Westward We Go by Irene

Westward We Go

In 1945 we had been living in the Choctaw house for about two years. Shortly after moving into the house, Daddy was sent to Portland, Oregon to work in the Kaiser shipyards building warships. Mother had coped with us alone on his allotment in Oklahoma. She had gone to Portland early in 1944 to visit Daddy. My brother, Mike, had been born in December 1944.

The war had finally ended and the soldiers were coming home. My father wrote and told Mother that he had decided that he was not coming back to Oklahoma. He had already found a job in Portland. She was to pack up the family and take the train to Portland. So, my mother with four kids ages 9, 8, 6 and 1 (two who were bed wetters) set out for the west.

We first took a local train from McAlester to Kansas City, Missouri. There we had an eight hour wait in the station for the “City of Portland, stream-liner that would take us the rest of the trip. We slept on the benches in the station and ate the food that Mother had packed in boxes for us.

When the time came to board the train, an announcement came over the loudspeaker saying that all civilian travelers were to wait until all military personnel and their families had boarded. As we waited, a young soldier came up to my mother and asked, “Ma’am, are you and your children catching the City of Portland?”

“Yes, we are,” she answered, “But we have to wait.”

“Why don’t you come with me,” he said. “I will tell them that you are my family and you can board with me.”

So, he helped us board and made sure that we were seated together for the trip. We celebrated Mike’s first birthday on the train.

We passed the wide open plains, fences going up and down the hills (some falling over), and the Rocky Mountains in the distance. Since it was winter, we saw lots and lots of snow. The route took us through Green River, Wyoming, Pocatello, Idaho then along the Columbia River into Portland.

Daddy met us at the station and took us to our first apartment on North Benton Avenue in the back part of a large house. We had one large room the width of the house with a stove in one corner and, wonder of wonders, an inside bathroom with the first flush toilet we had ever had.

July 26, 2008

This is a vivid description of Irene's journey to Portland. She brought in dialogue, which adds a nice flavor to any story. I enjoyed reading the description of their journey from one end of the country to the other. I don't know about you, but I was traveling right with her family.

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Memories of the Growing Up Years by Virginia

Summer Days

by Virginia

There were several springs in the Sanlando Springs area of Florida and one of my favorite things to do in the summer was to go swimming. The water was always very cold and it felt good in the hot summer, especially since we did not have air conditioning in our homes.

Every summer our church would have a big picnic at Rock Springs. The water came out of a huge rock. the reason for the name. Everyone brought his or her favorite covered dishes and cakes and pies and someone always made homemade ice-cream. We would swim and walk on the trails until lunch time and then an hour after eating most everyone was back in the water.

A special thing about this spring was that the stream was clear for quit-a-way down the stream. We could walk part of the way in the water and swim where it was too deep.

There was a first landing which was a little dock where there was a big tree. Someone had tied a rope in the tree with an old tire on it, so you could swing out over the water and then let go and fall into the water.

There was also a second landing which was a little more difficult to get to. There was a trail back to the main swimming area, so you could walk back or swim back, if you had lots of energy and strength left. It seems like most everyone at the time or the other decided to swim and walk back up stream. By the time they had gone down stream and back up in the water, they had had a pretty good work out.

One time my mom and dad and I went camping at Rock Springs. I don’t remember if we stayed one night or two nights. I believe it was a full moon while we were there and one night just before we went to bed in our tent, we decided to go to the spring to get some cool water.

There happened to be some bees buzzing around there and one got up my under clothes and started stinging me. Well, I began jumping up and down and screaming. My dad was smoking a cigarette, so he smashed it in the cool water and put it on the bites. That took the sting right out. That is the one thing I know of that cigarettes are good for.

Virginia continues on with her story of living in the Florida area. She describes well the events that took place on those hot summer days with family and friends. I could see them hiking up and down the rock. And for sure, I got a clear image of her dance with the attack of the bees!!
I would like for her to add dates.

Photo: Google, Yahoo.
Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

In The Mind of a Child by Richard

The following story is a continuation of Richard's childhood memories. Enjoy.

The next thing I remember was that Daddy did not have a wagon or team of mules or anything else except the bit of furniture and stuff we were moving with us to Kirvin.

Many of the one-team farmers had borrowed money and mortgaged their teams and equipment to try and to stay in business with farming. That was the fall of 1929 when the stock market fell.

All the small farmers had was not enough to cover their mortgages. The banks were forced to foreclose, even though they could not get money for the stuff they were collecting. That put the banks in worse condition than they were in by only getting a little interest from the farmers.

Now, while this recollection from a six or seven year old mind may not go down as fact; it is a record of the memory in that mind.


Richard shares his memories through the mind of a child. Isn't it amazing how children make difficult things simplistic? We have much to learn from them. This is a good reason to go back and explore your early memories. You might find a lot of wisdom hidden deep in the recesses of your little inner child!

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Wagons, Babies, and Switches by Richard

In September of 1928, I started to school in
Currie. At that time I knew Daddy had a wagon and team of mules and, of course, the necessary equipment to make a crop.

What I did not know was anything about the economy and Daddy's financial condition. In the fall of that year, I remember Mother helping gather the cotton, though she had a very young baby. I was appointed to tend this young child, who was bedded down in a little red wagon.

We were left in the shade of the big wagon where the cotton was held. My instruction was not to leave the baby or the wagon. That surely did not mean to me, that if that baby began to cry with or without cause, that I should stay there and listen. Who could stand that misery? My only hope of survival, I thought, was to get that baby's mother.

She was a long way up in the field from the wagon, but I could run that long distance to find some relief, so off I went. Thankfully, mother met me on the way which shortened the distance she would be switching me all the way back to the baby.

Richard shared a challengeing moment as a child with a blend of humor. Humor, in the right way, increases the chances of your reader wanting to come back for more. We look forward to more of Richard's stories. He will tell you, "I just write Texan." Whatever and however, he whets the appetite for more of that boy's Lone Star memories.

This photo was taken from Google Images.
Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Keep Your Pets In The Barn!

The Family Farm
By Mary

Thomas Edwin and Ruby Anna lived on the family farm property. Each of the five boys had a house on the land. They all worked together growing corn, cotton, peanuts, and a three acre peach orchard. So we had lots of peaches.

On Friday October xx, 19xx Mother and Daddy held a 6 lb 2 oz baby girl. Daddy was excited because all his brother had boys. I was the first granddaughter on both sides of the family. Doctor Terry asked, What’s her name? I was named Mary after both of my grandmothers. Mother had just finished a novel with a beautiful heroine named Evelyn; thereafter I was known as Mary Evelyn.

As I grew hair mother always said it looked like tiny beads strung on silk threads; it would shine like diamonds in the light.

As I remember the house, there was a room on each side of a hall with a kitchen at the back, and a front porch all the way across. A fireplace was in one room. We lived in that room; it was a sitting /bedroom. A wood stove kept the kitchen warm, somewhat.

There were times when Mother entertained me by giving me a pan of shelled corn. I would poke the corn through cracks in the floor and watch the chickens eat. Great fun!!

Mother had a cousin who loved me. One day he came to visit. I was dirty! I hated being dirty. When Mother said Uncle Clyde was here, I ran and hid under the house, in the chimney corner. If he saw me dirty, he wouldn't love me any more. He left me a gift and went home. He would not look at me; he knew it would upset me for him to see me dirty.

One day mother went across the hall to get something she needed. When she opened the door and walked into the room, I heard her scream, A SNAKE! She ran out of the house to the barn and got a hoe and chopped the snake into many pieces. When Daddy came in for lunch she told him about the snake in the house.

Daddy laughed and said, Well, Ruby dear, that was a special snake. He wouldn’t hurt you or anyone; it was a family pet!

Mother screamed, A SNAKE FOR A PET! Hereafter, keep your pets in the barn!


Mary gave us a snapshot of several childhood memories instead of one. She could take each of these, I bet, and make individual stories. In her spare time, of course. Regardless, all of these warm the heart and leave us with smiles on our faces. Keep up the good work, Mary Evelyn.

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Unlikely Twins by Barbara

As a young child growing up in Commerce Texas, I lived a dangerous neighborhood. There were two older mean boys and me. Their favorite game was Cowboys and Indians. Guess who was the Indian? Malcolm and Clarence were down right dangerous. The Cowboys would tie me to a telephone pole and leave me until they decided to come back, which was not nearly soon enough for me.

When I was five, my life changed for the better. Mary Lou came into my life. My aunt died and Mary Lou came to live with my father, mother, and me. She was also five. Our birthdays were only eleven days apart.

My mother got busy and had us dressed alike all the way down to our shoes. We had Buster Brown hair cuts which were square and generic. She called us the little girls. Little girls do this and little girls do that. Mary Lou was short and chubby with blond hair. I was tall and skinny with brown hair. Do I need to say more?

Shortly after she came, we put our heads together. We now had a level playing ground. We waited until Malcolm’s mother called him to come home for lunch. We sneaked up on Clarence and tied him to my father’s prized pecan tree. Some one must have untied him, because when we peeked out the window a half hour later, he was gone.

After this event, we became busy playing with each other and quit playing with them. There was heckling, of course, but we ignored it. Gradually they began to ask to play with us, and gradually we let them. There would be no tolerance of violence. Mostly we played with paper dolls cut from an old Sears Roebuck Catalog. Malcolm chose Menswear while Clarence, always the free spirit, chose the Fur Coats.
Looking back, Mary Lou and I felt that this story was an unlikely miracle performed by unlikely twins.

We stopped dressing alike when we were rebellious teenagers, but remain twins at heart at 86 years of age.

We all enjoyed this story in class. I'm sure you did, too. Barbara's memory of this early childhood event provided a variety of feelings. Humor. Hurt. More Humor. Sadness. Happiness. Satisfaction. And more humor. And that, folks, is what makes a great story.

NOTE:

The first photo has a great article on the twins in the photo.

The second photo is of a child who has a Buster Brown haircut. Guess who that kiddo is!
The third photo is a doll house sold out of a Sears Roebuck 1928 catalog which would be about the time Barbara and Mary Lou were six years old.

For all kinds of free paper-doll downloads, take a look at this fabulous site www.paperdolls.org/

Photo credit: HO/AFP/Getty Images, Daily UK News, Sears Roebuck.
Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

A Magical Time By Irene

A Magical Time

As my mind goes back to my growing-up days in Portland, Oregon, I think of how everything seemed bigger, or shinier than today. Christmas shopping time was an especially magical time for me. Portland was a city of beautiful greenery, white capped mountains in the distance, the Willamette River which divided the city and many, many bridges.

I was eleven, Jack was twelve and Tom about nine years old. Mike was only about five years old so he was too young to go shopping. The year was around 1948. Mother and Daddy would give each of us five dollars for shopping, but I was clever enough to save my allowance for one or two months so I always had more to spend.

In the early evening we would walk the two blocks to the trolley bus stop where we caught the Eastmorland bus which took us over the Hawthorne Bridge to downtown Portland. A misty rain would be falling because, of course, winter in Portland usually meant rain. The wet downtown streets gleamed luminous and golden in the old-fashioned streetlights. On certain street corners we could see the bubbling drinking fountains which were on many downtown streets. Streetcars and trolley buses rumbled past taking people home from work or bringing them downtown to shop.

The sidewalks and stores were crammed full of shoppers. Meier and Frank and Lipman’s, the big department stores, seemed to be in competition which each other to see who could create the most sparkling Christmas windows. Those stores had wonderful gifts but all of our shopping was done at Newberry’s, Kress’ and Woolworth’s, the “dime stores” that disappeared from the American scene in the 1960’s.

We would agree on a time and place to meet when were finished so that we could shop in secret for our gifts for each family member. I walked up down every aisle in each store looking for just the perfect present for everyone. I remember once finding a pretty teacup and saucer for my mother. She still has it in her china cabinet along with some lovely real china ones.

Tom usually came home every year with a Slinky as a present for all of us kids to share because he was fascinated with the way Slinkys walked down the stairs.

Jack would buy one big box of Chocolate Covered Cherries for everyone to share. We would always complain because he was the only one in the house who even liked Chocolate covered Cherries.

After our shopping was finished, we met at our assigned place, rode the trolley bus back to our stop and walked home. We each grabbed wrapping paper, ribbon and tape, went to a private spot in the house, wrapped our gifts and placed them under the tree where they teased and tantalized us until Christmas morning.

By Irene
Written February 2003
Revised June 23, 2008

This is a delightful story about a family during the holidays in Portland (love it there). I don't know about you, but I could see all the beautiful decorations dancing before me. And I love the personal detail of how each gift had a special meaning. What fun. I can't wait until Christmas! Ah, it's Christmas in July.

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Bob's Early Memories

EARLY MEMORIES - AGE 2

I arrived early in the morning on Tuesday, April 7, 1931 at Manchester Memorial Hospital in Manchester, Connecticut. Though I cannot vouch for this based upon memory, records at the Town Hall in Manchester indicate this to be true.Within a few days and for the next thirty years, my address was 28 East Middle Turnpike in Manchester.

During the first five years, I was the only child. Life was good. I had loving parents and wonderful next door neighbors, the Sonniksen's, who always welcomed me into their home. Though the country was in the midst of the Great Depression, my family pretty much escaped the trials and tribulations of that sad period in our nation's history. We lived in the house that my parents had purchased at the time of their marriage in 1928, my father continued be employed at a local bank, and we always had a car.

My earliest memory and this must have been when I was only two, was the homemade fence around our backyard which my kind and loving parents had constructed especially for me. This apparently failed in its purpose because very shortly after the construction of the fence I remember a harness being placed around my upper body with a rope attached. Neither of these lasted very long though both made good sense at the time considering what my parents were dealing with.

My next memory was a visit that I made to the gasoline station near the corner of our street. This was about a quarter of a mile from our house. I think I was still less than three at the time. My eyes soon spotted an unattended white container which probably had about a five gallon capacity filled to the brim with beautiful black oil. Most likely the oil had been removed from cars during oil changes. What happened next involved what was probably my greatest exertion of energy since the day I was born. The effort was successful. As I saw the oil spreading out on the ground in front of the station, I had the good sense to realize that, with the task completed, there was no need to dillydally. I was home in no time. At supper that evening, I resisted any temptation that I may have had to talk about my visit to the corner gasoline station.

Wasn't this a great read? Bob presented his story in a fashion that was easy to imagine. I wonder if he ever told his parents about his visit to the gas station?

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Virginia's Memories of Her First Home

This is the first home I have any recollection of: It had two bedrooms and one bath, a kitchen, a dining room, and a living room. We had a fire place in the living room, and I remember the ice box in the kitchen and a hurricane stove. There was a screen porch across the front with big tree around the house.

This is the first home I have any memories of and they are not very clear. I think I must have been a little over three or maybe four years old when we moved there. I don’t actually remember moving there, but I believe it was a happy time for my family and for me.

There was a living room with a fireplace. I really liked the fireplace. I began getting dressed in front of the fireplace after running from my warm bed during the winter. When anyone came in from outside they hurried to get warm in front of the fireplace. Warming their hands together and then turning around to get their backside warm, too.

There was a dining room where we ate when we had company for a meal. We ate in the kitchen when there was just my mom, my dad and me. I remember the icebox and having to get ice for it every day. Mom cooked on a hurricane stove with an oven. She made a pie or cake pretty after and we all liked that a lot.

I remember one time she made a pie. Then she cut two pieces and sent me to take those to our neighbor. Well, when I knocked on the door, no one was home, so I decided I would just sit down and eat the pie. I couldn’t think of anything else to do with the pie. Besides, that was a special treat.

There was a bedroom for Mama and Daddy and a bedroom for me, and a bathroom between them.

Virginia described her memories very well, don't you think? It is amazing what we can recall once we invite our minds to do so. And don't you love the story of the missing pie? One question: Where did this take place and about what year? I am looking forward to more of her memories.


Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

What I Learned in Kindergarten by Donald

Selma, Alabama
Kindergarten Remembrance in 1933
I remember when my sixth birthday was only a few weeks ahead; it was in late August.

I would be eligible to start first grade at a nice school only two or three city blocks from the home where my parents recently moved into for this convenience.

Shortly before school started my parents told me they had been notified that the school’s enrollment was full, and we would have to wait until the following year, suggesting we apply earlier for enrollment. My eagerness to get started was satisfied when I was enrolled in kindergarten near our home.

During that one year our teacher taught us how to make glue for our construction paper projects, using flour and water. We learned how and I noticed the similarity of the glue recipe to the starting ingredients for making biscuits. I mentioned this to the other children nearby. Since all of our fingers were coated with the sticky flour and water mix, we satisfied our curiosity by tasting and it was good, though some said it needed salt.


This story was short and simple but made an impact upon the reader. For sure, I got a visual of their tasty coated fingers all lathered in gooey goo! Donald taught us once again, there is somehting to be learned in kindergarten. What fun.

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.

Don's Early Remembrances

September 18, 1940 my life began with a bang at 12:14 a.m. and even though my father was a hunter the bang was not from a gun. It was the sound of the house being ripped off its foundation by a tornado and relocating it about 20 feet from where it originally had been. Since we were 9 miles from town, pregnant woman did not depend on Doctors or hospitals for delivery. So because of the necessity of what to do, my father delivered me. No one was killed in the tornado and the damage to the house was not large and it did not effect my life in the early years of my life.

The first thing that I can remember in my early life was I got to stay home from school and watch the power lines being brought to the house. We were anxious to know what it would be like to have electricity and they put one hanging light in each room of the house. After we got the first full month's bill from the electric company my Dad said we had to cut the use of electricity because the first month's bill had cost $5.80.

The next thing I remember in my life was a part in a concert being put on by my school and my parents had to buy me a suit. For the first time in my life, I had to stand on stage and hold the hand of a girl and we sang to each other "Because of You." When we finished the song the audience exploded in applause.

NOTE: Don's life story is the VERY FIRST added to this blogsite. Thanks to his wife, Donna, for making it possible!

The snipets of Don's life catches the attention of his audience. He kept it short and simple. No boredom here. Too, he could take each of these, expound and make them into individual stories as well. We can't wait to see his next story.

Copyright © 2008 by The Write Workshop. All rights reserved.