The Family's Years

On to the beginnings of our stay in Bremerton and the Navy years.

Life cannot be neatly packaged as are the days and years of a calendar. It is rather like a river where currents and streams blend and divide in an endless unity which keeps repeating.

C. Allen and Ivabell with John lived for a year with her parents; that happened frequently in those days of economic stress; households simply doubled up to minimize expenses. Finally C. Allen found a house and a mortgage which was affordable further down Forrer Avenue. The small family moved, using that furniture which the Campbells could spare. Campbell was born a year later. C. Allen began to finish the attic area in order to expand the space to include shelves for books - a continuing need/want of Ivabell. A vacation trip to Tennessee and the return with Mattie Alderson stopped all work on the attic for space and privacy was needed for Mattie. She was one of the great gifts of my life for she shared a mother's problems and rewards.

I learned with Mattie some of the problems and some of the solutions of parenthood. John would came home from nursery school happy and co-operative; then problems would build. Our decision was that we were saying 'don't' too often. I learned something which helped both the children and myself. I began to put my points across by asking questions until the answers were the ones that I wanted. The children and C. Allen found themselves doing what I thought was right for they had established the reasons as they answered my questions. It was years later that I discovered that question-asking was a Sophoclean technique used by that teacher as he worked with his contemporaries. You may say great minds if you like; I won't argue. Then John, less than five years old, established the idea that manners are a two-way affair. He had had enough of saying 'please' and 'thank you'. When his father, needing John's wagon for some job, kept insisting that he, C. Allen, father, wanted to use the wagon, it took 'please' to bring out the wagon happily. There were other times when my 'please, thank-you, you're welcome' were all in line and automatic; those words were the proper response at the moment; I insisted upon their use. Eventually that lesson was learned. Rather like an ad, you have to see often before you finally believe and buy. I also began to use instant doggerel to point up a thought and song to soothe ruffled tempers - my own included. It was possible to keep small children quiet in the car if I could find any old story to tell or make one up for the moment.

C. Allen moved ahead at Turners, being given more responsibility and receiving increased reward. Our memorable year of 1937 brought us Sylvia and took her away. It had taken us out to Lake Orion were we bought the cottage on the recommendation of the Almdales. Mattie went off for vacation and we moved to Pilgrim in Birmingham. We bought furniture; some came home from Canada as did the china and the silverware. A new (for us) house with its increased space demanded more furnishings. We bought in 1938 the walnut bed and the cherry canopy bed from a Lake Orion antique dealer. I still have the big walnut bed; Joyce has the canopy bed which presently is used by her Kirsten. They cost about a hundred and fifth dollars a piece. I have since been asked if there was a story to go with the old walnut bed; no story, just an acquisition that I have learned to treasure.

Things were going smoothly until one night C. Allen woke me to tell me that I had poisoned him with the turnip greens which he had eaten for dinner and that I should get him some milk of magnesia. Mattie had cooked and eaten the turnip greens; there were no complaints from her. I got him an ice bag. The next morning he was sent off to see Doctor Wilson who put him in the hospital and then removed his appendix. C. Allen spent ten days at Old Grace and ran his office from his bed until the doctor put an end to that. Recuperating in those days was a slow job for there were not today's antibiotics to help. Dr. Wilson insisted that his patient have peace and quite. George and Alice Seefred Bery came by the hospital for a visit; when hours were over, we three went to Greenfields (a restaurant of good reputation in Detroit and now long gone) for conversation and a snack. While there we imagined an ambidextrous architect who could draw with his right hand and erase with his left; which left hand actually worked faster than the right hand so that when his designs were finally due for presentation there was nothing to show. I still chuckle; I wonder if the Berys remember.

Once more home again with peace and quite restored, life went on smoothly. Joyce Lily was born and Mother and Dad were delighted to have a grand-daughter to follow the two boys and to replace Sylvia; Dad was pleased that I was willing to include his mother's name when we named the new baby. The first six months were rugged. John and Cam had measles and mumps; Mattie kept the boys carefully upstairs while I took care of Joyce on the lower level. Then Joyce developed problems which neither Mattie nor I could understand and which Dr. Siefert said were not ordinarily the problem of a fourth born, and seldom that of a girl. She had pyloricstenosis: the lower valve of the stomach was too strong to permit the usual passage of food to the intestine. Dr. Siefert could not do the necessary surgery so we asked Dr. Wilson to recommend some one and he gave us the name and address of Dr. Charles Kennedy. Joyce came home from the hospital with the neatest inch-long suture and eight little stitches on each side. That was the beginning of a long and interesting association which had many mutual advantages. When Joyce was put under the care of a pediatrician, she and I went weekly by bus into Detroit to that man's office so that he could check her condition; that was a long and tiring ride for the baby and for her mother - we may have both slept some of that time. The association with Dr. Kennedy grew, the baby grew, and the suture did too.

One of the great benefits of having Mattie always with us was that I was given the freedom to go with C. Allen anytime that his business took him away and he wanted my company to ease the tedium of a long drive. Later if C. Allen and I were to be gone for several days, Mother often shared the baby-sitting duties with Mattie. Mother would be much disturbed by the broken glass, the spilt milk for each calamity meant lost money to her. (Did she remember the board fence, the spilt milk of her childhood?) I finally told her that the children were simply little reflections of her own tensions. She was much upset by my remark. The next time that I was gone, I came home to find greater quiet. She said that she had tried and found things easier - both for herself and for the children. Things in this adult world were not then made to fit small hands, small bodies. Some time later, I was standing at the top of a fourteen foot flight of stairs in a Woolworth store; at the bottom of that flight were two women with a three/ four year old, scolding and urging the child to hurry up. Each riser in that flight of stairs was more than half as high as the youngster's leg; it was three o'clock in the afternoon and nap time; no way could that child hurry. Really in this life we should wear another's shoes if ever we want to be able to know the reasons for the reactions of another person.

Another thing about having Mattie with us - we had to adjust our lives to her needs. Not having her own rooms somewhere in town as some of her friends did, she could not entertain. We found it easy for us to take off each Christmas Eve to deliver presents. This gave her the house in which to entertain her friends and the afternoon during which time she could make her preparations. One year, she worked on the kitchen floor until it shone like glass - proof of her good work would be when some one slipped and fell. Not that she wanted anybody hurt, but.... None of the neighbors ever complained about Mattie and her friends using the house; we had understanding neighbors. The children in the neighborhood knew and loved Mattie as we did. Their parents appreciated that relationship. I remember Mattie frying onion rings which were gobbled up by several hungry boys as soon as they were cool enough to handle. When Mattie became ill; I took her to Dr. Siefert who prescribed medication. I know that it embarrassed her to have me doing the few things that I could for her. Of such are the bonds made that tie people together.

Then came WWII. Mattie's brother was drafted. We pooled our ration coupons, bought extra shortening and sugar and baked a cake which we shaped to fit into the shortening can, frosted it liberally with caramel frosting and sent it off to Marshall. It arrived late, grown old and hairy with mold. Cookies would have been a better choice; but he liked white cake with caramel frosting. At least he knew that we were thinking of him. Then C. Allen came home and announced that he and Russ Scanell had volunteered for naval service. Neither man needed to do that; both were doing essential work which aided the war effort, both were married and fathers; both were almost forty. But when two men stand around talking to one another, there is no predicting the result. I do not know how Marie Scanell felt. I could not find the rational except that C. Allen said that he had to go for he was from the Volunteer State. What excuse did Russ have? They were Toledo people and part of that branch of HEC.

So then, as told before, Mattie went to Pontiac to live with her sister and work in the factory. Allen was sent to Princeton for three months of training and then to Bremerton where he was assigned to Survey and Salvage - the junk department. All that knowledge, all those skills, all that experience and the Navy had the wisdom to put him in Survey and Salvage. Oh well; things are little different now in government than they were then. You can rely upon the government to do the inept expensive thing. I could never voice such ideas as long as C. Allen was around to object. With him gone, I can write my opinions and hear no voice forbidding me. These days, I seem to live in a condition of continually raised eyebrows.

Then comes the time when I know precisely what happened but memory does not dove tail all of the conditions which were or which should have been part of the events at that time. Eleanor, Dad, Mother and I had watched Laurencelle marching off with other inductees in the Michigan Central Railway Station. He was sent off to Taunton, Massachusetts; Eleanor followed him there. It must have been after he was sent to the Far East and Eleanor had come home that she, Mother, John, Cam, Joyce and I took off to follow C. Allen to Bremerton. Where and in what state of health my Father was at that time is the matter that I cannot fit into this sequence of events. Maybe Eleanor will remember. At any rate, I must observe that history records that there have always been camp-followers. Eleanor and I were of that lengthening crowd. (And now, Eleanor is gone; sad loss of a giving woman.)

At any event, we three women with three children in an old Buick(purchased from the Dyra's, you could not buy a new car in those days) with gas rationed (I have no idea of how much money I was able to carry) started off across the country to Bremerton. One had either to be very optimistic, slightly insane, or young to undertake such a trip then. For the most part, the drive went smoothly. Routes were not what they are today; with the children, we could only do so many miles daily. Overnights along the road were of the somewhat kind; restaurants were of the greasy-spoon variety for this was before the days when Howard Johnsons gave you some standard of quality. Our first real problem came as we approached Rapid City, South Dakota, on a Saturday. There were two or more camps there and everyone on leave had gone in to town for fun and frolic; no room at the inns and no more inns in the town. That was rough; I was responsible for two women and three children. There was nothing to be done but go on ahead - and I had no idea of what 'on ahead' meant. I found out. It meant the Black Hills. This all happened just after school had closed about the middle of June; it was still too early for hunters to be looking for accommodations. It was wartime and probably there would not be many hunters (who made up most of the tourist trade of that area in those days). We finally found a lodge that had opened early; as their only customers, we were thankful. The next day's drive showed me just what was ahead of Rapid City - miles of forest.

Later the gas coupons began to be precious few. I tried in Billings, Montana to get more. No way! We drove on on vapor with baited breath. There was help in Helena and enough gas to take us on to Bremerton. But rugged driving was still ahead. Going up Coeur d'Alene in Idaho, there were no guard rails along that mountain road. Mother, sitting on the right side of the back seat, next to the mountain, could only see the expanse of space, and kept begging that we drive closer - closer to the mountain. We could drive no closer. Even the fact that trucks and buses moved around us on the left was no assurance that we were safe on solid ground. That was a worrisome beautiful part of the drive. So on then to Spokane and our nights lodging. Into a large town where no one was expecting us. Stopped at a center city hotel, watched the young couple before me being turned away, and my heart sunk. ('sank' may be the past tense; 'sunk' is what my heart did.) But there was room at this inn for one tired mother and her crew.

The next day we started on the long hard, difficult drive across Washington, past the Ginko Petrified Forest, through the rich and beautiful Yakima Valley and on to Seattle. Having got that far and just being across the Hood Canal from Bremerton, there was nothing to do but go on. What fools we mortals be! It was late in the afternoon when we got to Seattle and began to look for the docks and the ferry to take us to Bremerton. The drop down to water level was more than Mother could bear at the end of a long hard day; she burst into tears. That part of the world habitually puts its stop lights on long steep slopes pacing the down moving traffic. (In Bremerton things were quite the opposite, all red lights were halfway up a hill so that you had to start with a slipping clutch - another thing which I never learned.) But we made it; we found the proper dock; we boarded the proper ferry. It took an hour to cross the Hood; we had no idea of the width and complexity of that span of water. Nine o'clock before we finally found the little house on Fourth Street which C. Allen had rented and there he was, expecting us but not expecting us just then. With all of the lights on he was trying to wash the ceiling before we came - with LUX! No one had ever told him. Where we all slept that night, I do not know; I can answer for how we all slept that night - exhausssssssted.

Did ever an adventure start so frighteningly!