeting around that big table in the Family History Center has moved several times since then.  Currently, in 2018, it is still meeting in a common room in one of the apartment buildings at the Wasilla Senior Center complex 34 years later.  Members have come and gone but people are still successfully writing about their lives.  Here are some members of the current group with some missing because it is winter in Alaska...and they are snowbirds...out having more experiences to write about.

Back, left to right:  Jeanene Bucaria, Kathy Greathouse, Elverda Lincoln, Judy Foley, Gretchen O'Barr, Betty Vehrs, Nancy France
Front, left to right:  Wendy Wesser, Mary Wargo, Winnie Wargo

There has even been a spin-off group from the Palmer, Alaska area.






 A favorite quote of mine says:

 

 

Most important to me, personally was that my in-laws wrote their life stories as a legacy for their children and grandchildren.  What a great gift!

My own life story is still a work in progress.  I currently have three 3-inch binders filled with stories and memorabilia.  The pages have had a lot of use over the years as our children have anxiously awaited the stories we wrote, grabbing them as they came out of the printer to be the first to read them, so I have placed each page in an archivally safe plastic sheet protector

When you set a goal to write a new story each week or each month, it seems like the task can't be done perhaps, but after a time, the stories turn into volumes!

What's for lunch? Sandwiches....

   Have our eating habits changed in the last 100 years?  You bet!  As a child we often ate pretty ordinary things for lunch...cheese toast, peanut butter and honey sandwiches and the like.  Now it seems like sandwich places compete to see how many different things they can pile on some sort of bread. In any case, today a sandwich is a quick, easy meal.

   Back in 1926 sandwich making was pretty different.

General Rules for Sandwich Making:

1.  Use rye, graham, or white bread not less than 24 hours old.
2.  If possible, keep bread in the ice chest 3 hours before using.
3.  Cream the butter as for cake making.  It is easier to spread, is more economical and will blend easily with anything to make what is called a flavored butter, i.e. 2 T butter (creamed) and mixed thoroughly with 6 olives, stoned and chopped fine, makes an olive butter, etc.
4.  It is easy and desirable to keep sandwiches for some hours before they are required.  Wrap in waxed paper and cover with a dampened cloth, then place in ice box or a covered stone jar or tin box to exclude air.

In addition to the more ordinary suggestions for sandwiches, such as club house sandwiches, toastwiches, hot meat sandwiches, checkered or striped bread and butter sandwiches or open sandwiches, the idea for sandwich fillings seem to have used a good bit of imagination and ingenuity.

Fillings for Sandwiches:
Eggs:

1.  Eggs minced and seasoned with salt, pepper, little vinegar or salad dressing
2.  Eggs sliced thin on lettuce leaf
3.  Eggs and olives chopped together
4.  Eggs and pickles chopped together
5.  Mixed sardines and eggs
6.  Eggs and ham chopped together
7.  Eggs minced with watercress and nuts
8.  Eggs scrambled with a little butter
9.  Eggs and nuts minced
10. Eggs and left over veal or ground meat
11. Eggs and deviled ham
(Add cream or salad dressing to all.)

Cottage Cheese:
1.  Cottage cheese and water cress
2.  Cottage cheese and chopped, stuffed olives
(Add cream or salad dressing to all.)

Cheese:
1.  Grind cheese and make creamy with salad dressing or cream
2.  Grind cheese and make creamy with salad dressing and ground pimento
3.  Ground cheese and catchup
4.  Slices of cheese spread with jelly
5.  Ground cheese with nuts and salad dressing
6.  Creamed cheese with chopped pickles
7.  Creamed cheese with chopped olives
8.  Slices of cheese and lettuce
9.  Ground swiss cheese and walnuts and prepared mustard
10. Slices of swiss cheese on brown bread
11. Chopped beef mixed with ground cheese and salad dressing

Meat and Fish:
1.  Ground cooked beef mixed with one-third of its quantity of boiled macaroni, celery, onion juice and salad dressing.
2.  Flaked sardines, lemon juice and salad dressing
3.  Ground boiled ham and walnuts and salad dressing
4.  Ground boiled ham or roast meat and pickles and salad dressing
5.  Sliced ham with lettuce and salad dressing
6.  Sliced ham with prepared mustard
7.  Sliced cooked meats of all kinds
8.  Chicken and celery chopped and salad dressing
9.  Chicken and nuts chopped and salad dressing
10. Sliced chicken and sliced tomato
11. Warmed Vienna sausage sliced
12. Deviled ham
13. Beef and pork ground together and moistened with salad dressing and flavored with chili powder
14. Salmon minced and moistened with cream or salad dressing
15. Salmon with pickle and salad dressing
16. Tuna fish with lemon juice
17. Salmon-one can, 3 hard-cooked eggs, juice of 2 lemons, 2T chopped pickle, 1T butter, little vinegar and 1t. mustard.

Vegetables:
1.  Diced celery and Mayonnaise dressing
2.  Cucumbers and radishes (diced)
3. Sliced tomatoes with or without salad dressing
4.  Ripe olives and walnuts with salad dressing
5.  Olives and chopped celery with salad dressing
6.  Chopped sweet peppers with onion and salad dressing

Nuts and Fruits:
1.  Ground peanuts and salad dressing
2.  Figs, dates and raisins moistened with lemon juice
3.  Peanut butter
4.  Peanut butter and lettuce
5.  Peanut butter and jelly
6.  Dates and nuts (ground) with lemon juice
7.  Figs (ground)
8. 1 pkg seeded raisins (ground with 2 bananas and juice of 1 lemon.  Nuts may be added.
9.  Chopped nuts with salad dressing.  Lettuce if desired.
10. 1/2 lb. nuts, 1 lb raisins, and 1 lb. dates.  Grind together and moisten with juice of 2 oranges and 2 lemons.
11. Bananas sliced thin and sprinkled with nuts
12. Chopped apples and celery with salad dressing
13. Raisins and peanut butter
14. 1t. butter, 1 c. sugar, 2 eggs, juice of 2 lemons and grated rind of one.  Cream butter and sugar, add eggs then lemon juice.  Cook over hot water until it thickens.  Cool and spread.

Lest you think the oft mentioned salad dressing was purchased from the store, think again.  Here are a couple of offerings for salad dressing.

Boiled Salad Dressing
1 T mustard
3 T butter
5 T flour 
2 eggs
1 t. salt
3/4 c. sugar
2 c. diluted vinegar (diluted with water about half and half)
Heat diluted vinegar.  Mix all dry ingredients; then add the hot liquid and return it to the sauce pan and stir until it boils 5 minutes.  Add beaten eggs. Cook a minute.  Add whipped cream when used.

Cooked Salad Dressing
2 eggs
4 t. flour
1/2 t. mustard (if desired)
6 T. sugar
1/2 t. salt
7 T diluted vinegar
Beat eggs thoroughly, add dry ingredients, mix.  Then add vinegar and boil until thick and cooked.  Cool.  When ready to serve mix with whipped cream.  Serves 4 persons.

There are additional recipes for Slaw Salad Dressing, Thousand Island Dressing, One Minute Mayonnaise Dressing, Cooked Oil Dressing, French Salad Dressing, Milk Salad Dressing, and Fruit Salad Dressing.

If that was not enough work to create the perfect lunch sandwich, remember, you also have to bake the bread!

No More Strangers

   The Relief Society president caught my eye from across the room as she waved a small white piece of paper at me.  I sighed, realizing that it must be a new visiting teaching route. Sure enough, the four sisters I already visited were still listed, but now a fifth name was added….Thursa. 
   How was I supposed to fit yet another thing into my schedule?  I didn’t even know her!  I think maybe she was new in the ward.  Dutifully, my companion and I made an appointment and set out to visit her.
   We drove down snowy Alaska back roads until we located her little home, set back from the gravel road on a large, treed lot.  It was clear from the pathway in the snow that they didn’t use the front door, so we headed around to the back of the house to the sounds of shrill barking, where we were greeted by Thursa and her spoiled little dog, Princess.
   We walked through the kitchen to the living room to begin our visit.  Thursa was pleasant enough, but it was clear to me we had nothing in common.  Nothing! She was probably 15 years older than I, and was on her third marriage.  She grew up in a rural mining town in eastern Utah and had relatively little education.  She’d had a hard life, working dead end jobs to make ends meet and raise her children.  Over the years she had had minimal contact with religion even though she had been baptized as a child.  She apologized for the toys Princess had scattered around the room and asked us to sit down.
    It was an average visit.  We gave the lesson and asked about her life…the typical getting to know you sort of visit.  She told us about her husband, Jim and her children who were scattered around the country. We were indeed strangers to one another, looking for some common ground.
   Over the months we visited with Thursa, I began to notice a remarkable quality she had.  She was one of the most teachable people I had ever met.  She was eager to discuss whatever message we brought to her. 
   One day the message had something to do with family history.  She said she had always been curious about her family but never knew just what to do, so I offered to come over on another day without my companion so we could begin to explore her family tree.  This was before the days of genealogy via the internet, but I was the director of the local family history center at the time, so I had access to some resources we could use. On the appointed day, I dropped my daughter off at school and headed to Thursa’s where I was happily greeted by Princess, who now considered me her friend.  Thursa brought out an old suitcase, dug through a pile of papers and came out with several of those old-style, long genealogy sheets.  Somewhere along the line someone had helped her get started! Over the months we were able to expand her family tree.
   The old suitcase held other things as well…an old piece of choir music her mother had saved, an old dance program and other memorabilia.  We enjoyed going through it together as she told me about each item.
   Thursa didn’t usually drive, so one day I casually mentioned that I was willing to give her a ride once in a while if Jim couldn’t take her, so it wasn’t a huge surprise when she called one day to ask for a ride to visit her doctor.  As it turned out, she wanted more than a ride.  She wanted a listening ear. Her doctor tended to talk over Thursa’s head, so she wanted someone else to listen to the doctor as well and then talk with  her later to explain her options…something Jim wasn’t very good at.  Thus I became her permanent ride to her appointments.  Pretty soon I became pretty familiar with her medical history.  After some months, she was referred to a specialist who told her she needed surgery.
   I reassured her as best I could and went with her to the hospital on the day of her surgery.  Jim was beside himself, pacing back and forth as we waited.  When we at last were taken back to her room, it was clear that Thursa was in terrible pain and seemed to be hallucinating.  Jim was frantic with worry.
   By the next day, Thursa was not in so much pain but was terribly worried about Princess.  Jim and I put our heads together and made a plan.  I picked him and Princess up the next morning and took them both to the hospital.
    I was familiar with the hospital layout.  It was a rural area, so the hospital was just one story.  Some years before, when our son was born, the hospital didn’t even allow anyone except parents of the baby in to see the babies, but I remembered that my in-laws, anxious to see their first grandchild, had hiked around the hospital to the back and located the window to my room so they could see him.
 That knowledge came in handy.  I went inside the hospital to visit Thursa and made sure to close the door to her room, then went to the window to watch.  Sure enough, Jim soon appeared with little Princess.  I quickly opened the window and brought her inside to see Thursa.  I think that was the best
medicine there was for her that day.  At some point one of the nurses came into the room to check on her, noticed what was going on, and tiptoed out and shut the door behind her.
   It wasn’t too long after that that the Anchorage Temple was opened.  Thursa was anxious to go to the temple for the first time, so several of us ward members took her, helped her dress and complete her work there.
  I realized one day that Thursa and I had fulfilled a scripture from Ephesians, “Now therefore ye are no more strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints, and of the household of God.”
   We were no more strangers, but rather friends and sisters in the Gospel.

    A few years later we left Alaska just before Thursa and Jim moved to California where one of her children was willing to care for them.   Thursa died shortly after moving there.
  
 

This Old House

   I loved to go into my grandmother’s old-fashioned kitchen, although it apparently was more modern than I thought.  My grandparents’ house was probably built around 1915 or so on a corner lot in Brigham City, Utah. The current address is 205 N. 2nd East.  It was built by my great-grandparents, George Richard and Euphemia Jane Carter Freeman. When my grandparents, Ernest and Ruby Kotter Freeman got married in 1919, they moved into the house and eventually bought it.

   
                                           House after remodeling and addition put on back.
         Addition is where the three windows are which used to be the back porch.


   When I remember the house, there was a living room the width of the house at the front.  Two doors led to the interior of the house from that room.  The door to the north went into the master bedroom and the door to the South led to the kitchen.  The kitchen was sort of two rooms with a wide archway in the middle.  The cooking area of the kitchen was close to the living room and contained the counters, cupboards, sink , counter top stove and wall oven.  The other side of the archway had a window seat under the windows, and a dining area.  At the end of the table, furthest from the living room, was a little alcove which was a couple of feet above the floor.  The refrigerator fit into that alcove.
   The master bedroom had three doors, one that led to the living room, one that led to the hall and one that led to another bedroom.  The hall in the middle of the house had some built in drawers and cupboards, a desk area with books in a cupboard above the desk and a chest of drawers that my grandma called a chiffarobe.  The hall had many doors, although it was quite a small room. One door led to the master bedroom, one to the other bedroom, one to the bathroom and one to the kitchen.
   From the dining area of the kitchen, two or three steps led down to a small entryway.  There, the door to the south led outside and the door to the north led to the basement.  (The refrigerator alcove was actually above the basement stairway.)
   The basement stairs went down the West end of the basement into an open room.  There was a chest freezer near the bottom of the stairs and a washing machine.  I remember before the modern washer, Grandma had a machine she called a ‘double Dexter’ with two tubs and a wringer in the middle.  Grandma never did have a dryer.  In good weather she hung her clothes on lines in the back yard to dry.  In bad weather, there were lines in the furnace room that she used.

   On the North side of that room was a door to a small bedroom.  Another door led from the East side of the room into a good-sized furnace room.  We children loved that room because Grandpa had his workbench on one end of it.  There we were allowed to use his tools and scrap wood to build boats to float in the creek up at the cabin near Mantua.  To the east of that room was a delicious smelling room Grandma called ‘the fruit room’ where she kept her food storage.  The home dried fruit made the good smell.  To the north of the furnace room was the coal room, which was mostly a storage room when I remember it.

   One day I asked my mother about her memories of that same kitchen.  She was born in 1923 and believes the kitchen was remodeled into a modern kitchen about 1936. These are her memories of it before it was changed.
  
   “The kitchen only extended to the archway when I was a child.  There was a door there to what was the back porch that was included in the kitchen when we remodeled.  (The boys used to sleep on the back porch.) The electric stove replaced the coal stove in about the same place.  We burned coal, but used a little kindling to start the fire each day.  It would burn either wood or coal, but we used coal because it lasted longer.  We’d get 5 tons at the beginning of every winter.  There was no furnace in the house.  We also had a coal burning stove in the living room.  The furnace was put in about the same time we remodeled the back of the house and added the boys room in the basement and the laundry area.
    In that smaller kitchen, the kitchen table was at the end of the stove and extended down to the hall, which was the bathroom then.  The rest of the kitchen was the same.  The ice box was on the back porch.  The stove was actually in the corner where the wall oven is now.
    The counters were the same as always, but the sink was single rather than double like it is now.  The kitchen table was very small. There was just enough room for the parents to sit at either end, then two kids on one side and one on the other side.  (Many years later, when refinishing that table, we found  out that it was really an old slant top desk that had been modified to sit level.)


   The fruit room in the basement was put in after we remodeled.  Dean and Kay dug out the dirt under part of the living room for what was Mother’s fruit room.  They hauled that dirt out bucket by bucket through the coal room.
   Before we got a refrigerator we had an ice box out on the back porch.  I think it was pretty well insulated because we only went to get ice about once a week.  We kids would go get the ice and put it in a gunny sack in our wagon so it wouldn’t melt too much before we got home with it.  The ice place was about four blocks from our house.  I can’t remember just where it was, but it was probably about a block west of Main Street and I think about a half a block north of Forrest Street.”

   My mother’s grandparents had a house just a few blocks away at 36 N. 2nd East.  Her Grandfather Kotter died before she was born, so she didn’t remember him, but she had many fond memories of visiting her grandmother, Minnie Erickson Kotter.  (Wilhelmina Albertina Erickson Kotter)  Minnie lived in a much older house, probably built before 1895.

                                                                     Minnie


She described Minnie’s kitchen.

   “It was on the north side of the house and the window wasn’t really big, so it was kind of dark and seemed narrow.  It had a door to the summer kitchen, a door to the boys’ bedroom, a door to the dining room and a  door to the dark, cold room cellar.  The sink was sort of built in and the cupboard was free standing.  There were no counters, so the kitchen table was the only place for food preparation.
   Cooking was done on a large wood or coal stove.  There were lots of children in that family.  She had 9 children to raise as well as two of the eight stepchildren.  She made a lot of bread, usually eight loaves at the time.  She would get up very early to bake so bread would be ready for breakfast.  She did that maybe three times a week.  Those loaves didn’t last long.  When we grandchildren stopped there after school sometimes, she gave us bread and milk or skorpor.”
   “Food was different then.  Flour and sugar and cheese came from the store.  We made our own butter.  Actually, Grandma Kotter made and sold butter.  Most things were home canned, although I remember in later years that every Fall we’d get a case each of peas, beans and corn to supplement what we grew in the garden.  However, Grandma Kotter did have a barn and two cows that she milked morning and night.  That is after the boys, Homer, Elmer and Wendell left home.  She had a big pie safe down in her cellar where she kept her milk and eggs.  It seemed like a deep cellar and was always cold down there.  We were always instructed to be sure to keep the cellar door shut 
   We only had one cow.  We always had a bathroom in our house, but Grandma Kotter’s  bathroom was built when I was seven or eight years old.
   We didn’t need to store meat very long.  Valbergs (grocery store) was close enough we went there often to get meat.  It did keep several days in the ice box.  I don’t remember if Grandma Kotter had an ice box or not.  I do remember going to the store for her a lot as well as for Mother.  We just ran up a bill at Valbergs and it was always around $20-25 a month for everything we bought there, like toilet paper, meat and things we didn’t have at home.  We had a cow and chickens and grew a bunch of stuff in the garden, so we didn’t need a whole lot of stuff from the store.  We bought cheese there, and in later years, pectin.  Earlier than that, instead of pectin, we just boiled the fruit down for jams and jellies.  We had a sugar bin and a flour bin.  The flour bin held a 50 lb. bag of flour and the sugar bin held a 100 lb. bag of sugar.  They were built into the cupboards.
   We probably ate meat almost every day, but small portions.  We probably ate more meat than a lot of people.  I remember fussing one day about nothing to make gravy out of for mashed potatoes and Aunt Gertrude informed me that that is what creamed vegetables were for, to use as gravy over potatoes. (I remember Grandma making creamed asparagus and eating it on her mashed potatoes.)
   In later years we had a meat locker in town when those came into existence, but not for long, because then we got a freezer.
   We didn’t use pasta and rice was only for making rice pudding which we had at least once every week or two. We also had bread pudding with raisins to use up the stale pieces of bread
    When I was small, I didn’t like to eat.  I was on many diets due to my allergies.  I guess my favorite food though was Yorkshire pudding that we had every Sunday.  One diet it seems like for three weeks I had nothing but orange juice and toothpicks.  The toothpicks were just something to entertain me after I drank my orange juice and everybody else was still eating.  I also had a ‘nothing but milk diet’ and a ‘no wheat flour diet’ and various others."

   Kitchens have clearly changed a lot since the old days with indoor plumbing, built in cupboards and fancy appliances, but kitchens still seem to be the center of the home.