The Olden Days
A LITTLE GIRL OF LONG AGO
Childhood Recollections of Illinois Farm Life
Cecilia Moran Vollbrecht
1908 – 1992
written 1965 to 1980 Princeton, New Jersey
CHAPTER 1
WHEN CECILIA WAS VERY YOUNG
IT WAS A BRIGHT OCTOBER MORNING, IN THE LONG AGO YEAR OF 1913. CECILIA AND HER LITTLE BROTHER, LOUIS, WERE PLAYING IN THE CHERRY ORCHARD. THEIR BIG BROTHER AND THREE BIG SISTERS, DRIVING BEHIND BABE, THE WHITE FACED PONY, HAD JUST GONE OUT OF SIGHT DOWN THE ROAD TO SCHOOL.
Cecilia was almost five years old, and her mother depended upon her to take care of Louis who was only two. So she watched him and kept him from going where there were animals that might hurt him and from dangers like falling into the big horse trough, or into the pond in the apple orchard. She did not let him go too near the bee hives, nor fall off the high back porch.
Louis Moran about one year old.
This morning she was taking him with her to the rail fence at the end of the cherry orchard, in the hope that they could see the new baby calf. Her older brother, Maurice, who was 16, had told her about the baby that had come during the night to Daisy, the Jersey cow.
Cecilia climbed up the rail fence and looked over into the apple orchard. She laughed when she saw the tiny calf standing beside its mother. Daisy was gently licking her baby. She mooed questioningly at Cecilia.
Then Louis wanted to see the calf. It was not easy to teach him to climb up the rail fence. His short legs kept slipping, but Cecilia held him and pushed him until he could peek over the top rail and grin at the wobbly new baby. He was happy.
For many days they went each morning for a look at the calf before wandering on to other exciting things. Cecilia wished Louis would hurry and grow bigger so that they could take longer walks beyond the barns and orchard. Louis was a chubby little boy with big pink cheeks, blue eyes and blond hair. Mostly he was good and they had fun together, but sometimes he was bad, showed fiery temper and would not mind Cecilia. She had heard Grandpa say to Mama “That little girl is spoiling that boy”.
“Grandpa” Peter Russell Moran abt. 1912
Thomas Benedict Moran, Cecilia’s father about 1912
Grandpa was very old, over eighty. He had come to live with them that year. Papa looked something like him except that Grandpa had a gray beard and walked with a cane. Papa walked straight and strong and his dark blue eyes had a lot more twinkle in them than Grandpa’s had. His hair was thick and sort of curly; Grandpa had hardly any hair at all.
The plaything that Louis like best was the bottom part of his old baby carriage: It was just four wheels on a frame with the carriage part removed. He would lean on it with both hands and run along behind it. One day he bumped Grandpa with it and almost made him fall to the ground. Papa punished Louis.
There were lots of fun things to do out side on the nice fall days. Now it was apple picking time. A small girl and boy could help by picking up the apples from the ground and putting them in the barrel that was going to be taken to the cider press. Papa and the hired man picked beautiful apples from the trees and stored them carefully in the cellar or in pits for the winter.
The pits were made by digging out a little earth, spreading straw and placing the apples or vegetables on the straw. Then they were covered with straw and a thick layer of earth. Sometimes carrots, turnips, parsnips and other vegetables were put in the pit. Later in the winter the pit would be dug open and the family would enjoy eating the fresh vegetables and fruit.
In those days fresh vegetables could not be bought at the grocery store at any season, as they are today. Parents had to plan carefully and spend much time and work in order to have good food to put on their table.
Some of the apples that were not good enough to store were made into apple butter. Cecilia liked it best when Mama made it in the big black kettle out in the yard. They liked to see the fire burning under the kettle and watch it being stirred with a long handled ladle and finally put into big jars and carried to the cellar. How good it would taste on a piece of Mama’s fresh baked bread on a winter day!
Thomas Benedict Moran and Frances Ellen Rice on their Wedding Day
January 29, 1895
CHAPTER 2
a BIG SURPRISE
One quiet afternoon Cecilia grew tired of playing with the pile of yellow pumpkins which her father and brought in from the corn field and stacked near the back porch. Mama had given her one of the cute, small ones for her very own. She tried scratching a face on it with a stick and poking bits of wood into it for eyes and nose. Still it didn’t look much like a face. Better wait until the “Big Ones” came home from school . One of them would get a knife and cut a real funny face out of her pumpkin. Right now she felt like gathering hickory nuts.
In the pasture just beyond the new barn, the tall hickory trees stood along the fence bordering the road. Cecilia picked up her red pail and started off. Louis was having a nap so he couldn’t follow her. That was good as Mama would scold her if she took him that far from the house. She had often come down to these trees with Dorothy, her next older sister, and sometimes on weekends, when Marie and Winifred were not busy helping Mama, they took her with them clear down to the big woods. It was as much fun hunting black walnuts and hickory nuts there as it was just playing in the big piles of red and gold leaves. Today it was an adventure to go alone down to the hickory trees with only Dewey, the big collie, bounding along beside her.
It was easy for a small girl to squeeze through the boards of the pasture gate beside the barn. She looked first to see that no horses or cattle were grazing at that end of the pasture. Then she ran down along the fence to the trees by the roadside. Many nuts lay partly hidden among the yellow leaves, their green outer shells had dried and were falling off. The nuts from these trees were the best on the farm; they were the white, paper shelled kind that were easy to crack. Her sisters taught her to crack them on the concrete slab under the high back porch, now Cecilia could do it herself and eat all she liked.
Her pail was almost full when Dewey, who had been chasing a squirrel, stopped and gave a friendly bark. Cecilia looked up and saw a young woman walking along the road toward her. It was Nettie coming home from shopping in Trowbridge. Cecilia liked Nettie, so she did not run away as she did from most grownups, but gave her a shy smile. Nettie sometimes helped Mama around the house when she was needed, like when Cecilia was a baby and later when Louis first came to Mama.
“Hello,” called Nettie, “How’s my little girl?” she stopped for a moment, resting her basket of groceries on the grass by the roadside. “You’re getting bigger. What blue eyes and pretty hair you’ve got. My, did you pick up all those nuts?”
“Yes, Ma’am.”
“If I remember right, you must be having a birthday right about now. Um – how old?”
“Five on the tenth of November.”
“Oh my, that’s next Saturday. Tell your Mama I’d like you and your big sisters to come to my house on Saturday afternoon for a surprise for your birthday. Will you tell them that?”
Cecilia nodded happily and waved good-bye. She was so excited as she started to run back home to tell her mother about Nettie that she almost forgot her pail of nuts.
In the kitchen, Cecilia found her slender, dark haired mother preparing pumpkin to cook and make into pies. When she saw Cecilia she sat down in the small rocker in the corner where she had rocked all her babies, and drew the child to her for a moment. Mama’s face was pink and white and she had lively, brown eyes. The tired lines left her face when she smiled. Mama was the center of Cecilia’s life, the person who was always there to comfort and care for her.
Mama brushed back the golden brown hair from Cecilia’s face with her hand and listened to the account of Nettie and the birthday surprise. The smile on Mama’s face grew brighter. This youngest daughter had always seemed more fragile than the others, but now, except for being a bit small for her age, healthy as any.
“Nice of Nettie to remember your birthday,” Mama murmured. “Such a good girl, Nerrie. I wish I could do more about birthdays, Cecilia, but they come too often in this house. Maybe later, but not now with Grandpa added to the family. Nine people are a lot to take care of.”
“But we can go to Nettie’s, Mama, all four of us?” It had not occurred to Cecilia to expect any notice of her birthday at home.
“Yes, I think I can spare the big girls Saturday afternoon.”
There was a sound of wheels turning in the driveway. Cecilia ran out
The ‘Big Ones’ were home from school.
Maurice let the girls out and then drove to the barn to unhitch Babe and care for her. The three girls came in and changed from their school dresses to rougher wear. Marie, the oldest, went to the kitchen to help Mama with the work there. She was little mother to both Cecilia and Louis. But Cecilia left her now to follow Winifred and Dorothy as they went to do outside chores.
As they got their baskets and started to gather the eggs, Cecilia told them about Nettie and the surprise for her birthday. They laughed and wondered about it and wished Saturday would hurry and come.
It was easy to gather the eggs from the nests built for the hens in the hen house, but the hens did not all choose to lay in these nests. Some made their own nests in the hay mow in each barn, or in a corner of a manger, so the barns had to be searched well. Then the eggs were counted and put into a container in a cool spot to be kept until they were taken to the store and exchanged for groceries. Some of the eggs were taken to the kitchen to be cooked for breakfast or used in other ways. Cecilia knew everyone was glad when the hens laid many eggs. There would be more eggs to take to the store and more money with which to buy good things for the family.
The next chore was feeding the chickens. The girls went to the granary in the new barn and filled pans with the ‘specially ground grain mixture’ for the chickens. One call of “Chick, Chick, Chickee” and the chickens came running in great numbers from all corners of the barn and poultry yards, and quickly picked up the grain the girls scattered for them.
Then they saw the milk cows being herded into the cow lot by Maurice who had ridden the pony down to the woodlawn pasture to bring them home. He and Papa would milk them, but the girls must feed the new calf which was being weaned from his mother. They took a pail of milk and tried to teach him to drink from it by dipping a finger into the milk and putting it in his mouth. Finally he understood and eagerly emptied the pail. They petted him and he said “Thank you” by following them to the gate and nuzzling against them.
It was growing dark as the girls hurried to the house. Mama was lighting the lamps. Soon the long table in the dining room was laid with nine places.
The sound of the cream separator was heard from the back porch. Papa turned the powerful handle of the machine and the fresh milk divided into the rich cream that ran in a small stream into a small container and the skimmed or fat free milk that ran into a big pail. Then the men came in and the family sat down to a hearty supper.
Later, as Cecilia sank to sleep in the soft feather bed beside her sister, Dorothy, she remembered that she was soon going to be five. Dorothy was eight and a half. That was old, but five was pretty old – almost old enough to go to school.
Marie, Winifred and Maurice Moran 1902
CHAPTER 3
THE FIFTH BIRTHDAY
Cecilia wished someone would help her with the top button on her new shoe. It was so slippery and would not go where it should. Maybe Winifred would fix it when she finished helping Dorothy loop her short, thick braids around her head. Marie had washed her and brushed her hair, and, because it was her birthday, let her pick her favorite dress to wear. It was nice not to have to wear one of those big ones that people always told her she was about to grow into.
“Come, get on your coat,” said Winifred, stopping to take care of the stubborn button. “It’s cold out, but nice and sunny.”
Mama watched them put on their wraps and waved them off happily.
They set off down the West Road to walk to Nettie’s house. Mostly Cecilia’s trips were down the East Road which led to the village and to church. She had never walked further on the West Road than the Miller Farm, a short way beyond the Hickory Nut trees. A half mile past the Miller House, the road became hilly and ran down to the big bridge over the creek. It was fun running up and down the hills. They seemed so much bigger when she had ridden over them in the buggy, once upon a time.
Just before the road reached the bridge, a little lane ran off to the right and they followed it to the old Polson Place. This was where Nettie lived with her Father. It was a small house almost hidden behind the vines and trees. Nettie greeted them with a gay smile and led them into her little kitchen where everything had a cleaned, scrubbed look, and there was a good smell of chocolate and spice.
They sat down in the stiff chairs in the little parlor. Cecilia tried not to fidget while Nettie exclaimed over each one of them and said how fast they were growing up and tried to decide whether she looked like her Mama or her Papa.
The girls told her bits of news from home and brought greetings from Mama. Soon they were invited into the kitchen and seated around the table. Then, while Cecilia was wondering what would happen next, Nettie carried in a big chocolate cake and sat it in front of her. On the top of it was a big white letter “5”.
“Your birthday cake, Honey,” said Nettie. “Wait ‘till you see it cut. It has five layers for your five years!” With that she cut a big piece from the cake and put it on Cecilia’s plate. Then they could all see the five yellow layers with the chocolate icing between each.
Cecilia’s eyes danced. She had never seen a five layered cake, nor had she ever had a cake baked just for her. Such a big surprise! Her sisters too, thought it was wonderful. They looked as happy as Cecilia as they each enjoyed a big slice, and told Nettie how delicious it was.
Cecilia gave her a big hug and said, “Thank you.”
When they started for home, Nettie put the rest of the cake in a basket and covered it with a cloth for the girls to bring home with them. Cecilia was glad that Mama and Louis and the others at home would get to taste and see her five layered birthday cake.
There was another surprise for the girls when they reached home. They had a visitor. It was Uncle Hugh Dooley, the husband of Aunt Eliza, Mama’s sister. He had come from North Dakota on business and stopped overnight to see them. When he heard about the birthday, he took Cecilia on his lap and had a special talk with her. He told her he was going to Shelbyville the next day where there were nice big stores, and there he would buy her a present for her birthday. What would she like? Cecilia couldn’t think what to ask for. So Uncle Hugh picked up her hands and looked at them carefully and said, “Would you like some pretty new mittens?”
“Yes, yes, I’d like new mittens,” she nodded.
“Then, don’t tell anyone. It will be our secret. They will come in a package in the mail, addressed to you in a few days.”
Dorothy came near and interrupted, “Cecilia can read and she can count to one hundred. Maybe she will count for you.” Uncle Hugh wanted to hear her count, so she complied. She wished he would say he was tired listening before she got to one hundred, but he didn’t, so she went on breathlessly to the end. Then she dashed from him to run to the kitchen to tell Mama the exciting secret about the package that was to come.
Uncle Hugh did not forget his promise. The next week a package came in the mail for Cecilia. When she opened it she found the prettiest pair of little mittens she had ever seen, made of soft leather and lined with fur.
The Barnyard as sketched by Cecilia when writing this story.
The farm house and yard as sketched by Cecilia in 1967
WINTER DAYS
Louis and Cecilia stood at the living room window watching the first snowfall of the season as it piled a fluffy white frosting on the bushes in the garden. Most of the day they had been playing with their toys on the floor of this warm room as it was too cold for out of door play. It was now late afternoon and they were looking down the East Road, waiting to see the white faced pony and buggy appear bringing their brother and sisters home from school.
Snow was a new thing to Louis and Cecilia told him that when he grew bigger they would take the sled and walk across the field beyond the road to where there were long sloping hills just right for coasting. Cecilia had gone there with her sisters and it had been great fun last winter. When her fingers and toes began to sting with cold and she was tired, they started for home. Then, because her legs were too short to keep pace with the bigger girls, they had put her on the sled and given her a ride home. Maybe the snow would keep coming down now until it was right for coasting.
When the “Big Ones” came home Cecilia asked them if they would get the sled out tomorrow, but they only answered with a hurried “Maybe”, and rushed to get the chores finished before dark.
When supper was finished and the table cleared, the school books were brought out and Mama took time to explain how to solve a knotty arithmetic problem for one child and then heard the spelling lesson of another. Cecilia forgot about the snow and sledding as she got out her story book and waited for Marie to finish her lessons and read to her before it was time for bed.
When Cecilia awoke the next morning she knew this was an unusual sort of day. It was bright daylight but the house was very quiet and Dorothy was still there beside her asleep. Just then the door opened and Winifred came in laughing:
“You sleepy heads! Are you going to stay in bed all day? The snow is so deep out there that they are digging a path to the barn.”
Cecilia grinned and looked at Winifred to see if she were joking. She liked to play jokes on people. Winifred was eleven years old. She had pretty curly brown hair, blue eyes and pink and white complexion that took on a few light freckles in the summer. She was tall for her age, almost as big as Marie who was thirteen and a half. Marie was of a slighter build.
Dorothy sat up wide awake. “Why didn’t you wake me? Is it time to go to school?”
“No one is going to school or anywhere else today. Just look out the window!”
The girls were out of bed in a flash and at the window wiping the frost from it. It was true! There was nothing but drifting snow as far as they could see. It was almost up to the top of the fence posts. Papa and Maurice were making a path to the barns so they could feed the horses and the cattle.
“Can we go out with the sled or will we make a snowman today?” asked Cecilia.
“Or maybe play fox and goose,” added Dorothy.
“It’s too cold to play out at all but it may warm up by tomorrow,” said Winifred, “Better get dressed now and come to breakfast.”
It was a happy day with everyone at home. Dorothy played dolls with Cecilia for a time then she got out the first reader and Cecilia had a reading lesson. It was great to be able to put the letters together and make words. Soon she would be able to read most of the stories in the reader. She was learning also to add and subtract numbers. Her sisters told her she was doing what the first graders at school were doing. Maybe when she started to school next year she could go into the second grade. Cecilia didn’t think much about that but she really wanted to learn to read so that she could read all the books for herself.
No one traveled the road that day, not even the postman came by. The next day would be Saturday and Mama wondered how they would be able to get to Trowbridge to grocery shop or to get to church on Sunday.
Papa said that likely the weather would moderate by Sunday and the roads might be very good for sledding. Maybe he would fix up the big sled and take everyone to Mass in the sled behind the team of horses!
Cecilia listened. This was something she had never done. In summer the team was hitched to the surrey and everyone put on their prettiest dresses and rode to church. Papa and Mama sat in the front seat of the carriage and Papa drove the horses. Mama held Louis on her lap and the girls sat in the back seat. Maurice went by himself in the buggy or sometimes Marie went with him. But in winter one did not always get to go to Mass. Often Mama would say that the roads were too muddy for the horses to pull so heavy a load. Then some of the family would say their prayers at home. This Sunday they might all go and ride in the sled.
The next day Cecilia was warmly wrapped and allowed to run out to the barn to watch the men fix the sled. The big wagon box was put on the sled runners. A thick layer of clean straw was spread over the bottom of the wagon box to make it softer to sit upon. This was all covered with old blankets. Carriage robes would be brought out warm from the house to wrap about each person when they got into the sled.
Cecilia ran back to the house along the shoveled path that was so deep she could just see over the top of it, and was glad to warm herself beside the big kitchen range.
Everyone dressed very warmly that Sunday morning for the sled ride to church. Cecilia’s long winter underwear fit snugly down to her ankles. Over this she pulled her heavy, black cotton stockings. Then she put on her cotton petticoat and over that went a warm, woolen long sleeved dress. Fleece lined over-shoes were worn over shoes to keep her feet dry and warm. She wore her warmest coat and hood and the new fir lined mittens.
Maurice pulled the team up close to the path from the back door and everyone climbed aboard. Only Papa and Mama sat in a seat at the front of the sled: the children snuggled under the robes on the straw cushioned floor of the sled with much laughing and jostling. Someone had found some old sleigh bells and fastened them to the sled. They jingled brightly as the horses trotted off over the hard packed snow.
Cecilia thought it was much more fun than riding in the carriage or being pulled on the little sled or anything she had done since she could remember.
It was two miles to the little white church. It looked so pretty in the snow with the big trees sparkling white all around it. The family loved this spot. Grandfather Peter Moran was one of the early settlers who had helped build this church about fifty years before.
Other families were arriving in sleds. Teams were tied up, the horses blanketed, and all hurried into the church. Someone had come early and built fires in the two stoves that were now glowing red with heat.
The priest came to the foot of the altar and the people knelt to pray.
chapter 5
DOROTHY
IN THE SUMMER OF 1909, WHEN CECILIA WAS A BABY OF EIGHT MONTHS, HER FOUR YEAR OLD SISTER BECAME SERIOUSLY ILL. THE DOCTOR WAS NOT ABLE TO DIAGNOSE DOROTHY’S TROUBLE. SHE RECOVERED GRADUALLY EXCEPT IN ONE RESPECT – SHE COULD NOT WALK. ALWAYS AN ACTIVE CHILD, SHE TRIED TO CRAWL OR GET ABOUT IN SOME WAY. THE DOCTOR WARNED THE FAMILY NOT TO CARRY HER ABOUT BECAUSE IF SHE DID NOT MAKE AN EFFORT TO WALK IMMEDIATELY, SHE WOULD NEVER WALK AGAIN.
By chance, she began to play with the bottom part of a worn out baby carriage. It consisted of a metal frame mounted on four wheels. It became her favorite toy. One happy day, Mama saw her put her hands on this frame and push it before her, at first on her knees, but in a few days on her feet. In a few weeks she was walking. How grateful were her parents!
Years later a physician examining a healthy young woman, noticed a slight deformity in one foot. It was then that she learned that she had had polio that summer of 1909.
As early as the age of seven, Dorothy seems to have shown responsibility and maturity beyond her years. She voiced a wish to launch her first business venture – she wanted to “get up a Larkin’s order”.
Little Dorothy had observed women who occasionally came to their house taking orders for a company that sold spices, cosmetics, household remedies and various items. Dorothy understood that the person getting up the order would be able to choose from a book of merchandise, a prize or “premium” for her work, varying in value according to the order she sent to the Larkin Company.
Mama was not given to discouraging initiative. She soon saw that Dorothy had the necessary permission and papers to start her enterprise. One bright morning Dorothy put on a fresh cotton dress, brushed her thick, curly hair and tied on her new white sunbonnet with the blue ribbons that matched her deep blue eyes. The bonnet was to protect her fair skin from the burning June sun. Equipped with catalog, order blanks and pencil, she set off down the road to call on the neighbors.
Surely she was the youngest and most energetic Larkin agent of the day!
With poise she politely approached the grownups in the neighborhood, introduced herself and said, “I am getting up a Larkins order ….” Few could refuse to become one of her customers.
Day after day she walked the dusty roads making calls. Each evening she and her sisters added up her sales and marveled as the totals grew into a surprising amount. Finally, she could think of no more prospective customers. Her work was done expect to deliver the orders when they arrived from the Larkin Company.
Now she could look at the premium book and select one of the beautiful things she had seen pictured there. This must have been a problem. Surely there were many things that would have delighted a little girl’s heart. Dorothy looked long and thoughtfully at many of them and talked them over with Mama. There were so many useful things. The house was about to be remodeled, almost completely rebuilt, and many pieces of new furniture would be needed for the new rooms being added. They saw an item that would fill a real need in the new living room-to-be, a sofa-like couch that could be converted into a bed if desired. Dorothy was happy and proud that her work would make it possible for them to have this for the new room.
Work was about to start on the rebuilding of the house and everyone was very busy that summer of 1912. Mama was over burdened having Louis only 9 months of age to care for, besides five older children and carpenters and hired hands about. These workmen were always given, at least, their noonday meal. Mama’s only helpers most of the time were twelve year old Marie and ten year old Winifred. These two older sisters of mine were of great help for their years, bright and capable, but only children.
Mama gladly accepted her sister, Emma’s thoughtful invitation for Dorothy and Cecilia to visit her for six weeks and be out of the way of the carpentry work at home. Aunt Emma was younger than Mama by two years. She had remained single to care for her aging parents. Grandfather John Rice died the year Cecilia was born, (1908) but Grandmother Bridget Fagan Rice was still living at the time of this visit. She suffered from arteriosclerosis and was becoming quite senile.
Emma Rice, sister of Frances Rice Moran and Cecilia’a aunt
So, in addition to the care that Grandmother Rice required, Aunt Emma generously took on the care of two little girls aged 3 ½ and 7 years. We found our first experience living away from home a very happy one. So many new experiences. It was fun riding in the little go-cart along the brick sidewalks when Aunt Emma took us with her marketing, shopping or calling on friends. It was fun to play in the park on toys that were completely new to us.
Aunt Emma’s small house shone with cleanliness; her yard and garden were very neat and pretty. Somehow we learned that we must also try to stay neat, clean and pretty. There is a photograph still around that Aunt Emma had taken of the two little girls, Dorothy and me, during this visit.
We returned home in September so Dorothy could start to school. The house construction was well along but not completed. The head carpenter took a great liking for Dorothy and built a miniature cupboard for her which delighted us all. It may still be around.
In a few more weeks all was completed and our parents were proudly showing our new house to visiting friends and relatives. A full second floor contained four bedrooms and ample closets. The first floor contained a parlor, living room, bedroom, dining room and kitchen. A basement held a new hot air furnace – the first central heating in any home in the area. The exterior of the house was painted white with a slate blue-gray trim. The barn nearest the house was painted the same shade of blue-gray with a white trim. An ornamental wire fence separated our front yard from the road. Only some concrete steps and walks remained to be laid.
The finishing touches were laid the next year . Flowers bloomed along the sidewalks; roses vined along the new fence. A huge, old locust tree to the front of the house was fragrant in May with its creamy white blossoms. A rope swing hung from one of its limbs and was one of our favorite things. A tall maple stood very close to the east side of the house. From a second floor bedroom window we could look down into its branches and watch some robins build a nest each spring, watch the little blue eggs and later the baby birds.
The next summer found Dorothy embarked on an equally successful Larkins order enterprise. That year she chose as a premium a very nice, large, oval mirror with a gilt frame. It was enjoyed for many years. As she grew a little older, Dorothy would point to the two items with satisfaction and pride as her contribution to the furnishing of the house.
The following spring, March 1914, Aunt Emma asked Mama and Papa if they would let Dorothy come and stay with her for a few months, to be a little help with Grandmother who had grown very senile. She felt Mama needed the help of the older girls but perhaps she could spare Dorothy. So Dorothy went to Shelbyville and lived with her Aunt until July. She missed a month of school, but she learned many things.
chapter 6
THE EASTER RABBIT
One day in late February, a letter came to Mama from her sister, Aunt Emma. Aunt Emma was a dear, gentle, little lady who lived with her mother. Cecilia knew Aunt Emma well because she had visited her last summer with Dorothy while their house was being remodeled.
Bridget Fagan Rice, wife of John Rice, mother of Frances Rice Moran
Grandmother Rice was very old.. Aunt Emma took very good care of her and Mama was glad.. So Cecilia knew when she heard Mama read the letter saying that Aunt Emma needed some help with Grandmother, that she would try to do what she asked. Aunt Emma was saying that it would be nice if one the girls could come and stay with her for a few months and help a little as she could no longer leave Grandmother alone safely. As the two older girls were probably needed by Mama, maybe Dorothy could come.
That evening at supper, Mama and Papa talked about it and it was decided that Dorothy would go. Dorothy was going to be nine in a few days. Mama said that wasn’t very old, but that she was bright and dependable and knew how to do some things that would be helpful. So she packed her bag and Dorothy was put on the train in a few days to go to visit Aunt Emma and Grandmother Rice.
Cecilia missed her sister. There was no one to sleep with her in the big bed and share her bedroom. Sometimes Cecilia was lonesome and went into the next bedroom where Marie and Winifred slept and climbed in bed with them. They always made room for her, but it was a bit crowded. She missed playing dolls with Dorothy, but otherwise she didn’t miss her much at play. Dorothy had not played with her very often as she always wanted to go with the big girls and do whatever they were doing instead.
A few weeks later another member of the family circle left them. Grandpa Peter Moran was not well. He went to live with another son, Uncle George and his wife, Aunt Laura. Aunt Laura had been a trained nurse and she was able to give him the care he needed. Mama said that Grandpa was tired and was waiting for God to take him to heaven. He missed Grandma Margaret (Keck) Moran who had died three days after Cecilia was born. Cecilia was sorry Grandma Moran hadn’t lived long enough for her to get to know both of her grandmothers.
So now there were only seven places to lay at the table instead of nine.
In a few weeks it was would be Easter. This year Louis was old enough to understand that the Easter Rabbit would bring them some candy eggs if they were good children. A few days before Easter they each made a nest for the rabbit. If the weather had been quite warm they would have put the nests out under the rose bush in the front yard, but it was chilly so Cecilia decided to put them in the house. They must be in a quiet, hidden place where the rabbit could come without being seen and leave the eggs. She finally decided to put them under the sofa in the parlor. No one went into the parlor except when company came. I was kept closed off from the living room so she was sure the rabbit would not be afraid to come in there.
To make the nests she had found two cardboard boxes, then she and Louis had gone to the front yard where the grass was already thick and green, and picked enough grass to partly fill the boxes and please Mr. Rabbit.
They put the nests under the sofa on Friday and made frequent trips to the parlor to peeking the nests but the bunny did not come that day. Saturday morning early they slipped in again and crawled under the sofa.
“Egg!” cried Louis.
“An egg, a pink egg! The rabbit found our nests!” Cecilia shouted.
“How did he get in here?” Louis asked as he tried the outside door to see if it was closed tightly.
“I don’t know. The rabbbit has some kind of magic at Easter. But let’s leave the door open a crack anyway.” Cecilia opened the front door just a tiny bit.
They hurried out of the parlor to show their eggs to the rest of the family. They found Winifred in the living room. She was happy about the eggs and told them they must have been good children or the rabbit would not have left them.
It was very exciting all that day not knowing when one might go in and find the Rabbit had left another egg. By evening they each had gotten three eggs apiece. They had eaten two of them.
Easter morning before they were dressed to go to church they ran to look in the nests. There, in each nest, was a big, beautiful chocolate egg and some small colored ones. The Rabbit had been very good to them! They thought this would be all they would find but, to their surprise, the Rabbit came back several times during the day and left some smaller eggs. Easter was such fun – almost as much fun as Christmas.
Everyone seemed happy at Easter. In the church the organ made happy music and the choir sang glad hymns. Cecilia didn’t understand all about it but she knew, as Father told in the sermon, that Easter was the day Jesus had come back to life after the bad men had put him to death. That was why people were glad. They knew, because of this, that that everyone who died would live again some day.
Chapter 7
CAME THE AUTOMOBILE
It was a warm day in the summer of 1914. Cecilia was digging in the sand pile under the shade of the big sycamore tree in the middle of the horse lot. This was between the house and the new barn. Horses didn’t run loose in it because it was open to the road. It may have been called that because there were two hitching posts there where friends tied their horses when they came to visit. Two driveways let into it from the road; one toward the barn and the other toward the hitching posts and the watering tank for the horses, near the well. The only other building in this area was the old log house which sat a little further back from the road than the line of house and barn.
The log house was used sometimes to house a sick animal or for storage of grain or implements and tools. No one knew when it had been built or by whom. Cecilia wondered if her great Aunt Sarah and Uncle Tom had lived there when they first came to Illinois in a covered wagon in 1864. She knew they built the frame house that her parents had moved into when they were married in 1895. But had they built the log cabin? Or was it already there? Had they lived in it for a while before they built the house? It was fun to imagine.
Cecilia was thinking now that it would be very nice if her father still harvested ice in the winter and stored it in the log house, the way her sisters had said he used to do. When the ice was very thick on the creek, he would cut it into blocks and haul it home and store it in heavy layers of sawdust for use the next summer. The sawdust kept the ice from melting by keeping out the heat. There was lots of sawdust where the fallen trees in the woods were sawed into firewood. When the log house was filled with ice, it was easy to have good, good, homemade ice cream many hot summer afternoons. Now it was trouble to buy ice and haul it home from Trowbridge before it melted, so they had not made ice cream all that summer. Mama said that they would make some today after Dorothy came home from Aunt Emma’s. Cecilia wondered when that would be. She wished Dorothy were home again.
Cecilia looked up as she heard a loud chugging noise and saw a cloud of dust coming along the road. It must be that new thing called an automobile coming. One came only once in a great while. It was fun to watch it and wonder how it moved without horses pulling it. She skipped over to the roadside to watch it as it passed. The man and the woman in the automobile waved to her and. The man was holding on to a kind of wheel; the lady was holding on to a scarf that kept her hat from blowing away. She had on a long sleeved, light colored coat even though the day was hot. Mama had said that was worn by ladies to keep the dust off their pretty dresses. Cecilia didn’t know the couple in the auto. Probably they were very rich and had driven from some far away place, farther than Stewardson or any place she had heard of beyond there. Only one family she knew owned an automobile., the Fredes. Mr. and Mrs. Frede and their five boys drove in their Ford every Sunday on their way to the Lutheran Church in Stewardson. Mr. Frede ran the grocery store in Trowbridge. It was nice they could have an auto to get to church as there was no Lutheran Church in Trowbridge and Stewardson was a long way off – about seven miles. She wondered how it felt to ride in an automobile. They went so fast – much faster than a horse could trot. She wished she could ride in one just once, but that was another thing that probably would not happen to her until she grew big.
After dinner, Cecilia sat in the porch swing on the shady side of the front porch, waiting for Marie to finish the dishes and come and read the story about the possum, the coon and the old black crow. It was such a good story. There was some of it in each day’s Chicago American that the postman brought. Her father and brother were nearby now reading the paper as they and the hired men took a brief rest after their meal before going to the fields. Usually they talked about what was happening in other parts of the world, especially about what the paper told them was happening to some bad person, far away, called the Kaiser. She did not like to hear about it, she only waited nearby to get the part of the paper with the story in it as soon as her father put it down. Then she would take it to the far end of the porch where she and Louis would wait until Marie came and read to them.
Mama came out on the porch and Papa gave her the paper and she sat down to read. Gradually the men left for the fields, all except Papa.
Then she heard him ask, “When would you like to go to Shelbyville to bring the little girl home?”
“It’s so far to drive,” said Mama, “She had best come home on the train about next week.”
“I have figured out a way that won’t make it seem so far,” Papa smiled, “I talked to Gus Freddie about taking us all on a trip to Shelbyville in his new Ford. Would, say, next Tuesday suit you to go?”
Cecilia could hardly believe what she was hearing. They were all going to have a long, long ride in a Ford – next week – and, best of all, Dorothy would be coming home with them. She ran to tell Marie and Winifred.
Chapter 8
PAPA IS SICK - AUTUMN 1914
Papa was not well. He was still working about the place but he was growing thinner; he looked tired; and he was coughing. Mama was worrying about him and trying to get him to rest more.
One morning early I saw Papa and Maurice coming from the barn carrying the big pails of milk to the cream separator on the back porch. There the milk was poured into the large tank on the machine. Papa began to turn the heavy revolving handle which set the mechanism into motion causing the cream to separate from the milk. It required much strength to turn this handle. Papa or Maurice had always done this. This morning Papa began to turn it but after several revolutions he suddenly stopped, staggered, and grabbed a post for support.
“You’ll have to carry on son” he gasped as he sank on to a bench. Maurice was already at the separator “carrying on”.
Papa never regained his strength. When he saw a doctor he knew beforehand what the diagnosis would be – tuberculosis. It was a dreaded disease that often ravaged whole families. Medical science at that time knew little as to its cause or cure.
There was a sanitarium for tubercular patients in Colorado Springs, Colorado which Papa heard of and decided to go there to see if he could be helped. This sanitarium was connected with an association called “The Modern Woodmen” which Papa had joined a few years before. Fortunately, at that time he had also taken out life insurance through this association Papa made ready to go to Colorado Springs.
It was the evening of my sixth birthday which had, of course, gone unnoticed when Papa left. He kissed us each good-bye as we stood by the buggy. Then he climbed in beside Maurice and was driven to the railroad station in the little village of Trowbridge. In St. Louis he required the use of a wheel chair in changing trains.
Whatever the treatment was at the sanitarium, I remember only his telling of one thing. The patients slept on open porches the sides of which were screened only by sheets stretched from railing to roof as protection from the cold. Fresh air was thought to be a great help in curing the disease of the lungs.
Papa soon realized that his case was too far advanced to be helped. He longed to be back at home with his wife and dear family. About three weeks after he left, I woke up during the night because Dewey, our dog was barking loudly. Everyone went downstairs and there was Papa, home again. Dewey had not recognized him in his new clothes. Papa had arrived in Trowbridge by train during the night and had walked the two miles home. Mama was amazed that he could walk that distance. We all wanted to talk to Papa at once, but Mama shooed us all off to bed again saying there would be lots of time in the morning.
Papa’s condition continued to worsen. Maurice had quit high school in order to run the farm, care for the live stock and see to the many chores that must be completed before winter. The rest of the children went on to school as usual. Mama was grief stricken, but did her best, to give Papa good care and took great precautions to prevent the spread of the disease to others in the family.
At the little one room school an exciting event was taking place – the annual spelling contest. The upper classes in each school district in the state contended in this. The winner in each district would be eligible to compete in the county contest, held in the county seat. The county winners would compete for the state championship, held in the state capitol.
We smaller children found it very interesting to watch and listen to the spelling contest. I was especially excited because my eldest sister, Marie, was considered almost certain to win. The suspense I felt as the final match began was almost unbearable. I watched the line of contestants grow shorter as, one by one, a boy or girl would misspell a work and leave the line. At last there were only two remaining, Marie and Orville. And then Orville missed a work and there was only Marie. She spelled it correctly and was declared the winner. She would go to Shelbyville, the county seat, the next week to represent the Trowbridge school district.
Papa was very sick but Shelbyville was not more than four hours away, in case she needed to be called home. Marie was allowed to go. She could stay with Aunt Emma and Grandma Rice.
A day or so later a phone call came from Aunt Emma with the good news: Marie was the winner!! She had spelled down all the schools in Shelby County. She was entitled to go to Springfield to compete for the state championship. How happy we all were! How good it was to see Mama and Papa smiling again and their faces glowing with pride!
Mama pondered the matter of letting Marie go to Springfield. It was a long way and Papa was growing weaker so rapidly. At last, regretfully, she phoned Aunt Emma to say that Marie was not to go to Springfield, but to come home very soon. This did not lessen the joyous pride we all felt in her victory.
There came a Monday when none of us were allowed to go to school. Some men who were good family friends came in by turns helping to care for Papa. Women came too. I remember one saintly woman who came and read a beautiful prayer to Papa. He asked that it be read to him many times during the next few days. We often knelt with groups of these friends and prayed the five mysteries of the rosary. Twice in the weeks before, our parish priest had come and Papa had received the sacrament of Penance and Holy Communion and had also been anointed (the sacrament of the sick.) Papa was prepared for death. He seemed calm and resigned, but I am sure he was sad to leave us all. We children were all at ages to need a father. Louis was only three and would never remember him. I was six so I have a few memories. I remember being near when friends visited him toward the last and hearing him tell them that I could already read well from the second grade reader.
Wednesday morning, January 16, 1915 was a cold, raw day. The sun shone brightly through the window above the daybed in the big living roon where Papa lay dying. The two men who had cared for him through the night were still with him. Louis and I were in the kitchen where Mama was clearing up the breakfast things when one of the men came in and said to Mama, “He is asking to see the “two little chaps”.
Mama quickly led us to Papa’s bedside. He held Louis’ little hand and mine for a moment and looked at us but he couldn’t speak.
Back in the kitchen Mama worried because the older girls had not returned from the errand on which she had sent them. They had gone to take a huge basket of laundry to Nettie to do. Then, at length, they were home with a dreadful story of mud roads down near the creek that were almost impassable because of the unseasonable thaw. The buggy wheels had mired almost to the axles. Many times they had climbed out and scrapped the mud from the wheels before the pony could go on. Somehow, they had managed to make the trip.
Now the entire family gathered in the living room, with the good neighbors who had come in, and joined in the prayers. The family doctor appeared and injected some medicine into Papa’s vein. I hoped it was a pain killer. Soon Papa died.
We were in the kitchen again where Mama wiped tears from her eyes as she kneaded the big pan of “sponge” and shape it into loaves to bake for her family.
The funeral was on a bitterly cold morning two days later. As we rode to the church in the back seat of the surrey drawn by the team of horses, the cold penetrated the robes around us. The hearse had some trouble and had to stop while repairs were made. It seemed like hours as we ached with the cold.
The church was warm when we finally arrived. We were grateful for this comfort during the funeral Mass. Afterwards, we went out to the cemetery in back of the church for the burial.
None of the facts of death were softened for us, but our sorrow was made bearable by our firm and real faith that we would meet Papa again in the next world: we would all be there some day with God.
We clustered quietly about the living room that afternoon following the funeral, while Mama tried to consider the future. Aunt Emma, Mama’s sister, had come from Shelbyville for a few days. It must have helped Mama to have had one adult relative with whom she could discuss the family situation.
Papa had advised Mama to sell the farm after his death and move to a small city where the children would have better opportunities to get a good education. But Mama hesitated to do this. Perhaps it was too soon for her to take such a big step. Maurice was seventeen and able to run the farm with the help of the usual “hired hands” in the summer. So it was decided that we should stay on, for the present, in our comfortable farm home.
DEATH OF THOMAS MORAN
1870-1915
It was with sincere regret that the people of this community learned of the death of Thomas Moran on Saturday, Jan. 16, 1915, after a lingering illness, from tuberculosis.
He was born in Shelby Co. Feb. 8, 1870 and has been a resident of this vicinity for almost forty-five years, and during that time has possessed the esteem of those with whom he came in contact. His life was one of industry and he was successful in most of his undertakings. He was married Jan. 29, 1815 to Miss Frances Rice.
The illness to which Mr. Moran succumbed was a very painful malady, which he suffered with a most edify-ing spirit of patience and resignation.
Last fall he went to Colorado Springs in the hopes of regaining his health but his great love for home and family overcame him and he returned Nov. 20.
The funeral was held Monday, Jan. 18, from St. Patrick's Church. Requiem High Mass was celebrated by Rev. F. M. Curran, who also delivered a beautiful sermon.
Mr. Moran is survived by his widow, the loving helpmate of a happily wedded life of almost twenty years, and by six children: Maurice, Marie, Winifred, Dorothy, Cecelia and Louis. One son, Donnette, died in infancy. He is also survived by his aged father, P. R. Moran of Stewardson, two sisters, Mrs. Constance Isabel of Columbus, Ohio; Mrs. Wm. Wilson, Crowley, La.; two brothers, George of Stewardson and Peter of near Lerna, and numerous other relatives.
As Mr. Moran had been, during life a member of the Venerable Council of Modern Woodmen, the members at-tended the funeral in a body and held exercises at the home, and marched in procession, forming a creditable parade as their tribute of respect to their deceased brother.
The pallbearers were six in number: Henry Boldt, Henry P. McClory, John Watson, John E. McClory, James Patterson and Frank Kennedy. Two schools were dismissed in his honor: Trowbridge and Gaskill.
St. Patrick's Church was filled from the communion rails to the belfry with citizens of all religious denominations and political affiliations and an immense throng accompanied his remains to St Patrick's Cemetery notwithstanding the disagreeable conditions of the weather.
In compliance with the wishes of the Catholic church which prefers prayers for the soul, rather than flowers, there was. but one wreath with the word “Father.” Friends of the family offered a “spiritual” bouquet in the form of prayers.
Those from a distance who attend-ed were: Mrs. Constance Isabel, Columbus, Ohio; George Moran, Mr. and Mrs. Martin Moran, Stewardson; Otto Widmeier of Mattoon, Mrs. Chas. Kiefer of Effingham, Emma Rice of Shelbyville, Agnes Rice of Clarksburg, Mr. and Mrs. Peter Moran of East of Neoga; George Moran Sr., Oscar Blonquist and quite a number of others from Neoga.
Those who, survive may reflect on the blessed hope of immortality and the happy reunion of those who part in sorrow for awhile to meet again where pain and parting shall be replaced by joys eternal.
Trowbridge Correspondent
CHAPTER 9
A NEW PLAYMATE AND A NEW SCHOOL
SPRING 1916
In the early spring, Papa’s sister, Matilda Wilson (Aunt Tillie), and her family moved to the old Moran homestead three quarters of a mile north of our home. They had moved to New Orleans for a while and decided they would rather live in Illinois. She and Uncle Willie restored and rebuilt the place into an attractive, comfortable home. There were two daughters to share it with them: Marguerite in her late teens and Lucille, a little girl of six. I was glad to find I had a cousin so near my own age living so near, a new playmate for Louis and me.
Lucille’s sixth birthday came in March, in time to start to Lone Elm, the district school, when the “spring term” of two months began in early April. It was the custom in some districts to divide the usual seven month term into a five and a two month term. I had finished the seven month term at Trowbridge school when I heard about the spring term at Lone Elm and that Lucille would be starting there.
Mama noticed my interest and asked if I would like to go to school there with Lucille for the next two months. Lone Elm was only a quarter of a mile from Lucille’s home and a mile from mine. It was closer than Trowbridge, but in another school district. If I liked I could go there, none the less, since we owned land in that district and paid taxes there. Since it was a small school of only ten or twelve students, there would be no question of overburdening the teacher.
I had been looking forward to vacation and all the fun of the woods in early spring, but the idea of going with my little cousin to a new school, having new friends and a new teacher, sounded like a great adventure. I told Mama I’d like to go.
I felt quite brave and grown up starting out on the road alone, carrying my small lunch box that first Monday morning in April. I’d never gone to school without my older sisters and never had any teacher except Mr. Zimmer.
When I stopped for my cousin, Lucille, I found her looking very pretty. Aunt Tilly was brushing her golden brown hair into finger curls. Marguerite had on her jacket and was ready to walk with us to school. I couldn’t understand why, so I told her she needn’t come as I could take care of Lucille. After some hesitation, she took off her jacket and decided she need not come with us after all.
Those two months were quite happy ones. The teacher, Miss Beulah Fritz was a lovely, bright young woman; an excellent teacher with many innovative ideas that I felt had been unknown to Mr. Zimmer. In addition to the usual studies, we had a singing period almost daily and occasionally drawing lessons, both of which I greatly enjoyed. During recess we planned and planted a small garden plot together and it became a science lesson. In a few weeks we were eating lettuce and radishes from our garden with our lunch.
Once on a very warm June day we sat out under the shade trees and studied and recited. The closing day we each brought picnic food and shared it on the grass.
Louis like to visit school with us and was made very welcome. Lucille, who had quickly become a happy, bright first grader, helped to keep Louis entertained. So many sunny days the three of us sauntered to and from Lone Elm together – four and a half year old brother, six year old cousin and myself. We enjoyed being with each other and becoming real pals. During the next five summers we were to have many happy play days together and a real friendship.
TROWBRIDGE SCHOOL AND A NEW TEACHER
When Trowbridge School opened in September, there were only Marie, Winifred and I to go. Dorothy had gone to Shelbyville to live with Aunt Emma and help her with Grandmother Rice. I missed her, not that she played with me very much but she seemed close to me and always understood when something was bothering me. Dorothy was eleven and was entering sixth grade in the Shelbyville school. Why was it not Marie who went to Aunt Emma? She could have started high school. Perhaps Mama needed the help of the two older girls and almost unconsciously clung to them. Maybe it was because Dorothy had been with Aunt Emma before when she was only nine and they had formed a great attachment for each other.
Trowbridge School 1912, Teacher – Gertrude McClory
Back row 3rd from right: dark hair, Maurice Moran.
Middle Row in identical dresses: Marie and Winifred Moran
Front row, far right: Cecilia Moran
The school had a new teacher, Ray Kingston, a youngish man with a bright, quick mind and as I remember him, a lively, energetic personality. I was a fourth grader, almost eight years old but small for my age.
Because I was small I sat near the front of the room where the seats were smaller. There I was easily distracted from my own work by the more interesting things the upper classes were talking about during their recitations periods. I particularly liked to listen to the eighth grade English class when the poems of Longfellow and Whittier were being read and discussed. I could memorize poetry just by hearing it read, and many of the ones I heard then are still in my mind. Two of the longer ones that I still remember in their entirety are Whittier’s “Maude Miller” and “The Barefoot Boy.” So began my enjoyment of poetry.
Some of the big boys in the upper class seemed to have difficulty in learning the parts of speech and could not diagram a simple sentence. One boy in particular seemed to aggravate Mr. Kingston by his slowness. One day when this boy failed in his diagramming, Mr. Kingston, in desperation, called on me to come to the black board and diagram it correctly. I was surprised and a little embarrassed, but I had no choice but to obey. I quickly ran to the board, did as requested and ran back to my seat. I’m sure such teaching methods would be condemned today. Several times I was called upon in this manner. I felt that there was something wrong in my teacher’s asking me to do this but I did not know how to protest.
OUR COUNTRY DECLARES WAR ON GERMANY
APRIL 1917
War was declared on Germany in April. How eagerly the Chicago Daily American was read by al the grownups in our family as they followed the European conflict. Notices for young men to register for the draft would soon go out. Maurice was nineteen. He must register for the draft. How terrible it would be for us if he had to leave the farm to go into military service! I think he would have liked to have gone with the others of his age. The excitement and adventure of it all appealed to him. However, farmers were being exempted for the most part as it was important that Uncle Sam continue to produce food for the fighting allies. There was no one else to farm our land. Maurice was given a low classification and the war ended before he was called.
The usual crops of wheat, oats, corn, timothy and clover hay were grown and harvested. Some was marketed, some stored in our granaries for food for our horses and dairy cows, and for our fattening hogs and steers to be shipped to the city stockyards for slaughter. Orders went out for the conservation of white flour and sugar. War bond rallies were held in the village and everyone able bought “Liberty Bonds to Save Democracy.” Women formed groups to roll bandages or knit and sew for the Red Cross.
MAY TIME
Louis and I felt the new excitement about us but we did not feel endangered. Spring had come as softly warm and bright as ever. The wild flowers were blooming in the woods and along the ravines, and we were off to explore what new wonders we could find. We would come home with our treasures – often some pretty rocks or a few mushrooms, and always a bouquet of fragrant blossoms.
Winifred suggested we make a little May Altar to honor Mary, the Mother of Jesus, since May was her special month. We could use our flowers to decorate it. We thought that was a lovely idea and Winifred gave us ideas as to how we might do this. First we searched until we found an empty wooden box of the proper size which was turned on its side and covered with a white cloth. A picture of Mary holding the Infant Jesus was hung over the center of the altar. When our little bunches of violets, buttercups and blue bells were put in small vases, we saw it as a work of art – at least, it was a work of love. Each day we said our prayers before our May Altar for people who were suffering because of the Great War. Each day we picked fresh flowers and put them on our May Altar.
We made a May Altar for Mary each spring until we left the farm.
THE MAXWELL
Maurice was trying to persuade Mama to buy an automobile. Several of our friends had them and more were buying them. He must have succeeded rather easily as in a few weeks a shining, new, black Maxwell touring car stood in our barn lot. Our first rides in it were unbelievably thrilling. Whenever Maurice was going on even a short errand, Louis and I would run and hop in the auto “just for the ride”. On Sunday mornings, dressed in our best, the entire family rode to Church in the fine new Maxwell, Maurice proudly at the wheel.
As summer wore on, another driver was needed as Maurice was too busy to be available for errands. Winifred was taught to drive. Although not quite fifteen years of age, she was a tall, capable, beautiful young woman.
It was not easy to operate the cars of that period, even though ours was equipped with a new gadget, a self starter, which supposedly eliminated cranking. It took much strength to crank a car. The engine did not always start with the first cranking – it often required repeated effort. Alas, the Maxwell’s “self starter” sometimes failed to start the engine. Winifred learned to crank it. She learned about gears and brakes, how to pump up a tire and how to handle a car on rough or muddy roads. When she was judged able to d rive alone we were all as happy as she. The five mile drive to Neoga for our many needs had taken an hour and a quarter when driving our pony, now in the auto we were there in fifteen minutes. What fun to feel the breeze as we sped along in an open car on a warm day!
The old log cabin that stood decrepitly at the back of the horse lot, housing sundry items, was torn down and hauled away. Only the concrete floor remained and on it a neat new garage was soon erected for the Maxwell.
With the car came many new pleasures for us all. At least twice during each summer we drove to Shelbyville to spend a day with Aunt Emma and Grandmother Rice. The first trip there by car was a very special event. It was the first time most of us had been there since the summer of 1914 when we had gone with Mr. Frede in his car. Mama, especially, was overjoyed to be able to visit her sister and her mother who was now in her eighties. Sometimes on Saturday evenings in the summer we drove to Neoga for shopping and lingered to enjoy the band concert in the public park and visit with friends. All were new and happy experiences.
MAURICE
My memory of the band concerts brings Maurice to my mind. He had once played in the band. I had seen his picture with his horn taken with a group at the Illinois State Fair at Springfield when he was fourteen. Mama had told me how he came to be there. He had read in the County Weekly that one boy from each county would be awarded a free week at the State Fair. When he mentioned this to Mama she urged him to write and apply. To his delight, he was chosen to be the recipient of the trip. It was a memorable time in his life. He must have played with a local band previously and thus was able to play with this band at the Fair.
I have also wondered where he learned to play the violin. I remember winter evenings when he would take down his violin from the shelf and practice on it for a long while. Recently, I learned that Papa played the violin and had taught Maurice. I have digressed from my chronological family story, but being much younger than Maurice, I know so little of his early years that I feel I should mention what little I know.
SUMMER CANNING TIME
Summers on the farm were busy, busy times and there was much else to be done besides enjoying the new auto. After the garden was “laid by”, that is, well into production of the summer vegetables: green beans, sweet corn, tomatoes, carrots, cabbage, etc. The summer berries and fruits were ready for picking.
In mid July the wild blackberries ripened. They grew in abundance in a far corner of our farm where the woodland thinned into pasture and briars. It was probably the summer of 1917 when I was eight that I first went with my big sisters early on a hot morning and filled my pail with berries. The sun was higher and hotter about noon when we returned to the house with buckets of plump, sweet berries. How delicious they were when eaten with sugar and fresh, rich cream!
In the afternoon, the work of canning and jam and jelly making started. It was a big job, but the finished product – rows of shinning jam jars and the knowledge of how wonderful it would taste on Mama’s fresh made bread – made it all worth it.
I soon learned that there were not only berries in the berry patch, but also “chiggers.” How I suffered from their attacks in spite of measures to keep them off. Yet whenever the others were going berrying, I would be there begging to go along.
The peach trees Papa had planted a few years before his death began to bear fine fruit. Each summer until we left the farm there was a wonderful crop of big, pink peaches. It was great to enjoy them fresh from the trees but also good to see a large amount canned and stored in the basement for winter treats.
Later in the summer there were tomatoes, grapes, plums and apples to be made into juice, jelly or various things. By mid autumn our basement was well filled.
SEPTEMBER CHANGES
1917
When September came, Marie left us to go to Shelbyville to attend Sparks Business College. A schoolmate from Trowbridge went with her and both stayed with Aunt Emma. We very much missed our eldest sister who had always been part of home.
Louis was almost six years old and ready to start to school with Winifred, Dorothy and me. It was fun to have him go with us and he was glad to no longer be left at home without a playmate.
Guy McClory was our teacher, a local young man who was soon to be drafted into the army.
School had been in session only a week or more when Winifred became ill. She lay for many days in the big bed in the spare room on the first floor, running a fever. Our family doctor came, diagnosed the illness as malaria and left medication for her. Gradually, she recovered, but it was a long while before she fully regained her strength. Having missed much of the new school term, and having already completed the eighth grade, she did not go back to Trowbridge school. As her health returned, she busied herself with the many demanding tasks about home, hoping, no doubt, that eventually her opportunity would come for further education. Perhaps, even then, she had dreams of what she aspired to do with her life.
Dorothy, now a fast growing girl of twelve, watched over her little brother as he got off to a good start in the first grade. Being a bright, happy little boy, he liked school and learned quickly. I was almost nine, making a trio: finding school satisfactory but not particularly exciting.
The news of the war overshadowed the events of ordinary living. Our school entertainments were made up of patriotic songs and recitations. Remember the conservation song to the tune of Marching through Georgia?
Cheer for Mr. Hoover, Woodrow Wilson’s right hand man!
To conserve the food for Sammies
Is his wise and wasteless plan.
The allies, too, need our sweets and fats
So substitute all you can,
And help in the food conservation.
Conserve, conserve! We’ll join in the fight.
Conserve, conserve! For democracy and right.
We’ll leave no scraps upon our plate
But eat that last small bite,
While we’re conserving the rations.”
Sometimes during that fall and winter, troop trains would pass through Trowbridge. If our teacher had been notified that one was coming, the whole student body would go to the little depot nearby and stand waving flags and shouting while the soldiers waved back at us as the train whizzed by.
MY FIRST VERSES
1918
One winter evening while the grownups were in the living room visiting with a neighbor, I sat in the kitchen reading a bit, thinking about the war news which I had heard them discussing and of a poem I’d read about it. I picked up my pencil and started to write a poem of my own.
After the visitor had gone home, Mama and the others came into the kitchen. When they asked what I had been writing, I showed them the scrap of paper on which was written:
They are fighting for Old Glory
Far away across the sea.
They will fight for Old Glory
Till we have our liberty.
They are fighting in the trenches
Under fire, shot and shell,
And the things that they must suffer
Are more than we can tell.
We all must be patriotic
And we must do our share,
And help to raise the food
For our boys Over There.
When I read this aloud, I could not have received more adulation had I produced a real masterpiece. Mama loved poetry and had been known to try her hand at it occasionally. She, especially, was delighted with my childish effort. We were all pleased, a few weeks later , to see it published in the Shelby County Weekly with the caption above it – A Little Child shall Lead Them” and beneath it “by Cecilia Moran, age 9” I wrote several more poems during the next year or so and they improved. The local paper published all that were sent to it. I enjoyed writing but didn’t really like it when Mama would ask me to read some of my poems for guests.
After the war ended I seemed less inspired to write. However, for a special occasion I could usually do so with ease. That was fun. This is a gift I have not lost entirely.
In June, Marie graduated with honors from Sparks Business College in Shelbyville. Always a bright student, she had done excellent work in all her courses. Instead of the usual short hand, a new method for taking dictation, stenography, had been offered. This was the method Marie had learned together with related subjects for secretarial work. No positions were immediately available locally, so Marie came home for the summer with a promise from the College of a job in St. Louis in September.
Thus, again we were all at home for the summer months except for a few weeks when Winifred and Dorothy, in turn went to visit Aunt Emma to be a help with the care of Grandmother Rice and to have a vacation of a sort.
MY FIRST DANCE
There were many farewell parties – dances in the town halls of the nearby villages – being given for the departing soldier boys. Maurice and Marie went to all of them with their friends. Some of my little friends occasionally went with their parents to these affairs. How I envied them!
One nice Saturday evening I had the courage to ask Mama if I might go with Maurice and Marie to the dance in Teutopolis. With a little smile, she replied, “ask your big brother”.
I saw him walking toward the house whistling as he led the team of horses to the watering trough. I ran to him and breathlessly told him how much I wanted to go with him to the dance that night. To my surprise, he happily invited me.
Dorothy was happy, too, when Mama told her she should go along to be with me while the older ones were dancing. We put on our prettiest dresses and white slippers and sought Marie’s approval of our apparel. Louis was distracted by having his favorite bedtime story read to him so that he would not notice I was going out and fuss to go along.
Just after sunset we were on our way. Maurice made two stops to pick up friends, a young lady and then a young man. They each seemed quite surprised to see me. The lady smiled and said she was glad to see me, that she hadn’t known I was coming with them. I replied that I hadn’t known she was coming either but it was nice to see her. Everyone laughed. Then it began to rain a little and they wondered if it might rain enough to make it muddy for the trip home. The dance hall was brightly lighted and filled with friendly people. Lively music was bringing most of them on to the dance floor. For an hour or more I was fascinated watching the dancers and listening to the tempo of the music. There were few children there, none that I knew. A few elderly men and women sat chatting in the chairs along the wall. I grew sleepy but I tried not to show it. Dorothy seemed very wide awake. I was glad when someone nudged me and said that it was time to go home.
I found we were taking two more friends with us whose homes were not far off our route. This crowded the car considerably. I wished more and more that I were home. The road seemed slippery because of the rain that had fallen while we were at the dance. When we turned onto the side road to take the friends home, we were in real mud. Suddenly, one wheel of the car became mired in a hole in the road. The men got out and pushed and shoved.. No use, the car was still much overloaded. Next, everyone but the driver climbed out on to the sticky mud road. I didn’t even have time to take off my pretty new white slippers!
Soon the car was worked out of the rut and everyone was laughing again. “How do you like going out with me now?” asked Maurice. “I wish I were home in bed.” I replied.
A TRIP TO THE BIG CIRCUS IN MATTOON
A month or so later I had another new experience which was quite a surprise. While we had read that the big Ringling Brothers, Barnum & Baily circus was coming to Mattoon, we had not dreamed of going. Mattoon was eighteen miles away, a long trip. However, Maurice came in from a trip to Neoga and announced he was planning to go. He had happened to meet Uncle Pete, (our father’s brother), while shopping in Neoga and had learned that he and Aunt Maggie and the children were also going. He had suggested that maybe Mama and we children would like to come along, too. We could join them in Peterson Park with a basket picnic lunch, see the Circus Parade and all have a big day together.
Uncle Pete Moran’s family lived about eight miles east of us and that much nearer Mattoon. Mama liked them a lot and every summer we spent a Sunday with them and they with us, a happy time for all. So Mama decided we would all go with Maurice to Mattoon and join the relatives. We could see the Circus Parade, which was free, the children could enjoy playing in the big park, and we could have a fine picnic lunch together.
To our delight, we reached the Park early and Louis and I with our cousins, Regina and Philomena, had time to have a wonderful round of play on the big slides, whirly-gigs, swings , etc., the likes of which we had never seen before.
About 10:30 we lined up, starry eyed, and watched the magnificent parade of the world’s biggest circus. The performers in bright spangled costumes, the clowns with their funny antics, the wild animals in cages and the huge elephants were all indescribably exciting.
We chattered about all these marvels as we devoured our lunch. I thought that we would probably get to play a bit more on the slides and then would go home. Then Mama made a surprising decision. She told us that Maurice intended to stay and go to the Circus so she felt we should all go with Aunt Maggie’s and see the Circus too!
On the way to the big tent, it was great getting a long, close look at the tigers, lions and the many other animals that we had only seen pictured in books. Dorothy and Winifred were enjoying it also very much, as was Mama. I think it was her first circus as well as ours.
The acts under the Big Top were breath taking. How much we had to remember and to talk about later as we hurried to drive home in time to do the evening chores. The farm at sunset looked beautifully serene and homey after the noise and crowds of the unforgettable day.
THE MUSICALE
“Where are you going, Mama?” I asked , as she and Winifred were getting into the car. They were dressed too nicely to be only going to the store. Winifred looked happy in a special way, as though she had a secret.
“We are invited to a musicale and tea that Mrs. Worland is giving for the two Sisters, her relatives. You saw the two Dominicans at Mass last Sunday, remember?”
Of course, I remembered. These sisters came home for a visit most every summer. I was always fascinated by their lovely faces and their white robes or “habits”. They were something like those in the photo of our aunt, Sister Isabel Moran, our father’s sister who was a Franciscan nun, now dead.
I wondered how Mama had decided which one of us she would take with her on this very special occasion, but I was glad it was Winifred. She usually didn’t seem to care about going to parties and dances the way Marie did, but she seemed really happy going to this affair. Years later I learned how this came about.
Both Mama and Winifred came home from the afternoon outing with beaming faces. Sister Rosalind had had a lovely voice and had sung, with piano accompanist, several favorite songs. Winifred was glowing as she told us all the lovely details. Mama was humming “The Last Rose of Summer” as she put supper on the table that evening. Yes, that was her favorite of the selections of the afternoon. Yes, I heard her humming it even in later years.
Moran home as remodeling was finished in 1913
MORE CHANGES
SEPTEMBER 1918
In late August or early September, Aunt Emma accompanied Marie to St Louis to be interviewed for a stenographic position, which had been arranged by Sparks Business College. Marie was eager to go and we were all happy for her. Aunt Emma returned from the trip in a few days and reported that Marie had accepted a position with a firm whose offices were on the 18th floor of Boatman’s Bank building. She was living at the YWCA, where she had found several young business women to her liking and a congenial roommate. That is all I remember except that I was amazed to know there were buildings so tall as to have eighteen floors.
We enjoyed her frequent letters. They were filled with accounts of new and interesting things she was seeing and doing and of the new friends she was enjoying. She did not plan to come home until Christmas – a very long time away.
Dorothy left us again to go to Shelbyville and Aunt Emma. She entered the first year of high school there. Of course, I always missed Dorothy, but she had been away so much that I had grown used to it. Only Maurice, Winifred, Louis and I were left of the children at home.
With no older ones to drive the pony, Louis and I walked much more to school. Only on rainy days we were taken to school in the buggy with Maurice or Winifred driving Old Babe. Nice days we liked dawdling along the road with the Sargent and the Smith children. Sometimes we took a back route, walking the railroad far enough to cross the trestle, an almost forbidden thing. One might be killed if a train came in sight traveling very fast. But the trestle was not long and the danger slight. Then we walked across Sargents’ woods and pastureland, going north to the main road and home.
Autumn was lovely when the leaves turned and the heat of summer changed to gentle sunshine. Time to go nutting in our woods. Time to pick up the paper shelled hickory nuts lying among the red and gold leaves. So good to bring home, shell, and eat at once. Only the black walnuts, which fell a bit later, were best spread out to dry under the high back porch. There the heavy outer coats would fall off. Then when a mild day in winter came, I would remember them and curl up in the sun under the south edge of the porch and crack and shell some of them. Often I would stay at this laboriously until I had enough nut meats for Winifred to use in making us a yummy good cake for our dinner.
On November 11th of that year, 1918, (the day after my birthday) the Armistice was signed. We heard rumors on the 10th that it was about to be signed and I had hoped it would be signed on my birthday. So that is how near my birthday came to being a red letter day! We heard of the bands and victory parades in the cities and of the Kaiser being burned in effigy. Louis and I tried to think of a way to celebrate. We were a parade of two – Louis leading, pounding a pan for a drum and I following, carrying an old scarecrow to represent the Kaiser. The long war was over.
CHAPTER 10
INTERESTING NEIGHBORS AND
MAURICE’S BUSINESS VENTURE
A half mile east of us lived a delightfully unusual family, the Tom Sargents, with seven bright, sturdy children. Both parents were well educated people. When they moved there a few years before, Papa remarked to Mama after meeting them, that they looked like people who had seen better times. This proved to be very true.
Tom Sargent moved his family to this farm apparently hoping that as the boys grew older they could do most of the farming, gardening , poultry raising, or whatever, while he spent his time at more lucrative pursuits. One of the more successful projects of the older boys was the acres of strawberries they planted and cared for. Many of the young people of the neighborhood were invited to pick the berries, either being paid in berries or in cash. I doubtless remember this as such a fun time because I’m rather certain I ate more than I picked. My older sisters joined in the picking too, and we took our pay in berries. We had many for our table and for preserving.
Mama and Mrs. Sargent became close friends. This friendship grew with the years and was a source of mutual inspiration and strength. Mama had great admiration and sympathy for her friend as she saw her cheerfully assuming the major burden of raising the large family, caring for and understanding each child as though he or she were the only one. The children were well mannered and expressed themselves in the perfect English of their parents, a shade better than most of our neighbors.
When Lauren, the eldest son, entered Neoga High School, he traveled the five miles in a rickety buggy behind a bony, gray nag. When the roads were very bad, he walked. Once when he happened to be at our house, Mama insisted on my reading some of my poetry to him. He was complimentary without being effusive. Then he took the time to teach me about meter in verse, something not usually taught in grade school. I understood, and this added much to my pleasure in writing.
I cannot define well what Tom Sargent’s business was. He may have been a broker dealing apples, potatoes and other produce. He went East in the fall, to the State of New York and shipped carloads of apples to various areas in Illinois. There he sold them directly to consumers, or to retailers; the same with potatoes and such.
He admired Maurice, who at twenty had a self-confident, out going personality and an ability to make friends. In the management of our farm, he had shown good judgment and had made it pay. That fall of 1918 Tom Sargent asked Maurice if he would take whatever time he could arrange to take from farming to work with him. Maurice accepted the offer and when Tom shipped a carload of apples to Trowbridge, Maurice was there to take charge of them and handle their sale.
He did very well and enjoyed it for several weeks during the fall season, traveling about the state. Then back to the farm. But he had gotten a taste of business and his keen mind was conceiving new ideas for future consideration. Meanwhile he had the farm to run for his mother. We had missed him. It was good to have him back again.
Maurice immediately embarked on a new enterprise, the purchase of a carload (100 or more) of ewe sheep. He planned to feed them through the winter. In late February and March they would have their baby lambs. When the lambs were six months or so old, they with the ewes would be shipped to market, hopefully with a tidy profit.
Louis and I did not remember long before, when Papa lived, that sheep had been kept on the farm, so we were very interested in them. When they arrived, we enjoyed them because they were tame and gentle. T he old barn was made tight for them against marauders, leaving the new barn, as usual, for the horses and cows. All went well. It seemed a long time until February to Louis and me as we looked forward to the coming of the baby lambs.
THE CHRISTMAS SEASON
After my birthday, November 10th, I decided to start making some Christmas presents. I had learned to crochet a few years before and I thought it would be a great idea if I could crochet a corset cover yoke for Mama and one for each of my sisters. There was a question in my mind as to whether to make one for Dorothy as I wasn’t sure she wore such a thing. At any rate, it was time to get started if I were to finish even three for Christmas.
I remembered seeing a very pretty yoke in an easy pattern that Aunt Emma had made as a gift for Mama. I found it and copied it with no trouble. I took my crochet hook and thread with me to school and crocheted during recess and lunch hour. I carried it about with me and worked on it incessantly. I finished one. I finished two. I was tired of the process but I hated to think of not having anything to give the others. So I asked for money to buy more thread and started a third. Often I worked on this under poor lamplight or in daylight far from a window. The third yoke was finished. I started the fourth. Winifred questioned me when I wanted more money for thread, asking why I was making another. I wouldn’t answer; to have done so would have spoiled the surprise. I finished the fourth just in time to ask Winifred to wash and iron all of them for me. Then I wrapped them proudly and put them away for Christmas morning.
A few evenings later, Winifred and I sat by the kitchen range playing a new game I had gotten in the Christmas gift exchange at school that day. It was past bed-time and we were trying to entertain ourselves while we waited for the sound of the buggy coming into the yard bringing Marie from the depot in Trowbridge. Maurice had gone to meet her train from St. Louis. The roads were rather slick and icy for the car, so he had driven Peaches, his fine new pacing mare. (Horses were still relied on in winter weather.) Mama had gone upstairs to see that Louis was asleep and rest herself. Marie had been away such a long time; I could hardly wait to see her and to hear about her life in the big city.
Soon we heard the crunching sound of hoofs and wheels and in a moment Marie and Maurice were coming in, dark eyes sparkling, cheeks rosy from the cold. To me Marie looked very beautiful in stylish new clothes. I was fascinated by her becoming hat, with pink velvet covering the underside of the brim. A new coat was buttoned high at her throat. Now she was hugging and kissing us each in turn and bubbling over with chatter about her trip. Mama appeared, glowing with happiness as she embraced her daughter.
We sat for awhile and listened as Marie told of the good friends who had regretfully seen her off at Union Station, knowing they would miss her. As she tried to answer all our questions, even assuring me that the building in which she worked really was eighteen stories high, she took an envelope from her purse addressed to me. I found it was from a friend of Marie’s who wrote poetry. I had sent her one of mine at Marie’s request. Now I found she had written one for me, sending it by Marie, expressing her pleasure in my poem and encouraging me. It was cleverly written, all in a light, amusing vein. Marie read it aloud. I was delighted, as was the whole family.
Finally, too weary to talk longer, we were reluctantly off to bed.
Dorothy came home the next day and again a warm reunion followed. She had grown considerably. In March she would be fourteen and was now one of the “big girls”. I was only ten and still termed by Mama as one of “the two little folks.” Dorothy brought us news and gifts from Aunt Emma and Grandma Rice.
Everyone joined in the preparations for the big Christmas dinner the next day and in arrangements to rise early and be off to Mass at St. Patrick’s.
When we opened our Santa gifts on Christmas morning, I found a warm, pretty cap and scarf, a book which I had been hoping for, and other things that delighted me. Then I distributed my gifts of crocheted yokes. They were politely received, but with little comment. Could it have been that they really didn’t want any more crocheted yokes for their corset covers?
I forgot about them completely as Marie brought out the presents she had bought for each of us in the city. She had been especially generous in her selection of charming little toys and games that were joyously received by Louis and me, treasured for months and years.
The holiday week passed too quickly and we again parted with Dorothy and Marie. The New Year of 1919 had arrived.
NEW PROBLEMS
A few weeks after Marie’s return to St. Louis, her letters sounded less happy. She was having painful trouble with an infected corn between her toes. A doctor had treated it yet had not given her much relief. Other ailments followed. Obviously, Marie was not well. Finally she wrote, “My doctor asked me today if I had to work. That she so wished I could go to the country and rest and be out in the fresh air for a time …”
Mama read this with tears, saying, “No, thank God, she does not have to stay there. She has a home. She must come home.”
Two weeks later, in mid February, Marie was home. We were all happy to see her again, but she looked too thin and rather pale. She slept late, took long walks with us on sunny days, and drank the rich egg nogs made of fresh eggs and country fresh cream and milk that were urged upon her. As spring came she improved and her vivacious spirit returned.
Meanwhile, I had found I had a problem. My eyes hurt when I used them for any length of time. My head ached too, and seemed to somehow be connected with my eye discomfort.
Mama said I’d been reading too much. I had received three books for Christmas which I had lost no time in reading and enjoying. One was “The Five Little Peppers” and another that became an all time favorite was “Anne of Green Gables” I didn’t think the reading had caused my trouble, but I did recall how constantly I had worked crocheting the corset cover yokes for Christmas presents. I felt I must have over worked my eyes then. I did not mention this to Mama even though I became very tired of being scolded for reading three books in the course of a short period.
I stayed out of school a great deal because it hurt my eyes to read. Mama told me that I should go even so, and learn what I could by listening to the class recite. She promised soon to take me to Mattoon to see an eye doctor. Aunt Tillie heard we were going and said she wanted new glasses and would go with us. At length, we drove to Neoga, took the train to Mattoon and saw Dr. Coultas. He found I had astigmatism, which caused discomfort, but that I had no defect in my vision. After I was fitted with glasses I was much more comfortable and wore them constantly.
LAMBIE AND POLLY
One frosty February morning, Maurice returned from the sheep barn for breakfast with the happy announcement that one of the ewes had given birth to a baby lamb. Louis had I lost no time getting into our coats and dashing to see it. There stood the tiny, white creature on its slim legs, its short wooly coat pressed against its mother as it nursed. It was hard to leave it, but we couldn’t linger; we must be off to school.
Each day two or three more baby lambs appeared. Louis and I loved to pet and play with them. We went with Maurice to the barn at feeding time, morning and evening, helping feed the ewes and counting the new lambs. One evening I noticed that one lamb had no mother to nurse. She was crying “Maa, maa”, sadly. I carried her to the house and made her a bed in a cardboard box behind the kitchen range. Mama got out an old baby bottle, filled it with warm milk, found a nipple for it and gave it to me. I taught my lamb to try the nipple. She learned quickly and eagerly emptied the bottle. That night she slept in her nest behind the range. The next day, Saturday, Louis and I took her to the barn to give her the bottle of milk and leave her with the other sheep. As we looked about we spied another motherless lamb. How great! Now Louis had a pet lamb too. Mama now supplied another baby bottle filled with warm milk. Louis happily fed the hungry little creature.
“I’m going to name my lamb Polly,” I said.
Louis thought quickly and announced, “I’m going to name mine Lambie.” So Lambie and Polly became our special loves.
“That ewe that died the night before last must have given birth to twins. I don’t know how it came we didn’t see this second one yesterday.” Maurice remarked to Mama.
So their mother had died! They were all ours to care for. Each morning before going to school, we went to the barn and called them by name. They wiggled out from among the crowd of sheep and hurried to us for their bottles of milk. By late March the days were longer and sunnier. Our pets followed the flock to the pasture each morning and learned to nibble the green shoots of grass pushing up among the fence rows. If Louis or I came to the field, they would come running to us and follow us about. They were wonderful pets.
Soon they were almost too big for us to carry about. They had teeth that chewed through the nipples as they took their milk. We taught them to drink from a bucket and to eat the handfuls of oats that we brought them. When the grass grew thick and green in April they grazed and played in the pasture with the rest of the flock, and soon did not need the milk any longer. Still we liked to go where they were and play with them. They would run to us and nuzzle against us happily. Often they would find we had a nubbin of corn or a small bag of oats to give them.
By mid summer their fine, white, baby coats had changed to resemble those of the older sheep. They were almost ready for market. The idea of Lambie and Polly being sold and shipped to a slaughterhouse was unthinkable. Yet the idea of two big lambs running about the place, lonesome for the rest of the flock, might seem silly to Mama and Maurice.
One August morning a neighbor man came into the barn lot saying he had come to help Maurice drive the sheep to Trowbridge for shipping. At the same instant, Maurice appeared and said to Louis and me, “Call your lambs out. We’re taking the others to ship.”
Swallowing the lumps in our throats, we called them and penned them safely. Then we ran to help drive the sheep to Trowbridge, one and a half miles away. We didn’t mind the broiling sun, it was so exciting to be part of it all, and besides, we had each been given a dime with which to buy a cold soda pop at Bingaman’s store. We were much in need of it when we reached that spot. When Winifred appeared in the Maxwell to take us all home, it was a most welcome sight.
February Lambs
I still can see my father going to the barn,
His lantern shining on the snowy ground,
To feed his sheep. Long hours before the sun
Brought feeble glow to February cold.
He found the newborn lambs who nuzzled there
Against their mothers’ breasts for warmth and food.
Sometimes he brought these babes into the house,
And warmed them in a box behind the stove;
My mother was solicitous and kind,
For here were little lives that she might save;
She brought a scrap of blanket and warm milk,
But most, I think, she warmed them with her love.
The lambs who start their lives in April sun
Or try their legs in thawing days of March
Are not so much a burden on my heart,
For they know more of springtime’s gentleness;
But February lambs evoke a prayer,
Whenever icy snowflakes bite the air.
Any Vance Weeks
A SMALL TRAGEDY
One Sunday morning, the day of Louis’ First Communion, a tragic accident occurred bringing sadness to one of the small boys in the class and to his family.
The children were waiting in line to enter the Church. Mass was about to begin, but one boy named Marcus was missing. Then a car rattled up to the gate and Marcus and his family climbed out. His mother was weeping and Marcus looked tearful and disheveled.
His eldest sister tried to tell the story. Their two milk cows were grazing in the field next to the railroad tracks. Somehow they had gotten through the fence and wandered on to the tracks and there they had been struck by a train and killed. The shock had been bad; the cows were their valued possessions. They had no money with which to buy others. To have no milk for their table would, indeed, be a great loss for a family already finding it difficult to properly feed their brood. Everyone was sympathetic.
Added to this loss was another disappointment. Marcus had broken his communion fast in the excitement of the morning and so could not receive his First Holy Communion with his class.
On the way home from Mass we talked about the plight of this family. They lived about a mile south of us in a crowded little house. They were hard working – at least the mother was – and clean and honest. Mama felt very sorry for this mother. How could she feed her family without milk? Mama remembered the big pails of milk we had to dispose of after the separator had removed the cream from it. Only whole milk was used for our cooking and drinking, the separated milk was usually mixed with feed for the animals. But separated milk too was nourishing. Yes, these neighbors could have all of this they wanted, just by coming for it.
This offer was quickly accepted. Every evening some of the young people of this family came to our house around milking time, visited awhile, and carried home big pails of milk. This continued until they were again able to have a cow of their own. It is interesting to learn that this same Marcus when a grown man working for a construction company, conceived an idea for a labor saving piece of machinery. It was patented. Marcus is now a man of wealth.
Another person who came with summer time and better roads was the music teacher. I had started piano lessons the previous summer when I was nine. I practiced faithfully from mid April until September; learned to read music and play a few simple tunes. During the winter months I could not practice as the piano was in the parlor, a room shut of for special occasions and not often heated in winter. Around Easter it was opened again and I was glad to try out my music. The older girls had each had a turn at music lessons. They had made satisfactory progress but dropped it as they grew older – probably because they were too busy with necessary tasks to spend time practicing. They were all hopeful that I would stay with it and urged me to work at it.
Our parents had bought the piano just a few weeks before my birth. When I arrived (the 4th daughter) my father’s happy remark was, “Ah, we have another little piano player.”
They decided to name me for St. Cecilia, the patron of musicians. So it was foreordained that I must learn to play. I had a very amateur teacher, and no special talent. However, in the three summers before we left the farm I had progressed well into third grade music, and the family was pleased.
It seems we all enjoyed music and were starved for more of it. That summer some of our friends had gotten the, then new, Edison phonograph with cylinder records, which we liked. Somehow we prevailed upon Mama to buy one. It became a source of much listening pleasure for all of us.
It entertained my sisters as they sewed their fall wardrobes which had to be finished by September. Winifred and Dorothy were preparing to go to boarding school, the Franciscan Academy for young ladies, in Joliet, Illinois. It was run by the same Order of nuns as that to which Papa’s sister, Elizabeth, (Sister Isabel) had belonged. The Mother Superior of the Order, Mother Vincent, was interested in having Winifred and Dorothy come there to school. Possibly Winifred had talked with her about her feeling that she had a calling to the religious life. Mother Vincent had explained that they could attend the Academy and be with a special group of girls with similar aspirations. If they wished, they could defray some of the expense by performing some duties. Thus they would be observed by members of the Order and advised as to their fitness for the life.
Winifred was aglow as she made her plans. At last, her long wish to devote her life completely to Our Lord might become a reality. She did not speak of this but I knew she was happy. Dorothy was excited too, but in a different way.
September came; their trunks were packed and they were off.
The family was small again. Besides Mama there were only Maurice who was almost twenty two, Marie nineteen and a half, Louis almost eight, and myself, soon to be eleven. Maurice was trying to arrange his farm work so that he could get away to work with Mr. Sargent again. We knew that with Maurice also away the work would be heavy for all of us remaining.
Louis was growing into a manly little lad who liked to follow his big brother about as he did the routine tasks about the barns and fields. I had grown a bit and was trying to help Marie with the poultry and other outdoor chores. Lamb and Polly were still running after us and we loved them.
Who the teacher was that fall, I can’t clearly remember. It was either Frank Crocket or Mable Bauer. I was in the seventh grade. Perhaps I wasn’t very interested. My classmates were all at least one and a half years older than I and some much more. Most of my best friends were in lower grades and of my own age.
MY CONFIRMATION
All the past summer my Catechism class at St. Patrick’s had been preparing for Confirmation. The Bishop was to come in early November to confer the Sacrament on those who understood the teachings of their Faith and the meaning of this sacrament. I knew the catechism from cover to cover. There was plenty of time in the summer months and it was always possible for all of us to go to Mass and Catechism class every Sunday during that season of the year. Besides, I read eagerly the Sunday Visitor each week and most any religious book or periodical that came into our home; also bible history and lives of the Saints (a huge volume ) from our own library. All these deepened my interest and understanding of spiritual things. God seemed very near to me. Perhaps never nearer that that fall as I prepared to receive the Holy Spirit in Confirmation.
In Catechism class, the teacher would ask our ages, or rather “You’re all twelve or over?”
I would say I was not. Then the would come the question, “When is your birthday?”
“In November, Ma’am.”
She would brighten hopefully, “Well, you are almost twelve?”
“No Ma’am, I’ll be eleven.” She would look troubled, but never say I was too young. I knew she would not. I knew my lessons.
The Bishop was coming to one of Effingham’s two large Churches to confirm the children from the surrounding parishes. Getting me to Effingham, twenty miles away, posed a problem for my family. Maurice was away on business with Mr. Sargent. Marie could not drive the car. It became necessary for Marie and me to take the train from Trowbridge to Neoga, spend the night there with a friend, and take an early train to Effingfam the nest morning.
It was a chilly morning as we lined up in twos in our white dresses to march to the church; so cool that we had to wear our coats over our white dresses until we reached the Church. There were over two hundred children and adults to receive the sacrament. The bishop in his red robes presided at the age-old ritual. I knew now I was a soldier in Christ’s army. I knew that now I must always be brave and be willing to suffer rather than betray Him by breaking His commandments, and that I must try to teach others to know and love Him.
THE CHRISTMAS SEASON 1919
A TIME OF DECISIONS
Maurice was now going to be away for a long period. The business he was going into was experimental. If he liked it, he might never come back to farming. He bought a partnership in a business in a town about forty miles north of our home. Occasionally, he came back for a day or two to see to farm matters. He sold some of the live stock so there would be less for us to care for and arranged for a hired man to come from time to time to do necessary heavy work.
Now it was December. Maurice would be home for Christmas. Too bad, Winifred and Dorothy would not. Mama had said when they left in September that she could not afford to bring them both home at Christmas time, since it was costing a great deal to have them in this excellent school. They had understood and agreed. I had loved reading their letters from the Academy, but I missed them both. It wouldn’t seem like Christmas without them.
One day a letter came from Winifred. Mama was shedding tears as she read it, but I could see that she wasn’t exactly sad. Winifred’s letter said that she and Dorothy had had a talk with Mother Vincent and had told her that they both felt they wanted to enter the religious life next year. Mother Vincent had said Winifred should write and tell her mother this, as, knowing it, she might want them to spend this last Christmas at home with the family.
Mama wiped her eyes. Yes, the religious life was beautiful for those whom the Lord chose. She would be proud to have a daughter aspire to such a consecrated life. It seemed right for Winifred, although she was young, but Dorothy was certainly too young to make a decision.
“But, Mama, will they be coming home for Christmas?”
“Certainly, they shall come home, Cecilia. I’ll mail a check for their train fares today.”
The days sped by as we rushed to make the greatest Christmas preparations ever.
Two days before Christmas, Louis and I hurried home from the closing day of school in order to have time for him to try out his new pair of skates, a Christmas present. We found a spot in the frozen stream in the woods beyond the north field where the ice was strong. A light skiff of snow had fallen but not enough to spoil ice skating. Louis learned to stand on the skates and tried to skate, but the skates kept coming off. Try as we would we could not adjust the clamps to hold to his shoes. Another time we solved this problem by adding straps to the skates. He was disappointed about it that day, but I could not feel sad for long – it was so beautiful in the snowy woods with the late winter sun shining low through the bare tree. My heart was singing as I remembered that our sisters would be home in a few hours and Christmas was almost here. I turned to go home but paused and looked back for a long moment to fasten in my mind the beauty of the woods on that winter day. Something within me seemed to say that I might never see my woods at Christmas time again.
Back at home, we were told that Marie had driven to Neoga to meet the train from Joilet bringing the girls. We stood at the double window of the living room watching the East Road for their coming. Then they were there – prettier than ever – hugging us and looking about as though they had never seen home before. So much to say, unpacking to do … We sat down to the good supper Mama had ready. Everyone was hungry. How good it tasted!
I felt that Winifred and Dorothy had changed somehow, in a pleasing way, but in a manner I couldn’t then describe. I noticed Mama’s face looked younger; it had lost its tired look as she laughed and chatted with her daughters.
The parlor doors were open wide that evening as we sat there in the living room and talked of all that had happened since they had gone away. They told us of their studies, their classmates, something of the rules and regulations of the school life, and of the many new experiences they had encountered.
Later that evening Maurice came home. We had not expected him until the next day, Christmas Eve. Now our family was complete.
Before the evening ended Winifred told us of her new plans, of her further talks with Mother Vincent who had told her they would be very happy to receive her as a postulant the coming fall. In the meantime, since she was so young, she felt it would be best for Winifred to go home and spend as much time as possible out of doors. Dorothy was too young to make any commitment and should return to her studies at the Academy after the holiday. We listened intently; glad that Winifred would not be leaving us for a rather long while.
It was wonderful to have the whole family together at Christmas Mass. The Infant must have smiled on us in a special way as we knelt before the crèche, offering Him our hearts and thanking Him for His blessings.
Then we were home having our gifts. Dorothy and Winifred were proudly presenting the gifts they had made each of us. They had learned to do beautiful needlework. Winifred, especially, who had never had time nor opportunity to learn such, now showed she had acquired real skill with it. I received a pretty pair of hand knit bedroom slippers, which I prized. There were knit slippers also for Mama as well as lovely embroidered pieces. Something just right for each of us. At dinner we were again surprised by the unusual and delicious dessert they had prepared; something Winifred had learned in her Home Economics class.
Dinner cleared away, we tried some of the new games that were among our gifts or looked at the new books soon to be read. Happy plans were made for the girls to see their friends in the week that lay ahead.
THE NEW YEAR
1920
Dorothy returned to the Academy at the end of the Christmas holiday period; a little lonely, I suppose, without Winifred. She was now with the group of regular students and doing very well scholastically. In addition to her regular studies, she was enjoying an art class, working in pastels. Some of her pictures hung in our home for many years and were admired. She was also in an “elocution class”, popular in that period before radio and TV. It would now be a “diction” or “speech” class, no doubt. Dorothy’s good diction was perfected and trained. After she came home, she occasionally entertained informal groups with her readings – dramatic, comic, poetry and prose. I think this training was of life long benefit.
At Trowbridge school, our teacher resigned in January and a new one appeared, Miss Mary Winkleback from Charleston, Illinois. She had, if I remember correctly, attended the State Teachers’ college there. She opened a new world of books to us by bringing the state traveling library to our school. It was available to any rural school for the asking. Our previous teachers had, possibly, never heard of it.
A large shipment of books arrived with suitable reading for each grade level. To be able to select whatever I wished and take them home to read was, to me, an unbelievable privilege, as though a fairy godmother had waved a wand and put before me such riches. I had long since read all the books within my range of understanding that were in the big bookcase at home, - lately the Horatio Algier series, a big “Life of Lincoln” and others.
Miss Winkleback’s opening exercises each day, instead of singing, was reading. She read aloud for fifteen or twenty minutes. The first book she selected was Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer. It delighted all of us from six to sixteen.
I listened to her short reviews of some of the new books we might borrow. Tarzan of the Apes sounded exciting. I eagerly stuffed it in my book bag. Mama was very pleased about the availability of the books, although she expressed doubt that Tarzan was a proper book for me. I brought home books too, that I thought my sisters and Mama might enjoy. Louis found books to delight a third grader.
Miss Winkleblack would have been voted a fine teacher except for one thing – she was a fresh air fiend. Picture a rectangular room with four windows evenly spaced on the two long sides, and with a big pot-bellied stove standing in the center. We were conformably warm most of the time. However, our teacher did not believe that one window on either side of the room, lowered a bit from the top, plus a general airing with open doors at recess and noon, allowed enough fresh air, even on the coldest days. Windows on each side must be opened much more. Children complained of drafts. Mothers complained of their children having many colds.
I was ill. I don’t know whether from the fresh air or not, but it was serious. I complained one evening or severe pain in my chest. I was running a high temperature, and I grew worse. Mama phoned the doctor right away and he sent medicine for me. Warm poultices were applied to my chest. I felt too weak to want to bother eating. I was urged to sip the good beef broth that I had always liked, but I could take only a little. Sometimes I saw tears in Mama’s eyes that she tried to hide. I knew she must feel that I was very, very sick. Slowly I began to recover and regain my strength. I had missed a few weeks of school and had, possibly, pneumonia.
In mid February, Maurice phoned asking Marie if she could come help temporally in his business, by doing bookkeeping and helping as cashier. So Marie was off in a few days, eager for a chance to use her business training again.
Now Mama realized that some difficult decisions must be made concerning the farm; if was foolish for her to go on living there with only her daughters and small son. All would be better off in town, perhaps in Mattoon, and the farm could be rented. Yes, it might be the wisest thing, especially since Winifred was planning to leave the next fall to become a sister. Marie could get secretarial work in Mattoon, Dorothy could finish high school, and Louis and I would have good grade schools.
Mama talked to Maurice. He gave no definite answer about his future plans, but suggested we should lighten the work load by having a public auction sale and disposing of some of the live stock and equipment no longer in use. Then if Mama should later decide to move there would be less to clear out.
He helped arrange this and came home for the sale. Louis and I decided, regretfully that we should sell Lambie and Polly. Fully grown sheep could not be taken with us if we moved to town!
Crowds of neighbors came to the sale. Sorry the Morans were thinking of moving; wondering that a young man should want to leave a well equipped farm and the land of his father and grandfather.
When the auction began, Louis and I watched nervously until our pets were put on the block. A farmer bought them to add to his flock of ewes for the sum of $24.00. Not a great price, but we were satisfied when we were assured that the buyer meant to keep them to raise baby lambs for him next year, not to ship them to market.
The $24.00 was put into a bank account for us. A year or so later, living in Mattoon, we were overjoyed to be allowed to use it to buy a much longed for bicycle.
SPRING BREAKS THROUGH
IT’S SAINT PATARICK’S DAY
With Marie away, there was a great deal of work for Winifred. I was well again and getting big enough to be more helpful. Winifred taught me how to do many tasks that I had not been, hitherto, permitted to try. I helped her fix breakfast, care for the poultry and I even helped with the milking.
Winifred had, among other subjects, studied Home Arts (Foods and Nutrition) at the Academy. From this she had developed an interest in cooking and our usual menus were being varied by new and interesting foods. I was fascinated by the new methods she had learned and the new recipes. Also she had a faculty for accomplishing things with dispatch, no dawdling or procrastinating. I liked to work with her. Somehow we got through the rest of the winter.
St. Patrick’s Day came – the heralding of planting time for certain vegetables and flowers. It was a fine sunny day. I found Winifred getting dressed to go to Mass at St. Patrick’s; I asked to go with her. She was planning to walk the two and a quarter miles. Old Babe was out to pasture and it would take time to catch and harness her. Could I walk so far? Of course, I could! Winifred was glad and we were off.
St. Patrick’s was a very special feast day in our parish. We were reminded of the great Irish Saints and of our own ancestors who had remained firm in their Faith through centuries of persecution. Father spoke of the sanctity of our forebearers and of many of our own grandparents who had come to this country and built this church and many like it, implanting their Faith.
We walked home light hearted, talking of Grandfather Moran who had in the early 1860s squared the beams for part of our Church. We talked, too, of all the things we would do in the coming months of spring. Life was beautiful, and we were young.
We reached home in time to answer the phone and find Marie’s voice on the line. It was full of excitement. An offer had come to her of a promising stenographic position with an insurance company in Mattoon. A friend of Maurice’s had recommended her there. She was to start the following week. How glad we were! Mattoon was less than an hour’s drive by car. She could surely spend a weekend at home with us often.
MAURICE RETURNS TO US
Then quite soon, an even more important phone call came – Maurice’s voice telling us he had made his decision – he had sold his half of the business to his partner. Yes, he would be home very soon, in time to start the spring planting.
Mama, numb with joy, found her voice, “Are you sure this is what you really want?”
Don’t worry, Mom, I’m going to spend the rest of my life farming,” came the firm reply.
How great! Maurice would be home to stay. Things would be like they had once been; not just a half way farm with women trying to exist on it. Mama looked happy again.
Winifred looked happy but pensive. She was wondering how she could possibly leave to enter the Religious Life that fall if it meant leaving Mama with only me to help with the workload. She had cheerfully done her share so that the others could go their ways, surely it was time that she should be able to do what she longed to do. Perhaps her heart told her to have trust, that He who was calling her to leave all and follow Him, would make it possible for her to do so.
It was mid April, and the school term had closed. The farm was buzzing with activity again. I was busy trying to help with the baby chicks and goslings and with the gardening. We must raise more of everything this year, I was told, so that we could can and preserve more to take with us to town when, and if, we moved there in the fall.
Maurice was home full of his jokes and laughter, teasing us all. He would joke with Winifred about a bashful neighbor youth being her secret admirer. She would laugh and tell him that she was going to help Mama move to Mattoon in the fall and that he must hurry and get married if he wanted someone to care for him. She repeated this more seriously from time to time. I wondered if he would follow her advice. He had never seemed serious about any of the attractive young women who seemed obviously interested in him, and whom we would have welcomed into our family.
For the time being, Maurice had much else to think of. He was a bit late in the season getting to his planting. With fair weather he could still have it finished in time. The new implements he had ordered were arriving each day. All the latest, most efficient type. One fine day, his most proud purchase was driven into the barn lot – a Fordson Tractor. With this a man could do in a day what it would take many days to accomplish working with a team of horses. A new era had come for farming!
Maurice at twenty-two was a handsome young man. Just under six feet in height, he was well built, erect in carriage, with a confident bearing. His hair was dark, thick and rather curly, complexion medium, and eyes dark grey-blue. Being by nature an ambitious, optimistic person, he very rarely showed discouragement. That spring I once heard him say, “I wish I had gotten an education.” It was a passing remark, not something to be brooded over. He still saw life as an interesting challenge, a race to be won.
Thus he set out anew, resolving to use his brain and brawn to make farming an interesting and rewarding way of life.
THE END OF SPRING
I awakened that morning in late May to bright sunshine. How good to see it after the many rainy days. Everyone would be glad, especially Maurice who had been waiting vainly for a stretch of dry weather so that he could finish planting the corn. He was probably in the field now with his new tractor.
Quickly, I slipped into my gingham dress and went down stairs. Mama called to me. “Cecilia, I’d like you to run down to the back field where Maurice is disking and tell him his breakfast is ready. He’s so determined to finish the planting today that he rushed our real early, before I was up.”
“Sure, Mama, I’ll call him.”
Louis stopped playing with his little wagon in the back yard, and together we climbed over the heavy barnyard gate and cut across the newly plowed field beyond.
It was a perfect May morning, the kind that made me want to skip and run. I loved the feel of the soft, plowed earth beneath my bare feet and the dewy dampness of the new grass in the meadow near the back field. We laughed at the sight of a baby rabbit hopping out from a clump of fence row brush to nibble the tender clover. As we paused to watch him, we stumbled into some thicker brush and a frightened prairie chicken suddenly flew up in front of us from her well hidden nest. We looked with wonder at the deserted nest with its dozen or so tiny eggs. Such a thing we had never before happened upon: the world was full of wonders.
But we couldn’t dally; we hurried on. Now we were in sight of Maurice on the tractor and two other men working with horse drawn plows. Maurice stopped the tractor and came toward us as we called to him.
Yes, he was hungry. Smiling, he joined us in high spirits. We could scarcely keep up with his swift stride as we traversed again the meadow and turned along the fence row of the next field. There Louis took the short cut diagonally across it toward the house. Maurice was following the smoother path along the fence so I did likewise.
“How come you aren’t taking the short cut too? It must be that you like to walk with me,” he bantered.
“Sure, I do if I can keep up with you,” I giggled.
Soon we were along the roadside fence under the shade of the hickory trees and turning into our yard. We drank eagerly of the cold water from the well, and went into the house to a hearty breakfast, which Winifred put on the table for us.
Maurice called to her before he went back to the field and asked her to go to Trowbridge and get gasoline for the tractor, which she did. Later that morning when he returned for the gasoline, I handed him a letter from his best girl friend, which had just come in the mail.
In the same mail was the Shelby County Leader, the local newspaper. I was in the living room absorbed in the exciting serial the paper carried of life in the old West, when the swift, terrible bolt fell - stunning my mind by the shock of it and changing the course of my life and the lives of all our family.
The phone rang. Winifred answered it and her voice trembled and broke as she heard the message. Frightened, I hurried to her side as Mama came in alarm from the kitchen.
“The tractor turned over on Maurice,” she sobbed. Moments of anguish – of uncertainty – was he badly injured – still alive – or – how hard to ask the next question.
The noon day meal, ready and waiting for Maurice, stood forgotten on the stove. I believe Winifred phoned the operator and asked him to call the doctor in Neoga. He did so and immediately spread the word through the neighborhood that help was needed.
We went out for a few moments to the barnyard gate and looked across the field. I started to go toward the back field where he was, but soon stopped, fearful. I saw Johnny Miller who had been working with Maurice coming across the meadow toward me. I started to meet him, but he turned away to avoid coming to the house. His face was white and tear stained.
“Johnny, tell me what’s happened? Is he alive?”
“OH – poor fellow –“ he stammered, choked and hurried on.
I ran back to where Mama and Winifred waited and repeated what Johnny had said. We returned to the house, praying in our hearts for strength.
Cars came careening down the road, pausing as they passed the house to look for the lane that would lead to the scene of the accident. They were filled with men who had instantly dropped their work to rush to be of aid, but it was too late.
Neighbor women came to try to comfort us and share our grief and shock. The doctor from Neoga came and spoke to Mama, expressing regret and telling her what she already sensed in the dining room, her face pale and drawn with pain. A kindly older woman hovered beside her, trying to speak of acceptance of God’s will and Mama great faith. She waved a fan over Mama, perhaps fearing she might faint in the oppressive mid day heat.
In the living room, Winifred, hearing the finality of it all lay on the sofa weeping uncontrollably. Someone was fanning her and trying to sooth her. People were everywhere trying to be helpful. There was a vacant chair by the reading table so I sat down and wiped my tears. At once a young woman from next door began to fan me. I wished she would stop. I wished the person sending the telegrams over the phone in the next room would stop repeating those dreadful words “Tractor killed Maurice.”
I got up from my chair and went to look for Louis. I found him on the back porch. Some women in the kitchen tried to get us to eat some lunch, which still sat untouched on the stove. We ate only a few bites. Then we were sitting on the front porch, wordless, trying to get away from the people, when a wagon stopped at the front yard gate. One driver climbed down and came into the house for directions from Mama. Others waited beside the wagon, on which lay the blanket covered body of our brother. Only the top of his head, his beautiful hair, could be seen. The reality of his death reached me suddenly, overpoweringly. I had walked with my big brother so happily a few hours before; I would never walk the fields with him again.
Mrs. Sargent was beside me saying, “You feel very bad, don’t you? Come, we must go inside. The men can’t do any more until we do.”
We followed her. She was right. They were waiting to carry Maurice into the parlor. There he would lie as Papa had after he died.
Father Berry, our beloved young Irish pastor, came to offer words of sympathy and consolation and to anoint the body. He explained that it was believed that the soul did not always leave the body immediately after death; therefore he would administer the Last Rites of the Church.
A friend brought Marie by car from Mattoon, telling her only that there had been an accident to her brother. She was in tears when I met her as she came up the steps to the front porch. Thinking she knew all, in my first remark I answered her worst fears. Her grief was terrible.
Dorothy arrived home from the Academy and Aunt Emma from Shelbyville some time that night. I was sleeping and missed their arrival. Now we were all home – all that remained of us – and we were of mutual comfort to each other in our grief. Plans were made for the funeral to be held on Sunday afternoon.
The story of the accident gradually took shape. Maurice was working in a low spot in the field where the soil was more moist than in the main part. The big back wheels of the tractor became mired. In his effort to get them out, the front of the tractor reared up and turned over the steering wheel striking Maurice in the chest with a powerful blow and pinning him beneath it.
Frantically, the two helpers tried to remove the tractor from him. One ran for help. It was too late.
The long day passed as we struggled with the numbing pain of our loss. At nightfall there was a little time of quiet before friends began to arrive for the wake. I sat on the back steps with my Aunt and my sisters, listening as they reviewed it all. A bright full moon rose above the big maple flooding their faces and the simple scene with unearthly beauty, while from the shadows a whip-poor-will sang his familiar lament.
I felt something of the eternal loveliness of all nature trying to brighten our sadness, something above and beyond death and life, perhaps an awakening trust in God’s eternal plan for us.
Sunday afternoon the front yard and beyond was filled with friends and relatives waiting to form the funeral cortege to St. Patrick’s. When the family formed a line behind the casket as it was about to be carried to the hearse, I found I was being pushed with Louis to the front to lead the procession. Just behind us were Mama and Aunt Tillie, and then the big girls, Aunt Emma and the other relatives.
So we walked behind the casket as it was carried down the porch steps and along the walk, the old locust tree shading it, and it’s creamy blossoms scenting the warm breeze. A sea of tearful faces surrounded us, divided and formed a lane for us to pass.
The little country church was filled to bursting and still there were crowds outside. Father Berry based his homily upon a quotation from St. Paul taken from the Epistle of the Mass for that day. A great coincidence, as a more applicable text could not be imagined as we in our hearts asked, “Why. Oh Lord?”
“Oh, the depths of the riches, the wisdom, the knowledge and the power of God. How incomprehensible are His judgements and how insearchable His ways”.
In the quiet, country church yard, we pondered these words during the burial service beside the grave of our father, and often in the weeks that followed, as we strove to put together the pieces of our shattered world.
We came back again to the same home, but it could never be quite the same. The late spring days brought no joy to our hearts. In time, we young people would find life’s springtime joy, but for Mama, I believe, it remained forever the end of spring.
Maurice Russell Moran
1897-1920
Maurice Russell Moran was born October 30, 1897, near Trowbridge, Shelby Co., Ill., and passed from this earthly life near noon on Friday, May 28, 1920, being 22 years 6 months 28 days old.
He was the oldest living child of Thomas and Frances Rice Moran. He leaves to mourn their loss: his mother, four sisters; Marie, Winifred, Dorothy and Cecilia, and one brother Louis, the youngest child, beside a host of friends who sadly regret his early and tragic death.
A Fordson tractor turning over backward pinned him beneath the steering wheel, crushing his life out in a few short minutes. So quickly was it done that no possible help could have saved his life, when once the engine started to make the final turn.
Help was quickly given but 'twas too late so forcible was the blow. He was discing a field getting ready to plant corn when in crossing a low spot in the field the machine got stuck, and in his effort to dislodge it he met his death.
He was ambitious to get ahead, had excellent business ability, bright and alert for every opportunity and gave promise of a successful future. He had been reared on the farm where he was born and to which he had returned but six weeks ago, after spending the winter in Arcola, Ill., having been a partner in the hotel business there and had been quite successful but had decided to return to the farm to be with the family to whom he had been elder brother and as nearly as possible filled his father’s place to the little brother, Louis.
His character and sterling worth make his tragic end the sadder for those with whom he was closely associated for his happy disposition made him loved by all.
A large number attended the funeral services which were held by the pastor Father Beary at St. Patrick's Catholic Church Sunday afternoon at 2:30 P. M., burial being in the cemetery near by beside his father who passed away five years ago.
The pall bearers were: Anderson, Henry Auffeniorde, Herman Auffeniorde, Guy McClory, John Riney and Charles Riney.
Misses Marie and Dorothy Moran sisters of the deceased were called home by his death. Marie is employed by the Crescent Automobile Co., at Mattoon; Dorothy is attending school at Joliet.
Others from out of town in attendance at the services were: Miss Emma Rice and Ed Rice of Shelbyville, sister and brother of Mrs. Moran; John Smith and family, Windsor; George Keck and family, Arcola; Miss Crane and Miss Daugherty, Mattoon; Miss Matilda Harrington, Arcola.
A Friend.
CHAPTER 11
DAYS OF DECISION AND
A PATH MADE STRAIGHT
COVERING THE PERIOD FROM JUNE TO NOVEMBER 1920
Written in the summer of 1980 to commemorate SISTER MARY PATRICIA MORAN’S SIXTIETH ANNIVERSARY IN RELIGIOUS LIFE
DAYS OF DECISION
In the dreary days following the funeral, we tried to rebuild the broken pattern of our lives. It was comforting to have thoughtful friends drop in to visit and to receive many wonderful letters of sympathy.
The arrival of the postman was the high point of each day. We gathered about as Mama read aloud the letters from old friends, faraway relatives, and even strangers who had read of our tragedy. A man residing in the state of Washington wrote asking if Mama could possibly be his long lost sister Fanny, whom he had heard was living in Illinois and had married a man by the name of Thomas Moran. A cousin of Mama’s, Mae Rice, a Carmelite nun whom Mama had never met, wrote a most beautiful and consoling letter. The glowing light of her great faith in eternal life shone through her words, lifting and restoring our spirits. Mama kept this letter among her treasures for years.
Now the perfect days of June were upon us. The garden was flourishing and needed our care. The baby chicks and goslings must be carefully tended. Tasks were all about us to keep our hands busy and give us time to accept the reality of our loss, time to adjust our lives.
We contracted with a neighboring farmer to “share crop” our land for the season, though we knew the yield would be poor because of the late season. Hopefully, we would arrange to move to town by fall. The farm must either be sold or rented by then, a difficult choice to make and execute.
Mama considered carefully which would be the better step to sell our home and our land or to rent it to a tenant farmer to “share crop” If we offered it for sale, would we be able to get a fair price for it? During the war, the price of grain and live stock had risen, making farming a more profitable enterprise and land had increased in value. Now in 1920, the trend was downward. We might not get an acceptable offer for it.
There were arguments, too, against renting it. Industrious, honest tenants were scarce. The income at best would be little, and from that little we would have to pay taxes and up keep on the property. We had a new, good house, one of the best in the area; the average renter would not take much care of it. Soon it would depreciate in value.
Winifred was strongly in favor of selling if a reasonable price was offered. Mama, however, had a fear of unsafe investments. She viewed land as the safest. Land cold not disappear, be stolen, or frittered away. A neighbor who hoped we wouldn’t sell, reminded Mama that she had another son, - eight year old Louis – in another ten years he might wish to farm.
Mama decided she would look for an acceptable tenant farmer.
The question of where we should move was easier. Mattoon seemed the logical place. It was a thriving small city of 15,000 population; the largest in a radius of fifty miles, and only eighteen miles from our farm. It was there that Marie had a good position, had made friends and enjoyed living. The schools were reputed to be excellent. How fine it would be if we could find a suitable house there and move in before school opened in September.
It was important that Mama find a time soon when Uncle Peter Moran (Papa’s younger brother) could go to Mattoon with her to look for a house. She sighed at the thought of parting with the big house that Papa had worked so hard to give his family and in which they both had taken such pride. After only eight years in it, she must leave it. The house in town could be smaller; five bedrooms were no longer needed. Would she be able to find a suitable home in Mattoon at a price she could afford? Papa’s life insurance money, now on interest would, she hoped, be adequate to buy a simple home where she could raise and educate the younger children.
While Louis and I were not involved in the decision making, we listened with interest. The idea of living in a town as large as Mattoon and going to a big modern school held much enticement. There were fun things to do there too that farm life didn’t offer. We had seen children roller skating and riding bicycles on the sidewalks and pavement, things we had never had a chance to try. Houses were closer together and one’s friends might live nearby, not a mile away as in the country. We could borrow all the books we wanted to read from the big public library. Possibly we might even get to go to a moving picture show sometimes. The attractions seemed endless.
Mama agreed these things were possible, but added that the best thing about it all for Louis and me was that we would have excellent schools and be able to attend them regularly. We would never need be absent because of roads or weather.
It worried us a little to hear that “town people” did not usually have the good food that “country people” enjoyed; the fresh vegetables and fruits from gardens and orchards, the rich milk and newly laid eggs. It was true, in those days before electric refrigeration and fast transit shipping, these things were expensive and seldom available.
Yes, we would have a small garden but not like we had on the farm. With careful planning we would get along well enough.
The day of decision came soon when Uncle Pete met Mama in Neoga and they drove to Mattoon to look for a house. It must have been a great deal to decide in one day, even though there were few among which to choose. Marie joined them in house hunting and they bought a house just a few doors from the home of her good friends, the Doughertys. It was only three blocks from the center of town and the office where Marie was employed; also close to our church and the parochial grade school and the public high school
Mama tried to describe it to us when she reached home that evening. She was satisfied they had made the best decision possible, but told us it was not as good a house as the one we were leaving and we must not be over expectant.
Knowing she had a house purchased, Mama set her thoughts on consideration of a tenant to occupy our farm house and till our land. Uncle Pete soon recommended a man and his family who were fairly well known to us, honest and respectable. The farm was rented to them.
We enjoyed our last summer on the farm, each of us helping as much as age and know-how allowed, with the berry picking and preserving, peach picking and canning. There was a bumper crop of peaches that season. Then there were quantities of tomatoes to be canned or made into catsup, grapes to be made into jelly or juice. All these things would help us through our first winter in town.
We were told to sort out our toys and give away those we had outgrown. So we parted with some of our childhood treasures. Mama was sorting out belongs too, deciding which would fit into the new home and which must be disposed of.
Mama had lived in this place since she had come there as a bride in January 1895. It was then a small story and a half house. A kitchen and another bedroom had been added soon. In 1912 it was completely rebuilt as described earlier.
The original house had been built and owned by Papa’s uncle and aunt, Thomas Dougherty and Sarah Moran Dougherty. Thomas was a Civil War veteran; Sarah, a sister of my grandfather, Peter Russell Moran. The couple moved there from Ohio about 1865.
There was a small log cabin, as I have mentioned, which stood it the back of the barn lot until 1916, used as a shed for machinery. I have been fascinated as to its date of origin and purpose. Perhaps it was a temporary home for Thomas and Sarah when they first came to Illinois. Or, - I have often wondered about it – did some earlier pioneer live there, perhaps in the 1840s? No one whom I asked knew the answer.
None of this was in my thought during those summer days which were passing too quickly. Louis and I often went up the north road to play with our cousin Lucille Wilson. She was halfway between us in age and liked our games. In a strip of woodland at the far end of her family’s farm, we like to play Indian. We followed a little ravine and picked up stones to fashion a miniature bridge or path to fit into our imaginary game, and of course, built a wigwam of dead branches of trees.
Sometimes we went to play with the Keck children, Catherine, Joseph and Charles, all within our age range for joining in games. Also, as in former years, Mrs. Sargent and several of her children would often walk the half mile in the early dusk to visit. While she and Mama enjoyed their conversation, Louis and I would have great games of hide-and-seek or such with Robert, Frank, Emily and Arthur, until dark. Then we would come inside and sit about the parlor while Mrs. Sargent played the piano and sang familiar songs.
Marie came home for a weekend occasionally bringing with her one of her new friends. She had a local boy friend and he and other young people would gather at our home on a Sunday afternoon. One weekend which we especially enjoyed, she brought the friend in whose home she lived and the girl’s mother and little brother. Mrs. Dougherty and Mama immediately became good friends, and Louis and I entertained eight year old Francis. Farm life was completely new to him and we liked showing him about. On leaving Sunday evening, Mrs. Dougherty extended an earnest invitation to Mama to come and bring her family to supper at her home on the evening of our move to Mattoon. This proved to be a most gracious idea.
During her weekends at home, Marie told us much more about the house Mama had bought and of the parochial school Louis and I would be entering. It was taught by Dominican sisters and only two blocks from our new home. Francis Dougherty and Louis would be classmates. How great! We could hardly wait for moving day.
That day would be soon, shortly after October first. Too bad it couldn’t be September first. As it was, Louis and I attended Trowbridge school for that month. The greater inconvenience was for Dorothy, entering her third year of high school, to find she must register at the Neoga High School to attend there for one month. Since she had attended Shelbyville High School her first year, the Franciscan Academy the second year, this third school seemed too much. However, she was cheered by the prospect of being in the Mattoon High School for her remaining high school years.
Each morning Dorothy hitched Old Babe to the buggy and started her hour’s drive to Neoga. I thought her very pretty as she drove off, her wavy hair held back with a big ribbon, dark blue eyes that contrasted with her fair skin, and her saucy little nose that almost turned up but didn’t. She looked smart, perky and self-confident.
Neoga High School 1920
Dorothy was the one who was looking forward most to
having a house in town with all the conveniences that country living lacked; the one to be most disappointed to find the new house was not all that she had hoped it would be.
A PATH MADE STRAIGHT
Winifred and Dorothy had worked hard all summer. Winifred must have often wished for time to think about her own future. For months she had planned on seeing Mama moved to town and comfortably settled before she went on with her plans to enter a Religious Order of nuns. Now the moving plans were complete; they would soon be living in Mattoon. Then, she hoped, she would be free to go and follow her calling.
But where was she to go? The Franciscan Order she knew and admired, but their work was teaching. She felt her vocation was nursing. How was she to learn of the right nursing Order for her? Surely, the Lord would answer her prayers and guide her.
One Sunday morning in early September, and exciting announcement was made by our pastor: a Mission Week was to be held at our church. It would be preached by Father Michael Pathe, a young Redemptorist from St. Louis. Everyone was delighted. It would be the first such parish event in more than ten years. All looked forward to it eagerly.
Mission Week would be a week of prayer and devotion, a time of spiritual renewal. The program would be Mass each morning with an instructive talk by Father Pathe, a special talk for the children in late afternoon, and a beautiful service each evening with sermons in logical sequence. It was a time for the returning of the lost sheep to the fold, for the good to become better, the lukewarm to grow fervent – a time of special grace.
Father Pathe was warmly welcomed on his arrival the following Sunday. An eloquent and inspiring speaker, he drew all to the church night after night. Men who had not been inside the Church in years, came to hear him and remained on their knees repentant and at peace.
Winifred listened and her heart sang within her. “Here is a priest who can help me. I’ll ask him for direction to an Order that will be right for me.”
Soon she had a long interview with Father Pathe. He told her of a wonderful nursing Order – the Sisters of Mercy - his choice because he had gone to school to them in Ireland. Some of them had come to Missouri in the 1870s. They now had a great hospital in St. Louis where they needed more nursing Sisters. Also in Webster Groves, a St. Louis suburb, they had recently opened a beautiful new novitiate. If she wished, he would write a letter of introduction to the Superior of the Order, Reverend Mother Mary Gonzaga and to the Mistress of Novices, Mother Mary Vincent.
Winifred was overjoyed; confident this was the Lord’s answer. St. Louis was not too far away. Perhaps she could join the next class of postulants which Father mentioned was to enter about November first. She hurried to write to Reverend Mother asking for an appointment with her very soon. Then she wrote to Aunt Emma asking if she could be her companion on this trip. Winifred hoped Aunt Emma would say yes; if not, she would go alone. However, the idea of finding her way about in a big, strange city was rather frightening.
Now eighteen years of age, Winifred was a beautiful young woman, unusually tall and erect, with curly golden brown hair pinned in a coil at the nape of her neck. She had blue eyes and a pink and white complexion with a light sprinkle of freckles in summer across her nice straight nose. Because she had grown tall and was quite mature in her outlook due to such early responsibilities, she was sometimes thought to be older than her years. Yet there was a shy innocence about her and a happy twinkle in her eyes that belied all this.
There was a new light in her face as she went about the work of packing for the move to Mattoon and watched for the postman to bring her the letter from Mother Gonzaga.
It came shortly, with an invitation for her to visit them soon. Then a date was set for her to go with Aunt Emma, after the family move, to meet Reverend Mother and other Sisters and learn more about their work, their history and their goals. Meanwhile our Mission Week continued to a joyful end. Its memories remained with us for many years.
I shall never forget the evening when the sermon was on repentance, the shortness of life and the length of eternity. In emphasizing the point that we should always be prepared because “We know not the day not the hour”.
Father said, “Men of Trowbridge, you have seen it here among you! Have you not before you the recent memory of a neighbor in the prime of his young manhood, going to the field one morning in the glow of health – snapped dead in a moment – the hand of God was upon him. But thanks be to God, he was well prepared!”
As we drove home after the service, we spoke softly about this reference to our loss; not saddened by it but somehow rather pleased. We felt our pastor must have told Father Pathe of the accident and our pastor had said that Maurice was well prepared to meet his God. What a consoling thought!
Back row: l to r: Aunt Emma Rice, Winifred Moran, Marie Moran, Dorothy Moran. Front row: Cecilia Moran, Frances Rice Moran, Louis Moran. 1920 before the big move to Mattoon.
Moving Day
Moving day was tomorrow. Today our public auction sale of farm equipment and household goods was being held.
It was a strange and difficult experience for me, and no doubt, for each of the family, to see the everyday things, so long a part control of our lives, being sold to the highest bidder. The implements, machinery, wagons, buggy , old surrey, the horses, even Old Babe, the western pony who had taken us to school in all weather, all going to new owners.
Even the car was sold – with some regrets – the Maxwell that had added pleasure to our lives. It was felt that a car was not a necessity for town living; only in the country was it really needed. Distances in town were short and there were sidewalks which made walking easy.
Then the furniture which would not fit into our new house was sold. We were ready for the movers!
Early the next morning the moving van arrived. By mid afternoon all was loaded and on the way. Uncle George Moran, Papa’s older brother, was waiting with his car to drive us to our new home. I felt a twinge of sadness as we drove away and I looked back at the home where I had spent my “almost twelve years” of life, but the excitement of the events ahead soon took over my thoughts.
In less than an hour we were stopping in front of our new home. It stood on a corner lot: a yellow frame house with white trim. A railed porch ran across the front of it with an entrance in the center opposite the front door. An ordinary house, looking much like the houses around it, - middle aged and comfortable.
We explored it hurriedly before the van arrived and found it all as Mama had described it. There were two bedrooms on the ground floor, and two in the half-story upstairs. One of these was to be used only as a storeroom. There was a rather large entrance hall, a smallish living room, a good sized dining room, kitchen, pantry and another small storage room with a tiny basement beneath it.
The van arrived on schedule. By nightfall the rugs were all laid and the furniture in place. It was beginning to look a bit like a home.
Marie came home from work, delighted to see us getting somewhat settled. She reminded us that her good friends, the Dougherty, who had been our guests during the summer, were expecting us all to have supper with them. Such thoughtful hospitality could never have been more welcome. How much we enjoyed the delicious meal and the friendly, relaxing company after our long and emotion filled day!
The following afternoon, Mama put aside the unpacking work for awhile to take Louis and me to register for school. Sister Sebastian, the principal of St. Joseph’s received us pleasantly and visited with Mama in the convent parlor. I was to enter the eighth grade and Louis the fourth.
I thought the parlor was quite beautiful but soon grew restless sitting quietly. T hen I spied a lovely framed poem on the wall beside me and spent my time memorizing it.
Mama was pleased with what she had learned about the school. She seemed very happy as she walked home with us. One of her hope was materializing at last: she was going to be able to put us in a really good school.
Winifred and Dorothy had finished putting the house in order by the time we returned. Clothes were in proper closets, books and bric-a-brac in place. It looked much more like a home.
I decided to try to find the public library. Marie had given me directions that sounded simple. Louis and I had already walked to Broadway, enjoyed the big store windows, and explored the business district. The library wasn’t far from Broadway, a large, stone building housing what to me seemed a great wealth of books. The reading rooms with their wonderful array of magazines were unbearably enticing. It was too late in the afternoon to look at them. I resolved to persuade Mama to come here with me when she had time. How she would love all this!
I looked through the book shelves in the older children’s room and finally selected two books which I had been wanting to read – sequels to some I owned – and went home happy.
Mattoon Library – renovated and enlarged in 1994
A DREAM COMES TRUE
On Monday Louis and I started to St. Joseph’s School and Dorothy to the Mattoon High School. Only Mama and Winifred were left at home trying to familiarize themselves with a strange house and new way of living. Winifred was trying to help Mama get all arranged in the most convenient manner. The time for doing so was very short. Before the weekend Aunt Emma would arrive to accompany her to St. Louis for her visit with Reverend Mother Mary Gonzaga at the novitiate in Webster Groves.
Winifred was ready when the day came and she and Aunt Emma set off by train. They returned with glowing accounts of the warm reception they had receive of their pleasure in meeting the sisters there, particularly Mother Mary Vincent, the novice mistress. The latter, when she learned that the Aunt’s name was Emma Rice, recalled with delight, that as a young woman she had been a bridesmaid for Laura Rice, Aunt Emma’s cousin. What an amazing coincidence it was - the prospect of having a young cousin of her dear old friend under her direction! Sister Mary Vincent gave much kindly attention to Winifred, answering her questions and instructing her in the rules and spirit of the Order.
Winifred met many of the sisters and immediately felt at ease with them. She was taken to see St. John’s Hospital where she might eventually study nursing, after she had completed her noviceship. Winifred felt certain this was the Order of which she wished to become a part.
Aunt Emma stayed several days with us, making the simple black dresses that Winifred would be wearing while a postulate. (the first six months). Then, if the Order found her an acceptable candidate and she chose to continue, she would be received as a novice and wear the habit of the Mercy Order. While she was a novice she would wear a white veil instead of the black veil of the professed nuns. These later requirements would be provided for her at the convent when needed.
So there were great changes taking place in our household that short month of October. While Winifred was preparing quietly to take the most important step of her life, the rest of us were struggling to adjust to the new situations in our lives. Dorothy, Louis and I each to the customs and demands of a new school; Mama to coping with a different environment, shopping and cooking in a different manner.
Only Marie went on smoothly with her office job, trying also to help us with difficulties and answer our endless questions. Each week she shared her pay check with Mama to help with the unusual initial expenses of getting the household in running order.
The short weeks passed; it was Saturday and Halloween. Tomorrow, the Feast of all Saints, was the day Winifred was to leave us. Her suit case was packed and all was in readiness.
Louis had heard of the big Halloween celebration uptown that evening and persuaded Dorothy and me to go with him to see the funny costumes. I think Winifred went too. We laughed at the grotesque characters in the parade and the milling crowds. It was a frosty night for the season, so giggling and shivering we came home early.
Winifred and I shared a big bed. I lay awake awhile thinking – this is another “last”. I knew I would miss her very much but I didn’t know how to tell her so. I might start crying; that would be the wrong thing to do. Besides, I was glad for her as I knew she was doing what she had hoped to do for such a long time. I thought she was really brave to leave us all to spend her life serving Christ in this very special way.
How pleased I was the next morning when she gave me her treasured opal ring and a prayer book she had used for many years. I guarded them carefully. Later I had the ring made smaller to fit my finger and wore it with pride.
There were no lingering good byes. After Mass we hurried to help Winifred get off. Then the entire family, taking turns carrying her bags, walked with her to the railroad station. The train was already standing on the tracks. She quickly kissed each of us, boarded and was off. No tears.
In later years, Mama, recalling Winifred’s departure, remarked that it was surprising she could have been given the strength to part so permanently with another child, having lost her elder son in death only five months before. Perhaps the greater sorrow dimmed the lesser one. It was hard to be sad when Winifred was so happy. Mama, all her life, felt honored and thanked God who had made her the mother of such a daughter.
There was an emptiness in our home without Winifred, but soon we were getting her letters, letters full of the joy she was finding in her new life.
ANOTHER NEW EXPERIENCE
ST. JOSEPH’S SCHOOL
St Joseph’s School building seemed cold and strange to me as I stood before it that first morning. This solid, square, brick structure standing in the center of its half block, worn grass area, looked eternal, indestructible. In my six years of school life I had known only the one room wooden school house standing on its grassy, tree bordered acre. I sensed that everything about St. Joseph’s was going to be as strange and different from my old school as its exterior.
With all the eager curiosity, yet fearfulness of a lone Columbus on an untried shore, I ventured in and found my way to my classroom. The teacher, Sister Josephine, welcomed me and assigned me to a seat.
Sunshine streamed in from two sides of the large corner room. The children looked relaxed and Sister was smiling. A bell rang; all came to order. To my surprise, the children turned to face the rear of the room, knelt in their seats and joined in an opening prayer. It was the familiar “Morning Offering” in which we commended to the Lord our prayers, works and sufferings of the day. Then everyone sat down and opened their books.
There were about twenty pupils in the eighth grade and a few less in the seventy. Most of the eighth grade girls were bigger and more grownup looking than I. Some, I learned later, were as much as two years older. I wondered which of them would become my friends. There were fewer boys than girls in both classes. I passed over them as of no interest.
Sister Josephine was a tall, rather large framed woman, possible in her early forties. Alert to all that was happening in the room, her bright eyes detected quickly any misbehavior. Good order was always maintained. I soon learned that she was an excellent, experienced teacher, fair and impartial with her pupils.
The school term had been in progress over a month when I entered the class. My greatest problem was that no text books were available for me to purchase, and although immediately ordered, they were three weeks in arriving. Meanwhile, I listened to the class recite and was able to follow much of what was being studied. I, sometimes, was able to borrow a book or two and try to catch up. It was a happy day for me when my books came and I could delve into them.
We were given a great deal of “home work”. I did it carefully and caught up and kept up with my class. But this did not keep me from feeling strange and shy and I did not volunteer in class. As a result, my teacher did not realize how much I was learning until exam time in January, two month later.
This was November and I had my studies well in hand when Mama asked me if I would like to begin piano lessons each week with Sister Timothy, the music teacher at St. Joseph’s. I thought it a great idea. Sister Timothy was a pleasant, young nun who came to our classroom twice a week to teach singing. All the children loved her. How luck I would be to have her for a teacher.
For the first time, in connection with my music lessons, Mama mentioned that they cost money, and money was scarce. I began to value these lessons as a special privilege; a privilege that carried an obligation to faithfully find time each day for piano practice.
My days were, indeed, busy. Not only had school demands changed for Louis and me, but home life had changed in such a way that every moment of our days, our weeks, became filled. Gone were the leisurely saunters home from school in the golden October sunshine along country roadsides edged with burnished red and bronze, and Saturdays when we roamed the woods filling our pails with hickory and walnuts. And, least missed, but forever gone, was any time or place to sometimes live in a dream world of our own imagination where, for years we had entertained ourselves with exciting fantasies. We did not realize the passing of all these things, so full were our days.
WINTER DAYS
After school hours held little time for play. There were always shopping errands or other tasks to be done for Mama. Sometimes we carried fuel from the coal house at the back of our lot for use in the kitchen range, or helped with cutting the lawn or raking leaves.
Marie Conlin about 1928
Supper was at six o’clock, or as soon as Marie came home from the office. Dorothy or I helped Mama with the serving of the meal and the cleaning up. Marie’s office hours were long, from 8:15 AM until 5:45PM, and the work was exacting. Evening found her much in need of relaxation. Saturday afternoon, Sundays and a two weeks vacation in summer were her only free times. No one expected her to spend any of this doing household chores.
Dorothy, always energetic and neat, spent Saturday mornings giving much of the house its special weekly cleaning. Vacuum sweepers were not yet affordable. Dorothy’s favorite method of minimizing the dust as she vigorously swept the rugs with a broom was to sprinkle them with used damp tea leaves. My job was to follow her with a dust cloth to clean the furniture, a task I detested. I even preferred washing windows or polishing the hardwood floors. Fortunately, I was often called off such work to go on special errands or to help Mama in the kitchen.
Weekdays, the four of us trooped in hungrily at noon for our lunch, consumed it as we exchanged bits of news from school or office; then we were out and away again. Thus, in spite of our efforts to be helpful, Mama carried a heavy work load. Her health was not good at the time and her nerves in need of rest.
Throughout our high school years, Dorothy and I dreamed of a day when we would be able to earn money and help to buy the new equipment that lightened housework – an electric vacuum sweeper, refrigerator, range and washer. But Dorothy was only a junior in high school and I an eighth grader. The years ahead looked long before such dreams might become realities.
SOME TIME FOR PLAY
I usually found some time on Saturdays and Sundays for play, but there were no girls my age in our block with whom I might make friends. Louis was luckier; there were three boys of his age or a couple years older living close by who immediately became his good pals. Sometimes I joined in their games. They played marbles, jackstones, and sidewalk hopscotch. Most of all there was roller skating. Louis and I watched them enviously. How we wished we owned skates. It looked like such great fun, but we knew we shouldn’t ask Mama to by them for us. We might not ever have them – yet maybe, some day---
That day came sooner than we had expected. On the 26th of October, Louis had his ninth birthday. Not much was made of birthdays. The gift might be a new sweater for school or a pair of new winter shoe. On the evening of this birthday when Marie came home from work, I noticed a package under her arm. I thought it was the new skirt she had talked of needing badly; but no, she was trying to hide it. After supper she brought it out and handed it to Louis while we all sang Happy Birthday. He opened it and his face flushed with unbelieving surprise to find a shining new pair of roller skates!
He must try them at once. While he adjusted them to fit his shoes, he assured me that as soon as he had learned to use them, he would loan them to me to try. I knew he would. Later when the others came out to see what progress he was making on the skates, they were all smiling. I though Marie’s smile was the happiest of all, though I felt sure she had given up the new skirt she wanted in order to buy the skates.
My twelfth birthday came the following month. I didn’t receive skates then, but only a few weeks later, I too, was given the same gift by my big sister. Now I could skate with Louis. I could even skate on the some of the endless errands.
There were other happy new experiences. In December, Bertha Wellch, an eighth grade girl, invited the entire class to her home for her fourteenth birthday. This was an exciting event for me and, I believe for all, as it was the only party given for the class that term. On the big day, after school was dismissed, we walked in a group to Bertha’s home. I thought it a very nice home and her mother a kind and gracious lady.
The parlor games we played were all new to me and fun. There was much giggling and joking. T hen we watched Bertha open the pile of small gifts and her pleasure with each. The high point was refreshment time when we entered the dining room and saw the big cake with fourteen candles burning upon it. Soon it was cut and, with a mound of ice cream, served to twenty eager boys and girls. S silence reigned for a time. The party was a success.
Bertha and I gradually became very good friends and our friendship deepened through high school days and beyond I was to know many parties in her home in later years.
CHRISTMAS ADVENTURES
One source of happiness that added to the lives of our entire family upon moving to Mattoon was the proximity of our parish Church. On the farm there had been many Sundays in winter when only two of us could go to Mass at St. Patricks because of the almost impassable roads or very severe weather. Now it was always possible to attend Mass, evening Lenten devotions or other services. The BEAUTIFUL BIG Church of the Immaculate Conception was only four blocks away. This was especially a satisfaction to Mama. I’m sure she found true comfort in prayer during that year in which she had known so much sorrow.
The joyous liturgy of the Christmas season added much to lighten our hearts. We were also cheered by a visit from Aunt Emma for a few days. She helped to fill the vacant places of the two who were missing for the first time.
I resolved to do some exploring during Christmas vacation of the parts of the town that I had not yet seen. Being without a car had been quite an adjustment; “even in town” it would have been a convenience. But it was out of the question that year. There was no car, but I could walk.
I did not have access to a map of the city of Mattoon. I knew the names of the avenues paralleling Broadway to the north, but not of those paralleling it to the south. I had heard the names of many but did not know the order in which they lay.
One cold afternoon, I put on my warmest coat, heavy stockings and overshoes and set out to see the south side of Mattoon. The three blocks down Eighteenth Street were quickly behind me; I crossed Broadway and chose Seventeenth Street for my journey. The first avenue was Charleston where I stopped for awhile to admire the new Post Office and went inside to see more of it and to warm my hands. Then I walked on memorizing the names of the avenues as I came to them: Charleston, Wabash, Lafayette, Edgar, Marion, Marshall – they went on endlessly.
I began to feel I had walked miles. How long would it take me to get home again? My feet were beginning to feel real cold. The avenue I was crossing had an unfamiliar name.
“Hello, Cecilia, where are you going away down here?” Startled I looked around to see Marge Schmidt, a seventh grade girl from my school.
“Just taking a walk, Marge,” I stammered. “Do you live around here?”
“Just a block over.”
“Well, good-bye. See you Monday,” I called as I hurried on. How could I explain that I had walked so far just to know what was here and the location of the different avenues. If she had always lived here, it would sound pretty silly to her, I felt sure.
The distance to eighteenth and Broadway seemed shorter coming back. Once I had reached that familiar point, I decided the weather was turning milder and that I wasn’t really tired. Why go home? I still hadn’t seen one place I had been wanting to see: The Hawthorne Public Grade School. I had heard that it was at Twenty-fourth and Richmond Avenue – that would be six blocks east and two north. I plodded off to find it.
The blocks, I found, were longer East and West than they were North and South. My snow caked overshoes grew heavier; my legs were aching. At last I came in sight of the Hawthorne School Building; square and made of brick like St. Joseph’s, but larger. Now I could go home – seven blocks away.
It seemed as though I had been gone for hours when I reached home and warmed my hands beside the heating stove. It hadn’t really been long, only two and a half hours. I had hardly been missed, yet I had seen so much.
Later, warmed and rested, I drew an outline of the streets and avenues in the part of town I had just explored. I wrote in the names of the avenues. Now when Mama read in the local paper about a happening or a special sale and wondered how far away the address was from us, I could show her on this map its location. Also the map would help me find where Marie Sullivan lived when I decided to visit her. She was my special friend at school who lived a long way east on Marshall Avenue. She had wanted me to come. Maybe when the spring days came, I might put on my roller skates and go.
MID SEMESTER EXAMS AND
A NEW PROBLEM
Soon after Christmas vacation our class began preparing for semester exams. My classmates were all quite serious about them. If they did poorly on the exams, they knew they might not graduate in June. I had studied and had paid attention in class, and as I wrote the exams I felt fairly confident that I had done well enough.
But I was not prepared for Sister Josephine’s remarks the day she reviewed the papers and announced the general results. I could hardly believe she was talking about me.
“Cecilia had written excellent exams in every subject. I want to congratulate her. She surprised me as she has been quiet and timid about speaking out. I misjudged her.”
From that time on Sister was generous in her encouragement and praise. So much so that sometimes I tried to slump low in my seat behind the tall girl in front of me, hoping sister would not be able to see me and maybe forget I was there.
Nevertheless, having heard the results of my exams, I was proud to go home with the good news of my high rating in the class and of Sister’s praise of my work. The family all made much of it in a delighted fashion. Mama, as usual, said she knew I could be at the top of my class if I tried, and that she didn’t see why I was so timid.
I didn’t know the reason for that either. However, weeks passed, I grew accustomed to my new school and gained more self confidence.
One of the few classmates who were dawdlers would often meet me as I hung up my coat before class and beg me to let her copy an arithmetic problem which she had not been able to work. I felt sorry for her, and if there was time I let her copy it. Then another morning two or three girls would beg for the same help. I tried to avoid them.
One morning, after working long the evening before on an especially difficult problem, several girls in the cloak room wanted “just a peek” at how I had solved the problem. Three of them had the peek. This time I was glad I had allowed it.
I went in to the classroom, left my tablet on my desk and went out to the play ground until the bell rang. Later, when arithmetic period came, I opened my tablet to my home work – it was not there!! I could see where the page had been torn from my tablet. Would Sister believe me if I told her this? At least three girls knew I had worked the problem as they had seen it, but would they admit that they had? I was angry and frightened.
It came my turn to recite. I stood up and clearly stated that the sheet had been taken from my tablet on which the problem had been worked.
A shock ran through the whole class. I had never seen Sister so angry – not with me, but because someone in the room had done such a dishonest thing. She requested the guilty one to come forward and admit it. No one moved. Sister went on with the class work.
She returned to the classroom a few minutes after the noon recess and motioned to me to come with her. There she locked the door and told me I was to help her look for the stolen paper. I unwillingly obeyed. She suspected the boy who sat just back of me as he was a mischievous, troublemaker type. But I did not think he took my paper; he would not have worried if he had not prepared his homework. I would have suspected some girl. We found nothing in our search.
The classroom was opened and the pupils came in. Howard took his seat behind me. Soon I heard him muttering loudly that someone had been in his desk. The real culprit was never found.
From that day none of the class asked me to let them peek at my arithmetic homework.
During Lent sister gave us a new assignment. To encourage us to pay closer attention to the sermon at Sunday Mass, and as an exercise in composition, we were to write a synopsis of the sermon to read to the class on Monday. This was a difficult task. I listened carefully to the sermon and spent most of Sunday afternoon writing my report of it. Everyone found it hard work; some found it impossible.
One Monday morning I found I was in trouble again. I had gone to school quite satisfied with my writing. Several girls were in the cloakroom when I arrived. Some asked to read my synopsis, promising not to copy it verbatim. There was no time for anyone to copy much. I let them have it for a few minutes.
When the period came for reading our writings, I listened with growing annoyance and disgust as several of them started with the same opening sentence – my opening sentence. Then they would continue with a few sentences of their own. Fortunately enough people had done their own work that there was variety. Sister did not comment nor, I felt, suspect their copying. I resolved never, never to share my work with anyone again.
In a few weeks Sister discontinued this assignment. I had begun to learn how to listen to a talk and pick out the main points and to remember them without written note, something I have often found useful.
PENMANSHIP
One skill which all my class had acquired with some degree of perfection, I was finding painfully hard to learn, namely the Palmer Method of Penmanship. Most of the class had been practicing it from the lower grades and their writing was effortlessly beautiful. Try as I would, my progress was poor.
“Do not move your fingers. Let your arm muscles do the work. It is less tiring and more even.” It sounded easy.
Toward the end of the school term, all in the graduating class were expected to submit perfect copies of the writing exercises in the advanced manual to the Palmer Penmanship Company for evaluation and awards. The whole set of exercises had to be done on good lined paper of specified size, and using only one side of a sheet.
How many times I started anew to make a set to the best of my ability, only to spoil it with a mistake before I was halfway down the page. Nothing to do but try again the next day.
For weeks I spent the penmanship period trying to accomplish this task which I came to view as impossible. I was growing more nervous as the time for completing the papers grew shorter and I was wasting a sinful amount of good writing paper. I decided it was useless as the last day approached; I simply would not have a set of papers completed in a manner fit to send in. I would have to tell Sister the papers were not finished.
On that day I saw that everyone else handed in a set of papers – everyone that is, except Homer, the big, awkward boy sitting across the aisle from me. He had entered the school very recently and was excused from doing this. I thought him the most stupid boy I had ever seen. He could rarely understand a question in class and would give an answer completely and laughably irrelevant. Still he was unabashed and unaware that he was not “with it”, and had great self esteem.
Nevertheless, I was pleased with him that day as he did not notice that I had not handed in a set of papers.
The honors and awards from the Penmanship office came back a month later. Everyone listened eagerly as the names of those who were winners of special awards, secondary awards, and improvement certificates were read. Sister congratulated each one as it was received.
I scooted low in my seat so Sister wouldn’t see me and prayed she wouldn’t miss my name’s absence from the list. So far so good.
While the students were going up to the front of the room to receive the awards, Homer was sitting there empty handed. He noticed me and horrors! My heart flipped when he started asking me in a loud whisper if I hadn’t gotten anything at all. I managed to signal him to keep quiet. To my relief, he finally understood and did just that.
It was over. Sister had not notice my missing papers. No wonder, with graduation day so near, she had so many, many more important details on her mind. I went home light hearted. Today I wonder, did she understand my distress and honest efforts and choose not to embarrass me by a reprimand?
THE EASTER SEASON
The Easter Season at St. Joseph’s School was a week of great religious ceremonies such as I had never experienced in or little country church. The solemn Eucharistic Procession was prepared for by weeks of practice by the entire student body of the school.
On the morning of Holy Thursday, the girls wearing white dresses and with wreathes of smilax about their heads, and the altar boys in cassocks and surplices led the procession, followed by the priests who carried the Blessed Sacrament from the main altar down the long aisles of the church. The children sang the beautiful Latin hymn, Pange Lingua, while very small girls strewed flower pedals before the celebrant until finally the Sacrament was placed in a special repository on a small side altar. This altar was magnificently decorated with flowers and candles, prepared to especially honor the Eucharistic Presence of Christ on Holy Thursday – the day He said, “This is My Body, this is My Blood”
All day and all through Holy Thursday night people came and spend an hour before this altar in silent adoration. They remembered the words of Christ to his apostles the night of His agony in the Garden, “Will you not watch one hour with Me?”
Good Friday we followed the Stations of the Cross through His journey to Calvary. The church was bare. Grownups fasted very strictly on that day.
Easter Sunday was a day of rejoicing. The Easter flowers were everywhere, the choir poured forth the Alleluias to the Risen Lord.
These days of meaningful commemoration of Christ’s death and triumphant resurrection made them become a deep reality for me.
SPRINGTIME ADVENTURES
One sunny, windy Saturday in March when the sidewalks were free of snow and water, I put on my roller skates and set out to visit my friend, Marie Sullivan, eighteen blocks away. I loved the feeling of adventure in finding my way alone to this far off part of the town. Rolling along on my skates was exhilarating, the distance short.
Marie was expecting me and happily introduced me to her mother and younger sisters and a brother. I liked them all, especially her mother, a kindly gentle woman. She asked if I had an aunt by the name of Anna Moran who might have worked in Mattoon some twenty years before. I told her this Anna Moran was my Aunt Annie, my father’s older sister. She smiled and her face brightened as memories of her friendship with Aunt Annie came back to her. I listened raptly as she described Aunt Annie as an attractive, lovable and energetic woman who had meant much to her.
Anna Moran Isabel, sister of Thomas Moran and Cecilia’s aunt.
Twenty years sounded like ages ago to my twelve year old mind. Married rather late in life, Aunt Annie was childless and was living now in Columbus, Ohio. I told Mrs. Sullivan all I knew of her, a favorite aunt. I promised if Aunt Annie should visit us some time I would see that they met again.
I was never able to reunite these old friends. I lost contact with Marie three years later when she dropped out of high school to take a job clerking in Woolworth’s. Her father had become ill, she told me, and the family needed her earnings to help pay the bills. It made me sad to think that things should turn out sadly for a girl as bright and likable as Marie.
But that was later. That afternoon I couldn’t wait to reach home and tell my mother of meeting a lady who knew Aunt Annie and see her amazement at the coincidence.
Very soon spring was really with us. The lawn was green; the trees in bud. Half our back yard was being spaded for a vegetable garden. Soon we were helping Mama sow lettuce and radishes, plant peas and beans, all things we had put in the garden on the farm, only in smaller quantities. Space was limited.
One Saturday Louis and I felt the pull of spring and asked if we might go to visit some friends of Marie’s who owned a big farm just east of Mattoon. We thought it would be a great place to fly our kite. A young couple, Tom and Anne Morris lived on this farm and Anne’s sister, Julia Harrington, lived with them and taught the nearby country school. She would sometimes walk into town and spend the weekend with us. We liked her very much and felt we knew all of the family.
Louis and I felt we could walk the two and a half miles easily. With clear directions, we set out. What fun it was finding our way there that spring morning. We were welcomed and told to enjoy our play. We explored the barns, the haymows, the granaries, the poultry yards and the orchard. It was almost like being on our farm again. We felt the old sense of freedom that had been missing.
After a good lunch we came outdoors again to find more new things to explore. We thought it would be fun to ring the big iron bell we noticed which was mounted on a high pole. After ringing it several times, we ran off to other discoveries.
Soon Mrs. Morris called to us and we went to speak to her.
“Don’t ring the bell! Two of the men hurried in from the field when they heard it. They were frightened that something terrible was going on here. The bell hasn’t been rung in ages”
We were properly apologetic – but not downcast. There were other things to do. In the open fields we flew our kite. Just enough wind. It soared wide and free in the wide blue and white sky.
Tired at last, we thanked Mrs. Morris and Julia and said good bye. They invited us to come again and we said we were sure we would. Slowly we trudged back to town and home.
Photo taken 1999. House is exactly as I remember it as a child, except the bushes were white spirea. I think the garage is a recent addition.
ST. LOUIS
Another unexpected experience was shaping up for me. In early May, Winifred would have completed her six months as a postulant and was to be received as a novice into the Mercy Order. Family and friends were invited for this happy and beautiful occasion. As the trip to St Louis by train and other expenses would be considerable, Mama could not afford to take all of us. Mama would go and one of us children. I had great hopes that I would be chosen, only because I was small and could still travel by train for half fare. And so it was.
Aunt Emma, who had accompanied Winifred there on her first trip would go with Mama and me.
The preparations were exciting. An outgrown dress of Dorothy’s which I had always liked was cut down and altered to fit me nicely. Then, to my delight, I was taken shopping and outfitted in a spring coat, a hat and slippers. Cinderella could have felt no grander!
The train ride alone would be a great treat, plus the new sights of a big city, but most of all, in my anticipation, was the thought of seeing Winifred again, seeing her in her religious habit with her white veil. I could hardly wait.
We learned that my cousin, Emma Moran, and Mrs. Zellers (a friend of hers), would be at the Reception; also a distant relative from Trowbridge, Anna McAndrew and Anna McClory. This would be a nice surprise for Winifred as she did not know they were coming.
Aunt Emma, Mama and I arrived safely in St. Louis the day before the ceremony and spent the night at Mercy Home, a short distance from Union Station, as had been suggested. Early the next morning, we took the streetcar for a long ride through the city and out to the pretty suburb of Webster Groves. A short taxi ride brought us to the entrance to the grounds where a long tree bordered driveway to the lovely new edifice that was St. Joseph’s Convent of Mercy.
We were welcomed by Sister Mary and escorted to the main chapel where the nuns were kneeling, and on to a smaller chapel to the right of the main altar. It was almost filled with visiting relatives like ourselves.
As the ceremony began, the young women to be received into the novitiate approached the sanctuary, one by one , in their long white bridal dress and veil. I quickly picked out Winifred, tall and beautiful, pink cheeked and glowing.
One by one each knelt and asked to be received as a novice in the Order of the Sisters of Mercy. I was not tall enough to get a clear view of the ceremony at all times, and the acoustics were not as good as in most churches today, but I understood the solemnity of it all. I thought how very much these young women must love our Lord Jesus Christ to seek to consecrate their lives completely to His service by these vows of poverty, chastity and obedience to the rules of their order.
Then we were in the parlor embracing Sister Mary Patricia, laughing as we called her by her new name, and congratulating her.
“I was undecided which name to choose,” she explained. “So I asked Father Pathe to suggest one. He said, ‘You come from St Patrick’s Parish; why not Patricia – Patrick with the fringe on it’”.
Everyone agreed it was the perfect name for her. There were many comments on the habit, how completely it transformed her and gave her an added dignity and beauty. Also she had gained a few pounds, just enough to look in blooming health.
We were served a delightful meal in a private dining room. Afterward we walked about the wide green lawn together, enjoying the flowers and sunshine of that perfect May day. Father Pathe joined us and took some pictures of Sister and her guests.
Frances Moran, Cecilia Moran and Sr. Mary Patricia Moran in front together. Other people I cannot identify.
The relatives and friends from Trowbridge departed toward evening, but Mama, Aunt Emma and I spent the night at the convent. We had come such a distance and it was uncertain when we would come again; maybe not until Sister’s Profession two years hence. We appreciated the hospitality offered.
Each of us had a little private time to visit with Sister. It was all like something out of another world, a world closer to Christ and His wishes, far from its evils and vanities.
We said good-bye the following morning, returning home to try to relate to the rest of the family all we had seen and done. It was hard to find the right words to convey the kindnesses we had enjoyed and the happiness that shown from our sister’s face from beneath the white veil of the sisters of Mercy.
In a few days we received the pictures we had taken of Sister Patricia and the Convent grounds. They were very good and added much to our word pictures. They were eagerly viewed by all, shared with old friends and are treasured to this day.
MY WEDDING DAY
July 6, 1932
As the organ poured forth the stirring strains of the wedding march I found myself walking slowly up the long aisle on the arm of my husband-to-be. I felt very glamorous in my ankle length dress of powder blue cotton lace, with taffeta jacket, which formed a short hip ruffle or peplum, very form fitting and made me look very tall and slim. It wasn’t hard to look slim that day as I weighed about 102. Dotty walked ahead of me looking gorgeous in a peach tinted flowered chiffon and picture hat. The dress had long graceful lines and Dot wore it beautifully. We had planned to keep the wedding as simple as possible and still have it pretty. I could not afford to finance an elaborate wedding. This had been hard enough on my purse. But I am digressing.
I felt as though I were rehearsing a part in a play as I went through the ceremony. I could hardly find my voice to repeat the vows. Somehow I did, and I felt Judd press my hand in his as he repeated the words “until death do us part.” Then a sweet voice sang “I Love You Truly.” I thought my heart would burst with joy. Our wedding, of which we had dreamed for so long, was a reality. I looked across at Judd and thought he had never looked so dignified and handsome. The ceremony was finished. We had received Our Lord in Holy Communion and asked him to help us serve him in the married state. We had received the Nuptial Blessing. Again we were walking down that long, long aisle between rows of smiling faces. I tried to smile, but my face felt frozen. Next I was being kissed and congratulated, felicitated, etc. by my friend.
After a short interval during which Jimmie (Judd’s younger brother) tore some of the tin cans, etc. from our car, we drove to the hotel for the breakfast. Just the wedding party, my family and Father Cusack were present.
We went to the studio and had some pictures taken after the breakfast. That ordeal over, we hurried back to Mother’s as Jimmie had to catch a train. Mary Hoffman, Hazel Swengel, Treas, Margaret Schultz, Bertha Rathe, Cecilia Mihlbachler, Marie (my sister) and her husband Peter, Mother and Louis were there. I threw my bouquet which was of white roses and baby breath, and Margaret caught it.
I hurried excitedly into my travelling clothes. Dot helped me do some additional packing, as Judd had received word to go out to Helena Montana on an inspection job. He was busy packing all manner of luggage into the car. He even had pillows in my seat to make riding easier.
Judd looked grand, I thought, in a new white linen suit. My going away dress was of pink chalk crepe, the hat was white felt, and slippers white.
OUR HONEYMOON
We had lunch – our first married meal alone – at the Illinois Hotel in Bloomington. We drove all afternoon. I still felt dazed as though it were all unreal. I remember toward evening a light rain fell and made the Wisconsin scenery very lovely. We reached Madison about eight thirty. We were both extremely tired but happy.
Our next day’s journey took us across Wisconsin – west and north toward Winona. We passed through the Dells. We stopped for the night at a little cottage on the Mississippi. It stood on a bluff overlooking the river. We put on hiking clothes and explored the woods back of the cottage and scrambled down the pastured slope to the village road and walked back to the cottage. The pictures below were taken at this place.
(picture of both standing outside of low house. C. has slacks on. Other picture of C. sitting on stone steps.)
We were fortunate at this stop in finding a nearby quaint, old home where tempting meals were served.
We drove north that day (Friday) through Minneapolis, then west, stopping at a little resort in central Minnesota. It did not prove very attractive but our next pick was better. Saturday noon we drove into Detroit Lakes and rented a cottage by the lake. All afternoon we played on the beach and swam in the lake. That night we took a boat and rowed on the lake. Juddie rowed and I sat there with blankets wrapped around me. The nights up there were cold. I shall never forget that night. It seemed stormy out on the lake, with waves so high and the moon shining dimly through an overcast sky. Judd sang all the songs he knew I love. I thought I was the luckiest girl in the world to have a husband who loved me so much and was so tender and thoughtful toward me.
We had wired the relatives at Grand Forks and had received an answer on Saturday PM. So, after early Mass, we started to drive there.
We reached Gertrude Brown’s about one o’clock and received a hearty welcome from all our relatives. We were shown to her guestroom in her lovely home and soon sat down to a delightful dinner. Gertrude, Dorothy and I visited that afternoon while the men played golf. In the evening we all six drove out to a pavilion dance. Then back to Gertrude’s for ice cream. I was so tired when finally we retired
The next day we slept late. When I finally sauntered downstairs in my pretty new negligee I found Gertrude had received a letter from Mother and a clipping of our wedding. I eagerly read both. While we were breakfasting Norbert dropped in to meet us. He said I looked just like my mother and Gertrude told him that I was the picture of Uncle Tommie (my father).
We had lunch at Dorothy Mahowld’s. She and Leo are such a nice couple. In fact, we liked all the relatives very, very much. Later we called on Nellie and Norbert and saw little David and Mary Alice.
That night Gertrude had the family at her house and we played cards.
We left on our journey Tuesday morning, after a delightful visit in Grand Forks. We drove west through vast, treeless plains all day and as night began to fall we entered what might be called the foothills of the Bad Lands. One small hill after the other arose like bumps on the landscape. Towns were small and few. We had a blowout in this region and while we changed the tire, a little Swedish girl driving her turkeys home peeped shyly at us. Judd tried to talk to her, but she ran away.
A few miles further we had another blowout. It was night now and we had no more spares. We were twenty miles from a town. Finally we succeeded in stopping a car that loaned us a tire pump and Judd fixed the tire.
Of course, we had to stop at the next town to have the tire fixed so we stayed all nigh there, at a private home owned by an old Swedish lady.
The next day (Wednesday) we entered the Bad Lands, rightly named. They were very picturesque in a rather gruesome way. This region gave way to the broad plains of eastern Montana. As we traveled westward the country grew wilder. We had supper at a village named Custer, near the spot where Custer fought his last battle. We were anxious to get to Helena so we drove as late as we could. We camped in the car on the air mattresses over night.
I remember well that Thursday morning, when Judd stopped before breakfast and took a swim in the Yellowstone River. Then we drove on and I had my first view of real mountains, in the distance I saw the purple tips of the Rockies. I forget the name of the range. Soon we were driving through them. I was thrilled by the bigness of it all. I cannot describe it in words. Perhaps when I read this little story as an old, old lady, the pictures which I am inserting her and there will bring back my honeymoon to me more than these words.
Thursday afternoon we reached Helena. We put up at the hotel and Judd started out to look after his job. It concerned the U.S. Veterans’ Hospital.
It has been three years since my honeymoon. If I had written this account sooner, I could have made it more vivid. But those first years were so busy and the typewriter wasn’t so handy, although I often wanted to put my love story on paper. So I shall do my best to preserve some of those sweet memories for later years. If life continues to grow sweeter with each passing year as it has thus far since my marriage, I shall have much worth remembering to write.
While Judd was working in Helena, I spent the days driving in and around the city, writing letters home and the time passed quickly.
Friday night we drove up on the top of a mountain pass (I forget the name). It was very beautiful. We had our car outfitted with air mattresses etc. so it was fine sleeping. Saturday night we parked and slept at the top of McDonald Pass. Sunday we drove into Helena to the Cathedral to Mass. The rest of the day we drove through the beautiful country around Helena. At dusk we saw little deer hurry out of our path. We stopped at a pretty spot and started exploring for water. We discovered a wee spring hidden down below the road. Judd had a grand time digging out around it and building a dam so we could get a drink. We named it Vollbrecht Spring. We spent the night in our car near this spot. We enjoyed those nights up in the woods. The air was so grand and pure and everything was so quiet.
We also swam in the famous pool of natural warm water, which is just outside of Helena.
Monday evening we went to see a movie – wish I could remember the name. Anyway even the movie seemed glamorous and we had heaps of fun. We went back to the hotel that night and prepared to leave the next morning.
We entered Yellowstone Park the next afternoon and rove along the West Side of the loop as far south as Old Faithful. There we took a tourist cabin for the night. We marveled at all the strange beauties of the place. I won’t attempt to describe them. The group of pictures I shall attach to my story will tell more. We listened to a nature talk while we watched them feed bears. Later there was a lecture with slides describing different wild flowers, etc. There was to be dancing after that, but we were so tired that after waiting to see Old Faithful erupt we went to bed. The nights were very cold in the Park. So much so that after Judd had put all the covers we had over us he got up and put on his woolen socks.
The next day we went fishing in Yellowstone Lake. I cooked a steak over an open fire for our dinner. I rowed a boat on the Lake and had a swell time. We enjoyed our first view of the Grand Canyon near the Great Falls. We also climbed Mr. Washburn – a never to be forgotten thrill where the road side fell away to great depths on either side at times. We fed the bears and got some snapshots. I think we stayed at Mammoth Hot Springs Cabins that night.
The next day we saw more of the sights we wanted to see. We also went swimming in the pool at Old Faithful. The water in the pool was naturally warm. It made the air seem very cold.
We left the park and drove South through Wyoming as far as Moran, which is near the Grand Teton Park. We rented riding horses and climbed a nearby mountain. It was grand fun. I was afraid of getting a wild horse and got a perfect nag instead. We cooked our supper and spent the night in a cabin there.
The next morning we drove through the Teton Park, which we enjoyed very much. Then we started our long drive through Wyoming. At first the road was very mountainous and the country beautiful, then it grew flat and dry. We had lunch at Riverton. It was very hot. There were many Indians in the streets as we were near the Shawnee reservation. We took a short cut out of Riverton. It turned into a mere wagon trail. There was not a soul to be seen for forty miles except at a small oil station. We traveled on and on and late that night stopped at a tourist camp near Laramie.
Sunday morning we drove straight into Denver. Made my acquaintance with Thelma Venuti (Judd’s younger sister) and the children. I enjoyed my visit there. We took the kids and went swimming on Monday. They are such cute kids. Bob Venuti came home from a fishing trip that evening. We visited with him that evening.
Tuesday we started homeward. We drove long and hard through hot weather. Too much like St. Louis weather. Our trip had been so cool that we had forgotten there was such heat. We spent the night near Manhattan, Kansa. The next day we drove as far as Fulton and stopped so Judd could do some more business with Mr. McCarroll. We drove almost into St. Louis that night. We were happily planning the home we were about to establish and hoping for its success.
The end of a beautiful honeymoon. I wish every girl could have as sweet a one as I.
AS TO THE REST OF THE STORY:
Cecilia graduated from Mattoon High, worked in an office in Mattoon for about a year and a half before going to St. Louis. Winifred (now Sister Patricia) was hoping she would also enter the Mercy Order, but she put off that decision and entered nurse’s training at St. John’s Hospital where her sister worked. While there, she met my dad, Judd Vollbrecht on a blind date. They went together for about two years before they were married in Mattoon on July 6, 1932.
They lived in St. Louis until 1938. Their first child died at birth. My brother John and I were both born there. In 1938 the family moved to Rye, Westchester County, NY because my father was organizing his business in New York City. We lived in Rye for six years and my sister Judy was born before my father became seriously ill with pneumonia. On his recovery, they decided to move again to Princeton, Mercer County, NJ so he could cut down on commuting time. At this point the Energy Control Company was thriving in both New York City and Philadelphia.
My Dad bought a beautiful house in Princeton in 1944 and all were happy with the move. We were expecting “baby brother” in a few months when Dad again became ill. At the University of Pennsylvania Hospital he had his lung removed and almost died. After three months in the hospital, he returned home and, with great determination, regained all his vim and vigor. Two months later Jim was born. All was well. We lived at 58 Cleveland Lane for 18 years. Seeing retirement approaching, they sold the big house and moved into a lovely place on Carnegie Lake. Two years later, at age 64, Dad died.
Mother moved to a smaller but charming home at 181 Laurel Circle in Princeton. Shortly after the move she fell and seriously injured her knee. I was always very proud of the way she participated in the physical therapy until she regained full use of her knee and no longer walked with a limp.
Nine years after Dad died, Mother married Paul S. Smith, a long time friend of them both. He was an officer at the Princeton Bank at the time, but retired shortly thereafter. He moved into Mother’s house and they lived there very happily for about 15 years. During this time they took an exciting trip to Jakarta, Indonesia where Paul did work for the Indonesian Bank as a member of the Retired Executives Corp. The trip lasted three months and it was a high point of their lives.
In 1986 Mother began to have early symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease. Paul took wonderful care of her with the help of aides as long as he was able. After she went to a nursing home, he faithfully fed her dinner every night. She lived in the nursing home two and a half years before she died peacefully in her sleep.
Her funeral was from St. Paul’s Church in Princeton with long time friend Rev. James Angert, TOR, celebrating the Liturgy of the Resurrection. She is buried beside my Dad in the church cemetery. RIP
It is my hope that this tribute to Cecilia Moran Vollbrecht Smith will be a source of pride for all her descendents and that it will help them appreciate the strivings of all those who went before them.
Jane Vollbrecht Dall 1999
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[pic]
Louis Moran, Emma Rice, Cecilia Moran, Winifred Moran, Jim McClory, Dorothy Moran and Marie Moran July 4, 1920
[pic]Judd Vollbrecht, his brother, Jim Vollbrecht, the bride, Cecilia Moran Vollbrecht and her sister, Dorothy Moran
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