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In the narrative which follows I will recall my memories of Grandpa Charles Fronefield Richards. He was a civil war veteran and was born in 1841. He sired two daughters, my birth mother, Dora Pratt, and my adoptive mother, Bertha Phillips. (Mother Dora died in July of 1918, soon after my birth and her sister, Bertha, adopted me.) Grandpa lived an austere life and died in our home in Princess Anne County, Va. in 1935 at the age of 94. He lived to see me graduate Kempsville High School. My narrative begins with my first memories of him when I was about four years old when Mother and I took train trips to his farm just south of Brooklyn, Pa. My story continues with childhood visits to his new home in Brooklyn, Pa. These trips took place soon after he had sold his lifetime dairy farm about a mile south of Brooklyn. It ends when I discovered his dead body in our upstairs bedroom in our home in Princess Anne County, Va.
I can remember two train trips from our farm in Princess Anne County to Grandpa's farm. I may have been two or three years old when the first trip were taken. I say that, because I can remember Mother giving me a baby bottle of milk while on the train. I took one suck on the nipple, the milk had soured and I promptly threw the milk out of the open window. That was the last time I was ever given the bottle. I can remember the steam engine's cloud of smoke as it puffed up the steep inclines and how it stopped at overhead wooden watering tanks to engorge water from long snouts that overhung the track. I remember getting cinders in my eyes and how painful they were. Finally, after numerous stops, where busy porters trundled baggage and cargo on rugged wagons with iron tires, we chugged the steep incline to the Hop Bottom train station. Grandpa was waiting there with his horse and buggy. What a joyful scene. The buggy trip from the Hop Bottom station to Grandpa's farm was about four miles, up and down hills, on a twisty paved road. There was scarcely any traffic, only occasionally a farm wagon. Grandpa placed the reigns in my hands and I proudly 'guided' the horse home to his farm.
On the second train trip to Grandpa's I can remember Dad taking us down to the large and busy passenger train station in Norfolk. The train station, now long gone, was located in the Brambleton area. There were a number of parallel tracks within the station running between long open sheds that were supported by cast iron center stanchions. The engines with a string of passenger cars seemed to impatiently waiting to take off for some faraway city. Steam gushed from the cylinders as the engines sought their proper place in the busy terminal. We boarded our coach with the aid of wooden steps placed there by the porter, called a Red Cap, and were on our way. I can remember the authoritative voice of the conductor as he called "All Aboard." We slept in a Pullman, for the trip was long and tedious. Often we pulled onto sidings to allow another train to pass. During the night the train swayed to and fro and I could hear the steady clickety clack of the wheels passing over the rail splices.
After a day and night, we arrived in the morning at Scranton, Pa. Here, we boarded a local train with only a coach and a baggage car and headed north through the countryside. The train tracks were lined with red bushes I later learned to be wild sumac. I remember this from later trips to Brooklyn when I walked and berried along the very tracks that I had ridden as a passenger. The local train stopped everywhere. These were the horse and buggy days, and traveling by train was necessary to visit nearby towns and villages along the track. I think the train could be waved down at most any junction; there were no stations. Finally, the engine stopped at a milk platform across the crick and meadow from Grandpa's farm. Mom must have been young and strong at that time, for we walked down the hill, across the iron bridge, and started up the hill to Grandpa's house. A short way up the rocky road she saw Grandpa in the distance tending his milk cans, and she released me to run ahead. I did so, and ran up to Grandpa's side. He scarcely noticed me, and went about his work. Then he took a second glance, and said something like, "My God, I thought it was Walter." (Walter was my older brother.)Excitedly, he dropped what he was doing and rushed to meet Mom.
My first memories of Grandpa Richards and his little farm begin at the time when I was about four years old. The little house beside a rocky mountain road was modest, but quite attractive. It was on a steep hillside and a rocky wall kept the house from becoming a part of the road. Along the wall were two current bushes. One had white currents on it and the other red. I remember this, because I tried to eat them, but soon found better things to eat because of their tangy taste. On the side yard stood a couple of mature apple trees that shed their over ripe harvest to the ground. I remember this too, because I helped pick baskets of apples to be fed to the pigs.
The woodshed was attached to the rear of the house, as was customary in most country homes in the north. It was filled with dry stove wood to carry him through the cold and merciless winters when the ground was blanketed with snow. His bucksaw and crosscut saw hung on the wall, and a chopping block was convenient for making kindling, in case the fire got low.
Grandpa eked out his survival on the small farm by much hard work and a great deal of frugality. His principal income was derived from the several cans of milk he produced each day. He had no water bill to pay, no electrical bill, and no heating bill. He cut his own wood with the aid of an ax and a bucksaw. This was done in winter weather when the fields could not be tended. It provided heat when the cutting and sawing took place, and heat again when the wood was rationed to the cast iron cook stove that not only heated the small home, but also provided hot water. He had free running water from a spring up on the hillside. And, the water was really 'running' water. And, I do mean running water. There was no faucet on the pipe where a little stream of ice cold spring water ran all the time. From a standpoint of food, he was nearly self-sufficient. He stored barrels of apples in a cool cellar for winter. There were always eggs and homemade bacon for breakfast. Needless to say the dozen cows provided all the milk and butter needed. And, a roasted chicken along with vegetables from his garden provided good eating for dinner.
The cows had to be hand milked. This chore was quite laborious for one man. The milk was held over in a cooling cistern fed my chilly water from the spring high up on the hill. Just before the milk train was scheduled to pass, Grandpa would load the three or four milk cans into his farm wagon and carry them down the rocky road to the county road below, then across the crick on a rattling steel bridge, and up the next hill a little ways to the milk platform at the railroad track. Shortly, the puffing milk train would appear and load the milk to be taken to the creamery in Scranton, Pa. But, as grandpa aged, he had to give up dairy farming and live on his modest Civil War pension. But, he still gardened until he could labor no more.
What interested me most about Grandpa's farm was his little garden on the downhill side of the house. A set of rocky steps led from the garden to the wood shed door. Most entry and egress to his home was through the woodshed to the kitchen door. The ground was strewn with rocks, and to the side was a pile of rocks collected from the garden over years of cultivation. I can't recall all the vegetables in the little garden, but I can remember that he had strawberries and onions. I am sure he grew as many vegetables as he could, particularly potatoes that would keep into the winter. After all, trips to the grocery were rare and only for basics. I am sure he tapped the maple trees on his farm for sugar and syrup. When absolutely necessary, Grandpa would order his overalls and long underwear from the Sears and Roebuck catalog.
I find it hard to believe how naïve and innocent I was as a child. We were going to have chicken for dinner. Grandpa went to the hen yard and captured a chicken and wrong its neck. I had never imagined such a thing and was fascinated as the dying chicken flopped. I wanted to do that too, and he showed me how, but my tiny hands and arms could not do it. Now, I could not muster the courage to do such a mean and cruel thing. But, I do eat chicken. Someone has to kill and prepare them. What an awful job for them, and what a hypocrite I am. I beg forgiveness.
Here is another story I am reluctant to recall. The rocky road leading up to Grandpa's home was overhung with branches of the small trees growing in a hedge row. Grandpa had made me a fishing pole from a slender sapling. I can remember walking down the road and spying a little bird sitting on a overhanging limb, I swiped at it with the pole. Somewhat, accidentally, I hit the bird and killed it. I was mortified that I had done such a cruel thing and memories of the dastardly act remain with me today. Since then I have cared for injured and orphaned birds hoping to make amends for what I did as a child. (In later life, I founded an Animal Humane Society.)
When I was a lad of four, Grandpa was quite old -- in his late seventies by my calculation. The farm hardships during the grueling winter were more than he could cope with, and he sold his quaint old home and farm and moved into the little town of Brooklyn. I was probably about six years old on the first visit to his new home, and mother and I made many trips to Grandpa's home in Brooklyn during my adolescent years. I missed visiting him the summer that I was ten because that summer was spent in Virginia Beach at our Briarwood Cottage on 37th street. My last visit was in the summer I turned twelve years old. After that, I had to stay home and help Dad while Mother took Grandpa to Brooklyn to spend the summer.
Grandpa's Brooklyn home was an attractive two story home, roomy and comfortable in the summer. It had a lovely front porch that angled around the side. From the porch, there was a front entrance and an entrance into the kitchen. I enjoyed sitting on the massive flagstone steps that lead to it. There were three sets of stairs in the house leading to four large bedrooms. There were no bathrooms and no water, except in the pantry. The principle stairway led from the front hall directly to the upstairs hall. It was quite lovely and had a curved banister leading to the second floor. Each of the four bedrooms were generous and had large windows. The front room overlooked Brooklyn Avenue and the school across the street. I could crawl out of the large window that reached almost to the floor to the flat metal roof of the front porch. I enjoyed doing this, just because it was dangerous and I wasn't suppose to do it. I had a bedroom all of my own. It had large windows on the south that overlooked the Doran's fine home. From there, I could survey the intersection of the two main roads in the little town of about two dozen homes. The bed was an old iron bed and the mattress was of corn shucks, but that did not bother me much, though it was noisy and rustled when I turned.
Grandpa's home in Brooklyn was the base for many childhood adventures. The home was well situated on Brooklyn Avenue, the main street in Brooklyn. It was separated from the main road and the feed store by just one home, Mr. Doran's. From the front porch, or the bay window, you could see the busy corner where the milk wagons were unloaded of their cans each morning. Sometimes the dairy farmers would tie up their giant Clydesdale and Percheron horses and pitch quoits while they waited to pickup the empty milk cans from the previous day. A huge transport truck with 40 x 8 tires and 12 speed gear shifts would deliver the empty milk cans from the previous day and pick up the full cans to take to the creamery. All of this was of great entertainment to Grandpa who sat in the spacious bay window where he could recognize the various farmers both by their teams and their appearance.
The kitchen was large and roomy. It had three doors that led to the front porch, living room, and pantry respectively. All of our eating was done at the roomy kitchen table by the window that overlooked the garden and the blacksmith shop. A large cast iron wood range stood across the room from the table. The range had a warming oven up above and a built in hot water tank. It gave the kitchen a comfortable glow on chilly mornings, and unwelcome heat on hot days. All of our meals were prepared on the stove, and served in the kitchen. I can remember the five of us: Grandpa, Mom, Aunt Jessie, Walter, and I eating corn on the cob at the table. Once I sneaked one of Walter's corn ears when he wasn't looking. Years later I confessed and apologized. Adjacent to the kitchen was a large pantry where the coffee, sugar, and canned goods was kept. It smelled of ground coffee. As on the farm, it also had a sink with running water from a spring. A dipper hung close by and we drank from the dipper, or brought a cup. A door led from the pantry to the woodshed, which in effect, was an addition to the house.
There was no plumbing in Grandpa's house. Indoor plumbing was very rare in homes built long before the turn of the century, and Grandpa's home was no exception. And, it was impractical to have indoor pipes that surely would freeze in the subzero weather. When we lived there, the kitchen was the only heated room in the house. But, we did have a nice outhouse, privy if you will, on the far side of the garden. It was spaced well from the house for obvious reasons. It was regularly attended by the whole family. The ever present Sears and Roebuck catalog served its intended purpose. I was always careful not to tear out the pages showing the bicycles and the tents. One of the tricks of the boys of the town was to overturn privies at Halloween, but I won't talk about that subject.
The front yard was spacious and the yard had a wide street frontage. A thick flagstone walk lead from the street to the front porch. The house sat back from the street perhaps fifty feet. The whole yard sloped from right to left as viewed from the front porch. The grass was soft and lush -- too lush. When we arrived in the spring, it was more than ankle high and too much for a push mower to handle. Grandpa dispatched me to Mr. Cameron's place up the hill and above town. I was to ask him to come down and mow our lawn. The following day he arrived with his curved scythe in hand and a whetstone in his pocket. He was an old man, and I thought inadequate for the job. He whetted his scythe to a keen edge, hunched over, and with rhythmic sweeps of his body sliced through the grass with his scythe making neat windrows as he went. I was impressed that his arms scarcely moved; it was the turning of the torso that did the work. From time to time he would stop to rest and sharpen the scythe again. It was poetry in motion and It fascinated me to watch him work. After he left, I raked the hay and put the lawn mower into play, It was my job to keep the grass trimmed. For that matter, I not only mowed Grandpa's grass (for nothing) but earned a little money mowing other lawns in Brooklyn. I charged twenty-five cents and earned enough money to buy a much used tennis racket.
There were a number of apple trees on the place. The one at the back porch was the first to bear. It was called a "King's Sweet" and it could be eaten when green, though not all that tasty. My favorite was the "Astracan." It was a lush, tasty apple that when just right, would literally explode when you sunk your teeth in the delicate skin. I can remember the excitement it caused when the first robins of spring flocked in. Whoever saw them first would hasten to notify the others and we would watch with rapture to see them feed on the earthworms present in the moist soil of the downside of the lawn.
Brooklyn Avenue was a road with a high center flanked by stone rubble on each side to provide drainage. On the far side, a beautiful flagstone walk, shaded by large maples, led up the hill to the town post office. Some of the large flagstones in the walk were heaved up by the tree roots. The footing was uneven, but that made little difference to people long accustomed to rocky paths. It did however make for a very bumpy ride down the hill on our wagons. For our purposes, the avenue started at the iron bridge over the big crick on the south side of town. It crossed the main highway from Hop Bottom, and led up the steep hill to the post office and Bertofts store where we could buy a five cent ice cream cone. It was an arduous five minute climb from Grandpa's home to the post office. And it was even a more difficult bicycle ride because the grade was so steep that we had to ride hair pins on the road to make it to the top. At this time, it was far too much work for Grandpa to climb the hill, and so it was my duty to fetch the mail each day, as well as to go to the grocery store for bread, butter, and sugar.
There two cricks always available for our pleasure. The main crick (it had a name I cannot recall) originated miles north and followed the valley though the Kurpinski farm, by the sawmill, through Brooklyn, through the Capron farm, and on to Hop Bottom and beyond. It was peaceful and pleasant most of the time, but as with most mountain streams it was a monster in disguise. I can remember on several occasions when heavy rains brought floods that inundated the bridge and state road. But, Grandpa's house was just far enough up the hill to be high and dry. We had swimming holes in the crick on both the Kurpinski and the Capron farms.
A small feeder crick ran across our backyard to join the main crick about a hundred yards down stream. This was my crick, and I loved to play in it, searching for pretty well worn rocks of differing shades, and finding little shrimp like crawdads hidden under rocks. I would build tiny rock dams and watch the glistening water trickle through them. A path from the wood house led through the backyard garden, and crossed the crick on a flagstone foot bridge on its way to the barn.
The house had a full basement that was a delight. Its floor was damp earth and its four walls were not unlike a stack of flagstones piled neatly one on top of the other. There was no mortar. The walls were porous and leaked whenever the ground was wet. But, the best thing about the basement was a tiny stream, about a foot wide, that followed along the wall on the side closest to the street. The basement was always dank, almost dark and cool, and the ice cold stream served as a refrigerator to keep perishables for a short term storage.
The once vital barn with it horses and milk cows now suffered from years of disuse and neglect. But it was filled with mystery and provided a perfect place to explore and play during rainy days. I can remember a four passenger ice sleigh that occupied the central open space in the barn. Dust and straw were strewn about, and the mangers lay empty. It was a nostalgic reminder of former days when it was put to good use for winter trips to attend church and visit neighbors. Old harnesses hung from the walls, and the empty stalls silently waited for the horses to be brought in. I climbed the worn ladder to the loft which still had remnants of hay harvested in yesteryears, and memories returned of how Boney and I played in the haylofts on Dad's farm in Virginia.
I had a path along side the barn through the small back pasture that was grown up with milkweed and nettles. Heavy morning dew wet the weeds so that it soaked my pants walking through it. This path lead to the hillside pasture where the cows had grazed the grass short, and walking became much easier. The hillside pasture was separated from the lower meadow by a winding stone wall where the little red chipmunks cavorted. Hickory nut trees overhung the wall to furnish islands of shade. The stone walls had tumbled down in places, but for most part the heavy stones held formation. Cattle are habitual creatures and over generations of grazing the hillside had made winding paths, taking the easy grade to ascend the hill and to avoid small cliffs and large boulders. The paths made walking easier for us kids who used the whole hillside to explore and play. High up on the hill was a cave we explored. I use the term 'hill' rather loosely, for these hills were large and steep and could take an hour to climb.
There was ample garden space on the uphill side of the house. This area was partly occupied by a strawberry patch which I rued because Grandpa expected me to spend countless hours pulling grass from the berries. Beyond that was a wagon path that crossed the backyard crick and led to the barn. The bridge over the little crick was one robust slab of flagstone thick enough to bear the weight of team and wagon. Other children and I would sit on top of the single stone bridge and watch the little critters in the babbling crick that flowed beneath. Next on the uphill side, was the village blacksmith shop. Oh! What a delightful place it was. Often you could hear the ringing of the hammer as the Smith shaped horseshoes on the anvil. I have watched him intently as he held the red hot shoe in his tongs, and shaped the curve on the arm of the anvil. He hammered with a rhythm, sometime beating the hot metal, and taping on the anvil in cadence as he repositioned his tongs. I gasped as he plunged the red hot shoe in the barrel of water and saw the puff of steam. The Blacksmith wore a heavy leather apron, and I can see him now, as he wedged a massive hoof between his legs and positioned the shoe on the bare hoof. Then he drove the nails into the hoof and clinched them so that they would not loosen. On occasion, he would let me pump the big leather bellows to liven the red embers in his forge.
The Universalist church was just uphill from the school. During the early visits to Grandpa's I attended Sunday School there and became acquainted with children of my age. I was allowed to toll the big heavy bell in the tower. The rope ran from the bell to the foyer of the church. I would pull on the rope with a rhythm and take glee at the powerful bong - bong - bong. If I held onto the rope, it would almost lift me from the floor. The church had a luxurious grass lawn in front of it which was a delightful place for little children to play. The lawn was framed by flagstone sidewalks that led to the dual church entrances. We enjoyed a game we called: "Tom, Tom, Steal Away." It was a form of tag where we would run and dodge from one walkway to the other trying not to be tagged by children in the center lawn. The last one to be tagged was the winner. We ran back and forth with shrieks of laughter and thought it was the most fun. Mrs. Smith was the Sunday School teacher. She had two boys, Boyd and Homer, that were near my age. Sometimes she would invite me home with them, and I could read the funny paper.
The church had a long shed in the back with a number of stalls for parking the horses and carriages. It was a great place to climb and exercise on rainy days. And this is where the church 'restrooms' were. They were actually partitions in the stalls and only used when necessary, but as kids are, we explored them thoroughly and took notice of the odor associated with such places.
There was a huge boulder in the back pasture that stood so high that it could be seen from the backyards of most of the homes on Brooklyn Avenue. It could be climbed, and the top was flat like a table. From the top there was a nice view of the homes below and the hill and cliff above. I remember the rock particularly well because on an early trip to Brooklyn to visit Aunt Stella Pratt, Mother had a birthday party for me. Aunt Stella and Mother prepared a picnic basket and spread a cloth on top of the rock where we lunched. Up above the rock stood the cliff where we frequently camped. There was a beechnut tree that tenaciously clung to the edge of the cliff with its branches seemingly suspended in space. I took great pains to carve my initials in the smooth bark of the beech. On many occasions I would dream of returning to this beech to see if my initials were still there. After many years had passed I did indeed return to the tree, and Lo, the initials remained. That trip stopped the dreaming episodes.
Aunt Nellie and Uncle Joe had a beautiful place that bordered on the crick just across the iron bridge. They did not have to worry about flooding because his home was on a steep hill well above the flood plain. An ancient cemetery was situated on the hill above the home and another in front of his home. It seemed that Brooklyn cemeteries occupied about as much space as the town itself. There were many civil war veterans buried there. Uncle Joe and Aunt Nellie Tewksbury were of no kin but were given honorary titles because they were lifelong friends of my Mother. When I was perhaps six or seven years old, I spent a lot of time with Uncle Joe. He was a violin maker and had a pleasant shop out behind his lovely home.
Uncle Joe's shop was a delight. It was a man's place filled with all sorts of interesting things. The walls were decorated with squirrel tails and pickerel heads. His long bamboo fishing poles were mounted on the side. In the center of his shop was a well used chopping block. He always kept a supply of butternuts and he would allow me to crack and eat them when I visited. Uncle Joe was an exquisite craftsman of many talents and was well educated. He was a cobbler and repaired shoes (though mine were beyond repair.) He was a good barber and he cut my hair many times. Sometime early in life his scissors slipped from his hand and stuck in the top of his foot. It crippled him for life. When he cut my hair, he made me feel so good by telling me that I had a nice shaped head. I think he liked me. He was very finicky about his carving tools, and taught me how to lay them on the side to protect their keen edges. He would give me a soft rag and have me polish parts of the violins he was crafting. His violins were beautiful and hand crafted all the way. He sought very old wooden stock from antique furniture to fashion the violins, taking preference to curly maple. His signature, inlaid with silver and hidden inside, embellished each one he built. Sometimes he would entertain me by playing "Turkey In The Straw," and "Yankee Doodle Dandy."
There was a deep well in Uncle Joe's front yard. It was covered with a shelter and had a windlass to fetch the cold water from its depths. It was fun to plunge the bucket into the deep, dark well and wind it up and get a cold drink. Once, when I visited Uncle Joe on a clear night, he brought out his brass telescope and gave me a tour of the heavens. I asked him many questions about the stars and life, and he taught me as a philosopher would have. He attributed the beauties of the sky and the mysteries of the universe to: "Mother Nature." It stimulated my mind, and when I told mother about my delightful learning experience, she was disturbed for it was not religious doctrine. On many occasions Uncle Joe and I would go berrying. He knew where the best blackberries and raspberries were hidden and was welcomed on many farms. Uncle Joe was a master fisherman too. He had hip boots to wade through the tall grass along the crick shore, and with his long bamboo poles could cast well out into the crick and entice the pickerel and pike to take bait. The fish heads that adorned the walls of his shop attested to his success. Uncle Joe added dimensions to my life that I had been denied. Some of him lingers in me today. We are creatures of our environment.
The summer I became twelve years old was the most memorable summer I spent at Grandpa's. When I first arrived in the spring of that year, this southern boy was not well accepted by the group of boys my age. There were about eight of us. Their ring leader, Herman Otto, looked upon me with disfavor, and the other kids followed his lead. Inevitably, there was a confrontation, and the years of hard farm work that had made my little arms hard and sinewy paid off. We tussled and I was able to pin him down. That was the end of the unfriendliness. I was accepted; Herman and I became friends; he gave me use of his bicycle, and took me into his home. We camped and swam together.
Perhaps my favorite playmate was Herman Otto. He had a bicycle and lived in a nice home on the main road with two large hemlock trees in the front yard. His Daddy was a friendly man and I can remember him chinning on a limb of the hemlock. And when the occasion was right, he would pop open a bottle of homemade root beer and treat us. Morris Otto was Herman's cousin and lived at the top of the hill across from Berthof's store. Morris' mother had passed on, and his Dad let Morris do as he pleased. On rainy days we bounced tennis balls against the wall in a large room. And his Dad had a large barn in back of the house which had the best hiding places for the game of hide and seek. There were two Smith brothers near my age, Boyd and Homer. Often on Sundays, Mrs. Smith would invite me home with them, and I could read the funny paper. Mr. Smith drove us up to Ely lake quite frequently. The Smiths had a large building in back in which a whole gang of us would sleep out. Homer Smith had gland trouble and at twelve years old was six feet tall. He developed sexually ahead of his time. Tragically, he was hit in the head by a baseball and it killed him on the spot. Then there were the Tiffany children, Billy, Margie, and Jean. The Tiffany's had money, and Mr. Tiffany would pile us in his yellow open top Buick sedan and take us on trips. The two Capron boys lived on a farm south of Brooklyn and we swam with them at the Capron swimming hole. Bob Capron and I played a lot of tennis together.
One of the joys of Brooklyn was fishing in the cricks and the fresh water pond on Sterling's farm. And such fishing requires worms. Night crawlers are large earthworms that as their name implies crawl at night. After a heavy rain, the worms come to surface and crawl around. We used to take our flashlights and go hunting for them at night after a rain. They were fairly easy to catch, but we had to be quick. They could zip back into their holes in the ground in a instant. They were easier prey when they ventured onto the sidewalks and roads. In about fifteen minutes we could catch a nice can full of worms for use the next day. We did much of our fishing on rainy days. The old folks said the fish would bite better in the rain, but I now suspect that it was a ruse to get the kids out of the house.
Jerry and I were of the same age and over time we became close friends. Jerry's father was an alcoholic and ruled over his family with fear. They lived in a small home on the flood plane adjacent to the sawmill. When the river would rise, it would float the caked sawdust and threaten their home. Jerry and I fished together, swam together, and berried together. He had access to a 22 rifle, and we would scour the hills and hickory groves hunting for squirrels. We learned that squirrels were wary creatures, and it was best to take a place under the hickories, stay quiet and still, and let the squirrels reveal themselves. It was risky business for two twelve year olds to have access to rifles, but we were careful. I can remember once when we went blackberrying that my toes were sticking out of my shoes and Jerry loaned me a pair of his shoes. We found a particularly fine patch of blackberries in a hemlock slashing on the side of a hill. The thorny vines stood well over head tall. I was making my way down the fallen trunk of a tree when I lost my footing and plunged down amongst the thorny stalks. I was scratched unmercifully and had great difficulty extricating myself from the dense thicket. Later, when we went swimming, each and every scratch became alive and I had to relive the ordeal.
One of our favorite things to do was to camp out. It was a thrilling experience for young twelve year olds, and some younger children, to go up into the hills, set up little pup tents, and spend the night. One such camping spot was on the top of the cliff that stood a few hundred yards up the hill from Grandpa's barn. It was a lovely site and we had a great view of the village below. But, Oh how dark it got at night! The only light came from the stars, and if it was cloudy, you could not see to walk without a flashlight. We would bunk down in our little tents under the quilts and talk and giggle ourselves to sleep. Usually we slept two of us to a tent. We thought we were quite manly and brave, and we were because the desolate hillside seemed to be beset with all sorts of dangerous things, maybe even bears. Late one night my buddy and I slipped over to an adjacent tent and silently loosened the tie downs and completely removed the tent (it had no floor). Then we made a noise and wakened the boys. They sat up, searched around with their arms, and then one inquired: "Who moved us out here? We burst into laughter. My older brother, Walter, and Art Sterling, setup camp higher on the hill one night in a desolate area. They heard noises and became so frightened that they came scampering down to safer territory.
The school had a nice tennis court in the back. The surface was a little coarse and the footing was not all that good. We had to renew the lines with lime ourselves. The backstops were made of two heights of chicken wire and that stopped most of the errant balls, but not all of them. The summer I was twelve was my 'tennis summer.' Oh how I wanted to play well. Somehow I got my hands on some instructions written by my idol 'Big Bill Tilden.' I studied and tried to imitate his style and strokes. In the morning, we would meet early and play tennis until the heat of the day. I played and played. I can well remember one day that I played 100 games. When it got too hot to play tennis, and it does get hot in July in Brooklyn (the roads would stew tar) we would mount our bikes and go down to Capron's swimming hole.
The Capron family were close friends to Mama. Aunt Vina Capron (no kin) and Mom had known each other from childhood. The Capron farm adjoined Grandpa's farm. Robert Capron was a playmate. We enjoyed playing in Capron's barn. It was a three story barn and it had a swell hayloft. We would pitch down a bundle of hay to the lower floor and then jump from the loft into the hay. This barn still stands (2003). We spent many delightful hours at Capron's swimming hole. It was situated in the middle of Capron's cow pasture. Grandpa's former farm house overlooked this flood plain meadow. The same crick that ran through Brooklyn ran through this pasture. It was a beautiful crick with all sorts of rocks big and small, and the water rippled over them and glimmered in the sunlight. Once in a while, we would walk the crick bottom from Brooklyn all the way down to Capron's, but it was much faster to ride our bikes down. Over the years, boys had piled rocks across the crick to make a leaky dam. We plugged the major leaks with sod, and that made a nice swimming pool which occupied the area of a small house. The water was only about waist deep and relatively warm in the summer. As many as six of the Brooklyn boys would swim together and frolic in the water. Sometimes when the girls were not with us, we would abandon our swimming suits and play 'pickle on a plate.' Once in a while Francis Quick would come down to join us, but her stay would be brief before her older brother would come down to rescue her.
During the summer, we made almost daily trips to Ely lake for a swim. Often, Mr. Smith would load us into his Dodge Touring Car and drive us up the rocky, unpaved road to the lake. The road was rough and twisty. In one place it had washed down to the bedrock and we were actually driving over nature's pavement. The old Dodge would grind along with frequent gear changes that fascinated me. I had been used to a Model T with pedals on the floor. At other times we would walk and take bicycles up to the lake. It was near impossible to ride the bicycles up the road, but we could thrill at the harrowing ride back, using enough discretion to brake when absolutely necessary. Billy Tiffany took a fall and broke his arm. At other times, when there were only one or two of us, we would walk up to the lake. Perhaps it was a couple of miles of climbing, and we would take shortcuts through some of the farmer's pastures, ever on the alert for the bulls. On one occasion a surly bull spotted us and forced up a tree for fear of our lives. (Bulls do kill farmers. The farm Dad bought in Princess Anne County became available because the owner was gored to death.) We didn't go that way again.
Ely lake was a great place to swim. There was a little rocky beach on the lower side of the lake where a small spillway continually released the overflow from the upwelling underwater springs. At this location the beach tapered out into the lake about 40 feet before the water was over our heads. This gave us ample area to frolic and splash around. Sometimes there would be two carloads of boys and girls swimming at one time. Once, brother Walter waded out too far and slipped off a rock into water over his head. He went under, touched bottom, and jumped up, only to sink again. Fortunately, he was able to bounce his way to shallower water and made it in OK. We had a nifty dressing room just across the rocky road from the beach. It was a patch of high huckleberry bushes that was quite dense. But, there was a little path leading to the center where there was a bare spot about the size of small bedroom. This spot provided seclusion were we could change out of our wet bathing suits and enjoy a few handfuls of huckleberries as a bonus. The girls would change there too, but we were chaperoned by the parents that drove us up to the lake.
When the scouting season was over, we would at times go to the girl scout camp to swim. There they had a nice dock and diving board. But the water was very deep, and only real swimmers dared use the diving board. Sometimes there would be several girls with us. The girls and boys were at that naughty age. We had learned to tell nasty jokes and say bad words. I can remember so well the day I was sitting on the dock, when Jean Tiffany came up behind me, straddled her legs across me, and proceeded to slowly and deliberately wring out her bathing suit skirt on top of my head. I got the message and we all laughed. I just don't know what would have happened if I had spent summers in Brooklyn when I was older.
The most fun in camping occurred at Ely lake. This beautiful mountain top lake was a delightful place to camp. In the spring and early summer the water was good enough to drink, and well it should have been, for it was not fed by cricks, but by under water springs that welled up chilly columns of fresh water. The lake was elliptical in shape and nearly a half mile long. Only the very best endurance swimmers could swim around the periphery. It was deep too, very deep in the center, for it filled a mountain gorge. We had a diving board on the Otto property, and once Herman Otto lost his glasses while diving. The next morning when we came down to swim, Herman's glasses were clearly visible, nestled in eight feet of water, just off the end of the diving board.
At times we were privileged to set up our tents in the meadow just above the lake. Someone provided us with a nice, army style tent that comfortably slept four of us boys. At the end of the lake, there was the Girl Scouts Camp. It was quite active, and at times dozens of girls from nearby towns camped there. We were about twelve years old at the time and took great joy slithering through the tall meadow grass to sneak a close look at what was going on in the camp, and hoping to get a furtive glass of the girls as they put on their bathing suits. We would cook our breakfast, eggs and bacon, and drink milk which we kept cool in the lake. As I have mentioned, the water was quite chilly in spots and it took a lot of activity to keep the goose bumps down. But, after swimming, we would go up to the warm tent in the sunshine and the heat would cause our bodies to glow. After sunset, all four of us would bed down in our quilts, talk and laugh, and do experimental things that naked little twelve year old boys are likely to do.
On one occasion, we were allowed to use one of the Otto cabins to spend the night. The adults prepared us a good meal over an open fire just on the edge of the lake. They had a canoe pulled up on the shore. After supper, it grew dark, and Morris Otto and I decided upon a little adventure. We sneaked the canoe into the water and paddled out into the lake -- our first canoe trip. The next thing we knew a resounding splash broke the silence of the night. We had overturned the canoe and were floundering in the deep cold water. We heard cries of alarm from the shore from Mr. Otto, but were too frightened to answer at first. The next thing we new, Mr. Otto was at our side with a rowboat. He gathered us in, and would have berated us severely, but for the fact, that he was so glad to find us alive. We were brought ashore, and after wringing out our clothes, we hung them above the smoldering fire to dry during the night.
During the summer a traveling carnival came to town. What an impression that made on us children. They set up a one-ring circus tent up on the Sterling's place. There were no rides, or that sort of thing. But, they did feature little skits, clowns, and side shows. I thought they had the most remarkable acrobats I had ever seen. One of their performers placed the two back legs of an ordinary kitchen chair into two tall glass bottles. Then he sat in the chair and succeeded in balancing himself. He was a thrilling trapeze artist, and would place the back two legs of a chair on a trapeze bar and balance himself. They sold candy and offered prizes to naïve children who bought a box of candy. There was music and fanfare, and it was a delight for the country people who rarely had a carnival to come to town.
High up on the hill above Brooklyn was the Sterling place. Art Sterling and brother Walter were friends but they never played with us youngsters. Below the Sterling place was a meadow and cow pasture with a small crick that ran through the pasture. Beside the crick stood a small oak tree with branches that you could walk under. Morris Otto and Art Ulko and I got permission to build a shack under the oak. We managed to garner a few posts and boards and erected a makeshift shelter. We found an old piece of linoleum to serve as a roof. We were wise enough to build three hammock like structures about two feet off the ground to serve as bunks. The hammocks were made of burlap bags (feed bags) and we filled the sagging burlap with wheat straw. We were partially sheltered by the oak, and the shack was quite comfortable, if it did not rain hard. And it gave us a real feeling of accomplishment. I can remember awaking one morning to find a cow browsing on the straw that I was sleeping on. The novelty soon wore off and we sought other outlets for our energy.
There were a half dozen bicycles owned by the boys of the town. Eddy Ulko was a natural mechanic, and his bicycle was lubricated and tuned to coast the farthest and the fastest. We would gather Uptown in a relatively flat area in front of the three stores that served Brooklyn. I say 'Uptown' because we had to climb the hill from Grandpa's place and because this was the location of the Post Office, grocery store, and a general merchandise store that comprised the heart of commercial activity. There was a large Town Hall building across the street from the grocery store. It was in this area that we boys would congregate in the cool of the evening and demonstrate our riding skills on the bicycles, like riding without hands, riding backwards, making tight circles, and bouncing on the sidewalks. It provided an outlet for our energy and kept us from pranks. But the most fun came after we ascended the hill all the way to the top, way above Brooklyn. It was an arduous ascent; we had to push the bikes a good part of the way. The breathtaking glee came on the descent as we speeded down the incline so fast that we could not catch up with the pedals. It was dangerous, but the Lord looked out for us and no one was seriously hurt.
Directly across from Grandpa's house stood the township school. It was a large brick building with three stories. I remember it so well because on a later trip to Brooklyn when I was about sixteen, I became infatuated with Anna Collins, a pretty little redhead that I would swim with. She had a silk swimming suit that drove me nuts. While in school, she would sit close to the window that overlooked our front lawn. I would take that opportunity to take off my shirt and mow the lawn with the push mower, swell my chest and show my muscles as she looked down and waved. Her brother, Jerry, and I were close friends, really close. That was the summer we drove the 1932 Chevrolet to Brooklyn to pickup Grandpa. Jerry, his girl friend, Anna, and I piled into the Chevy and took a late night ride on a desolate road that was under construction. We parked, and I did the first necking I had every done in my life on the back seat with Anna. Jerry and his girl friend did the same on the front seat. That was my last trip to Brooklyn as a kid, and it was indeed a memorable one.
The summer I was fourteen was a particularly bad summer. My play days were over and the grim reality of making a living became my focus. Mother was in Brooklyn with Grandpa. Dad and I were on the farm by ourselves trying to grow tomatoes for market. We had no money. I mean NO money. And, there was very little to eat in the house. On one occasion I walked up to Tom Doughty's place on Indian River Road and asked him if he would share some of his garden vegetables. He did, and that put food on the table for a day or to, but we needed bread and butter. That Friday we received a letter in the mail from Mom; it had a precious dollar in it. Dad was too embarrassed to spend it. So, I made up a list and went to the A&P store in Campostella and bought almost exactly a dollar's worth of staples. We did have a smoked ham of our own, and we scrimped along until the tomato crop came to market.
The summer I was twelve was the last full summer I spent in Brooklyn. After that I stayed at home and helped Dad on the farm when Mother took Grandpa north to enjoy his home in Brooklyn. But, those summer trips North came to an end when I was about fourteen. Grandpa was no longer strong enough to make the trips, and he came to live with us the year round. We dedicated the West bedroom in our home to his use. He stayed down stairs all day and was barely able to climb the stairs at night. At this time the great depression had forced us deep in debt because the prices we received from acres of labor-intensive vegetable crops did not begin to pay for the cost of fertilizer, baskets, harvesting, and shipping.
As I mentioned above, our income was very meager, and between crops we had no income at all. Dad had mortgaged the farm to the hilt to pay past bills for guano and baskets. I can remember his going to the bank to try to borrow another hundred while Mom sat in the car and cried. By act of congress, the civil war veterans were granted a pension. Grandpa received $100 a month. Conditioned by a life of frugality, and with little regard for the nursing care that Mother was providing, Grandpa was slow to part with his money. Reluctantly, he doled out $20 each Saturday for us to go to town and buy groceries for the week. And from that $20 he expected Mom to buy him a quart of oysters for his personal consumption. This was a hard way to live, but it enabled us to survive.
Somehow Mom and Dad persuaded Grandpa that it would be a good idea if he would finance a crop of spinach so we could have some income. He took a personal interest in this because it was his money being spent, and I believe he expected to reap a personal profit. Dad and I, with help from our farmhand, Maryland, tilled the land, made up the beds, and planted the seeds. We hired hands to spoon the couple of acres. This was slow hand labor and expensive. Fertilizer was applied by a hand drill that we wheeled down the top of each bed. Grandpa, with his cane in hand, would occasionally make his way out to the field to inspect the crop. The crop grew well. Dad was an expert farmer. Finally harvest time came, and the crop was cut, barreled, shipped, and sold. We made a little more than expenses, and Grandpa wanted his money back. I doubt that he ever got it. After all, he was receiving free nursing care from us. I used to have to shave him and trim his toenails.
Time passed on and I became sixteen in the spring of 1935. Graduation was nearing. I was extremely shy and ashamed that I could not dress as well as the other kids. I had one pair of pants for school and I would brush them off and press them before going to school. One dear girl, Kathleen Woodhouse, called me aside one day and very gently gave me some grooming tips. Once, in Latin class, somehow my shredded underpants gave way and fell down my leg to the floor. The kids were kind enough not to notice, but inwardly I was mortified. Graduation finally came. All my classmates had stationery cards printed. Mom made mine with pen and ink. Grandpa lived to see me graduate, and he was talked into giving me $15 dollars to buy a graduation suit. I had no suitable shoes, so Dad loaned me his dress shoes. I remember that they were of the "Douglas" brand.
Grandpa was now ninety-four and too feeble to climb the stairs anymore. We took his meals to him upstairs and emptied the pot and chamber each day. We nursed him the best that we could. His bladder went bad, and Dr. McDonald came to his room a few times to insert a catheter and relieve his bladder. One morning when I checked on him, I found him dead in bed. It was not unexpected. He had lived to see his youngest grandchild graduate from high school and become a man. Mother took his body back to Brooklyn, and he was buried on the far downhill side of the cemetery in front of Uncle Joe Tewksbury's home. So ends the saga of Grandpa as I knew him from the my age of four to sixteen.
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