AMERICANS ARE MOBILE

Travel?

Of course, we did, singly and in family groups, by car, by train, by boat and in planes. We have been hither and yon, from place to place; three of us have gone three hundred and sixty degrees around the world. We have traveled for a single day, for extended vacations. We have traveled for the most part at our own expense; two of us have traveled at the request of Uncle Sam; C. Allen was sent to Nigeria by the M.S.U.

On that honeymoon trip to Tennessee, C. Allen and I had to borrow (This happened in the early thirties, deep depression for us all.) the suitcase which Mother and Dad had used on their honeymoon trip to Niagara Falls. That suitcase lasted a half century more to end up under the front stairs at 3535 storing sepia drawings done by Marvin Beerbohm. (Since then those sepia drawings, the basis for a number of paintings featuring the development of technology, done at the request of C. Allen, which were to be copied and published, serially, in the architects magazine with articles written by C. Allen. The sepia drawings were given to son, John, to give to Dr. Wayne Buell, then president of Lawrence Institute of Technology. The ultimate gift would be to the College. The originals hang in the entry of the Harlan Electric building.)

There was a time, when HEC was new, that I kept a bag packed for C. Allen because, leaving home in the morning, his unexpected schedule might take him off to some place on business. Soon to develop were the businesses out of state which routinely took him on his way to handle their problems and growth. We have bought, worn out and discarded or lent several sets of luggage or parts of sets. Suitcases have been damaged but none have ever been lost. On occasion one of us may have caused the damage; there was the time that C. Allen, leaving the Michigan Central Railway Station, set his bag down to open his car door, completely forgot the bag and drove over it. Not many bags can take such treatment and survive. That bag had been a birthday gift about which he was miffed for he decided that I wanted him to go away - to leave! Another time when coming home, he stopped at the office, set his bag down just inside of the door and went upstairs to check any notices. Some one had seen him leave that bag, opened the door, grabbed the bag, and gone! There was much sadness at home for that bag contained a new pair of shoes and a recent gift silk robe. There were times when he simply did not pack his clothes to come home. I was scolded for having misplaced or lost a pair of light-weight trousers which he had worn in Dallas. Truth was that he had never packed them; they arrived by mail. There was the time when the family was preparing to leave for Mackinac Island; an argument over which car to use stalled all progress. Finally everyone got into the car of Dad's choice and we drove off, leaving my bag behind. Imagine a woman on her way for the summer's vacation with only the clothes on her back. Shopping between home and the Island was very poor.

The best of days had begun for me when Mattie came to live with us for she freed me from the daily responsibility of always being with the children. I was able to go with C. Allen for a single day or on over night trips that took us to Ohio and beyond. Many days I waited in the car for the better part of the day; soon I learned to take with me some knitting or a book to read. Restrooms and lunch were where I found them; time schedules did not exist. As the trips stretched out to Pennsylvania, I knit as C. Allen drove. I navigated if we did not know the area. He and I had trouble over the maps for he insisted that every map, no matter how small the map nor how large the area, showed everything; all that I had to do to find where we were was to turn the map so that it and the roads coincided in direction. He could not understand that everything easily adjusted in my mind. Or, as Holme Sembach said: left is where the thumb is right. Most often C. Allen would put up with anything just to have company while he drove. You will notice that I say 'he drove'; the minute I took the wheel, so that he could sleep, weariness vanished. He then drove from the right seat.

We spent an Easter vacation with the Drummonds in Washington, D.C. and had a very informative time for Victor and Alice knew what they wanted the children to see, where whatever was and how to get there. Most of the details are forgotten except that I recall noon traffic in Baltimore being congested. Does every one in that city go home for lunch? Vic, driving ahead of our car, signaled that he needed gas - now. I was driving behind Vic, considered the traffic and nosed the Harlan car into the lane to the right. This gave Vic the time and space needed to move out of the lanes of traffic and get the gas which he needed. It must have been a gentleman driving behind me. Any traveling in tandem does have its problems. Once upon a time, I was, it seems, a fearless driver. I've even argued with truck drivers as to which car or truck had first entry into the Holland Tunnel. Now, I am a timorous old soul; I know too much or am I simply older?

Soon our trips began to extend to greater distances. West to Wisconsin and the Hercules Powder Plant, east and south to possible jobs below Washington D.C., to Delaware to look for possible work with Alcoa in Marysville where C. Allen visited an old schoolmate, to New Orleans many times because of the Hughes airplane plant which was to be constructed there. Detroit's Albert Kahn was the architect who was designing that plant; it was that firm which opened the door for C. Allen. We took John and Campbell with us whenever we could. They went with me to New Orleans for a week, enjoyed running the elevators in the swish Hotel Roosevelt, riding the tourist buggy, walking the town, and eating the fresh made doughnuts at Morning Call. That was 1937, a date clear in my mind, a time of race riots in Detroit, a time when the neighbors so kindly warned me to keep Mattie home. Why do I remember? Well that 'old colonel', driving the horse, asked the other party in the buggy where they came from - 'Indianapolis'. 'The boys and I?' 'Detroit.' 'Oh. we do not have race problems in New Orleans.' Then a couple of blocks further on he pointed out 'Quadroon Hall'. I wondered what he called a race problem; I wondered what his wife thought. Another time took us down to the Wilson Dam at Muscle Shoals. That time Mattie was with us; no one would serve her lunch when we stopped - federal land!

We went cruising on the North America, another time on the South America, along the Great Lakes, through the Soo Locks (Never dreaming that in time HEC would be helping to add one more lock. Matter of fact, we never dreamed that one day there would be an HEC.) On up to Isle Royal, a special spot in Lake Superior, up to Duluth were we turned around to start back down, a visit, not our first, at Mackinac Island, stopping off in Midland to buy a 35 cent haircut for the boys, to meet an Indian and to see a foreign land. Mattie was with us on the North America. C. Allen and I went for one more cruise on the lakes after WWII and found that it did not compare with the first two cruises for the people were different: people with war-time money to spend and without prewar culture. The same might have been said about C. Allen and me ten years earlier.

Our first trip to Mackinac Island was at the invitation of David Murray whose family lived on the Island. Judge Murray owned their home. Only the people who had been part of the population when the island became a state park could buy property or own a home and only owners were permitted to sell their property to outsiders. C. Allen bid on one house; fortunately his was not the high bid. We had John and Campbell with us that first trip. I often wonder about Mrs. Murray; gracious and kindly, she must often have been the victim of people who did not understand the problems of entertaining in such a detached community. I am certain that we were of that crowd. Off to the Grand Hotel one evening, we returned to find the Judge walking one of the boys who had woke to a dark room, in a strange house, and could not find his mother. David was amused for he said that his Father never walked any of his own children. Many of the children of that family attended the island school until the limited number of classes forced them to visit relatives so that they could finish high school. Winter transportation, I have been told, was often by horse and cutter for at times the Channel froze completely. We returned many times to the Island after C. Allen began to work closely with Detroit's architects. It is a special spot where life slows down until - to quote Henry Murray: "We've been all morning deciding not to golf." Flies were the most active part of the population; horses were second; then the populace followed slowly.

Walmet once planned its yearly board meeting on the island; the Almdales, Wiedmens, Laxes and the Harlans stayed at the Grand Hotel. After dinner, one evening, we rode (horse and buggy style) to visit Soapy and Nancy Williams at the Governor's Mansion (? It was actually the largest house on the Island, taken over by the State to be used as the summer residence of the governor; there was nothing special about it.). Then continuing by carriage, the eight of us went from one hotel bar to the next. I definitely saw more of Island night life that time than ever before or since. My special drink for the evening was Irish coffee - the Irish was an acceptable drink for the rest of the crowd; the coffee kept me upright.

WWII took us west to new vistas; all of us because I no longer had Mattie on whom to rely. She was in Pontiac working in one of the factories; one of her brothers had been drafted and she had a great compulsion to make her own contribution. We really were exploring new vistas; the entire area was different from the rolling green hills of home. Second Lieutenant C. Allen Harlan found time and gas coupons to take us for a July weekend to Mount Rainier - that dish of strawberry ice cream on a forest-green plate which I could see from my Silverdale kitchen window occasionally. What a wonderful weekend! We, northerners (Actually Michigan and Washington are not too different in so far as latitude is concerned; western Washington is warmed by the Japanese current.) hungry for real snow, enjoyed thoroughly the touch, the cool, the snap in the air. Small Joyce, wearing summer clothes, went to the edge of the glacier to sit there playing in that ages old snow.

Later that summer we drove to Victoria and Vancouver; that was a trip to remember. Never having been one to consider reservations or time schedules, C. Allen put us in the car and we simply left Silverdale (There had always been a secretary to take care of such details.) "We" - this time there was Jim. Sophisticated car furnishing for babies had not been invented; I created a bed of an old sheet, a shake shingle, and (newest of the new) fiber glass ribbon. That put two boys in the back seat, the little bed swung above their knees and Joyce sat up front with C. Allen and me. The Olympic Mountains were fascinating for they are almost jungles: huge trees, downward rushing streams, mosses and ferns. We arrived in Port Angelus in time to see the last ferry of the day leaving port. There was nothing to do but look for over-night accommodations. Every place we asked was full. So we drove back into the mountains. Surely C. Allen must have had some inkling of how I had felt as we women left Rapid City, South Dakota: no room at the inn; no other inns in sight; and beside that we were in Rapid City on the wrong night of the week. At the last stop, the owner said that she was completely booked; our hearts sank. An old duffer sitting on her porch offered us the use of his cabin; he was going to Seattle that evening. Marvelous. We would accept his hospitality. We went to look at his cabin. I wonder if John and Campbell remember; they thought it quite a lark, like camping. It was a cabin, no glass in the windows, rabbit fencing for screens to keep out the mosquitoes, orange crate cupboards nailed to the wall, planks ripped from the floor, a junior-sized range, two rooms, two beds - one full sized and a chesterfield which opened into a twin size sleeping area. So? It was what we had. I opened the bed to find that the sheets had not been changed since the old duffer was born. Mercifully the woman, who ran the camp, brought clean bedding. We slept well that night - C. Allen and the big boys in the bed, Joyce, Jim and I in the chesterfield. What is a chesterfield? That is just another name for davenport; this one happened to open. (Probably its parent was the Murphey bed. What is a Murphey bed? Come on now! You've seen enough old movies to know.) Then chesterfields were common, long ago; anyone who owned a davenport owned a chesterfield.

Believe me! We made the ferry the next day.

Vancouver Island was a delight. Most of you have seen Canada's Stratford or Michigan's Frankenmuth. That describes Victoria as we saw it - flowered, neat, clean, tidy, well maintained. We found a room in a private home. We were two nights there; one slept a baby in a dresser drawer; there were no cribs supplied. The owner of the house remarked as we were leaving that they had not known that we had a baby with us; they had not heard a thing. Of course not; not my children. We saw the gardens, saw the beaches, saw the matrons, shoes off and skirts up wading in the waters of the Sound. We enjoyed. Then on across another channel to the city of Vancouver. C. Allen was intent upon doing shopping for things which were in short supply in Silverdale. There were forbidden items at the U.S. port of re-entry. It was none of my concern and I do not remember what was purchased. As we were going about the city I saw 'HBC' - a huge sign on the side of a store. What did it mean? Finally the dawn came - Hudson Bay Company! It was one of the great businesses of the new world and one of the oldest businesses in the new world for it had been based on the fur trade of the 16/17 hundreds. I, northerner, had learned my history lessons; C. Allen, southerner, did not remem-ber ever having heard of it. Memories are tucked away for use when called upon.

There were meetings of the National Electrical Contractors Association in Miami, in Baltimore, from Baltimore to Bermuda, and one with a side trip to Cuba - now you know how long ago those trips were. There had never been any problems until we were returning from that trip to Bermuda; the ship was caught between two severe storms. Everyone with good sense went below; C. Allen, I and the sailors were the only people walking the decks. It was better to be out in the open rather than closed into a cabin. One listed to the right, one listed to the left in order to stay upright. After an extremely violent lurch had sent C. Allen crashing against the rail we went below; he almost went bottom walking. That night there were broken bones, seasick travelers, people who had to be strapped into their bunks; the doctor was on call all night long. I slept for I knew that I was still needed by the children; we'd get home. We did. That wasn't the end of going to organizational meetings. C. Allen had become a power in that organization, not because he attended every meeting (he didn't) but because the dues which HEC paid were the largest.

Back to Birmingham after WWII with Mattie still working in the factory. My gadding was limited to going around in small circles; C. Allen's trips extended as his business grew and, as he became involved in more non-profit activities, word was passed that he was an interesting speaker. Trips were made simply so that he could be the featured speaker. He began to develop and use terms and phrases which he found to be entertaining. In Kansas City a woman came to tell him after listening to him one evening: "Mr. Harlan, I hate you." He often told groups that he had five sons and each of those sons had two sisters. That poor woman's simple arithmetic had reached a total of fifteen. Those seven children prompted the response to the often asked question concerning our religion: not Catholic, simply prolific. On the way to Battle Creek to speak to a group about the UN, he had nothing prepared and spent the trip wondering what he should say. I tried to create a geneses for him: "ignorance begets suspicion; suspicion begets fear; fear begets hatred; hatred begets war...." But there was not the time necessary to set that idea into his mind.

I have driven across the continent several times. I know for a certainty that there were western roads so narrow that they should have been 'in' on Monday, 'out' on Tuesday. Most always the weather west is fit for driving; or maybe it is so only because I drive the desert west in the summer. There have been exceptions such as the time that I drove in a dust storm; the sand was fine enough to strip paint off a car. I am fortunate for I tow a small cloud above me all of the time. Henry Lak called a glum day in Tuscan - Ivabell weather. It is most comforting to have that bit of water overhead; it has rained on me in the Bad Lands, it has splattered my windshield between Neddles and Barstow. I have been fogged into oblivion along 75 on the way to Atlanta; and I have definitely driven on nothing, into nothing following a tail light around the west end of Lake Erie. Beth and I came home from Ann Arbor one night with Beth reporting the white line at her side of the car and me with my eyes glued to what I could see of the center line. Joyce and date arrived home very late; his Mother scolded; C. Allen scolded because I did not have a time-limit set on her activities. Those teen-agers had driven slowly because of dense fog; I was pleased that they had had the good sense to do so. (What ever has happened to understanding and trust? Did they go out of style with the invention of hyperbole?) Another stormy night Jim and I were on the way home from Ann Arbor, the Mercury was old and very damp and stalled. Finally, after we had sat awhile, after the engine had dried itself off, the car was ready to start and we got home late to find Helmut Krippendorf waiting with C. Allen for Jim and me to get home. Had it been C. Allen, alone; he would have been in bed asleep; Jim and I could still be sitting by the roadside. Then there have been the days when those rains turned to snow, to sleet and froze. Thelma James followed me home from Lansing to a meeting at Cranbrook House; she did not know the way from high-way to Cranbrook and chose to travel in tandem. We arrived to find a note 'canceled' on the door; understandable for the weather had turned foul; we had passed workmen removing fallen branches, even trees, from the roads. Why I did not put Thelma up at 3535 that evening I do not know. We were out of power for a week. I have driven endlessly with and for the family; just like a hub cap I have gone around in small circles endlessly.

There were countless times that we drove across the continent after that first trip to Bremerton. The second time with the car full of children; for some reason John was not with us; C. Allen may have gone by train or plane and we were on our way to reach him. Campbell, young, took over the driving for he could not 'just simply sit there' for such a distance; he became concerned about the height of the roads near Denver but he conquered fear when reason told him that we were only 'hub cap to tire bottom' above the road. On to Salt Lake City and beyond while young Joe slept; when he awoke, a look at his surroundings brought the delighted expression 'snow'! "No, only salt and sand." There was no air-conditioning then. When the front vents were opened and the back windows rolled down a half inch, a cooling breeze was created which sufficed. There are always ways of overcoming minor problems. Some people were certain that the porous water-filled bags which were hung on the radiator did help to cool the car; we never tried them. We drove on to the heights until the road took us to the edges of patches of snow, then everyone was out of the car for a snowball fight.

Another time when C. Allen had been sent by Soapy Williams to represent the State at the tenth anniversary of the U.N., Joyce and Maryann Kreuger, cousin, settled into the back seat for the long ride. C. Allen drove and I would spell him. We crossed the Mississippi from Illinois into Iowa. It was just after lunch and I, as usual, was given the car to drive. C. Allen sprawled out in the right hand seat to nap; I picked up my bits and pieces, shoved them under the seat so that he would have room to nap. As we made the driver change, the left door was not closed tightly. I finally asked Maryann to hold the folding table (between seat and left door) while I shut the door; done. Miles further on I began to feel under the seat for my purse and could not find it. C. Allen had me stop the car and then search; still no purse. Joyce was all for driving back to the last town to notify the police; Father insisted on going on, the purse was lost so that was that. I must have driven about 50 miles further west when the driver of a car hailed us; "had we lost anything?" I started to back up parallel to the other car. C. Allen insisted that I stop and he would walk back. "Have you lost something?" "Yes, my wife's purse." "Can you identify it?" "Of course." So we followed that car beck to the last town through which we had driven, identified the purse, thanked the Marshall for having stopped us, were thankful to have it back again for there was three hundred dollars in it, and started west again. In that moment when the car door had been opened and shut, past the obstacle created by the little folding table, the purse had fallen out. It had been picked up by a woman who insisted on leaving it at the 'next town', she, easterner, not knowing how far apart western towns were in those days. There were many roads leading west from that river town, there was nothing in my purse to tell the Marshall which way we were going, what road we had taken. How did that Marshall happen to be on the right road, happen to stop the right car? Happenstance. How could we do without it! That woman was mother of 4 children; they were on their way a new home in the fringes of Seattle; she could have used the money in that purse; she was certain that the woman, who had lost it, needed that money for 'it was probably that family's vacation money'. I sent them subscriptions to the National Geographic for many years after that; the Geographic became my thank-you for the kindness of strangers where ever, when ever I need a thank-you.

(When I lose something, it is a thing of importance. Another time, leaving under C. Allen's pressure: "Hurry, hurry!", I left the movie camera behind; it came home by mail. I have left John Paul Miller's gold frog behind; it followed me home. There are [were?] honest people in the world.)

Then the next happenstance of that ride which created a chuckle was Maryann's seeing water ahead on the road. 'It is only a mirage, Maryann, I've been through here before and seen just what you are seeing. You have seen on Michigan highways in the summer time the appearance of water on the road and the reflections of the head lights. Those telephone poles are just like the reflections of the head lights.' After a few more miles, the reflection of telephone poles turned into reality. Low dikes had been built about sections of land which were then flooded with water so that the chemicals would leach out of the useless soil and could be harvested.

We arrived in San Francisco and were assigned rooms at the St. Francis on the same floor as Eisenhower. C. Allen, of course, had been checked by the FBI many times during the war years. The girls were delighted to find the corridors filled with Secret Service men. I wonder if those men were as filled with delight at the sight of two giggly teen-agers. Then to cap that trip, we were having breakfast in the Grill Room when C. Allen said: "There is General Romulo." The General recognized C. Allen. They had sat together at a speakers table during some evening dinner. The General must have had many banquets to attend, many compulsory speeches to give, many casual conversations to exchange with table mates. It was amazing that he should have recalled and been able to name C. Allen.

The last trip was the one taking Joyce to Garden Grove where she was to teach - her first year out of college. I was taking her belongings, some of the belongings of the girls with whom she was sharing an apartment, 3 weeks luggage for 4 people and 5 people in 2 cars. My little Pontiac was weighted down; the car which Joyce drove was a Corvair (small and wonderful). Other than Joyce and I, there was Mattie, Jeanne and Lois Sloan; for Mattie it was my way of thanking her for her gift of loving years. On the way out, that little cloud of mine falling in rain made us late for our reservations at the motel in Gallop. I stopped to phone the motel that we would be a bit late. One stops at any crossroads where there might be a phone. First query - they had no phone; across the road to a garage and there was a phone. I was welcome to use it. When I came out of the garage I found the women sitting in the two cars, windows rolled almost closed, in spite of the humid heat, while a drunken Indian tried to talk with them. He was offering them the hospitality of the reservation and establishing his reputation as a veteran of WWII. Actually he meant no harm; but how were they to know? Mattie's darker coloring often made her the focus of attention. We finally got to Gallop with no further unusual events and on to California; we did our share of sight-seeing. Then into the car, unburdened except for the souvenirs which we had bought in Mexico, we started home - Lois, Mattie, Jeanne, and I. High on a mountain pass, on a narrow road, the Pontiac developed a flat tire. We all piled out to see what needed doing. Cars passed us; no one offered help. But praises be! Pete Estes had had a decal with instructions for changing a tire put on the inside of the trunk lid; I needed that. Pete Estes? At that time he was the president of Pontiac Motors - why do you suppose I was driving one? HEC had done a job for them; we had paid the full price. One bit of information which had not been included with Mr. Estes' instructions was how to put the lugs back on; I put them on backwards. When I finally got to the bottom of the mountain, the garage attendant, who sold me a new tire, insisted that my car was overloaded. "Yes sir!" it had been. (One of the features which had changed the Pontiacs that year was greater width between the wheels; C. Allen took credit for naming the new road, about the center of Pontiac, Wide Track. He also made certain that special honor was paid to Mr. Estes by the Iron and Steel Engineers.)

It was nice to know Mr. Estes. Another time driving west I was so troubled by the sun's glare reflected from the chrome used on the windshield wipers that I stopped at a hardware, bought electricians friction tape, and wrapped all of the metal parts of the wipers. Finally home, I told C. Allen what my problem had been and the solution. Pete Estes saw my car and asked C. Allen: "What does Miss Ivabell have on her windshield wipers?" C. Allen explained. Since then all windshield wipers are finished in matte black. To be sure, by that time Mr. Estes was president of G.M. You have to know the right people if you want to get things done. I pulled that rank years later when I wanted a G.M. man on the board of the Children's Aid Society. It took a second letter, signed 'Miss Ivabell' to get the recommendation for which I was asking. He sent me Robert Gregory who was in charge of the restoration which G.M. was doing to property in the vicinity of their headquarters. Then I picked up information to help me with my understanding of the requirements for the restoration of the Frank Lloyd Wright Affleck House which belongs to Lawrence Institute. (There is a tale that Iacocca, in Europe, received a phone call from the Ford Company about complaints concerning the claus-trophobic back seat of early Marks; Iacocca gave directions. The little portholes became a feature of future Marks. You just have to know the right people.)

Meanwhile the world came to me - exchange students. Joyce became acquainted with Holme Sembach who lived with the Cooper family and spent most of his time with the Harlan family - Joyce. C. Allen entertained some exchange students at the Economic Club for luncheon, invited them home, took them out to one of our small ski hills, where, with rented equipment, they enjoyed an afternoon of skiing. Truls Gjestland still keeps track of us; we of him for his address is a part of my mailing list. Joe asked if he could have an exchange student; Thomas Ziehe from Germany came to stay a year. Tom was interesting for the things which he did not know about America. Riding home from East Lansing after we had left Jim at school, seeing no signs of civilization because of the excellent landscaping (No one told him that it was all man-planted.) He asked if we would see any Indians. He seriously told C. Allen that he would like to go to California; maps give a distorted view of the world. C. Allen replied: "Fine Tom. it is too far away. He gained some idea of the size of America as he drove to Watchung, New Jersey with Jim, Joe, and me; we were pulling a trailer to take Joyce's wedding gifts to her. From Bloomfield Hills to New York was the same distance as from one side of Germany to the other; his mental maps changed scale. When, finally, Jeanne was the only child left at home, Monti, Finnish, came, spent a year with us. Leda, a Costa Rican exchange student, was living at Kingswood. One spring vacation, I took the three girls to New York; that made an interesting trip for there is much to do and more to see. Coming home we crossed Canada, stopping at Niagara Falls, to have our dinner in the tower with its rotating restaurant - there still were not too many of them then. (Years later, flying home from Europe, I recall the excitement among the passengers when the pilot pointed out the Falls. Every one crushed to the windows; every one wanted to see this wonder; from our height of over 30,000 feet the Falls appeared to be an inch high; everything depends upon your point of view.) Customs at Detroit were willing to let blonde Monti back into this country; but brunette Leda was another matter. None of the men could read Spanish and it was a time when many Italians were crossing that border and coming into the States illegally. Leda might be one of those migrants slipping over the U.S.-Canadian border. Shades of our prohibition past; that border works like a sieve! The men finally agreed to let her pass; then, as an after-thought, one of them asked: "Where were you born?" I answered: "Detroit." I said that name with the accent on the correct syllable. Would they have thought me foreign if I had sounded like a Kentuckian? We got home. With Central America in such a turmoil, I often wonder where Leda is. So you see, while we had to stay home because of school, the world was coming to us.

Over the years, Mattie returned to us and left again as the unions forced strikes. Between times I found extra help. There were time when I could have sworn that those women stayed awake nights trying to figure out way to be stupid the next day and frustrate me. There was Mrs. Tighe, mother of a large family; and therefore experienced. My children complained about her cooking. I'll wager that her children, grown and married, tell their wives that they (the wives) 'can't cook as mother did'. Of course the problem was mine for Mattie and I had learned to think alike and do alike. I did not know how to instruct; I assumed knowledge that was not there. At last, Mattie decided that the money which I could give her and the money which she earned in the factory were about equal; she would come home to the children who had become hers over the years - loving care will do that every time. That had opened many possibilities for me. Her presence, as we drove to California for Joyce's teaching year, was a delight, a reward to Mattie for her years of dedication and one means for me to repay her for loving care. Because of her the trips with our borrowed students were possible, it was possible to visit new young Allen in New York, it was possible to help Campbell and Sida move from Long Island to Lake Orion, we could go to Joyce in New Jersey when Gregory was born. There was so much that could be done; so much that could be enjoyed. What love can accomplish is marvelous and amazing.

"the money which I could give her" speaks of the variance which existed in the family funding. First I was not 'economically feasible', I spent money and never brought any in; my work hours had no value. C. Allen maintained a myopia of his own choice. The prices that had to do with the family never changed from the early years on; children never grew physically not did they develop any new interest, needs, and desires. C. Allen knew the cost of every bit of installation, every contract, every wage increase demanded by his workers clear back to Adam. Over the years Ozzie Knopf had taken to sending the weekly check directly to me since he knew that otherwise I might never see it. Some one might collar C. Allen with a sad story and the need of a 'loan'; the check would be handed over. When I asked 'where' or 'why' there was no response; silence was often used to explain many things. C. Allen figured that what C. Allen did with his check needed no explanation. Eventually Oz even blinked at my signing C. Allen's name; he understood the man. Eventually, after the war years, Campbell went to bat for me and a raise was forthcoming; it was a joke at the office that Ivabell had not had a raise even though everyone else had. I was accustomed to darning the darns and mending the mends; I pinched my pennies until the buffalo on my nickel bellowed. That was why Mattie 'accepted the money which I could give her'. Her salary, like mine, was our bread, butter and love; true our bread was well buttered.

Then time brought a weekend of pneumonia for me; John asked when Mother was going to Florida to recuperate. No answer. When I had a bout with diverticulitis, Beth, a couple of days after my private implosion and since I was not back on my feet, was told to drop me off at Grace Hospital and then to proceed to the DAC and act as C. Allen's hostess at dinner when he would give Dr. Jones' Lincoln collection, which C. Allen had bought, to the Detroit Public Library. The dinner party went on; the gift was given; and due notices were in the papers. I was in the hospital for ten days; I saw more of Dr. Kennedy than I did of C. Allen - after all he, C. Allen was a busy man. Dr. Kennedy was not the physician taking care of me. There, again, Mattie's presence was most wonderful for it did give me the time to go to Florida for the rest which I needed.

Sandra Bob, Lois Sloan, and Joyce went with me to Siesta where reservations had been made. We flew down during a storm, circled St. Pete's airport in pouring rain and went on down to Miami where we did not want to be. If I'd had any sense at all (knowing what I know today), we would have dropped out and taken a long safe walk. Finally we were taken back to St. Petersburg where we picked up the car for which Joyce had asked and turned south towards Siesta Key. We crossed the Sunshine Bridge to Sarasota; the wind blew the rain across - not into - the windshield. I have flown and driven in some peculiar weather; that was the worst. It was 1 a.m. when we finally landed in St. Pete. We found Siesta Key, could not find the motel, pulled up by a garage and went to sleep. The girls in the back seat woke with their feet in puddles of water; canvas roofs leak. Found the hotel in the morning and had a delightful week on the Key. Then we drove to Fort Lauderdale to meet C. Allen and Hugh Sloan. Joyce was given a chance to drive; she had her learners permit. Everything went fine until a bird flew in front of the car. Both hands went up in front of Joyce's face. Lois's reaction and mine: Hands on the wheel! We got to Fort Lauderdale; had another week of rest before going home to work. It is always a problem to pick up the threads again.

A most peculiar thing happened in the hotel in Fort Lauderdale. C. Allen was standing by the hotel desk; he looked up to see a little woman approaching and reacted: 'Oh, no not her!'. 'No' I said 'that is not the woman of whom you are thinking.' I never asked him of whom he was thinking; I just knew. She turned and moved off in another direction. Then the doors of memory clanged shut; I could not think of her name. Lois and I were sitting in the lobby another afternoon, the couple came in, stopped for a moment behind a column, decided that I was 'Mrs. Harlan' and came to speak to me. I made left-handed introductions (I introduced Lois to them but not them to Lois; I couldn't; I could not name them.) I rode with them in the elevator. It so easy to make conversation that says nothing and reveals nothing. Somehow C. Allen never met them. It was a common thing for him to meet people who had heard him speak, whom he had met once and forgotten; they could remember him for he had been the speaker. This time there were no clues - none at all. In late July, we were crossing the straits to attend the architects convention on Mackinac. I said 'they're architects'. "Who?" The couple in the lobby in Fort Lauderdale; they were and the four of us had many chuckles about that incident for C. Allen had to tell.

Following the exchange students, we went to Europe in 1958. That time without Mattie to take care of things, the Drummonds house- and child - sat. In exchange, we took Phillenore and David as companions for Joyce and Jim. Into Jim's hands we put a camera; a twelve year old is not necessarily interested in traveling. David carried the Drummond light meter, swinging it at the end of its cord; of course you know what happened. We sailed on the America, a big ship by all standards then, which put into Bremerhaven. Holme Sembach was there to greet us with a new VW bus. He and Joyce left for Berlin to meet his family. The rest of us took off in that new VW bus to see Europe....Koln, up the cathedral tower, along the Rhine to Bonn for a look at the new capital, on to Koblenze. By this time the boys were growing hungry for Ameri- can food; we stopped for lunch in Koblenze. The restaurant was two steps down from street level; C. Allen was slow to accept it as proper for us. The menu read (in German, of course) 'ground beef'; I told Dave; he asked "How's it cooked?" The menu didn't say. So we ordered and Dave ate my lunch. It arrived - two pounds of freshly ground beef, neatly placed upon the plate with sliced tomatoes, slices of onion, pickles, and two depressions in which nestled two raw eggs. Dave said: "Its alive! Shoot it." We survived, (I had eaten 'steak tartar' before in an Arabian cafe in Detroit; C. Allen and I were the guests of Soapy and Nancy Williams. The company was good; the steak tartar was good.)

Phillenore was growing hungry for sweets; she saw in the bakerywindows luscious looking deserts loaded with whipped cream. "Phil, just go in, point out what you want and hold out your money; the clerk will take the money due and give you whatever you order." "Now, Phil, where do you suppose all that lovely cream came from?" Alice Drummond had warned her not to eat any milk products on the continent. Between the end of WWII and 1958, Germany, with the help of the Americans, had cleaned up many of the old problems and I was not afraid of the dairy products. Being an American in Frankfort had not meant that one could get an American hot dog. Food can be a problem for the very young.

We hunted up the Webers in Heidelberg; they had been, for a summer, host family to Suzy Campbell. We could tuck the Weber family (Mr. and Mrs. and two daughters) into the VW with us; they showed us their countryside. We visited a castle, complete with auditorium where young Mozart had performed. We walked the grounds and made inter-lingual jokes. It had been raining and there was 'much much'. Of course C. Allen did the driving and roused the interest of the Weber daughters: did we not have directionals on our cars? Yes; except that at home they functioned automatically. Father kept forgetting to turn them off; there are always problems with the foreign makes.

On to Baden-Baden, a stop in Zurich, then on to the Jungfrau, on to the glacier. Again David complained; this time about the depth of the snow as he sank to his knees in the fluffy stuff. The Jungfrau, like so many other things, was a tourist attraction, not just to Americans but to every one who could come.

At last, when Holme and Joyce rejoined us, Holme took over the driving. The right of way - the car on the right - still worked in those cities of plazas, round-abouts and maxi-intersections. We enjoyed the German side of Switzerland; it was clean and orderly. Except for the miles of vineyards, the French part was not so well ordered; but Lac Leman, Lausanne and Castle of Chillon were fascinating. Here for the first time we came across the term 'not potable'. Into Italy to Lake Como where we stayed at an old Este palace - wonderful. We had been staying in palaces or their equivalent all along the way for American Express had made the arrangements for out trip; Some one had told C. Allen that that was the way to go. Some one was right. (I with no cash to carry had made arrangements for an American Express credit card; that was my second and I still use it.) C. Allen enjoyed the gardens at the Villa D'Este; that was where he got the idea of planting wisteria (here it was bittersweet) at the base of many of his pine trees; plantings that at home in later years caused me trouble for the vines were slowly choking the host plants. That was where C. Allen was embarrassed when he had to pass through the parlors in order to reach the swimming boat. ('Swimming boat' was a boat docked just off the breakwater from which people swam; there was no beach at Lake Como - only deep water.) I pointed to a gentleman sitting on the turn of the stairwell; he was sitting there in his underwear, very cold, all marble.

Italy is a long country - both sides. I have checked the atlas for the names of all of our stops. To me it is like counting beads; every bead is now a memory. From Venice to Ferrara, down to Ravenna, a swim in the Adriatic and the water was warm; I have no idea of why we should have expected the water to be cool. On to the spine of Italy to Perugia where I bought a length of dark coral for a new grandchild, Diana. Then down to Salerno where we found that 'soft underbelly of Europe' to be a place of narrow roads and rocky hillsides. Why Chruchill chose to call that place 'the soft underbelly of Europe' I do not understand. I could only see the desperate effort those guarded steep hills required of the WWII American soldier as he tried to wrest them from the enemy. The weeks stop in Porto Fino was simply time to recoup our energy; from there the young ones went on to Capri. We woke early to the sound of wooden-soled shoes clattering down the steep hillside steps.

Sorrento, Capri, and Naples - Naples with its wash hanging over the faces of the buildings. We had to stop for directions in Naples; which way should we go; we tied up traffic as we asked questions. Holme spoke German; I a bit of French; the Italians spoke Italian; and 8 or 10 streets intersected at that plaza. In 1958 Europeans were still glad to see Americans. Naples had the only automobile junk yard that we saw in Europe with everything taken apart and everything orderly arranged - the most orderly place in all of Italy. Naples! Its museum was filled with pieces from the ruins of Pompeii. The stop in Pompeii gave the young ones an opportunity not offered to C. Allen and me. That five of us took off for a second look before we were to leave. A guide, fascinated by the group, took them to places not ordinarily opened to the public, talked, explained, and was greatly pleased at having an attentive and appreciative audience. After Pompeii we stayed a week in Rome. We were typical tourists and there was a great deal to see. Remember? Only some of it.

Then we resumed our drive up the west side of Italy to Liverno ('Leghorne' on old American maps) which is near Pisa and Frienze (Florence to us). The weather was becoming increasingly hot. We parked our VW in front of our hotel; I told the busboys to leave the cameras and film, to take everything else up to our rooms. Later that afternoon we found the remains of our ball, expanded and exploded by the midday heat. Imagine what would have happened to the cameras and film had they been left in the bus. Mrs.Sembach (she had joined us earlier) and I hung over a malachite table in the Petti Palace trying to figure out how to get it out of the palace and home; trouble was that we both liked it. Now I shudder to think of the damage done when the Arno overflowed. Italy has fault lines and there are continuing troubles there - troubles geographic and political.

We next drove to Genoa to find the railway station; Mrs. Sembach wanted to go home to Berlin by way of Venice. Problems. We found the station - one only has to follow the railroad tracks. We found the schedule; but there were no trains towards Venice. We were standing together being unhappy in German and American when a gentleman spoke to me in French: 'there is another station in town; all you have to do is tell your taxi-driver.' 'We have our own bus.' Then he would come with us, show us the way; he did. C. Allen wanted to tip him; I tried to stop C. Allen's gesture; the gentleman would not accept. I hoped that the Europeans still liked Americans.

Continuing, we drove from Italy into France, passed Monaco by way of the high road and went on to Nice to stay at the Nigress in Nice. That was another place where one had to pass through the lobby in order to swim, mercifully the French had provided full-length terry robes. We found the beach at Nice was all stones - no sand. Up through the center of France, sight-seeing as we went. The advantage of driving your own bus was that you could stop where ever you found something interesting and stay as long as you liked. We stopped in Lyons, silk capital of France, to buy silk material. Any silk material, scarves, etc. I bought came from Harrods in London; I guess it was good export material. The weather was miserable while we were there; the boys kept occupied by building houses of cards. It was the condition of the floors which knocked those houses down. Jim came striding down the corridor once to say to me: "Look Ma; starched carpets." Really were; every step Jim took shook the world.

We went on to Paris by way of the castles along the Loire. Was it pictures of those estates that gave C. Allen his ideas for the drive at home - a long drive edged with huge trees? In America our drive could never be so long, our trees so large. We could have - and did - a smaller version. Our gardens were never so clean as the gardens there. We stopped in Caen to visit with Mathilde and her long ago history of William's wars in England. xEven Paris showed its best for us. Our hotel was interesting; it fronted on a small park with an elegant fountain in the center, that fountained once a week. We walked the streets to window shop; I had no intentions of doing any shopping for me. It is always a problem to shop in a strange city, especially for one who was never a shopper at home.

We drove over to Omaha Beach through the fields of Normandy, fields that once had normal trees along the property lines. Now those trees were struggling to survive for the concentrated war-time artillery action had shot off most of the branches. My mind goes back to Salerno, to that 'soft under-belly of Europe.'

Joyce was intent on seeing Mount St. Michele. So, of course, we went there. The VW was left on the mainland while we were taken over the causeway. I watched with amazement as two porters carried our seven heavy bags up several flights of stairs. As we sat waiting for our dinner, the sound of castanets surprised us. The persistent beat was made by the rhythmic striking of the whisks against the sides of copper bowls as the eggs for our omelets were beaten to a froth. We had a touch of English weather on the island; the dampness invaded the buildings from top to bottom. It was interesting to see once; it was too crowded with tourists.

It was World's Fair time in Brussels; we wanted the young people to see the best that the world could show. World's Fairs for years had been occasional affairs. Recently, if the economy of your country had been going poorly, your government finds that an excuse for holding a fair. hoping that the proceeds and the show-and-tell time will give local business a boost. C. Allen and I had visited the Fairs in Chicago (1933) and New York (much later) but this one in Belgium was especially interesting, truly a world's fair. It had displays, imaginatively and well presented by most of the world's nations. Toshiko Takaezu had a pot in the American display; it is pleasant to recognize the work of an old friend. We saw little of Brussels; we spent all of our time at the Fair grounds. C. Allen, walking in Brussels, was hailed by a friend from Detroit. That occasioned remarks about the size of the world: here we were in the midst of the world's displays that had brought the world to see.

I must really stop with this world's fair to speak of the otherswhich we were able to visit. They all began for us with the one in Chicago in 1933. We took John with us for we went in August; I had the doctor's permission. We drove overnight to Chicago, found housing in an apartment, and settled down to the walking business of seeing a fair. One thing which you do at fairs is walk; arrangements are made for transportation to, in and around the fair. Once inside the gate, if you want to see, you walk; if you want to see everything, you walk further and faster. If you are part of a small group, it is easy to plan your day's activities; if you are part of a large group, you go where the group goes, do what the group does, on and on. The Chicago fair was for me a chance to see the world through C. Allen's eyes for we visited all of the business displays; he was, of necessity, business oriented. My family had never been. Everything which G.M., Ford, G.E. had to show was interesting, pointed in the direction of the future. We saw the fair in New York, in Seattle with the Boy Scouts, and in Montreal with the Economics Club. Each fair had its high point and everybody made a point of visiting that display. Each nation has something which is distinctive and each nation presents that capability as well as possible. In Montreal,the American display was set in a geodesic dome, centered by an escalator which stretched up 3 floors. Today there are geodesic structures, or the elements of them, used in many ways. Since the long escalator proved its value and strength, Lou Redstone has used one of similar length in Detroit's International Airport. With the Boy Scouts in Seattle it was imperative to have dinner at the top of the Space Needle; to get to the top, you rode in an outside elevator (less fancy ones than it had been used on con-struction jobs for years). Helen Kilmer went up with us in spite of her fear of heights; we carefully made certain that she stood facing the back of that elevator. It was natural when we were in Europe to see the Brussel's Fair, and, when we were in Japan with the Drummonds, to make certain that we could visit all that was displayed there. Just going to the fairs took us about. (One thing about recent fairs, mostly here in America, have happened in too close a sequence, have not had as wide a participation as have former 'world' fairs because many nations could not afford the cost, and have been largely regionally motivated by slow financial growth. They have resulted in improved roads, increased hotel and restaurant facilities, employed many people, in general resulted in some improvements at the cost of increased debt. The problem remains the debt; the question - are the benefits worth the debt overload? Some one must have the answer.

England was definitely different from anything on the Continent; was it simply that we knew the language? The only definite dates for which arrangements had been made were in London. We stopped at small inns, ate in small restaurants with the natives (may I use that word?). We had no trouble with the wrong side of the road driving, since Holme was doing the driving. (The Swedes made the same mistake as the British who continue to drive on the wrong side of the road. Sweden has been thinking of changing.) The chief goal in England was to see the Harlan relatives who live midway up - near Wales. After giving London (we stayed in one of the Grovernor Houses) - a hurried once-over, we headed north following the ripening strawberries.

We headed north up the east side of England. The stop in Cambridge filled our library with old books which Clair College librarians were selling in order to empty their shelves for new. Those books went back to the ship for, in those days, we were traveling with a trunk; in so far as C. Allen was concerned, trunks had rubber sides. We drove to Sheffield for it was from that area in Yorkshire that the Harlans migrated. The old house was gone; a new one had been built during the 18 hundreds (this problem of 'old' vs. 'new' is ages old). A talk with the caretaker told us that the estate was owned by an executive of Shef-field. The stop in York was informative and interesting; the city walls were walked; the cathedral was admired. We had been seeing colored glass everywhere on the continent; it is only since the fire in Yorkminister that I began to appreciate the beauty of the windows which we enjoyed there. For the first time we met fish and chips with vinegar, saw the spikes upon which severed heads were displayed for the edification of the middle-ages populace and I shuddered. Then on to Hadrian's Wall for a short look at a much shortened wall that had been intended to keep the Scots out of the Roman hair; it didn't. Walls were important in the days of the Romans. What good is a wall when we have satellites to peek?

Up into Scotland, a short look at Argyle Castle, a ride upon a loch (not hunting Nessie) then down again to the lowlands to look up the Drummonds; again we were not able to visit the estate. Are those people simply tired of having Americans ask, telling the gateman to turn visitors away. I think that I should do so.

Turning south, we stopped in Windemere to find the world of Wordsworth. After the shrub and heather covered hills of Scotland, after the sparse fields of Northumberland, after the endless stone fences limiting the pasture land and the movement of the sheep, in Westmoreland, growing yet more green, we would find the little house with the tiny windows which opened his world to his mind. One wonders some times that so many of our great minds have grown in limited areas; they did not need, could not have used the confusion of our times. During the times in which that small house was built, there was a tax on windows which tax limited for the poor the number and the size.

Visiting C. Allen's relatives was of prime importance. Catherine Harlan Walker, cousin twice removed, lived near the border of Wales, in a house built during the reign of Henry VIII. Of course it was scaled to the shorter Englishman of that period, with plumbing of that time. Catherine had to move Parliament to allow her to make the necessary improvements without radically changing the exterior of the house and little of the interior. (I wonder if that was called restoration; it certainly was an historical building.) Many time we had to ask her to repeat herself for her speech was much anglicized; her British friends thought she still sounded American. We were introduced to her dog, Tuppence (mother had been Penny), to her method of frying bacon (which was not at all British for she remembered fondly the crisp bacon which had been prepared at her Pennsylvania home), to the delights of English tea. Just as David and Jim were starved for American food after they had left the ship, so they hungered for sweets; four o'clock brought tea cakes. I had gifts for Catherine, jewels put into my care before we left America. Her mother, Cousin Rebecca, wife of a Tennessee Scott Harlan, had promised Catherine this jewelry; I had it to carry and guard through all Europe. Duly given; duly accepted. (I had the jewelry, seven one hundred dollar bills {C. Allen had been told to carry these with him for dollar bills would be the most usable of all American currency}, and as much film as I could carry.) From her house we saw the Welsh countryside. We followed the ripening strawberries to the farm-homes of her two daughters: Catherine Quinney and Becky Bevan. Dairy farms, well kept and profitable - this was where the strawberries were ripest and the cream was thickest. One noon sitting at table, I made some remark which brought up eyebrows of the young opposite me; that made me realize and say that some day we would have English-American dictionaries, just as today we have French-English ones to help us. With the Quinneys, we went to Stratford to see 'Hamlet'. After the play, I asked Phillenore if she had clearly understood the actors' words. "Yes." and so had I. I recall seeing 'Othello' played in Connecticut and having great difficulty understanding; I have seen Katherine Hepburn in a Shakespearean play in Detroit and I had to struggle the whole evening to understand. We talked about this discrepancy with the Quinneys. The English are unhappy about the training of the Eng- lish Shakespearean actor which, in theory, teaches him to speak with the dialect of the 16 hundreds. It was less difficult to understand the people in York than our Shopshire cousins. Is there a relationship between the dialect of the Yorkshiremen, the Shakespearean actor and my Detroit accent. Still we are told that the people of Applachia speak a dialect which is close to that of Shakespeare's times; which leaves me wondering if that information is complete. concerns any particular part of England, or all of England? There are rhythms to every form of speech. I know that I do not sound like some of my Canadian cousins in the London area; Windsorites speak with a hybrid form - Windsor/Detroit; Toronto's voice sounds akin to ours. I wonder.

So on to the Plymouth docks, back to the smooth August sail on the America towards home. The August winds which ruffle the Great Lakes across the current's flow do not soon reach the ocean. Most August sailings are smooth. C. Allen was ready to get home, back to the office, back to work, enough of vacationing; he read all of Scott's history of Napoleon while on the ship. They were all three interesting men - Napoleon, Scott and Harlan.

Travel continued. The next extended trip, 1960, was to the Hawaiian islands. This time, in the old VW bus, we drove to San Diego where we picked up Captain Ray and Elizabeth Jones. That time the bus carried C. Allen, myself, Joyce, Jim, Joe, Jay, and Jeanne. We started after school was finished; we planned to return in early September. The Jones drove in tandem with us to our departure point - San Francisco. We stayed at the St. Francis, did the town, and visited the Atwood Austins who lived in the Del Monte Lodge area. Mary and Atwood owned a home there and, of necessity, another in Oakland which was closer to schools. Atwood was at home; Mary was off to visit her family in Grosse Pointe. Woody was a perfect host. One evening we dined in an Italian restaurant which featured operatic singers, mostly students practicing their skills and hoping for a career with S.F.'s opera company. Liquor was sold; we tried but could not get Jim in - too young. Next evening we went to a Japanese restaurant; everybody was of an acceptable age. Shoes off, into the dining area, down on the floor at short legged tables - Jim's long legs didn't fit. Oh, well, that was better than being turned away because of age. Once we were afloat and on our way and out on the Bay, the Jones returned to San Diego.

The peculiar thing about that boat ride was that I slept. I had strained my back on Wednesday before we left home; drove a week across the continent; did the usual sight-seeing; tried a doctor in San Diego. I rode with my back pressed hard into the back of the seat. Once aboard ship, up for breakfast, back to bed, awakened for lunch, back to bed, awakened for dinner; made a short evening after all of that sleep. Finally the pain eased and went away. Thank goodness. There is very little that I could tell you about that sail on a pacific Pacific. The family brought me bits of news. They were skeet shooting at the stern; this or that Hollywood star was aboard; they had seen.... C. Allen was especially amused to tell me of walking the deck, meeting Jim and a little Texan girl who was standing tip-toe in front of Jim, saying: "Say something funny, Jim." It wasn't his accent that amused her for most accents aboard were similar to ours; her's was unusual.

We arrived in Honolulu to a great hurrah! Norma and Melinda Martin were there to meet us with leis and joy. Captain Marshall Martin was on duty at Pearl Harbor and could not meet us with his wife and daughter. One might think that friends from the mainland were in short supply. Just as they were pleased to see us, we were happy to see them; they became our personal guides. It is always good to have knowledgeable friends as guides. We stayed on Honolulu until we had done that island. We found Toshiko and her family, the Takaezus; entertained the Martins, Toshiko and her mother, and Admiral and Mrs. Hall at dinner one evening. It might be best to say that Mrs. Takaezu entertained us; she knew as little English as we knew Japanese. We played an old Japanese drinking game: scissors, paper, rock; each time you lost you were required to empty your saki cup. Mrs. Takaezu beat Admiral Hall and Captain Martin every time. She could not drink them 'under the table' - short legs; she beat them at her game.

Then we spent a week at Pearl Harbor. The Admiral's cottage was free for us to use. That was a wonderful gift; Norma sent along a houseboy. The houseboy was a substitute Mattie; it was his job to watch the children, clean up after them and cook their meals if C. Allen and I were not there. Mostly we were not. The young were delighted for they could swim, carry in sand on their feet, carry out sand on their feet, and swim again. The waters around Pearl were warm and pleasant. We rode in the Admiral's boat which was for us a special treat and saw the place where the Arizona had gone down. The Jones had been stationed at Pearl when that attack happened and Capt had filled us with all of his tales of that horrible day. What a week to remember.

After our week in the Admiral's cottage, we flew across to the island of Hawaii. Packing to leave the hotel as I was putting on my hose (I always placed my diamond ring between my lips for safety's sake.), Joyce called for help; she had dropped my watch behind a dresser. I must have lain the ring down with my hose; retrieved the watch, finished dressing and packing. I was pointing to something high in the air at the airport when I saw that my ring was gone. C. Allen called the hotel; no one had seen it; the room was checked. There was nothing we could do except continue to Hawaii; there is no point in carrying unpleasant memories. In Hilo the hotels restaurant had a 'high water' mark on a picture window which indicated the height of the last tsunami (tidal wave) - high over our heads; that was our introduction to the geology of the island. We visited all of the flower gardens, talked with the people who owned them went up to the prison to look at carvings done by the prisoners; bought some bowls, rented a car. There begins a tale .....

Joyce was so upset by the cockroaches which we found every where on Hilo that we finally sent her back to the Martins. With her gone, the family again would fit into a car; C. Allen rented one and we took to the roads towards the mountains - volcanic source and base of all the islands. The fields of ash were a constant attraction. We stopped along the way to do sight-seeing, up to the forester's displays, out to see the latest ash fields on Kilauea, arid, gray, covered with burnt trees, still hot. We watched a scientist going down to measure the temperature in a deep depression made as the last eruption drew lava from underground. We followed a trail down a lava tube left behind as lava poured out of the ground melting the walls of the tube, turning them into glass. C. Allen was fascinated by the crater of Ki- lauea, by the hot spot that could be seen near its center, by the birds that nest along the walls, by the idea of life existing on the edges of death.

Then we went on to tempt the fates ourselves. We had found mention of foot-steps in volcanic ash. We drove on to find a trail, marked by cairn of rocks, piles of 3 or 4 small rocks which marked the trail to see the footsteps which, like fossils, like the sides of the volcanic tubes, were hardened in the ash. They were the foot prints of Polynesians, who caught in a rain of hot ashes, were fleeing. Young legs travel faster than older ones. It always took me a step and a skip to keep abreast of C. Allen; neither one of us could keep up with the children. He and I finally made it to the proper spot; there were no children there. C. Allen hollered and halloed; there was no response. I finally decided that I could see the flash of a white shirt in the distance. C. Allen was willing to stand and call; I wasn't. It was getting late, darkness and chill come quickly there; I set out to follow that twinkling shirt. I have no idea what I thought I could do if I did catch up with them before they reached Kilauea for that was their direction. At least I would be with them. At last Jim decided that they had lost the path, that they would see no footprints; they turned to retrace their own. I recall no more exploring after that.

We left the islands on the Mariposa, beautiful little ship, small, stabilized; she rode the pacific Pacific like a dream. It was a good trip back to San Francisco.

Re-united with our aging bus, we started along the northern route home. We had taken the middle and southern routes west to reach the Jones; it was a natural thing to decide on the northern route home. C. Allen was sure that route was shorter; he was restless, wanting to be back at work in his office. I have been through Yellowstone several times; it had been years since any of the children had seen the wonders of that place. Always entry and exit had been by the eastern and western gates; this time we would go out the north gate. We did the park. How we tourist can walk about on such a hot spot, as though we had the fateful sisters under control, I do not know; but we do. This time one of the sisters snarled our thread. We reached the high point of Bear Tooth (Claw ?) pass. (I cannot find the name in any atlas; so much for memory,) We stopped for a breather and an overview of the country side; back into the car. Start the bus? We found we had no clutch. We could coast; we could use our brakes going down the mountain; we could hope. It was a dramatic ride to say the least. We finally came to the first phone in to civilization and stopped to call for help. A car could come out from Red Lodge, tow us into town and our needs could be checked, perhaps fixed. The car arrived; it was an Oldsmobile with an improvised tow-line: an old tire. Now, sitting behind the wheel of a VW bus, you are right up front. That tire stretched long, squashed narrow; and the cars went up and down grades. C. Allen was uptight with worry. Red Lodge could do nothing for us; the nearest VW garage was in Billings. On to Billings behind that Olds and its stretchable, squashable tire. We could stay overnight in Billings and they would repair the motor, with no guarantee that it would remain so; or for $200 they would remove and replace the motor in a few hours. C. Allen was impatient to be on his way home; we had a new engine. No comparable excitement remained for us after all of that; we got home.

Travel, individually or collectively, went on. There was to be one more summer long trip to Europe in 1962. This was the summer that Joyce left Ann Arbor with a group, from the university, which planned to go as far as Thailand and then turn back. Louise Stirton told Joyce that, when she and Bill (Mr. William Stirton), had reached Thailand they had gone half way around the world. Joyce took her suggestion; left her friends; finished her way around the other 180 degrees. She had a wonderful trip; in that time a young woman could travel protected by the fact that she was an American. She spent all of her cash on gifts and postage; American Express came to he rescue.

Now C. Allen, Jim, Joe, Jay, Jeanne, and I would see northern Europe. We sailed on the Amsterdam, getting off ship in England where a new VW bus was waiting for us. This crossing was interesting; the Bunt family was aboard ship. When we returned in 1958, Floyd Bunt (master at Cranbrook School) had asked how we liked the bus and a myriad of other questions that had to do with our trip. His reason was that, a school master, he and his family had a limited budget with which to go abroad, he wanted 3 Bunt children to have a chance to see the continent; he wanted them to see, hear, and play the organs of continental churches. The result was that our answers prompted their purchase of a VW bus and the booking of passage on the same ship. The Bunts wenttourist passage; the Harlans first class. Although ship rules barred movement between classes, the young Bunts and the young Harlans found that restrictions posed no barriers. Even the adults learned the passages. Good company - good passage!

This was an interesting trip with long lasting effects. To be sure, we shopped the ship's store. I was wearing the necklace made by Stanley Lechtzin with a smokey quartz, cut by John; it centered John's stone in Stanley's design. The stone was large with a crescent design on one side and an 's' curve on the other. The lines of the gold reminded me of early Scandinavian design. It was interesting to the young man handling the ship's jewelry but it was not a style which he could sell aboard ship. We bought from him a necklace of three strands of dark coral with a clasp of filigree gold (Presently Joyce has this necklace.) That young man gave C. Allen his card and a note of introduction to a Mr. Ascher who handled diamonds in Amsterdam. Later...

Once off ship in England, C. Allen made arrangements for a hotel; no reservations this time - everything off the cuff. There seemed to be an excess of rooms in England; agents, meeting us at the dock, each hawked his own establishment. Allen took rooms in the Mayflower Hotel; refinished, clean and sizable. Everytime, that we opened the door into the corridor, we were met by the odor of fish. We never figured that one out. We shopped for more than the silks which I managed to find at Harrods; C. Allen wanted to buy suits for the boys - the boys wore them only under compulsion. Now we know why the British are so upright and uptight - there is more canvas in their suits! I think they finally went to Goodwill. At Simpsons I bought a Chanel wool suit for Jeanne; the English female is not clothed in cloth of steel. We moved slowly up the country; C. Allen drove until Jim and Joe could no longer stand his slow reactions and took the wheel from him. He turned grayer. Driving forward on the left side of the road is simply not an accomplishment of older Americans.

Before we get back to visit the Harlan/Walker/Quinney/Bevan families and back to see Macbeth, there were stops to see Nelson's ship, Victory (short men those Britishers were), to visit Salisbury Cathedral, time off to investigate Stonehenge, and then on further north again. I suppose that it is no especial thrill to watch a parent rattling family bones. We left Scotland in a hurry because there were races in Liverpool; they simply had to be seen. Liverpool had not been on the agenda but down we went. We watched, from our hotel window, whippets racing on the beach of the Irish Sea. The whippet is a small version of the greyhound, same lines, same grace, same speed - a more manageable dog. We went to the auto races and C. Allen was able to buy seats. I have never been one for large crowds and I chose to stay in the bus which was parked in the center of the race track; a very convenient spot. I soon had company; Jeanne came down to stay with me, shove back the sun-roof in the car so that we could stand and watch the entire proceedings as the cars raced around the track. Our vantage point must have been envied.

Then on across England to New Castle-on-Tyne which was to be our departure point for Norway. First we had to look up Jane Nicholson, friend of Joyce. We had seen Jane in London for a short visit. She had been attending Birmingham University, housed in a private home on the third level with no heat. She and her room-mate had often, during the winter, huddled together under a blanket converted into a tent to share body heat and spotlights. What a way to study! Looking for summer work, she found a job waiting tables in a restaurant in New Castle. We found Jane, met the family with which she was living, had lunch at her place of work and were amused by the tips which came her way. The English women were forever stopping in for a spot of tea, tipping her a pence or two - those large copper pennies which were then part of English currency and which, at the end of her stint of work, weighted her pocket. Her New Castle hosts were a coal miner's family, living in a neat ages-old brick house on a small piece of land with a garden - all typically British. C. Allen was amazed at the quality of the house and lot for it was well above that of a southern coal miner in America. There were differences in housing, education, social level, and much else. The bases from which each had started were totally different.

We took boat from there to Bergen, Norway, north east across the North Sea. It was a long crossing. The most memorable part of the trip, for me, was to see and hear a kilted band of young Scots practicing their pipes. They went above decks and all of the other passengers followed them. I could not help but compare those swinging kilts, pressed and neat, to the wear rumpled trousers of all others on board. Sorry family, I don't care what tartan is worn; the swinging of the kilts and the sound of the pipes makes my scottish background tingle.

The port of Bergen has the appearance of a Japanese painting - huge bare rocks: gray with age, little vegetation, a few trees and the sea. The people of Norway have strong ties to their land. Truls and a brother had driven to Bergen to meet us in a lovingly reconstructed 1927 Ford. They brought gifts: two Scandinavian-design sweaters, knit by Mrs. Gjestland; one was for Jeanne and one for Scott. I wonder who has them now; they were not something which could be discarded; they were the kind that wear forever. The VW bus was taken off the boat; then, Truls driving, we headed south to Porsgrund, home of Trul's family. For some reason Truls knew that C. Allen seldom made reservations; everything was arranged for us: reservations in the new hotel in Porsgrund, a stay in a cabin by a lake that had the added attraction of a local wedding, which we could attend, rooms in the universities when there was one in the towns along the route which he and MaryAnne Mikkelson had planned for us through parts of Norway, Sweden, and Denmark. Professional care was never so thoughtful.

The Harlans and their luggage were settled in the Porsgrunn hotel and they prepared for their first dinner in Norway. Jeanne, outfitted in her new English suit, ready before C. Allen and I, came to ask permission to the lobby and wait for us there; she was given permission. It was not long before she was back to report to me: she had been approached by a young man who had spoken to her in Norwegian; properly she regretted that she spoke only English. "No problem; he spoke English too. Would she have a cigarette with him?" "I'm only eleven years old; I don't smoke." How wonderful it is to be content with the status quo. Why do the young want to be older and the old want to be younger? Much more fun to be just what you are. We enjoyed dinner that evening.

It was interesting becoming acquainted with the Gjestlands. Truls was Norway's best PR man. The arrangements which he had made for us made certain that we saw, enjoyed and understood this best of all nations. His parents began our introduction by having us to their home for dinner. Mrs. Gjestland outdid herself preparing for us the best of Norwegian meals. We all enjoyed. Then came the desert to cap the evening - cloudberrin. The Norwegians make a holiday of gathering the berries which grow only high on the hillsides; they were a special treat. Had we ever tasted such before? Jim said yes; he recognized the flavor. We all waited for his comparison. The flavor reminded him of Ewa. Of course! Mrs. Gjestland had used natural sugar in her canning. Ewa was asugar mill which we had visited in Hawaii. The prevailing odor there was of un-refined sugar, sweet with the touch of molasses' distinctive flavor.

We visited the historic village where they had gathered artifacts of all of their past; this was mainly an anthropological study. The buildings and the artifacts of a society reflect the problems and the solutions imposed upon a people by situation and climate. The granaries were placed upon piles to defeat the rodent population, always numerous, always hungry. The houses were built to defeat the storms which rage in from the arctic. The tools of the house-wife were woman powered. I recall the cylinders of wood which were used to iron clothes, not as hot as our sadirons but about as ineffective; a standard had been set and maintained with difficulty and determination. The fields had racks on which the harvest was hung and turned until the grain had dried in spite of the frequent fog-bearing north winds. There were evidences of the appreciation of beauty; the housewife's needle and her husband's paint brush enlivened everything. Early Norwegian life was difficult but difficulties challenge and the survivor rises above present problems. C. Allen came home with a wooden bowl that had painted on its outer surface a message and rose mahlerung designs. I remembered such painting on the doors of the little house in Silverdale. Can you sense my pleasure? Here was again a bit of the beauty which is purely Norwegian. (Presently, grand daughter, Sandra, has that bowl, given to her as a memento of her summer vacation in Norway.)

We went to a dance; we watched old-fashioned dancing when the men showed off and outdid themselves by kicking higher and higher. We went for a week to the Mikkleson cottage. We watched a wedding. Truls had planned for our pleasure and planned well. Mrs. Mikkleson prepared some of those delightful and sweet thin cakes which are truly Scandinavian. Jim ate and ate to Mrs. Mikkleson's amusement; she prepared extra batter and continued to feed him. There was so much to see and to enjoy.

We went to Oslo where we met Grandfather Gjestland. Truls was truly proud of his Grandfather who was of man of great reputation in Norway. We saw the federal office buildings. We were amazed and amused by the square before those buildings; there were ten traffic lights in that small square. That outdid anything Ameri- can that I have seen; even here in Detroit. We tried the finerestaurants - some for food and some for view. Most memorable of all was the evening we dined on a ship anchored in the harbor. That was a good dinner; that was the night that Jim lost the key to the VW. Now a car without a key is useless. Jim was reciting G. A. Strong's MODERN HIAWATHA (There are some things that Trulssimply should know!) To accentuate a point, Jim flung up his arm...and then "Mother, have you another key?" She did. Jim is certain that this all happened on the way to the ship; I am as certain that we were leaving. It is certain that on the bottom of the harbor lies a VW key.

The sight to equal the kilts and the bag-pipes of the young Scots were the old Norwegian long boats. Might they have been the great-grand relative of the Indian's birch bark canoe? They probably developed under the prod of necessity with the help of ingenuity and available materials. The vantage point from which we viewed them was raised so that we, looking from above, had a marvelous idea of their length and size. They could truly have breasted and bested the ocean's waves.

So on to Sweden where Ruth Lindegrin's work had been added to that of Truls. We were housed in the universities where ever we went. Those arrangements must have taken some doing. The University of Uppsala was so over-crowded with increasing student population that many students tented and found sanitary services in trailers provided by the university. Meals, we found in the dormitory lunch rooms; laundry was done for us (When you are going about a bit, laundry service becomes essential.) There was much to explore and to see. We looked into all of the glass factories; C. Allen bought and the rule of the rubber-sided trunk was again established. We visited the Museum in Stockholm where we met an old acquaintance: gold of the Incas. Millesgarten took us mentally back to home and Cranbrook.

Joe and C. Allen (especially) were fascinated by the work being done on the Vasa. The Vasa, a Swedish war ship, had bravely set out to sea and immediately sunk in the harbor. It was only shortly before we came to Sweden that there were the funds and the necessary knowledge to raise it. It was housed in a building especially constructed for its care and preservation. Continually sprayed with a special solution to solidify the wood. A new product for the markets of America had been created. I have here at home two ashtrays so treated and able to withstand the heat ofburning tobacco, the abrasion of burnt ash. The Vasa will never be subjected to anything harsher than admiring gazes. It will survive centuries more.

The National Geographic had been everywhere before we were there. In one edition we had read about the Vasa and in another we had read about Vestra, Ruth Linegrin's home town. The heat and power source for everything in that town came from heat pumps. That was a daring solution to the major problem of a northern community. Today the use of heat pumps is being promoted by electrical companies as a 'productive' use of their power. The work crews of the Geographic make fine ambassadors where ever they go; you follow in safe foot steps when you follow theirs.

Before I leave this section on Sweden, I must write about the two women, prisoners by choice, attracted to me because I sounded like an American. Their daughters had married Swedes; therefore they chose to live in Sweden. I had left C. Allen busy in Kosta's factory shop; he was buying glass; I felt that the trunks rubber sides had stretched enough. Sitting on a bench outside of the shop, a woman sat beside me and said: "You are an American? Please, I want to talk to you for I am hungry for the sounds of home." We talked for a while until Allen had finished his shopping. Another woman, following a similar impulse, asked that I give her greetings to the Lady in the harbor. I promised that I would; I made a point of being at the rail as the ship sailed into New York Harbor to communicate the longings of a distant American. How does one talk to a symbol? With the heart.

Truls went on to Denmark with us. This time we stayed in a hotel for the dormitories were over loaded - no room at those inns; everybody was using them. Tivoli was the goal of the young people. Tivoli, an unique feature for a European city, is an amusement park, forerunner of the Disney parks but having its own appeal to differing tastes; it was a good tourist attraction and we were attracted. The Little Mermaid in the harbor, Hans Christian Anderson, Danish design, George Jensen each had their special appeal. Denmark has few natural resources other than its ability to design and manufacture. We had dinner with a Danish family - Christianson; our hostess prepared the special Danish fruit desert, the name of which I can no longer pronounce let alone spell. It was the five o'clock traffic which stands out in my mind. Most people traveled to work on their bikes; there were bike stands every where and a bike so placed was safe. (I wonder if that is still true?) The number of bikes and the persistence of the bike riders made five o'clock traffic a thing to dread. Jim dared not touch a one and their biking was akin to the driving of our VW beetles. He drove amongst the bikes carefully, muttering under his breath: 'ban the bikes; ban the bikes!'

Truls left Denmark and the Harlans to go home; there was school on his mind. We continued on to Germany, then to Holland. With the letter of introduction which had been given C. Allen on the Amsterdam, we went in Amsterdam to see Mr. Ascher...he wasn't just any merchant; he was THE diamond merchant. His family, uprooted by the war, had returned to re-establish themselves in the city to which they were accustomed, in the business which they knew. This was the firm that had cut many of the crown jewels for the British monarchy. We were in very special company; Mr. Ascher was the head of the largest diamond cutting firm in Holland and, possibly, in the world. C. Allen told Mr. Ascher just how much he intended to spend. The gentleman excused himself, went off for a short while, and returned with five diamonds in his hand. These were the stones best suited for us - a two caret oval with a slight flaw and four half-caret stones, pear shaped, which he considered to be our best buy. C. Allen bought; he relied upon the man's honesty and his knowledge. What else could we do? C. Allen's knowledge about diamonds equaled mine: nothing! Mr. Ascher has (had) a daughter living in Flint, Michigan. Americans had a special spot in his heart, in his life. Finally for us came the problem of customs. No one worried about customs until we were preparing to disembark in New York. What to do? I insisted that C. Allen declare the stones; he did. I expect that it was the best thing which we could have done. The custom official, looking over the declaration, was impressed by the fact that the diamonds were listed; he went off to figure the least amount which we could be charged as duty. The duty we paid was minimal. Truly I will never know whether declaring the stones made a difference or not. I did feel more comfortable.

As we were preparing to leave Holland, as I was packing the bags, I sorted out the things which had to go home from the things which would be of no use to us there. The children's shoes had been outgrown; they were dropped into a waste basket. We went out for some last minute looking about; on our return to the motel, I found the shoes neatly lined up beside the basket. Back into the basket; back our again. The maid was insisting; so was I. Those shoes, out grown, still in good condition, might better be used by some one in Holland. Maybe they had no poor to need them. Then on to the Rotterdam with the Bunts aboard; a fine trip home.

Meanwhile we have followed the football teams of the two universities. During my last years in college, C. Allen had used the seat assigned to Ivabell; she didn't mind. He had a philosophy which said that no matter how 'sold out' a game might be, somebody would not be able to be there; there would always be extra seats for sale.' None of our guests ever had the opportunity to test that theory and find it wanting when C. Allen had done the inviting.

John and Campbell went to the first Rose Bowl of which I am aware; that was the year that Michigan had the punter who never missed. Eric McGuire volunteered to take the boys to see the game and C. Allen got the tickets. Eric had relatives in Los Angeles - that made a perfect combination. Eric was driving (how else would the son of a GM executive go?). Everything went well until, on the way home, the car threw a rod; that means trouble. Eric called from just west of the Mississippi. He was told to put the boys on a train, that they had to be home for school. He did and everything worked out find - that is to say 'Eric got home too'.

We continued to see the majority of the home games, either in Ann Arbor or in Lansing - and we yelled accordingly. I recall one game in Wisconsin; that must have been during the Hercules Powder Plant days. C. Allen and I went to Pasadena a few times. Once we went out with the Williamses; it is nice traveling with the governor of your State; everybody makes way. Long before going to Milwaukee on business, our plane had been grounded because of a snow storm over Lake Michigan. Guess who decided that never again would we be on the same plane? That was fine until it was time to go west with Soapy and Nancy; one airplane would do. Guess who teased endlessly? There were seven of them to tease. Buzzing along a Los Angeles expressway with a police escort, a private car interfered with our exit. Short shrift made of that problem: we went out. I still have visions of that lone woman going miles out of her way trying to find the road to where-ever. We took the Martins to New Orleans to see a Navy-Old Miss game. Marshall and C. Allen sat together; Norma and I were in a different part of the stadium. Navy made a touchdown. An old man, close to Norma and I, collapsed and died; he had had a heart attack. I have always felt for the young scouts who were called upon to carry that body down the steps and out to a Red Cross ambulance. Then we could hear the public address system calling, calling one by one, that man's family...It had to be; the last names were all the same.

Business continued to take C. Allen about. He made several extended trips to Philadelphia; from there he brought home some excellent oriental pieces. A trip to Mexico convinced him that the thing lacking in Detroit was bull-fighting, Portuguese style. We had a hard time changing his mind about that. There was a trip to Nigeria on business for M.S.U.; the trustees looked yearly into the well-being of the oversea's colleges for which M.S.U. had assumed responsibility. Then C. Allen decided that, as long as he was in Africa, he might just as well see more of that part of the world. It was his custom, while traveling, to write to his secretary; she would copy the letters and send the copies to the many people on C. Allen's mailing list. I heard about them if some one was curious about some item which he had mentioned or something which they did not understand. Eleanor Scott asked me one day 'why green plastic bags'? I always packed a few plastic bags; these just happened to be green. The car in which C. Allen was riding sprung a radiator leak; they were near a stream. What more natural than to put the plastic bags to carrying water from stream to car - excepting that they leaked in the corners. Now if they had - but of course I wasn't there to tell them what to do. He went on to Egypt and Greece. Finally he came home from Paris after having written me (the only letter I ever received) that he would be coming in a day later than the date and time which Mrs. Cook had given me. I met him as first planned; he was on that plane. Another trip took him to Turkey on possible HEC business; that trip produced no job. It did generate speculation about the up-to-the-minute plumbing in the best of hotels; there were no water traps between floors. The top man had the best air to breath; then, as toilets were flushed on the descending floors, the quality of the air degenerated. A trip to Peru with Robert Patterson followed to look into the copper situation since Power Piping, as I understood the matter, was interested in the availability of copper. That time he brought home azurite; I still have that piece of azurite and have considered having a slab of it used to make another table top for that bronze tripod which had been the base of a Hugh Acton top. Another time he brought home an ancient piece of Indian ceramic which was a replacement for the obviously recent piece which he had bought - taken by a native Central American Indian, saved by a priest who knew and collected and did not want a fellow American cheated. (Joyce now has all of the American Indian pieces.)

C. Allen's and my last trip was around the world. The Drummonds planned the trip and hoped that we would come with them; we did. In this day of aeroplanes, one can skip large sections of the world, seeing little as one flies over. Our first stop to change planes was Los Angeles; then on to Hawaii where there was no one to meet us and no one to visit. From there to Japan, where we stayed in the hotel designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, rode the bullet train, saw Fujiyama and did a little shopping in Tokyo. A young man, who had been an exchange student in Wisconsin, was our tour guide. At one resort hotel we had had meatloaf for luncheon; back in the bus our guide, talking about dogs in Japan, mentioned how few there were. We all chuckled at this and he, understanding our humor, laughed too. The marvel of the Japanese world was the smallness, the cleanness, the neatness of everything, and the efficiency of the work which we were able to see from a tour bus.

Everybody got along with everybody else by being always very polite. I carried a movie camera and have some interesting shots, those especially of a man who, seeing a bus filled with Americans, began a Sumeria duel - all by himself. If my pictures jiggle and move, it is because the roadbed was rough. If my pictures of a beautiful Fuji were returned blank, it is because the Lady chose not to have her picture taken. (Or had I forgotten the lens cover?) From there on to Taiwan where Allen set Jay's camera down, went to the front desk for postage, and presto, the camera was gone! Magic! There is some such magic the world over. We went on to a delightful visit in Thailand. David, the Drummond son who was with us during our first trip to Europe, was stationed there; he became our guide. In Bangkok, we looked up two delightful people, Lert and Som Urasyandana. He had been sent to Cranbrook by his government to study architecture; she came along to study ceramics; they left two little girls behind for two years. I have many pots which they made and many fine memories of the two of them. Lert had designed and built a home for them; floors like table tops; everyone walked in stockinged feet. Separated for a short while from C. Allen, I bought a bronze head which I have given to Joyce. My regret is that I did not buy its mate. Why is it that I always regret the things which I did not buy? We went up to Chiang Mai to watch the women weaving Thai silk, beautiful stuff, endless work. Everyone seemed happy to be working. Allen bought yards of silk, ostensibly to be given to the Cranbrook students. I still have most of it. I gave yards of it to Sonia (Jay's wife) who wanted to make a silk dress. She found that the stuff crushes and wrinkles; people who live with polyesters do not expect or accept that. Spirit houses, paper umbrellas, silver work - so much to see and to recall. Bangkok was a sophisticated city on a dirty river.

But no river is a dirty as the Ganges. Alice tells me that the Drummonds have a photo of me looking absolutely ill. That could well be for I came home to tell John: "You think the Detroit River is polluted, let me tell you...." India was dirty, crowded and I am happy not to return. Wonderful things to see and to wonder which of them was built under British control, how much of it was native to the time of the rajahs? Exploitation was the rule of the world in the early days; the strongest had; the weakest served. Today everyone within reach of America is ruled by the American precept of the Christian religion: life is precious. So we create problems for ourselves as we deny nature's laws. We allow adversaries to take advantage of us to their own defeat. The old days age gone; information travels too fast.

We went up to Nepal where, we discovered later, the camera's eye does not always record the truth; dirty little faces appeared clean on developed film. Nepal lies in the foothills of the Himalayas; those hills are carefully terraced. There are schools; but everything else belongs to the times of the terracing of the hills. The Hindu religion rules; cattle are everywhere. Vic missed a picture because of concern for my safety; a cow had come up and butted me. Nepal, its mountains were the source of the Ganges - a normal river at its beginnings. We went slowly, following that river to Banaras, a holy city to the Hindu. They cremate their dead by the river side, or set the dead afloat on its surface. The laundry for the city is done in its water's just north of the city within view of the tourists; people bathe daily in the waters, holy absolution; people wash their goats by the river side; mothers sit on the quay with their babies on their laps and give the children to drink of the holy water. Vultures sat on the eaves of buildings waiting a chance to finish a meal.No wonder that I was sick at the sight; I wonder how many were sick at the taste. One can become immune to many things.

But India has much of beauty to offset the bad (as we saw it). We visited the palaces, the Taj Mahal. We went to Delhi. We were amazed at the fine detailing done to fashion and to repair the mosaics. We watched men working with slender sticks of pigment which, with the use of internally applied heat, were used to make intricate patterns in brass vessels. We bought a bowl and a lamp; neglected, they are still beautiful. That Drummond planned trip was complete in every detail.

Joe was about to graduate from the U. of M.; C. Allen and I wanted to be home for that ceremony. We prepared to leave; there again I had an argument about the things which I chose to leave behind. Knowing that our trip was ending, I began sorting out the things which I did not want to take home. I always start out with that in mind; I never carry my best with me; there will be few who know me to see when my dress repeats and repeats. We left in our room a plastic bag filled with the castoffs; they met us at the front desk as C. Allen was checking out. Absolutely honesty is the rule and was well obeyed. No disappearing camera; no persistently reappearing shoes. The Martins had assured us that there are no people so honest as the Chinese.

We left the Drummonds to continue their trip with a desert ride behind a couple of Arabs; the Drummonds felt insecure even then. Since we were going home and since Detroit had an international airport, I suggested that our baggage be put aboard, destination Detroit. No bags to carry and not a worry in the world, C. Allen and I took plane to Athens, changed to another to Hanover, and a third to London to visit for a short time with some of the English Harlans. There was some mix-up in dates and times for there was no one to meet us at Heathrow. Another change in planes and in schedule and we were on our way home. Unexpectedly we had to go through customs in New York; everything of importance had been sent on to Detroit. I had a small bag and a few receipts - but not all; the young man at customs sighed, charged us $27.00 and let us go. We reached Detroit's regular airport wondering where our bags were; would we ever find them? We found them -sitting at Northwestern Airlines; they had arrived home before we did and never gone through customs. Miracles do occur! But today?

That was C. Allen's last trip. Since then I have been to the Virgin Islands, to Egypt, to Greece, to England and Scotland. Jay shared the last trip to St Andrews to study Adam Smith. Now, excepting the yearly drive to Atlanta and a trip to Phoenix (in '86 I did neither of them), I am contented to stay at home. I am content to think with Wordsworth: the world is too much with us.