Voice From the Past

This is the second time today I've posted this - the first time was a real mess, and I finally figured out what to do about it.  I can't remember if I posted the gist of this letter before, but if not, it truly is a gem. Dorothy and I spent the weekend going through boxes of letters, and she is going to scan them for the family, but this one I kept - it is such a gem.  When I was a senior in the spring of 1953, I was in the senior class play, staying all week with Kells, and going home on the weekends for six weeks.  Ann kept me in the family loop by sending me little messages via Audrey Baxter, also a senior, who rode the school bus.  This letter is a real gem, and deserves to be immortalized.  It wouldn't mean much to those who did not know our family, but it is definitely meaningful in all aspects to us.

Baby Louise Taking a Bath in the Yard 1932?

No remedies existed for this photo.  However, it tells so many stories the way it is--the summer day, the wash on the line, Louise in the washtub in the yard, the orchard trees--this yard was a part of our lives.

Frosty Tree in Penrose Winter

Sounds of Home

Sometimes it is a sight, sometimes it is a smell and sometimes it is a sound that takes us back to the love of our Penrose home.  I captured this sound this morning to share with you on this lovely sunshine day.

The Cow Barnyard After I Left Home

The shop is on the right, the lean to garage straight ahead, the light pole that the cat named Holstein (a coward) would shinny up and sit on top until his warring battle scarred friends departed, the white house ahead.

Steve

I apologize for feeding the blog so much this morning. Recovering from the flu bug that was generously shared while we were together last week (thankfully it is about a 24 hour bug), has given time to just sit and start on the photo scanning again. I ran across this photo of handsome Steve and one of our many cute kittens. This does show a little more of the "guys" bedroom.

Legs and the Repainted Bed

The pictures on the wall have changed. I wonder what they were? Judy is busy with something and now you can see the stencil on the end of the now blue bed. Books in the bookcase still remain a mystery. This negative is on the same negative strip as the one of Judy at the sewing machine and Steve crawling under the truck.

The Rest of the Story

This photo of Judy is on the same negative strip as the one with Steve under the truck. Note the baseball glove on her left hand. Did she miss the ball and it went under the truck?

A Real Truck

What do you think that Steve is looking for????  Name this truck....year and model.  Remember when Mother laid the bricks so she could have a clean walk way?  I think I see a branch of the red roses I planted on the right edge of the picture.  Ann probably took this one too.

Treadle Sewing Machine

How did I ever get Ann to take all of these pictures?  I'm sure happy that she did as I think this is the only picture of the old sewing machine.  When did Mother get it?  And at what expense?  Most of our clothes were created with the foot power of this machine, including the shirt I am wearing.  Make a list!

Pansy Curtains

A couple of years earlier with a more reasonable pose.  Notice the pansey curtains and Elizabeth's graduation picture on top of the chest of drawers.  I think we each had one drawer??? Everything fit just fine, one of the blessings of not having too much.

Curtains on the Windows

I suspect if I played with this photo I could cut back on the glare, but oh, well. And what can you see in this photo? Note, the curtains on the windows. I can't imagine Dwight lived in this room and didn't have curtains, unless he dressed and undressed in the dark.

Thoughts of Home

Here are a few lines from a poem by Thomas Hood I included in my book "Echoes of My Wyoming Boyhood."  I hope I am not infringing copyrights.  I thought the poem fit in nicely with the photo below of the little brown house where I spent the first nine years of my life.

I Remember, I Remember

I remember, I remember,

The house where I was born,

The little window where the sun

Came peeping in at morn:

He never came a wink too soon,

Nor brought too long a day;

But now, I often wish the night

Had borne my breath away.

. . .

I remember, I remember,

Where I used to swing,

And thought the air must rush as fresh

To swallows on the wing;

My spirit flew in feathers then,

That is so heavy now,

And summer pools could hardly cool

The fever on my brow!

. . .

Who Remembers The Old Fashioned Revival Hour?

Morning get-out-of-bed-and-get-going time always came early at our house. Dad always had to get up and milk the cows, 30 below zero or not, and Mom always had to get up to prepare food for the tribe. In the winter, Dad got up extra early because the coal fire in the coal stoves that heated our house and cooked our food always went out around 3:00 a.m. or so and we would freeze when we woke up in our unheated bedrooms, pulling something on quickly and moving to the living room to finish dressing by the stove.

One constant through those early mornings of getting ready to go out to the fields to hoe beets or haul hay in the summer or to catch the unheated school bus for an hour ride to school beginning in September was the radio. And I can still hear the echoes of "Good morning, this is KGHL, Billings Montana, bringing you The Old Fashioned Revival Hour." This greeting was followed by a stirring rendition of "Every day with Jesus is sweeter than the day before; every day with Jesus I love Him more and more; Jesus loves and keeps me and He's the One I'm waiting for." And then we scarfed down cooked cereal, or invalid eggs (baked eggs in cream, pancakes, toast miraculously toasted in the coal-stove oven slathered with strawberry jam from the cellar, milk from the cows in the barnyard, and we were out the door. And, try as I might to do otherwise, my days still echo to the strains of the Old Fashioned Revival Hour from KGHL in Billings Montana.

Penrose 2009

Kemp took this picture when he visited Penrose this last winter. At first glance, I did not recognize the picture as THE house. The hills seem too close and the light pole is in the wrong place. And what a smooth graveled lane. And in general though, it is still an inviting place to live, love and stay warm from the cold wind.

Keep the Home Fire Burning

Whose turn is it to bring in a load of coal from the coal shed? Got to keep the fire going so the stove can keep us warm, cook the dinner, bake the bread, and heat water for washday and Saturday night baths. This coal bucket stood sentinal beside the stove, ready to feed the fire's hungry mouth.

When It's Springtime......

I have borrowed this photo from Dwight's archives. Just as his photo of the lilacs brought to remembrance the sweet perfume, so does the picture of cleaning the barnyard remind me of a certain smell. How I would love a good load of this stuff for my garden!

Addition by Dwight: Oh my gosh, what a wonder the manure loader was. For all of those years before, each load of manure was hand forked into the manure spreader--backbreaking work. But look at that contraption: It took forever to attach that complicated maze of equipment to that poor old anemic John Deere. And note the combination of tractor power and horse power with Pet and Babe. One of the first loads was typically spread on the garden which ensured another bountiful harvest so the bog clods would produce enough for another year. And the Penrose church is in the background. I can smell it all now. I don't think any of us ever understood or fully appreciated just how hard Dad worked and how much backbreaking manual labor he did to make it possible for all of us to survive.

Home Sweet Home

Name That Cat!

How does a cat keep from freezing to death in the Wyoming winter cold? Where did we get this cat? How old was he? Any stories to share? And who would give a cat such a name?

Winter 1959

I don't know who we owe for this photo of our Penrose home. The winter of 1959 I spent at BYU. The day I left to return to school the temperature was 40 below zero. It doesn't look much warmer in this photo. Frost is on everything! We have all had our own share of too much winter weather this year. But really did any of us have anything that compared with this?