I wrote short bios on my grandparents and am now working on aunts and uncles. My book (from 2007) called 'The Alphabet of my Life' has small tidbits but they don't really tell much of a story about each person. And of course, when you read back what you've written years later, it's normal to cringe with just how badly you did write. I'm hoping to improve on that a bit. Course, some relatives I knew better than others so I can only go with what I have and hope that it's accurate.
Ideally, I would be able to visit each cousin and get their perspectives but sometimes it's hard to connect with family. I still intend to work more on that end of things. Saturday, I'll be visiting my oldest cousin, Ann, and since I don't have a lot of data on my Uncle Arthur, I'm hoping she can fill in some holes. I do have a piece her brother, Bill, wrote me years ago about their dad and it was a treasure to get. He writes well and we used to email frequently but not so much anymore. Not sure why. Some cousins are better than others at keeping in touch. I think that's how it is in most families. Anyhow, the piece on my dad's oldest brother, Arthur, is worth sharing....
I had to really think about what
he liked to do as I realized a lot of what we did together may have been more about
what I liked. He enjoyed watching wrestling. We watched it on TV and he took me
to local matches on occasion. I think most of the matches we went to were in
Tacoma. We went to Seattle Rainer baseball games at the old Sicks' Stadium.
That was my first experience with professional baseball. He liked auto racing.
We went to the midget auto races
out on Aurora Ave near the old Playland amusement park. Midget cars were
smaller versions of the Indy race cars of the time. We also attended races at Midway
and Spanaway.
The TV shows he liked were
Jackie Gleason in the Honeymooners, Your Show of Shows with Sid Caesar, and
Sanford & Son. We listened to music on the car radio but I never heard him
listen at home or express any real interest in music. This may have been
something we did for my pleasure. He got a big laugh out of a program on radio
called "Could This Be You". It was a program produced by the
Washington State Patrol of recordings of people pulled over for traffic
violations. It was really funny. Other radio shows He liked were Amos &
Andy, Jack Benny and Red Skelton.
Before he had a TV we went to
movies. A lot of them were war movies or westerns. Some of these must have been
when I was pretty young because I can remember that during intermission they
passed the hat collecting money for the war effort and "The March of
Dimes" to fight polio.
Thinking about my Dad enabled me
to realize some things I hadn't really thought about. I can't remember him ever
making a racist remark. I think that is pretty remarkable considering the
period in which he grew up. You wondered if he had a favorite sibling. If he
did he never told me. He enjoyed visiting with all of them and was really
pleased when they came to visit him. My dad always worried about visiting
around mealtimes. He thought they would think they had to feed us. He seemed to
have a really tough time accepting things from others.
Like many people who experienced
the depression he was pretty frugal. He wasn't cheap but he believed in getting
value for what he paid. He paid cash for everything. If he didn't have the
money to pay for it, he didn't buy it. He never had any credit accounts until
late in life and then it was only because to do certain things you needed to
establish credit. It seems strange that paying cash for everything doesn't
establish your credit worthiness.
He shopped yard sales and
frequently went to the Bremerton Shipyards surplus sale. He would buy things
that he thought he might have a use for some day. He bought several cars at
disposal auctions.
My Dad was a "Rigger"
at the shipyards. He never talked with me about his work so I am not exactly
sure what a "Rigger" did. I think they were involved in setting
scaffolding and various cables for lifting heavy objects on the ships.
He liked to fish and hunt. He
taught me how to shoot and we would go target shooting. He enjoyed taking Lee,
Arlie and me camping and fishing. He liked playing jokes on us. On one occasion
he pretended to be a bear outside the tent. I am sure Lee and Arlie will tell
you they knew it was him all along but they were screaming just as loud as I
was and we were all trying to get away from the side of the tent he was on. He
spent a lot of time with me every year, taking me on trips, camping and
fishing. He had to take a lot of time off from work to do this. I just took it
for granted and thought every father did this. After I took my own kids camping,
I came home and told everyone I didn't remember camping being so much work. I
am not aware of any hobbies but he did like to garden. He had an extensive
fruit and vegetable garden with several apple and cherry trees. He gave a lot
of what he raised to his neighbors. He kept his house even after he moved out
and would go there during the day and work in the garden.
I don't know when my parents
divorced but I think I was around three years old. I used to wonder when I was
in my teens what had brought my parents together. They were so different in
their interests. I can't remember either one of them ever saying anything bad
about the other. I was very lucky that my father chose to stay part of my life and my
mother allowed it.
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