Grandma’s Story
I was born in Orange County Indiana, September 16, 1871. Brother Harvey Hobson was 18 months older than me. His birthday was February 22, George Washington’s birthday. Harvey and I walked to school one and one half miles; usually four months of school in the winter. We ate breakfast always by candle or kerosene lamp. I helped with the dishes then got ready for school. Maybe dark cloudy weather or maybe some snow. We started sometimes as soon as dawn. We went through the grove where the sugar trees grew. The big iron kettles and the brass kettles were under troughs to catch the sugar water as it came out of the hole bored in the tree. If any vessels were full, we were supposed to empty them into a larger vessel. They then made a fire out in the woods and boiled this down into sugar. This was my first year of school. When we left Indiana I was 8 years old in September and we left there on Harvey’s birthday, February the next year.
I remember one time Harvey and I were out in the field, I think cutting corn stocks. We had received a new baby brother the night before (that was Emory). Mother had been keeping a piece of black and red checkered cloth. (Linsy, we called it.) Half wool and half cotton. I guess Mother wove it on her loom, I know she did some and I was anxious to learn to weave. That day Harvey says “Ma said she would make me a shirt out of that goods, now she has made that baby a petticoat”
I did a little spinning yarn from the wools made from our sheep wool. I had learned to knit stockings to turn the heel and to finish the toe. I would sit by the fire place light and candle with mother after the others had all gone to bed. We would knit and mother would mend fathers work pants while he was in bed as he might not be able to have only the one pair, except his suit pants, which must be saved to wear to church.
It was my job to take the white ashes made from burning the hickory wood in the fireplace and scour or polish the knives and forks, and to rub the chairs that were made of the hickory wood. We didn’t use any paint on them. Scouring them with the ashes made them real white and clean.
I remember the first cake I ever saw made of any sugar except maple sugar. Grandmother Hobson lived about one fourthmile from us. Aunt Cinthia Hobson Kearby (my Fathers sister) got married. That day they had a cake baked of sugar with frosting on it, and a big long table set with white table cloth. We always used a table cloth but not such a long table. We had never heard of oil cloth in those days. Well that was one of the most exciting days of my life. I saw him come to meet her at the door, escort her out to the horses which were tied at the hitching rack. One with a side saddle on. She put on a long black riding skirt and they rode away to the probate judge to be married. Their daughter, their youngest child now lives in Ft. Scott, Kansas. The rest of the family are all laid to rest.
Now in February 1879 we are moving from Indiana to Kansas, going to Indianapolis a distance of 30 miles to get on thetrain, taking everything with team and wagon. Bed clothing, dishes, cook stove, cooking utensils, barrel of home made soap, sauerkraut and other things besides the team and wagon. We got off the train at Ft. Scott, Kansas after the freight train pulled in. We children played around the depot while they unloaded things, then they put the wagon together, harnessed the horses and we all got in the wagon and rode 20 miles to Uncle Thomas Hobbs place. It was after dark when we reached our destination. It was then that I saw the corn planter for the first time. A man sitting in the seat driving the horses. I had the pleasure of riding it some, jerking the lever to let the corn drop every turn of the wheel where a white rag was tied to the spoke.
That year we lived one mile from our Uncle on the highway, near the County line between Bourbon and Allen County. We then moved one mile further east on the Ft. Scott and Humboldt Road. While there my father raised mostly broom corn and flax. It was there that my sister 14 months younger than I passed away with typhoid fever. We then moved west to Woodson County. There Harvey [Hobson] had typhoid fever and was so low there was not much hopes of his recovery unless God saw fit to spare his life, which he did. The doctor had come 14 miles in a buggy. He told us to go to the garden, pull onions, which we did green tops and all. He made a poultice and put on his bowels. He lived to be 71 years old and raised a family of five children.
We then moved back to Bourbon County. It was there that my sister Maud was born on the last day of our 4 month school, in cold February in Kansas. We all walked home 1-1/2 miles, four of us. Myself and three brothers; Harvey, John and Emory. I had to get supper in a big cold kitchen. So cold that I put on my overshoes over my shoes, then for a while I put my father’s overshoes on over mine. This was my last year of school. I was then 16 years old. We made another move near Ft. Scott. There I met my husband, Joe Lawton. We were at the school house to an oyster supper. As we hadn’t lived there very long, I wasn’t acquainted with many people but there was a girl friend there who introduced me to Joe. He asked me to eat supper with him, then he asked if he could take me home. There was a boy friend of Joe’s with his girl there who was driving a team and a 2 seater carriage.
Well, we got in the back seat and they took me home. That spring and summer passed. Joe worked part time at a stonequarry for $15.00 per month. I only saw him on week ends. One time he came home, went into Ft. Scott, bought him awhole new ouffit, suit and all. Then we rode in a buggy to Ft. Scott and got married by the Probate Judge, Waterson October 25, 1890. My sister Nettie and Joe’s sister Tina Putnam were the witnesses. After we were married westayed at his sister, Tina’s home for a short time, then he got a job at the Union Pacific Car Shops in Ft. Scott.I got a job helping with the housework and cooking where Joe boarded. Joe got $1 .00 per day and I got $3.00 per week. After a while Joe boarded at the James Hotel and I worked there. I got my board and $1.50 per week.
Next Joe worked for a farmer and received $15.00 per month. I lived with my parents on a farm not too far away, so Joe came home week-ends. On August 26, 1891 God gave us a little baby boy. We named him Leonard. When Leonard was 7 weeks old Joe’s sister Mary Bates came from Illinois to visit us. We went home with her. We lived with her that winter at Williamsfield. In the spring we moved to Kewanee, Illinois. This was our first time living alone. Joe worked in the car shops there. We lived there until after Leonard was a year old. I guess we got homesick. We got on the train and went back to Kansas. My parents then lived in Ft. Scott, so we all lived together again. It was hard for a man to find a job then. The men folks, father, my two oldest brothers, Harvey, John and my husband Joe all worked for the City.
Then on September 26, 1893 God gave us a little girl baby. At this time Leonard was but two years, one month old. When she was one month old Joe went back to Illinois, intending to send for me and the babies as soon as he could get a job and save $11.00. But to our sorrow his brother Jim came down with typhoid pneumonia and lay at deaths door for some time. Joe had to spend the money he had made to support the three.( Jim and his wife Martha.) He also had to help watch over him at night. I didn’t receive the $11.00 for six months to pay for my train ride to Illinois. Joe went to work for a Road Construction Co. He received $15.00 per month, paid rent, bought fuel for a small cook stove which was our only heating in cold Illinois. Leonard would try to play on the floor but in a few minutes his feet would be so cold he would have to climb up in a chair and put his feet in the oven again. In the fall of 1894 the two children and I got on the train and went back to Kansas again. Leonard was then four years old. Estella Pearl was two. Joe had a job of work that he wanted to stay with for a month yet. Soon after the children and I went back to Kansas my sister Sarah was married. Leonard was sliding down the stairs and tore a hole in his little new pants that I had made for him.
About a month later Joe came. Just a few days after Sarah was married she was taken ill with typhoid fever. Afterher recovery all of us except she and her husband moved to Lamar, Missouri. We all lived together that winter. Inthe spring Joe got a job on a farm about 3 miles out of town. He received $13.00 per month. He did the farming and fed beef steers that they were fattening for beef. Leonard would stand up and hold the sack open while Joe threw in the ears of corn, then the sacks were hauled into the feed lot and thrown into the feed trough. When it came harvest time we had to be up by 4 A.M. as the men came to work about 7 A.M. As Joe was the man to stand on the haystack to stack the hay he had to be ready to go with the men. They quit work at 7 P.M. so we got to bed about 10 PM. We had a cow to milk but she only gave from 1 to 2 quarts of milk. I had to churn all the butter we used from that milk.
While there at Lamar our little girl was taken from us. We laid her to rest in the Lamar cemetary to await the day of judgment when she will come forth to meet Jesus. We stayed there for 18 months then moved onto the farm with my parents, here Joe worked the farm with my father and brothers.
Brother Harvey was married by that time. He married Emma Strauaz. They were living near Lamar, Missouri. John and Emory were still at home. While there at Lamar [John’s wife, Flora and Emory’s wife, Sadie] John and Emory both found them a wife in Lamar. Our next move was to Colorado. We left my 3 married brothers behind. Also sister Sarah Runkle. There was just my family, mother, father, Nettie and Maude. We traveled from Lamar, Missouri to Pagosa Springs, Colorado in a covered wagon. We were on the road about 2 months. We didn’t travel on Sundays as that was our Sabbath at that time. We spent a week at Rockyford, Colorado taking in the sites and eating cantaloupe, as that was where they raised so many cantaloupes. There I saw ladies with slacks on and riding astride on mens saddles for the first time. It was also my first time to see a mountain, and my first time to see a pine or evergreen tree growing except for a very few I had seen in yards. I was 12 years old when I saw my first Christmas tree. I had seen a few Christmas trees after they were cut and shipped to Kansas and Missouri.
We first lived in a saw mill camp then on a farm near Pagosa Springs, Colorado. While there I said to Mother, “Why is it that we go to church on Sunday and keep Sunday as our sabbath day, when we know the bible says “six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work but the seventh day is the sabbath of the Lord Thy God.”
Mother says “I dont know.” When I went to school my school book said we go to church on the first day of the week.About a month after this a big tent was stretched up in Pagosa Springs. Seventh Day Adventists It didn’t take us longto decide to keep the seventh day instead of the first.
Joe got a job working at a sawmill near Bayfield, Colorado, which was about 30 miles from Pagosa. He soon came after Leonard and me. We lived in a tent first but soon built us a house and lived there for about 18 months, then Joe got a job near Pagosa working for a man on a farm there. He received $50.00 a month and a house furnished, of course that was all. We had never seen electric lights. We got our water from a well. The man name was Bennie Minnium a cousin to the father of our daughter-in-law to be. Leonard’s wife. Leonard was then 11 years old. We stayed there for 13 months then took up a homestead 7 miles from there. We built a log house. Just one large room with the beds in one end, a carpet for a partition.
Afterwards Leonard and I built on a bedroom. We sawed small logs for the walls. Leonard said “Mama you do the planning, I’ll do the sawing”. We used home made shakes and some pieces of boxes given us at the stores that dry goods and groceries had been shipped in. For the roof it didn’t matter so much about whether the roof was so good or not, as when we had snow we could sweep the snow off, before it melted. We very seldom had rain. I remember one time it rained and our house leaked so bad that we all had to stand close together and roll the bedding up and cover it to keep from getting wet. That was after we had lived in it quite a few years and were planning on building a new house.
We had 30 acres with no timber on it at all, just tall grass. Each year we put that into barley or oats. We had never seen irrigation then. A saw mill moved in on our ranch. Joe and Leonard sawed down the pine and fir trees, hauled them to the mill with horses and wagon or sleds in the winter. While there Leonard made me a nice cupboard with 2 long doors for the upper part where I kept my dishes, then 2 drawers below with 2 shelves and short doors below the drawers for cooking utensils. Leonard also made a new buggy bed for our little one seated buggy that we used with 2 of our ponies. At one time we owned 10 ponies. Sometimes people would want to hire a pony to ride somewhere.
While there we always had a 3 day fourth of July celebration. Joe and I and Leonard would get on our ponies and rideto Pagosa, a distance of 7 miles. Me with my long riding dress to keep the dust off my dress. Either Leonard would go home at night to do chores, taking a boy friend with him , Joe and I would usually get us a bed in a hotel after we had watched all the horse races, bucking races, both horses and steer. Also Ladies side saddle races.
Then some nights we would go home and do chores, and Leonard would stay with a boy friend. One time Leonard won the foot race and sack race. He didn’t spend a cent of the money. He brought it home to buy him a phonograph. One of the first Edison phonographs. Leonard had to stay in town part time to get any schooling, as our nearest country school was four miles away. He rode a pony and went to the country school part time. He would board some place where the people were keeping boarders or roomers, someplace where there was considerable work choring around the house, like making fires, splitting and getting in the wood and there was plenty of wood used in the winter. Most winters got down to 40 degrees below zero. I remember one winter it was 45 below. Our snows were so dry and light the flakes when coming down looked more like feathers. Usually we had a snow about Thanksgiving time but it would all melt away then at Christmas or between Christmas and New Years we had our big snow. Maybe it would snow 3 days and nights. I remember going to bed at night, no snow; in the morning we couldn’t see our yard fence at all. Snow would be to the top of the chicken house door. I took my shovel and Joe took his. I shoveled a path to the chicken house; he made a path to the barn. The stock had to be fed and the cows had to be milked. The snow was so light it almost like throwing feathers on each side of the path.
As Leonard had been going to the country school on the Blanco River he had become acquainted with all the scholars. Among them was little Bessie Minnium the one he liked best. On the Fourth of July we had a real country picnic on the Blanco River. They had ice cream and lemonade stands, a merry-go-round, a dance platform etc. The young people and children had a good time. Leonard took this little one seated buggy with 2 ponies hitched to it. We got little Bessie in the seat beside him and they went to the celebration. The next spring they were married.
I had been sick most all that winter. One doctor advised Joe to have me stay in town where the side walks at least would be kept clear of snow and I would have a better chance to step outside. There was no hospital there. We had friends who operated a hotel there so that is where I stayed for 6 months except I was home one week. I was under doctors care and it was too far for me to ride to the doctor. In the spring I went home. Bessie’s mother was a widow. We got her to keep house for us. Bessie was with her, so in the spring Bessie and Leonard were married. The doctor advised me to go to New Mexico for the winter as it wouldn’t be so cold. Joe rigged up a covered wagon. Joe took a widow sister of Bessie’s with us to keep house and wait on me. After we left Leonard and Bessie lived in our house at the homestead and took care of all the stock. Leonard got a job hauling logs about 5 mile from home. As the milk cows were running out on the range, late in the afternoon the cows would graze close to our ranch fence. Bessie would get her pony, go drive the cows in home and milk them, strain the milk, put it away, then get supper. By that time it was getting late. She would go to a neighbors place to wait for Leonard as he had to pass that way coming home.
That winter while in New Mexico Joe went back home to help with the work. I stayed in New Mexico with my housekeeper. Soon after Joe left I was down in bed sick again. We stayed there alone for a while, then a neighbor lady came with a spring wagon and they put a feather bed in the back and the 2 women carried me, lifted me onto the feather bed. This lady took us to her home. While I was there they called a doctor. He advised me to have an operation. He told me to notify Joe and have him come and meet me in Durango. Yes, I wrote home to him, he came but not for an operation. He was scared that I wouldn’t through it. I said “Why? other women have come out alright”. He cried and said they hadn’t been sick and so weak as I had. I couldn’t walk alone. I only sat in a chair 5 times to have my bed made in 7 weeks. They just made one side then rolled me over on it then made the other side. Joe took me home.
When I got home there I saw my new grandson. They called him Leo Earl. This was in the spring of 1910. I kept gaining in strength for a while then I was bedfast for a month again. We lived together for a while in the old log house, then Leonard took a homestead about 1/2 mile from us. We soon got lumber from the saw mill and built us a real nice home. Four large rooms with 2 fireplaces. A nice bay window. Bessie and I made a nice stairway going up to the second story in the kitchen. We made a closet under the stairway with a nice little door made of some of the nice planed pine lumber from the sawmill and also a door for the foot of the stairs.
In January of 1912 God gave us a little granddaughter, born at our house. We called her lnez Estella. I went out anddipped tubs full of snow, melted it on the stove and poured the water into a barrel which was in the kitchen in order to have water to wash the clothes. We had a hand washing machine. Leonard and his daddy built a real nice house on Leonards ranch and a large barn for hay and cattle.
On October 27,1913 God gave them another girl baby. We called her Bertha Leona. In 1914 Leonard and family, Joe and I made up our minds to sell our farms as soon as we found a buyer and get ready and go to Idaho where my mother; brother Harvey and Sister Sarah Runkle then lived. My folks had left Colorado and moved to Washington about 14 years before, but after living in Washington a few years mother, father and the Runkle family and brother Harvey and family moved back to Idaho. They had heard about a big irrigation canal had been built there and land was cheap. Well, we sold our homesteads in Colorado, or traded them for cattle, horses, sheep, goats or anything that we thought would sell at a sale. We also received some cash. We then rented a large ranch which had 2 houses on it, for 3 years.
By that time God gave Leonard and Bessie another boy baby. We named him Laurence Wesley. Well we stayed on that ranchfor 3 years then we made our intentions good, had a sale, sold everything except our clothes and bedding. We boughtone of the first 2 seated Ford cars that came out I had only seen one car in our country. Then all of us, four grown-ups and 4 children piled in that car and started for Idaho. We filled boxes and trunks with bedding and clothes and shipped them on the train. There were no paved or graveled roads, just plain dirt roads. Although it was late November 1917, the dust on the road in Utah was so deep the car went down to the hub in some places. We all had to get out and walk except the driver- Leonard. We were on the road to Utah 11 days. After we got to Salt Lake City we had a black top road to Twin Falls Idaho – 80 miles. My folks lived around Buhl a distance of 20 miles from Twin Falls. We arrived at my folks – my sister Sarah’s home on Thanksgiving day. Joe and I stayed there 5 weeks. We left Leonard and his family there in Idaho and we got on the train and came to Washington.
Joe and I got our tickets to Sunnyside, Washington. Brother Emory met us at the depot in his new Ford car; on the last day of December 1917. When my parents left Colorado sister Maud was only a school girl, now she was married and the mother of 4 children; 2 boys and 2 girls. The youngest, Helen. [CI?ra Melvin and Fenwick] I had 2 married sisters, Nettie and Maud living near Yakima and 2 brothers.
At this time John had 3 boys, [Carl, Paul,Mark] the youngest 4 months old. John and Emory living near Sunnyside. Atthis time Emory had 2 daughters. Violet was married. It had been about 15 years since I had seen them. Baby Stellawas married soon after we came to Washington.
My oldest brother, Harvey had married in Missouri then he and his wife and her parents and a married brother haddrifted west to Washington a few years before. Their name was Strausz and my father located near them. Maud wentto school, walked of course and as Harvey’s brother-in-law had a son about Maud’s age they both went to the same school. Of course they got married. My sister Maud married my brother Harvey’s wife’s nephew, Hubert Strausz. They had a nice fruit farm near Yakima.
Joe and I lived near Sunnyside near my 2 brothers until the spring of 1918. So one day the first of June, shortlyafter Decoration Day my niece, Emory’s daughter, came to our house to tell us the sad news that they had receiveda telegram from Idaho that Leonard’s oldest child, a boy ? years old named Leo Earl, had been killed in an auto accident. Leonard had been hurt and was in the hospital in Buhl, Idaho. Joe then had a job working in Sunnyside on a new sugar beet plant they were building. He quit his job and we went back to Idaho to Leo’s funeral. Leonard was in the hospital and their 5th baby , a girl, Dorothy was only 12 days old at the time of the accident. Leonard and Leo were going to Buhl, Idaho and had just crossed the bridge over a river going up a hill, when the car started going backwards. Some way the brakes wouldn’t hold. The car went backwards, turned upside down in the water. Leonard crawled out and up the river banks then up the hill on his hands and knees to a farm house and told the news. He couldn’t walk, as his hips were out of joint. The people took him to the hospital. After Leo’s funeral we went and rented a house in Buhl. After a while Leonard was brought home. Bertha was then past 3 years old.
Bertha had an attack of appendicitis. Joe and I and the doctor got into a car and took her to Twin Falls for anoperation. We stayed all night in Twin Falls but she was still unconscious when we left the next day on the train.In ten days Joe and I went to the hospital after her on the train. It was sometime in August that she and Leonardwere able to be taken on the train to Sunnyside, Washington. We laid Leo to rest beside my father, who had passedaway three years before. Joe and I with Leonard’s family boarded the train for Sunnyside, Washington. Leonard was still on crutches and we had to still carry Bertha, as her incision didn’t heal as it should. Dorothy was only 3 months old. After we moved to Sunnyside we rented a small cabin and all lived together for a while. In the meantime we had bought a used Ford car. Joe and I soon went to Yakima to see about Joe getting a job. ‘While he was looking for a job I went to my sister Maud Strausz to visit her. Joe got his job. A janitor job of taking care of the furnaces and other things around the Indian School at Ft. Simcoe, which is south and west of Yakima. Joe and I moved to Ft. Simcoe.
We had a real nice large house furnished us. Soon after we left Sunnyside, Leonard and family went to visit my sister Maud Strausz. She was only 4 years older than Leonard. When we all lived in Kansas and the two children were small they had a good time playing together Now they had been separated for 15 years and a big change had been made with Leonard’s five children and Maud with four children. When Leonard and family went to visit Hubert and Maud they took a wrong road (they weren’t acquainted with the country) and soon found they were at Naches so by the time they reached Huberts place it was after dark and raining. There was a bad flu epidemic in that area at that time. When they got there Bertha was awfully sick and they supposed it was the flu. Leonard told them that he better not unload but they told him that Hubert was in bed with the flu so they went ahead and unloaded. They were there on Bertha’s fifth birthday October 27, 1918. Sister Maud baked a birthday cake for her. They showed it to her but she was too sick to eat any cake. Leonard and family stayed there with Maud’s family for about 3 months. Leonard worked for Hubert on the farm and Hubert paid him $80.00 per month and didn’t charge him anything for the family keep. They then moved to Ft. Simcoe and moved in with Joe and me.Leonard got a job working for a man who owned a store near the Fort. He delivered groceries to the people livingat the Fort. In the spring Leonard moved onto a farm near Sunnyside, picked up a few pieces of household furnishingsuch as the old cook stove. The top fell in while Bessie was cooking for thrashers. In a few months Joe and I moved from the Fort too, into a vacant house on the farm near where Leonard lived. I had to take a walk every day to their house to see how they were coming. I went to their place one forenoon. Leonard and Bessie were out in the field hauling in grain with a team of horses and wagon, oats that had been cut with a binder. Bessie on top of the load, Leon pitching the bundles to her. I went into the house. The two little girls, lnez and Bertha started telling me how they had washed the breakfast dishes and put them in the cupboard and also taken care of the baby, Dorothy. One of the girls climbed up on a chair, the other one carried the dishes and handed them to her to put them in the cupboard. Then they asked me to come upstairs to see how they had made the bed. At this time lnez was 7 years old and Bertha was [5]. The summer before that Joe and I were at Leonard’s place one day and Joe was helping with the farming. After lunch while the men were taking their afternoon nap the children were outside playing and we heard a scream from Laurence, who was 2 years younger than Bertha. The washing machine was outside under the porch. They had been turning the water which had cog wheels below the tub. Laurence had put his finger in there trying to stop the machine and his front finger had been cut off except for just a little skin holding it together. Our Lord was there. We put him in the car in a hurry and Joe, Leonard and I climbed in the car and hurried him to the doctor in Sunnyside about 4 mile away. The doctor put the finger together and it healed – a bit crooked.
Soon Leonard [bought] a little 20 acre farm close to the little town of Outlook, Washington. Joe and I bought arestaurant building in Outlook. On September 11,1920 God gave Leonard and Bessie another baby girl. They called her Gladys Louise.
Bessie’s sister, Callie and Archie Blair came to Washington. As Archie was not a farmer he wanted Leonard to rent a large farm and they would farm it together. Leonard rented a farm between Outlook and Sunnyside. Joe and I rented out our restaurant and moved into Leonard’s 20 acre farm. Before the school year was out, and as lnez, Bertha and Laurence were in school, they stayed with Joe and I at Outlook until school was out, June first. Bertha had such pretty curly hair, I always curled her hair around my finger many times. Bertha often wasn’t ready when the others started walking to school. Many times I didn’t eat my breakfast until I had curled her hair and helped her get ready for school, then I would walk to the door, watch her start to school and think how sweet she looked. After school was out the children went to live with their parent. It wasn’t long until Bessie got sick. After she had been sick for a week she was taken to the hospital in Sunnyside and in one short week she passed away. We laid her to rest in the cemetery at Sunnyside, Wash. Joe and I then took all five children to care for them. Leonard still stayed on the farm with Archie and Callie, then in the fall Leonard came down with typhoid pneumonia.
They had an M.D. to care for him. Now Joe was staying there with Leonard day and night and I was on the 20 acre farm taking care of the children and sending them to school. All except Gladys and Dorothy who was now 2 years old. I also had the chores to do, feed the stock, milk the cows etc. Finally my sister Nettie phoned me that we better change doctors and get an osteopath. I made up my mind to go to Sunnyside and see the doctor we had in mind. My brother John and wife Flora had taken Gladys to care for and John’s son Carl and wife Iva took Dorothy. I phoned my brother John to see if he could take me to Sunnyside to find another Doctor. John said as soon as he was through with the chores he would be there. As John had several dairy cows he had plenty of chores. We went to Sunnyside, found the doctor we wanted. As Bessie’s sister Mary Moore and family had recently arrived in Washington they were still with Archie and Callie. They went to our house to take care of the chores and also the school children and I stayed there with Leonard. This doctor got a trained nurse. He said one more hemorrhage of the bowels and there would be no hopes. Thank God there was not another hemorrhage. Before too long Leonard was improving some and by Christmas tine Leonard was able for us to take him home with us on the farm. The nurse kissed him good-bye. Now as the family was united again this was one joyous Christmas and I thanked the Lord for his loving care. On Chnstmas day the people of the Outlook Church brought a large box of food, all and everything we needed for a real Christmas dinner. Also a box of clothing which we certainly appreciated as we sure did need it.
Next Leonard rented his farm out to my sister and husband Ed Marr. Leonard soon started working out by the month. Joe and I bought the old Outlook Hotel. We kept roomers and operated a restaurant and sent the children to the Outlook School. All except Gladys, as she was yet under school age. I would send her on errands and across the street to buy any groceries that I happened to see that I needed to complete a meal. One day I said to her, “Gladys, I don’t know what I will do for a helper when you go to school.” Dorothy had said she wanted to be a school teacher. One day she wasn’t well and she stayed home from school. As she was playing in the kitchen she says “Grandma, I am not going to be a teacher.” I said,”Why not Honey?” She says, “I am going to get married and raise me some babies.”
Now lnez was 17 years old. Carol Huber was her boy friend. One day we thought he was in school all day until Berthacame home. She said no, lnez hadn’t been to school that day and to our surprise she had met Carol at the Post Officeand they went where Leonard was working, got his consent and went and got married. She returned with Carol that night.
Soon Leonard was married to Elsie Crimmins, his second wife. Leonard had sold his stock, bought a piece of land just outside the city limits of Outlook. He built a cute little home there and he and his new wife Elsie moved in. After a while there was a baby boy in the house. They named him Leon. In a short time Bertha was married. At that time we had many philopino boys eating and sleeping at the hotel who were hired by the farmers to harvest the crops and pick fruit.
Now a great depression came over our country. No money for anything.Each man had to do his own work or leave it undone. There was no pensions granted to the aged. No welfare help as thereis now. So in 1932 we all pulled up and left Outlook, moved over the mountain range near Olympia. the Capital ofWashington. Bessie’s sister, Mary and hubbie Will Moore had moved to Rainier, Washington after they had moved fromColorado to Outlook, Washington. I suppose we thought we would get rich by moving.
Soon there was a little welfare help we could get $6.00 of groceries for each person in the family, also the husbandwas allowed to earn $9.00 per month in addition if he could find the work. Then the women were allowed to work someat the same wages sewing clothes to give away to the people on the welfare. I got work enough to earn enough money to buy me a new cook stove, which cost $40.00 and I was glad to get it as I didnt have a cook stove except an old stove that happened to be left in the house that we moved into. It didnt have a good draft and you could see the blaze through the cracks in the top. Joe got work on a farm to earn his $9.00. We lived in a vacant house where he worked (rent free). At this time Dorothy and Laurence were with Joe and me. Laurence went to Rainier high school 2 years then graduated. Dorothy was in her last year of high when she married Orval Harmer of Rainier. Gladys was staying with Leonard and Elsie then taking care of the baby Leon. Gladys came to visit Dorothy and me now and then. One time she stayed almost a month with Dorothy and me & Laurence. Joe got time to come home now and then to visit for a while. Now we moved into Rainier. Laurence sold his pony to get his graduation clothes.
This was in 193[?] . By that time Leonard had bought a 40 acre farm 2 miles out from Yelm. One time we went to Olympia to the welfare where they were giving clothes away. They had some new corduroy pants they said were especially for the high school boys in Olympia. They had Laurence try on a pair. They were just right so they gave them to him. Boy, was he tickled. Leonard built a house on his farm out of railroad ties. It wasn’t long until it burned down. A forest fire had been raging near his place for several days. Leonard was out helping the firemen when the wind changed, turned the fire and it caught. Elsie was home alone with the 2 youngest children, Myrtle and baby Richard. Elsie saw the fire was going to burn the house. She loaded a suitcase, with some special clothing, especially a new suit of Leonards. She said she saw she couldn’t carry the suitcase and the baby too so she dropped the suit case, put $10.00 cash that they happened to have in her pocket, picked up the baby, put on her coat and left the home to burn, which it did. They had a corral made of logs, as there was plenty of pine timber at their place.
Fortunately one corner of the fence burned and allowed the calves to get out. Elsie got a ride into Yelm after she had walked until she was tired. The children were in school in Yelm. She stopped and told them not to go home after school as there was nothing there. She got a lady to drive her to our house in Rainier where Joe and I were still living. Leonard said he went to the edge of the timber where he could see his home and sure enough it was all ablaze. He said he went as close to the house as he could to listen to see if he could hear any cries from the family inside, then he started on the road toward Yelm. He found Elsies coat where she had dropped it off as she had too much to carry so he knew she had got out safe. They then converted their chicken house into a dwelling until they could get another house built. Leonard soon built another home with concrete basement. Four rooms down stairs and 2 up, also a breakfast nook. He and his Daddy made shakes for the outside wall, as you know he had plenty of nice trees on his place. Next he bought 80 acres just across the road with a small orchard. Apples, a few cherry trees and a big red plumb and a few prune trees. Joe and I still lived in Rainier. By this time we were 65 year old and were getting our pension of $35.00 a month. Joe was born August 11, 1871.
Leonard owned a small sawmill now where he lived on his little 40 acre farm 2 miles from Yelm. There was plenty ofrange for his cattle but he said he couldn’t take care of his stock, go get the cows at night and run his sawmill. Leon was then 7 years old. So Joe and I moved out to his farm to run the farm and take care of the stock. Leonard then bought a lot right in the northwest corner of Yelm, Washington, built a house on it and moved to Yelm and ran his sawmill which was not too far from Yelm.
At this time Laurence was working for Weyerhauser Sawmill Company. We lived on Leonards farm for 3 years. By thistime Leonard had built a house on the 80 acres he had bought across the road from his little 40 acre farm where welived. He moved back to his first home while Joe and I moved to his last new home. Leonard then moved his sawmill onto this 80 acre farm where Joe and I lived. Now Joe and Leonard operated the sawmill. Now came the time when the government was compelling every farmer in that area to sell his land to the government. They didn’t receive what their homes were worth so Leonard bought a home 7 miles from Yelm in the Lacamas district. By this time Gladys was married to Buster Wells and Laurence was married to Anita Sonickson. Laurence worked for the Weyerhauser Co. He was brakeman on the log train, then on the main railroad line. Now in 1956 Laurence lives in Olympia and owns a nice home and a 20 acre farm 3 miles out of town, also 2 horses. He uses them to go hunting in the hills at hunting season. Besides this he owns 2 cows and several head of calves to sell for beef. He also has 3 nice children, a boy Gary, 15 years old and 2 girls Sonya 13 and Laurel 10.
Now in 1943 Carrol and lnez arrived in a seated car, not even a trunk in the back. They decided to take Joe and mefor a ride. We took Laura Rose, Leonard and Elsie daughter named after her two grandmothers, with us. She was then 1 years old.
Leonard [Carrol { Note: ?Leonard was crossed out}] had a job promised him to start in about a month so we borrowed a 4 wheel trailer from a neighbor, put our suit cases, trunks and all belongings into it, also a small feather bed, covers and pillows into it then on August 1st we started and went as far as Sunnyside the first day and stayed at Emory’s that night. The second day we reached Brother Harvey’s place before noon at Buhl, Idaho. Now Harvey had passed away a few months before but we visited his wife Emma who was still living in her home on the farm. Also 3 of the married children who lived near Buhl. The next night we stayed all night at Salt Lake City, Utah. The next night we reached the west border of Colorado, then we went across the southwest corner of Colorado into Farmington, New Mexico where Joe’s nephew Harry Putnam then lived. His 3 daughters were married so just Harry and Alice were home. They owned a feed store, a grocery store, a home and 2 farms. We reached there about 1 A.M. We hadn’t seen them since we left Colorado in 1917. Joe thought he would see if Harry would know him. Harry was helping a customer to load some baled hay that he had bought. Joe got out of the car, left the car a little distance back and walked around watching them load the hay. Harry says, “Don’t need to be walking around here I know who you are.” We stayed there 3 days. Alice took us to see the old Aztec Indian Ruins. The guide took us all the way through the ruins where the first old Aztec Indians had lived. It was sure a hard looking place to live all of stone and dirt, then we went on to Indiana and visited the place where I was born Pagosa Springs Co.