skip to main |
skip to sidebar
In the morning of New Year’s Day, after we came home from church (New Year’s Day is a Holy Day of Obligation when Catholics must attend Mass), we would watch the Tournament of Roses Parade from Orange County, California. All the floats in this 2-3 hour parade were constructed completely out of natural materials: flowers, petals, grass, seeds, bark, etc. All the surfaces had to be covered with these materials and with no other types of materials. People worked for month to built these floats and glue on all those tiny materials. It is a spectacular parade if you have never seen it. There were also marching bands and dancers, and I always enjoyed the equestrian contingents, especially the charros (Mexican cowboys and cowgirls) and the Palomino horses. I don’t know why I remember tthe Palominos so well, but I do.
After the Parade, the college football bowl games would begin, and there was nothing else on television except football. Since I was not terribly interested in football at that time, I usually read one of the books I had received for Christmas. I always received books, and I was especially thrilled if I received a Nancy Drew mystery, as I exchanged them with my good friend Deborah. We were both huge Nancy Drew fans, and I still remember the hours of pleasure those books gave me. My parents also began to give me the Cherry Ames mystery series, which got me interested in nursing, and I considered becoming a Navy nurse at one time during high school. Cherry Ames was a nursing student, who then became a nurse in various capacities and solved mysteries. The key line in the stories was that the hospital director always told Cherry to wipe the rouge off her face, but she had no rouge, only naturally rosy cheeks.
Sometime in the afternoon, my mother would start badgering us to take our Christmas presents up to our rooms, since until that time they were still in the piles under the tree. I usually had also received a diary for Christmas and I looked forward to writing in it on the first day of the New Year. Unfortunately, I never had anything really exciting to write about.
Toward the end of the afternoon, my mother would often make a pizza and mini barbecued hotdogs for us to eat as we watched the football games. She often brought out a cheese ball made of bleu cheese and cheddar cheese and covered with walnuts, which we ate with crackers. Sometimes there was so left-over sparkling grape juice or apple juice to help the celebration.
After we went back to school the day after New Year’s Day (unless it was on a Friday or Saturday), my mother took down and packed away all the Christmas decorations. She took the Christmas tree out into the woods and there it stayed, lonely and bare, a memory of another Christmas.
The Geers did not have a television set, and never got one as long as they lived there, until Adam Geer died in the 1970s. Adam and Esther Geer were my sister Joanne’s godparents. They were an older couple who had no children of their own. Adam had been disabled after being subjected to poisonous gas in France during World War I. He worked with science experiments and collected precious rocks and gems. When he passed away, Esther gave his collection to the New York State Museum in Albany. Esther worked first in one of the textile mills in Utica, and then when the mill closed and moved to the southern part of the United States, she worked at a bank. Adam drove her to and from work every day, and they went to the large, oldest Catholic Church in the city, St. John’s downtown. They had no electricity lines running to their house. They used a generator to bring electricity to the home. As I mentioned, they had no television but they did have radio. Their house was built like a stone French farmhouse which Adam had seen and fallen in love with in France during the war. It had a large, wrap-around porch, a certain front door and two large main rooms on the first floor. One was used as a living room. It was a huge room, with two sofas and several chairs. It was heated by a large fireplace decorated with fleur-de-lies. The other large room was a formal dining room with french doors that opened onto the wrap-around porch. It, too, had a large fireplace for heat.
Off the dining room was the Geers bedroom and a bathroom. The other rooms on the first floor were a kitchen with a wooden-burning stove (very old-fashioned) and a breakfast nook with benches. The second flood was devoted entirely for Adam’s rock collection and science experiments. We used to visit it often. It was light and airy, a very pleasant large room. When we young, Adam would pretend with us that we were soldiers in his army. He, of course, was the general, Patrick was the sargeant (because he was a boy--Adam was a bit of a chauvinist), I was a corporal, and Joanne was a private. We went to walks in the woods and learned a lot about the woods from Adam.
When we went to visit at their house, Esther always gave us a small glass of Pepsi-Cola and Ritz crackers or graham crackers. Her Christmas present to Adam each year was always some sort of wind up toy that clapped or turned flipped. Their Christmas tree fascinated me. The lights were electric but filled with oil and when the oil heated it bubbled in its container. They were beautiful. They also had beautiful glass ornament. They gave us our Christmas gifts on Christmas night, when we went to visit them with one of our toys while our parents chatted with them, and after we had watched Adam’s collection of toys and the newest one. We went to visit after our dinner at our grandparents’ house and after we had driven to look at the Christmas lights around the city.
We also went to visit the Heilmanns. Usually Herman worked at night at the Utica Club Brewery, the beer brewery in town. He had come to the United States with his borther Gusaf and his wife Afrieda after World War II and had a very strong accent. Levina was American but learned to cook delicious German food and was an exceptional baker. Whenever we went to visit, she had a large selection of amazing baked goods--cookies, cakes, torts. They also grew raspberries on several trellises in their side yard. Another thing I remember was that they collected rainwater in a huge barrel in their back yard; this water was used for their laundry and for hair-washing because it was soft water. Our natural water from our wells was quite hard, with many minerals, which made cleaning and washing clothes difficult. It was not quite as bad as San Antonio’s water, but it wasn’t good. The city water was better, but it didn’t run lines as far as our homes
The Heilmanns collected Hummel figurines from Germany and also Dresden lady figures with lace dresses. They had many collectibles from Germany and also brought back more when they went to visit Herman’s family. And they always brought us gifts from Germany, too. Herman was from the Black Forest area of Germany, Baden-Baden, the same area as my grandmother’s father and his parents. One year, I received a baby in a wicker baby carriage and one year Levina brought me a doll dressed in traditional Black Forest dress, which was a dirndl dress and a straw hat with two large red balls on top. I don’t remember my siblings gifts.
Their Christmas tree, too, was beautiful. It was decorated with exquisite German glass ornaments and twinkling lights. Their collection of Hummels was magnificent, and their furniture was absolutely beautiful. I’m not sure if they had a television set. They, too, were childless, so they and the Geers tended to spoil the three of us and their nieces and nephews.
We were not exactly “party animals” in my family when it came to New Year’s Eve. I always wanted to stay up and “see the New Year come in,” but it was oh, so hard to stay awake until Midnight to watch the crystal ball drop from the high tower in Times Square in New York City on the television. That was usually the only celebration that was shown on television at that time. Now there are all sorts of celebrations shown on television, Dave Clark has had a “Rockin’ New Year’s Eve,” and there are numerous other celebration shown on many other channels.
Back when I was growing up, there were only three televisions channels: NBC, CBS, and the newest was ABC. All three covered the crystal ball dropping from radio tower in Times Square in New York City. Since we lived in New York State, the ball drop was in “real time.” Here in Texas now, the New Year is celebrated at midnight East Coast time, but it is only 11 p.m. here in Texas, so we have to celebrate and then wait another hour to celebrate again.
My mother usually fixed special hamburgers and small hot dogs in barbecue sauce for their New Year’s Eve party. Levina always brought a cake, and Adam and Esther brought some sort of alcoholic beverage for “high balls.” They watched the crystal ball drop, shouted “Happy New Year,” and there were kisses all around. We often watched the festivities from the stairs leading to the second floor. This tradition continued into the 1970s. So that was the exciting New Year’s Eve in our home.
On Christmas Eve, we were finally allowed to put the figurine of the Baby Jesus in the manager in the nativity scene underneath the Christmas Tree. He was the only figure who was not in the nativity scene until Christmas Eve. We three children always squabbled over which of us got to place the Baby Jesus in the nativity scene, but my mother either decided which of us would do it on a rotating basis or else she would do it herself (usually the latter).
Since Christmas Eve was technically still Advent and we were still abstaining from meat, our Christmas Evening meal was a bowl of oyster stew. I think it was an Irish tradition, but I’m not certain of that. Whatever tradition it was, I hated it. I despised oyster stew. I dislike oysters in general, but I really hated oyster stew. For my dinner, I would slurp some of the milky soup and eat many oyster crackers. For me, Christmas Eve dinner was the worst dinner of the year.
Our neighbors on the north side of us, Levina and Herman Heilmann, would always stop over on their way to Christmas Eve services at the Lutheran Church. Herman was from Germany and Levina learned to make all sorts of German Christmas cookies from his family. His brother Gus lived in town and his wife was German, so Levina learned much of her fabulous baking skills from his wife Alfrieda. (After Alfrieda and Herman had both passed away, Levina and Gus married and were together in the remaining years of their lives.) The Heilmanns would bring us a huge box of Christmas cookies and Christmas gifts for each of us. I especially looked forward to the Christmas cookies since I sort of made my Christmas Eve meal from them (after the horrendous oyster stew).
Later in the evening my grandparents and Uncle Don would come to the house to open presents with us. My grandparents and Uncle Don always came to our home on Christmas Eve to open gifts and celebrate Christmas Eve, and then they would go to Midnight Mass at Our Lady of Lourdes Church. On Christmas morning, they would go to my Aunt Elsie and Uncle Bob’s house to open gifts with my cousins. On Christmas Eve while my grandparents and Uncle Don were visiting, we would drink eggnog and eat Mrs. Heilmann’s Christmas cookies. My favorite cookies were the honey and spice Lebchuchen which were cut into a variety of shapes and lightly coated with a thin, hard sugar coating. There was two other kinds of cookie that my father and I were particularly fond of: a sort of fruit cake bars, which was a dark, cake-like cookie filled with candies fruits and nuts; and pferrinesse, or pepper cookies, small rounded mounds which tasted of anisette and were covered with white powdered sugar. Mrs. Heilmann, or as we called her “Aunt Levina,” also included star-shaped sugary cookies covered with white icing and colorful sprinkles and a spriegel cookies, which were cookies piped from a bag filled with dough into the shape of candy canes. Two types of dough were piped: one red, and one white. Then Levina twisted them together to form the candy cane. They were colorful and tasted a bit like shortbread.
I loved having Grandma and Grandpa at the house. They always seemed to enjoy seeing us open their gifts and they “oohhed” and aahhed” over the gifts we gave them. Uncle Donald enjoyed himself wherever he went and often helped assemble any toys that needed to be put together. The Christmas lights on the windows were lit as were the lights on the tree, making it a very festive occasion.
Several years, my grandmother made Della Robias, which were wreaths made of pinecones and small, plastic fruits such as pears, apples, and berries that were glued onto a circular wooden wreath shape that my father had cut out of wood for her. She taught my mother how to make them, too. They originated in Italy and originally surrounded painting by the Italian artist della Robia, from which they took there name. Our Della Robias usually held a tall red candle in the center of the wreath and made a festive decoration.
I remember that one of my favorite gifts that I received from my grandparents when I was about 4 years old was a doll house with doll furniture and little people. I adored playing with this gift and it was very difficult to pry me away from the doll house to go to bed to await Santa’s arrival.
On Christmas Eve, there were many special programs on television, which at that time was only in black and white. (Color television had not yet been invented.) I best remember the Perry Como specials, where he always sang “Ave Maria,” which is the Hail. Mary prayer in Latin. Oftentimes he also sang the Our Father. That was sung in English. There were also Christmas songs that were popular at the time on his special and there were always children gathered around him as he sang.
When we were very young, we went to church on Christmas morning, usually to the 9 a.m. Mass, since we were always up early to open our gifts from Santa. I know my parents had stayed up late into the night wrapping gits from Santa and then placing them in our designated piles under the tree. Our Christmas stockings were laid on top of the piles. After we had opened our gifts and eaten some breakfast (usually pancakes), we went to church. Church on Christmas was always very crowded, as many people who never went to church often always seemed to go to church on Christmas and Easter. My father was always ready to go early and got us into our winter outerwear and we always go to church early enough to get seats in the pews. However, the ushers squeezed as many people as possible into the pews so we were always cramped. The rest of the people had to stand in the back of the church.
The same was true when we started to go to Midnight Mass at St. John the Evangelist Church, our home church, when we were older. It was usually a candle-light ceremony and a High Mass, which meant that the choir sang the responses to the priest as he said the Mass. Before Mass began, the choir sang Christmas carols and they also sang them at appropriate times during the Mass. Often all three priests at our church celebrated Midnight Mass together, called con-celebration. Since nearly everyone received communion, it took a while for the Mass to be celebrated. It began about 11:30 p.m. with Christmas carols and we arrived back home about 1:30 a.m.
We were all very tired by that time, and we children went straight to bed, but my poor parents still had to fix our Christmas presents for the next morning. Christmas Eve was a long night.
Thanksgiving dinner was held in the late afternoon so that my Uncle Rick and his sons could watch the Thanksgiving Day football game that was traditionally held between the Chicago Bear and the Detroit Lions. Uncle Rick loved football and loved to play and watch golf on television. My grandparents’, who really didn’t care about sports, always took into consideration Uncle Rick’s love of football. So we ate around 4 p.m. when the game was finished.
The dining room was set up with the good china and crystal and we were dressed up and on our best behavior. My mother and Aunt Emily always brought a dish or two to contribute to the meal. One year, my grandmother started serving “green salad,” a jello salad made with marshmallows, lime jello, pineapple, mandarine oranges, and sour cream, which Grandma told Uncle Fred was “salad cream” since he insisted that he did not like sour cream. “Green Salad” began a staple at Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, and Uncle Fred loved it!
When we and our grandparents grew older, my mother and Aunt Emily alternated having Thanksgiving and Christmas at each others’ houses. When I was about a sophomore in college, it was Aunt Emily’s turn to have Thanksgiving at her house. When we walked into the house, Aunt Emily was distraught and the entire kitchen sink was torn apart. Apparently, the water was not working in the kitchen; there was not water at all. Aunt Emily did not know what to do. There was nothing wrong with cooking the food, It was just that nothing could be washed in the kitchen when dinner was over.
My Grandma commonly told everyone not to worry. She had a plan. So we all have a nice dinner and enjoyed ourselves. When it came time to clean up, Grandma’s plan came into action. “We’ll wash the dishes in the bathtub,” she announced. What a great idea! Uncle Fred and I took turns washing the dishes and pots and pans in the tub in the bathroom, while my grandmother dried them while sitting on the toilet seat. Problem solved.
On Christmas Eve, our neighbors from next door, who were of German heritage, would bring us gifts and a large box of German Christmas cookies. For me, that was the highlight of Christmas Eve, even though we were allowed to open one of our gifts on Christmas Eve.
My grandparents and Uncle Donald came to the house on Christmas Eve and gave us our gifts and we gave them theirs. Then they went to my aunt and uncle’s house on Christmas morning to open gifts with them and my cousins. My grandparents and Uncle Donald always went to Midnight Mass at their church. We usually went to Mass on Christmas morning after opening our gifts (meaning we didn’t get to play with our toys until later). My aunt and uncle and cousins also went to Midnight Mass with my grandparents, as they attended the same church.
When we were young and still believed in Santa Claus, the the same routine had been followed, but when we were older, we did go to Midnight Mass at our church in New Hartford. It was usually a candle-light ceremony, and a High Mass, sung by the choir, and Christmas carols. It seemed to go on forever. It was made worse for me when my mother sang. She could not carry a note in a bucket. Truly, she sounded like some strange creature with a raspy voice that was totally out of tune, not even beginning to follow the melody of the song.
We went to Midnight Mass when I was older, I think, because my parents were hoping that we would be so exhausted that we would not get up early. When we were young, we would all wake up early and try to sneak down the stairs to see what Santa had brought. If it was too early, we would be sent back upstairs and told to wait until a more reasonable hour. It was torture.
We all--aunt, uncles, cousins and our family--would go to my grandparents’ house for dinner on Christmas afternoon. In my family, we would be allowed to bring one of our toys to play with. We usually had turkey and my mother and aunt also brought dishes to be served. The dining room was sent for all 14 of us. We were dressed up and on our best behavior at our grandparents’ house. We had much respect for our grandparents. When our grandparents were older, we alternated having Christmas afternoon dinner between our house and my aunt and uncle’s house.
After spending the afternoon at Christmas dinner, It became our tradition to drive around the city to look at the Christmas lights on peoples’ houses. We also always visited the General Electric (GE) plant in town, where they displays and a life-size nativity scene set up on their factory property. This tradition continued even when we were older.
I will tell you a story that involved a trick that someone (I think my Uncle Don) played on me when I was very young. I was told to go to bed; Pat and Joanne had gone to bed, but I was not cooperating. Suddenly I hear sleigh bells, and looked at the front living room window, where--I swear--I saw Santa Claus. That was enough to make me run up the stairs to my room, so I would be sure that Santa would not pass me by.
Christmas trees are a very central part of Christmas, as you well know. We got our Christmas tree usually by going out into the surrounding fields around our house, pulling a sled behind us, and finding a good-shaped Christmas tree. Our father and we children would select the tree, put it on the sled, and pull it home. At home, Mom usually had hot chocolate and cookies waiting for us, as it was usually cold and snowy. When we were very young, our parents bought a Christmas tree from one of the Christmas lots that dotted the city.
We usually got our tree about two weeks before Christmas, on a weekend. Then we would set it up in the living room at the far end of the room. First, my father would string the lights around and through the tree. He had a penchant for blue lights as he got older. He said they looked “heavenly,” but when we were young, we did have multi-colored lights. We children were allowed to hang plastic icicles when we were young. As we got older, we we allowed to take over arranging the glass ornaments on the tree. We had to be careful that the ornaments were hung in a well-balanced fashion around the tree--but not in the back of the tree that was next to the wall. My mother was the arbiter of what was well-balanced.
Then we hung filmy plastic silver-colored icicles on the tree. There was also an argument with my mother about the icicle hanging. She thought we hung too many icicles in one place at a time--”You’re clumping them!” she would yell. So it was very important that we paid attention to this tedious task as we hung one or two icicles at a time on the tree. If seemed to take forever to cover the tree!
The final task was to set up the nativity scene underneath the tree on a bed of cotton that had sparkles glued on it. The nativity set was ceramic and thus, breakable. We were not allowed to touch it until we were each about 5 years old for fear that we would beak the figurines. There was a stable, the Blessed Virgin, Joseph, an angel glued to the top of the stable, two or three shepherds (one carried a sheep), a sheep, a cow, a camel, and three wise men (or three kings, as they are sometimes called because no one wants to admit that they were astrologers). The baby Jesus in the manager was the pièce de résistance. It was added on the evening of December 24, Christmas Eve. Since the temptation to place with the figurines was sometimes almost unbearable, we would often sneek under the tree to play with them.
In the meantime, my father would string the outdoor Christmas lights. Well, early on, they were inside, around the two front large windows, one in the kitchen and one in the living room. Later, during his “blue” period, my father built a huge wooden cross, onto which we stapled evergreen branches and then he strung with blue lights. That was secured to our front door and two spotlights were focused on it. We never used the front door, so that was not a problem. My mother hung an evergreen wreath on the back door, which was the door we always used. These were our Christmas decorations until I graduated from high school.
Today, I have a confession to make, I am TERRIBLE with money. I have had plenty of money in my later life, but I have done one of two things with it, generally. I have spent it foolishly and impulsively on myself, or I have spent over generously on those I love. My second marriage broken up (finally) over the issue of my debts.
I am sincerely hoping that I will learn, even at this stage of life, to be wise in my spending, to realize I cannot buy love from others by giving them things or loaning money unwisely, to buy only things I need and not impulsively buy things I want on a whim.
This is a short post, but an important lesson that I would like to pass on to my daughter and granddaughters, and whoever comes after me. Money is not the most important thing in life. It can make life easier, but only if you use it wisely.
Today I decided that I would write about my "other" parents, my Godparents. In the Catholic Church and in many other Christian churches, when a child is baptized or christened, two people "sponsor" the child and become his or her Godparents. The duty of the Godparents is to set a good example for the child and to encourage his or her religious education throughout life.
My Godparents were my Aunt Elsie McCarthy Samson, my Uncle Bob's wife (my mother's best friend and sister-in-law of my mother and father) and my Uncle Donald Robert Samson, my father's middle brother (my mother's brother-in-law). I think my parents made an excellent selection. We have a small family on my father's side in the Utica area where we lived, and I grew up being very close to both my Godparents.
Aunt Elsie had all boys as children. I know she would have dearly loved to have had a girl, but that was not to be. I was only 9 months younger than her second child Michael, and he and his older brother John and I grew up closely with one another. In some ways, I am closer to them than I am to be own brother. I sometimes stayed at my aunt and uncle's home as a small child, and I loved that. I got to play with my cousins (who always treated me as an equal), and Aunt Elsie cooked my favorite foods, fixed my hair, let me play "dress-up" in her clothes and shoes, and generally treated me like a princess. Until my sister was born nearly 2 1/2 years after my birth, I was the only girl of the Samson cousins and much loved by all my family.
My mother and Aunt Elsie had become best friends when my mother was in Business College in Charlottesville, Virginia. Aunt Elsie lived in Amherst, VA, and attended Sweet Briar College, a small college for women. After Aunt Elsie met and married Uncle Bob, my mother met my father, Uncle Bob's oldest brother, on a visit to New York to see Aunt Elsie. So my parents were always close to Uncle Bob and Aunt Elsie and their family. Later in life, my mother became jealous of Aunt Elsie, I think because Elsie and my grandmother got along better, I adored Aunt Elsie, and my mother had some emotional problems that contributed to her jealousy.
When my Aunt Elsie and Uncle Bob moved to a newly built house in Vernon, their church had a Mother/Daughter Communion Breakfast once a year. The women of the church and their daughters would go to a special Mass and then to a restaurant for a nice breakfast. Since Elsie had no daughters, she "borrowed" her Goddaughter (me!) for these breakfasts. I loved going to her house and going to church and breakfast with her. I was so proud to be her "daughter," and often wished I could REALLY be her daughter, because my mother and I did not get along well.
Aunt Elsie also gave me her vanity/dresser when she bought a new one. It was blonde wood with a huge mirror, six drawers and a space to sit in the middle with a glass divider. I loved it. I felt so grown up using it. When I was able 12 or 13 years old, she also gave me some of her clothes and shoes. She was an extremely petite woman and at that age, I was able to wear her clothes and shoes. (I later grew too much :-( ). She would also give me her old copies of Glamour magazine, a fashion magazine which I loved to look at. My mother never bought such magazines; she bought Family Circle and Women's Day, magazines that had crafts and cooking rather than fashion.
Aunt Elsie died of pancreatic cancer in July 1975, just about a month before Sabrina was born. She had given me a baby shower, even though she was ill. She did not live to see her granddaughter Caroline, born two weeks after her death. She was only 54 years old. I miss her everyday of my life.
Uncle Donald was my favorite uncle. He always treated me like a special person; he listened to me when I had something to say, and respected me. He liked photography. I remember one time all of us were at my grandparents' house where my Uncle Donald lived. He had set up a little photo studio in his room and he took color portraits of all of the cousins (Tim was not yet born). He took individual portraits and then portraits of my brother and sister and me, and also a portrait of all of the cousin (6 at that time). They were beautiful photos. I had my hair in braids and wore a red jumper and white blouse. It was exciting to have my picture taken.
My uncle was very religious. He went to Mass often (on days other than Sunday) and belonged to Our Lady of Lourdes Nocturnal Adoration Society. This meant that once a month or so, he would go to the church during the night and prayer before the Blessed Sacrament for a hour. This society made sure that someone was always praying before the Blessed Sacrament.
I got to know my uncle very well when I was in high school. I always went to my grandparents' house for dinner every Wednesday night and I learned a lot about my uncle from our dinners. He was the Vice President of Sales for a company that made machine parts and traveled often, or often took clients out to dinner. He drove my grandparents wherever they needed to go, since my grandmother did not drive and my grandfather had given up his license. He took care of all my grandfather's brother Nick's financial affairs. He was NOT an easy person to deal with, but Uncle Don was always patient with him. He adopted a child in need overseas as a sponsored child for many years. He was incredibly generous to all his nieces and nephews, although some of them took advantage of his generosity.
Whenever Uncle Don went on vacation, he always sent us postcards and brought us back gifts. His best friend was a friend from the Navy from World War II, Andy Geddis, who lived in Amsterdam, NY, and he and Andy always went on vacation together. They often went to Mexico; Puerta Villarta was a favorite destination. He brought a back beautiful portrait of the Virgin of Guadelupe and a wooden carving one time. Uncle Don also enjoyed music. He had a piano, and then bought an organ which he loved to play. He was smart, funny, and very caring.
It was he who bought a house from a Jewish couple and taught us about kissing the mezzuzah when we entered or left the house. He never ate left-overs! He was a good cook; I remember him often cooking at my grandparents' on Wednesday nights. He tried to eat health. His cholesterol level was high and there were no statins then, so he was careful about eating high cholesterol foods.
He died suddenly of congestive heart failure in June 1995, just before we knew Sabrina was having twins. I think about him often and miss him terribly.
I decided that since it is approaching Christmastime, I would write about one of the favorite Christmas gifts I ever received. My number one favorite Christmas gift would have to be a book, called All About Archeology. http://www.amazon.com/About-Archeology-Anne-Terry-White/dp/B001MJNPVY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1293802151&sr=8-2It was a gift from my parents when I was about 9 or 10 years old. It was part of a series of books, All About..., that were introductions to various subjects. This was my introduction to the world of archeology.
I had not heard of archeology before. I, of course, immediately began to read the book and a new wonderful world opened up for me. The book explained what archeology was, and then reviewed the main explorations and discoveries and archeologists, such as the discoveries in Ur and the ziggaurats, the Egyptian pyramids, the discovery of Kin Tut's tomb by Howard Carter, and the Maya Pyramids. I became very interested in Egyptian culture and also in Maya culture. These interests continue until this day. I took courses in high school and college, where I majored in sociology (the study of societies), and I also became interested in anthropology and the work of Margaret Mead.
Another wonder Christmas gift was a mosaic kit that my parents gave me. It was an icon mosaic of the Virgin and Child. I knew little about mosaics at that point (around 12 0r 13 years) and really enjoyed completing the project. Little did I know that nearly 45 years later I would take a mosaic class at the Southwest School of Art and Craft in San Antonio, and discover how much I loved making mosaics. I have not had much time or space to work on my mosaics, but it seems to be the medium that I love to work with most of all.
When I was quite young, I had a Ginny doll. They were very popular when I was in elementary school. One of my siblings gave me a roller skating outfit for my Ginny doll. The skates really worked and it had a little blue vest and white skirt. I was very thrilled with that gift.
I loved dolls and was always thrilled when Santa Claus left me a doll. I mentioned the Ginny doll, an eighth-inch tall doll with a young girl's face which was very popular when I was in elementary school. Barbie dolls had not yet been developed when I was young. My sister had a Barbie doll when she was about 10; I was 13 and considered too old for dolls. However, truth to tell, I would sneak and play with my sister's Barbie doll when she was not around! Other memorable dolls I had were a bride doll, about 18 inches tall, and a ballerina doll, about the same size. I was enthralled by dancing, and the ballerina doll had pointe shoes, a pink tutu, and dark hair in a bun. I loved playing with her and pretending I was that doll and dancing and dancing in ballets.
And a couple of years ago, my daughter Sabrina gave me a rather unique gift. I owe a square foot of land in Ireland! She bought it for me and make a scrapbook about it. It is in County Tipperary and has directions to the land. One branch of my relatives comes from that county, so that was a special gift. It was special, too, because it was one of the few gifts from my daughter that she seemed to have really put thought into and knew that I would love such an unique gift. Previous gifts from my daughter were a foot bath, and two outfits that were the exact same color. Those were a little strange.
Gifts that I received that I did not care so much about were the usual winter gifts that children in New York receive--winter hats, mittens or gloves, scarves, boots, etc. We also always received very practical and gifts few children would be excited about--underwear, vests, socks, etc. Would YOU be excited with those kinds of gifts? I wasn't.
The thing that really upset me about Christmas presents was that after we had stopped believing in Santa Claus, my sister would extort money from me over Christmas gifts. Here is how she did it. Joanne would scour the house and always find the hiding places where my parents had stashed away our Christmas gifts, so she knew what each of us would be receiving from our parents as well as what she was giving to us. Our parents never wrapped our presents until Christmas Eve, so it was easy to tell what we were getting. I loved being surprised on Christmas morning, so Joanne would demand part of our allowance NOT to tell us what we were getting. That's extortion! I don't know if my brother cared so much about being surprised, but I did NOT want to know what my gifts were going to be. Maybe I was afraid that I would be disappointed if I found out what the presents were. Maybe I just wanted to be surprised on Christmas morning. Whatever the reason, I always paid up and didn't tell my parents that Joanne had found the presents. She would have been in BIG trouble!
Now I am at the point in my life where I enjoy giving gifts to those I love rather than receiving gifts, especially gift bought just to give me something.
Today is the 30th anniversary of John Lennon's death, a very sad anniversary indeed. John Lennon was one of the Beatles, a very popular British band in the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, they were the biggest band when I was in high school
I remember the first time I heard a Beatles' song. It was "I Want To Hold Your Hand." When I first heard it on the radio in January 1965, I couldn't believe what a fabulous band this was. I was a freshman in high school; John F. Kennedy, our president, had just been murdered in November. Everyone needed something to be happy and excited about. The Beatles were just what we needed.
The Beatles were a huge hit in Great Britain and in Europe. "I Want To Hold Your Hand" was their first single and first album released in America. In February 1965, the band came to the United States and appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show, a Sunday night variety show. Teenagers all over were glued to their black-and-white TV sets to watch them perform. Their style was called "mod," for modern. They had longer hair than most boys had, with long bangs. Girls would scream and faint at their concerts. They were the beginning of the British invasion of bands such as the Rolling Stones.
John Lennon and Paul McCartney (the cute Beatle) wrote most of the bands songs. Lennon and McCartney were an extremely prolific song writing team. The other Beatles were George Harrison (the quiet Beatle, who died a few years ago from a brain tumor) and Ringo Starr, the drummer who wore lots of rings. John was the intellectual; he wrote poetry and drew pictures. He had been an art student. The Beatles were always innovative. Everything they did was so different from what they had done previously. They introduced the Western world to the Indian music of Ravi Shankar.
When the Beatles split up in the 1970s, they each continued music on their own. John met and married a Japanese artist, Yoko Ono, and became a peace activist. They lived in New York City. Paul and his wife Linda made many songs for movies and other activities. George worked with people such as Bob Dylan, Tom Petty, and Roy Orbison. Ringo worked in movies and other endeavors.
Thirty years ago, as John and his wife walked home from dinner in New York City, a deranged fan shot and killed John. The world was in shock. We had lost a great artist and visionary. One of his most famous songs is "Imagine." You should look up the lyrics and read them. We would like to live in such a world that he imagined. Rest in Peace, John.
I loved to spend the night at Grandma’s house. I knew that Grandpa and Uncle Donald, my godfather, lived there, too, but I always thought of 1925 Storrs Avenue as “Grandma’s House.” When I stayed overnight there, I slept in my father’s old bedroom. It was on the second floor, the first room on the left, across from the very large bathroom. The bed was immediately on the left as you entered the room. The stairs to the attic were on the left, at the end of the bed. Across from the door were the windows, which faced the northeast. All along the wall under the windows was a very long desk with a long shelve above it. On this shelve were my grandmother’s prize African violets. They were stunning. Florescent lights hung above the plants; the combination of the florescent lights and the northeast light from the windows above must have created the perfect environment for the African violets, which are notoriously difficult to grow. (I can’t count how many African violets Grandma gave to my mother that died at our house.) I loved to sit at the desk and glance up at the lovely violets as I drew picture upon picture.
Another thing I loved about staying at Grandma’s house was the food. For breakfast, Grandma would make me a perfectly prepared soft-cooked egg. She would scoop it out of its shell and chop it in small bowl with a little butter (REAL butter, not oleo-margarine like my mother bought), salt, and pepper. There was also toast with butter, and jam if I wanted it. Grandma squeezed oranges for my orange juice, and I also had tea with cream and sugar. This was so unlike my usual breakfast at home of cold cereal or oatmeal. And NO pancakes, which I did not like, at Grandma’s house. Often, we would also have a dish of fruit with breakfast. Apricots were my favorite. We never had apricots at home. Breakfast was heaven at Grandma’a house.
In the summer, “The Vegetable Man” would stop his cart pulled by a horse in the street in front of my grandparents’ house, which was in the middle of their block. On one side of the cart were all sorts of local fresh vegetables; on the other side were fresh fruits. My grandmother would let me help select the vegetables and the fruits for the family meals. My favorite vegetable was fresh peas. I was allowed to shell the peas and rinse them so that Grandma could cook them. At home, we had mushy canned peas. These peas were fork-tender when Grandma steamed them, and then put a pat of butter on top of the dish of steaming hot peas.
The fruits I usually chose were bing cherries, dark red and so sweet, and peaches and apricots. Grandma would let me eat the cherries after she washed them. She would cut up the peaches and the apricots, sprinkle a little sugar on them, mix them, and then we would have them for breakfast or sometimes over vanilla ice cream. I can still smell the fragrance of the peaches and the apricots in my child’s mind. Aaahhh!
For lunch, Grandma would make soup, usually cream of tomato soup, and make me a sandwich, usually of sliced ham, with a little butter, mayonnaise, and mustard on white bread. She always had dill pickles for me, since I was a “pickle freak.” I ADORED dill pickles. Our dinner would often be roast pork, roast beef, or pan-fried steak, served rare and juicy. Every now and then, Grandma would roast a duck on a spit. These were my favorite things, and Grandma always made sure that she served them when I stayed overnight.
Never was I scared when I stayed at Grandma’s house. I felt safe and secure there; my grandparents were right next door to my father’s room, and Uncle Donald’s room was across the hallway from my grandparents’ room. Someone was right there if ever I needed them, but I don’t remember ever needing comforting or having nightmares or anything unpleasant happening when I was there.
Unfortunately, my overnight stays at Grandma’s house came to a rather abrupt end when I was 7 or 8 years old. My mother thought it was unfair that I stayed at Grandma’s and my sister did not. Joanne was quite the opposite of me; she was very active and “antsy.” She didn’t listen nor obey well. She always got into some sort of mischief. And Grandma simply didn’t want to deal with it, so yes, Grandma played favorites, and I was the favorite, My mother did not like it, and so forbid me to go to Grandma’s house unless she also invited Joanne. Grandma just didn’t want to put up with Joanne’s antics, so my visits to Grandma’s house stopped until I was in high school.
Every Wednesday when I was in high school, I would take the city bus downtown with my school friends. We would shop or “just look,” and then I would take the bus to my grandparents’ house for dinner. I would help my Grandma and Uncle Donal make dinner, and we would chat together as we worked. Then we would eat, watch the news, and I would do my homework. Around 8:30 p.m. or 9:00 p.m., Uncle Donald would drive me home, or my father would come to pick me up and take me home. Dad often came a little early so that he could spend some time with my grandfather, and then we would go home later. Wednesday nights at my grandparents’ house provided a my safety net for me throughout my high school years. I felt wanted, loved, cared about, listened to, and I was given loving advice at my grandparents’ house. If given the choice, I would have stayed FOREVER at my grandparents’ house!
On the opposite side of the yard, across from the rose bushes, my grandmother planted her annuals. These were the flowers that have to be planted from seeds every year, such as zinnias, snapdragons, daisies, pansies, petunias, etc. Bulb flowers were also to be found here, such as tulips and daffodils. Grandma dug up the bulbs after the blooming season for that flower had passed and then replanted the bulbs at the appropriate time for them to bloom during the next season.
At the far end of the yard, against the retaining wall that backed against the yard of the house on Oneida street, Grandma had her rock garden. Large rocks were placed in this area, and succulents such as “hens and chickens” that needed little water and light grew in this area. The rocks were covered with moss and the succulents grew in the shallow soil surrounding the rocks.
Grandma allowed Grandpa his own part of the yard, too. On the end of the yard closest to the house, opposite the rock garden, Grandpa had a small vegetable garden. In the summer, he had tomatoes, cucumbers, green beans, and squash. He also had a grape arbor next to the vegetable garden, near the driveway. He grew luscious deep purple Concord grapes. There were benches inside the arbor, where you could sit and breathe in the sweet aroma of the grapes. It was shady and cool in the arbor, and a wonderful place to sit on a hot summer day. Grandma would make grape jelly from the Concord grapes, but of course, we would also sneak and eat a few of the fresh grapes.
Soon after my grandparents’ marriage, my grandmother became pregnant with my father Floyd, who was born on September 16, 1912. Around this time, my Grandma began to use “Rose” instead of “Rosa” as her given name, and that is how she was known all her life. We knew that she was originally “Rosa Anna” because she had her First Communion and Confirmation certificates framed and hung in my grandparents’ bedroom. Grandpa apparently chose my father’s name: Floyd Donald. But my grandmother named the other children!
The family of three lived in the area of St. Francis parish; that was where my father was baptized. While my grandmother was pregnant, she made the christening (baptismal) gown for the baby. Both my grandparents were raised in devout Roman Catholic families. In the Catholic church, babies were usually baptized as soon as possible after birth so that they would go to Heaven if they died (very common in those days). If a baby died without being baptized, it was believed that the baby would go to a place called Limbo, a nice place but they would never be in the presence of God because they still carried the “stain” of Original Sin, the Church taught. In addition, unbaptized babies could not be buried in the sacred ground of the Catholic cemetery; they were buried in unconsecrated ground in a special section. So my father was baptized about a week after his birth. I don’t know who his godparents where; that’s something I’ll have to investigate.
Soon my grandfather began to build a house for the family in the northern part of the city at 1925 Storrs Avenue, just a block east of Oneida Street, one of the major north-south streets. It was near Kemble Street School (the elementary school) and Utica Free Academy (the high school). Only a block away was a spacious city park. The house was not far from Our Lady of Lourdes Church, where the family began to attend church and where all the Samson boys made their First Communion and Confirmation.
When my father was about 4 years old, my grandmother gave birth to a baby girl who died soon after birth. However, she lived long enough to be baptized in the hospital and was named Rosemary Catherine. We know that she was baptized, because even though my father said she died at birth, she was buried in the consecrated area of St. Agnes Catholic Cemetery. My brother worked at the cemetery during his high school summers, and he came upon her grave. She must have been born alive and baptized, because stillborn (dead) babies could NOT be baptized.
The death of Rosemary threw my grandmother into a deep depression. In addition, my father had a terrible asthmatic condition. So my grandfather took their doctor’s advice and took the family to to St. Augustine, Florida, for the winter months of 1916-17. The doctor thought that the warmer climate at the seaside would be good for my father, and a change of scenery might help ease Grandma’s depression. They took many photographs on their prolonged vacation; I was able to look at them with my grandmother and Uncle Donald after my grandfather’s death. I recall that there was a lovely photo of my father and his father with a toy sailboat at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean. I really loved that photo and wish I had asked for it then. Uncle Donald took possession of the photos after Grandma died, and then they passed to my Uncle Bob. I know one of my cousins has at least some of the photos; perhaps other cousins have the others.
My grandfather had experienced some illness when I was young. I remember that my mother gave blood when my grandfather underwent surgery to remove part of his stomach (I don’t know what the problem was). But in the summer of 1969, Grandpa began passing some blood in his urine. In August, his went into the hospital and it was found that he had some sort of cancer that involved his blood. He was in the hospital for about 3 weeks and was quite alert and lucid until the night of his death. My parents had gone to visit him, and found that he was slipped away. They called my grandmother and uncle, who rushed to the hospital, and Grandpa passed away on September 6, 1969, at the age of 85.
My parents came home and told my brother that Grandpa had died that night. My brother sat in our back hall, hugging our dog Sissy, crying, and telling her that Grandpa wouldn’t be coming back anymore. For months afterward, when my Uncle Donald’s pulled into our driveway, Sissy ran to the car and looked for her best friend who would never return.
Grandpa is buried with Grandma, my godmother Aunt Elsie (Uncle Bob's wife), and Uncle Donald in Mount Olivet Cemetery in Whitesboro, NY. The Samson headstone has a bas relief of the Sacred Heart on it. Their graves are just a short distance from my parents graves and the graves of Uncle Nick and Aunt Josephine.
My grandfather was much like my father in personality. He was quiet, gentle, and soft-spoken. He had a wonderful sense of humor, and loved the outdoors and animals. He loved his family--his immediate family, his extended family, and even his in-laws. I never heard my grandfather raised his voice except at his youngest brother, Nick. Uncle Nick was a bit of a character, cheap as cheap could be. (When his wife Josephine was alive, she had to take the remainders of the bars of used bath soap and melt them down, then let them harden into a larger, usable bar of soap. Nick and Josephine reused coffee grounds. Uncle George Kraeger once commented that he thought Josephine’s coffee was fine, until someone informed him that he was actually drinking tea.)
When I was in high school, I always went to my grandparents’ home after school for dinner. On this particular night, we were just finishing our dinner when the back door opened and in stomped Uncle Nick, my grandfather’s youngest brother. Uncle Nick was yelling, “They’ve torn down the coal bin!” He flung his gloves, hat, and scarf on the hallway floor, began crying, and kept yelling about the coal bin. Here was the problem with the coal bin: Uncle Nick’s sister Anna Kraeger’s grandson, Gerald, and his wife Corinne lived with Uncle Nick and helped take care of him. Corinne needed space in the basement of their two-flat home to hang a clothes line since Uncle Nick didn’t have a dryer (surprise). Never mind that the coal bin was empty and probably hadn’t been used in 20 or 30 years. But Uncle Nick was extremely upset that Gerald had torn out the coal bin.
Grandpa calmly got up from the table, went out to the hallway, grabbed Uncle Nick by the elbow, and pulled him into the den. It was then that I heard my grandfather raise his voice, the ONLY time. He must have gone into “older-brother mode.” Grandpa shouted, “Nick, you silly old fool! You haven’t used that coal bin in 25 years and you never WILL use it again! What is the matter with you? I’ll tell you what’s the matter, you’re an old fool. A silly old fool!” He went on to tell Uncle Nick that he should be grateful that he had a nice young couple--his sister’s grandson and wife--who were willing to put up with all of Uncle Nick’s nonsense and take damn good care of him. Uncle Nick was speechless. He must have been in shock (he didn’t even ask if there was any dinner left). Uncle Donald got involved (after dinner), got the two brothers calmed down, and took Uncle Nick back home (he had walked from his house a mile or so away). Grandma and I finished our dinner and washed up the dishes.
One food that Grandpa loved was limberger cheese. This is a VERY smelly cheese that must be kept tightly sealed or else everything in the fridge would smell like limberger cheese. My grandfather loved limberger and onion sandwiches with mustard!
I mentioned that we ate frogs. Well, technically, we ate frogs' legs. Grandpa and Pat would go to some ponds in the woods near our house and shoot frogs and skin the legs. Then my mother would cook the frogs' legs. She would lightly batter them and fry them; I prefer them sautéed with garlic and tomatoes, the French way. Even today, if I go to a very good French restaurant, such as Le Jardin in Vermont, I will order frogs' legs, or cuisses de grenouilles. (I love escarots, as well!)
Grandpa made his own sauerkraut, which is simply pickled cabbage. In a large stoneware crock in my grandparent’s cellar, my grandfather would place shredded cabbage and kosher (large-grained) salt. He would mix these well, and place a round wooden board on top of the mixture, and hold in all down with a large brick. The cabbage and salt would ferment in the crock, and voilà! Sauerkraut! It was not until I was in college that I realized that most people actually bought sauerkraut in stores, because when we needed sauerkraut, we brought a glass Ball jar to my grandparents’ house, went down to the cellar, scooped out a jar-full of sauerkraut and took it home. Periodically, my grandfather would grate more cabbage into the crock, add a little salt, stir the mixture, and let it sit and ferment.
The common dandelions, generally considered a weed, was a plant that my grandfather used both for food and for making wine. The leaves of the dandelion plant are actually very good as a salad, with a little oil, vinegar, and sugar on them. My grandfather also made wine from dandelion flowers. He also taught my brother how to make dandelion wine. It has an interesting taste, and a powerful “kick.”
Grandpa loved to walk. That probably had something to do with his longevity; he lived to be 85 years old. As I said, he walked to the various construction sites; he also walked through the Forest Lawn cemetery and through the woods to our house. This was about 3 miles "as the crow flies." He would call my mother to let her know he was coming--a safety measure. He nearly always carried his rifle when he walked through the cemetery and woods to our house--another safety measure. In the summer, he would then take us kids walking in the woods. That's how I learned to recognize different trees, as he pointed them out to us. Sometimes we would take pails and secure them on our belts, and we would pick wild strawberries, wild blackberries, and gooseberries. Of course, we would eat as many berries as we picked! But we loved to walk with Grandpa as he told us stories of his youth.
In the summer when raspberries ripened, my mother would take us with my Grandpa to Aunt Anna's house to pick the raspberries from her many raspberry bushes. She had 4 or 5 rows of raspberry bushes which grew up along wooden railings. I LOVED to help pick raspberries! Grandpa would leave some for Anna for her cereal and dessert, and take a bucket home to Grandma. But we took the rest home, and my mother would make a pie and usually can the rest of make jam or jelly. But I would have preferred to just eat fresh raspberries with a little sugar syrup!
Grandpa told wonderful stories. He had a slight accent; he never said "th's." One day he told about seeing many birds on his walk through the woods to our house. I remember him saying, "D'ere must have been tousant ['thousand'] unt ['and'] tousant of dem!"
When I think of Grandpa, I can still smell his pipe tobacco. Grandpa smoked a pipe, and the smell to me was smoky and sweet. It was a very pleasant, comforting, safe smell. Grandpa (and Grandma and Uncle Donald) were people who always made me feel safe, appreciated, and loved, which I often did not feel around my parents, sad to say.
My grandfather loved animals. My grandmother wasn't keen on dogs, but when I was young, they had a cat named Ginger, a yellow tabby. He wasn't fond of children and we learned to keep our distance early on. But Grandpa had a special relationship with our dog Sissy, whom we got when I was in the 7th grade. Grandpa loved Sissy and she loved him. He would pet her and say, "Oh, if only you could talk!" What would you tell us?" If Grandpa walked home through the woods, even if we kept Sissy in until an hour later, she would follow his scent and turn up at my grandparents' home. So my mother or father usually took Grandpa home after he had had a glass of beer so that Sissy wouldn't follow him.
My father was very close to his father. They both loved to hunt and fish, and even when my father was an adult and my grandfather elderly, they never missed a deer-hunting season nor at least one fishing trip for rainbow trout. When my brother Pat was old enough, he, too, always went along on these trips and learned not only to hunt and fish, but to also respect the land and animals. What they killed or caught was ALWAYS eaten--deer, squirrel, rabbit, trout, bullheads, and frogs. I was not (am still not) a great fan of venison (deer meat), not just because it came from a deer, but because I don't like the taste. I ate everything else (except the bullheads).
Grandpa and my father also went snowshoeing: walking on top of deep snow on snowshoes. He also taught my father to hunt with a bow and arrow, and taught my father to make his own arrows, as well. He taught me how to shoot a rifle, as well as teaching my brother and sister. And most importantly, he taught us that we are stewards of God's creature, and he taught us to respect our environment (before environmentalism was a big thing.)
Grandpa was a skilled carpenter and cabinet-maker. He built the home that my grandparents' lived in at 1925 Storrs Avenue in Utica. My father and his brothers grew up there, and my Uncle Donald lived there for a while even after my grandparents' deaths.
When my father graduated from high school in 1930, just months after the Great Stock Market Crash of October 1929 which signaled the beginning of the Great Depression, he was unable to go to college to become an architect as he had hoped to do. Instead, he went to work as a carpenter with my grandfather and his brother. They were all members of the carpenters' union, The United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners. (The union gave me a scholarship of $100 every year that I attended Niagara University; this scholarship paid for my books all through my undergraduate years.) They most often worked for the Alt Brothers Construction Company; even after my grandfather had retired, he would walk to one of the Alts' construction sites to see how the work was progressing, visit my father in the summer when he worked for the Alts' on summer break from teaching school, and "chew the fat" with other carpenters.
Since I wrote quite a bit about Grandpa Samson, I really need to write about the person I loved most in the entire world: Grandma Samson. My grandmother went the world to me, and I want to share everything I know and remember about her with you.
Grandma, my father’s mother, was born on April 21, 1888, the daughter of Catherine (Kate) O’Melia Shibley and Joseph Shibley. Shibley is most likely an anglicization of the German name Scheible, since Joseph’s parents, Matthias and Grace came from Baden-Baden in Prussia. Great-grandfather Joseph never used the word “German”; his parents were “Prussian,” which is more correct since Germany was a collection of princely states when they arrived in American with their older son Enos. Joseph was the first child of his parents born in American. They were German-speaking people. Kate O’Melia (whose parents came from Ireland) married Joseph Shibley and they lived in Fish Creek, NY with the elder Shibleys. Kate desperately wanted to learn to speak German to that she could speak with the neighbor ladies of the area who were mostly German-speaking, so only German was spoken in the Shibley home.
Joseph and Kate had four children. Howard was born in 1886, my grandmother Rosa Anna was born in 1888, and they had two younger children: Flora, born in 1892, and John (Jack) who was born in 1894. Howard and Rosa were very close all their lives. Howard never married, and eventually inherited Kate’s brother Martin O’Melia’s cabin and all its contents in Fish Creek. I remembering visiting Uncle Howard often. The cabin was at the foot of a hill, on which he had sheep and goats that grazed on the land. He also had a small pond on his land. It was a beautiful, rustic little place, quite cozy. No central heating, of course, but no one had heating heating in that are then (and NO air conditioning, of course).
Grandma and Flora were rather rivals for their father’s attention, it seems. Grandma felt that her father spoiled and favored Flora. And Jack was the baby, totally spoiled, of course. Flora eventually married Floyd Canfield and moved to Utica, as did my grandmother when she married my grandfather. Flora had a son, Roy, my father’s cousin, and the Samson boys and Roy Canfield were very close.
There is an interesting story about Aunt Flora. At one point in her lifetime, she painted nearly everything a light, turquoise-like green. Everything. Beds, wicker furniture, dressers, tables, EVERYTHING. When I was grown and needed a bed frame in 1979, my father said that he had his grandparents’ bed that Joseph had had made for his wedding to Kate in 1891 in the upstairs of his garage. It was, unfortunately, been at Aunt Flora’s during the “Aunt Flora Green” period, so my father took it to be stripped by dipping it in a paint remover. He felt that there was good wood underneath, and he was indeed correct! The bed was made of black walnut and was absolutely beautiful. The huge headboard was made of a single piece of black walnut. The bed was incredibly heavy, being that it was solid wood, not veneer. I used that bed until I moved to Austin in 2002. Then I gave the bed for Cassie to use. The sideboards eventually rotted and broke in around 2007 or 2008.
After my Aunt Elsie, Uncle Bob’s wife, died at the early age of 55, and Roy Canfield had passed away, Roy’s widow Fran and Uncle Bob became quite good friends and were good company for each other, as they shared many of the same interests. Uncle Bob and Cousin Fran were great friends until Fran’s death of heart disease. Jack, too, married and moved to Utica. He married Florence XXX. They had one adopted daughter, Jane, and one child, Rosemary, of their own.
As with most of the children in the area, the Shibley children were educated in the one-room school in the town. They knew English but had only spoken German at home until Howard and Rosa went to school. Grandma aspired to be a teacher, so she continued her education past the 8th grade, and eventually attended Normal School, which was teachers’ training college in New York State. When Grandma graduated from Normal School, her graduation gift from her parents was a rifle. She had secured a job in the one-room school near their village, and when she walked to the school, she had to walk through a wooded area where there were wild animals. So she needed the rifle for protection from the animals, such as bobcats and lynx.
Miss Shibley, as she was known to her students, met my grandfather while she was a teacher and he was a carpenter. They married in Fish Creek at the Catholic Church in November 1911. Grandpa was 27 and Grandma was 23 years old. They moved to Utica, about 45 miles to the south, which was the largest city in the area. It was easier for Grandpa to find work as a carpenter there. And each of them had siblings who also lived there: Grandpa’s youngest brother Nick and his wife (Nick was also a carpenter); and Grandma’s younger sister Flora and her husband Floyd Canfield, as well as her younger brother Jack and his wife Florence (Jack was also a carpenter).
Halloween will soon be upon us, in just a week. All American children LOVE Halloween, and I certainly was no exception. First, there is the mother-load of candy that you get from all those lovely people who are so sweet to you as you sing out, “Trick-or-treat!” When I was growing up, nobody worried about some sick-o tampering with candy, with only accepting store-bought, wrapped candy. It never occurred to anybody that some nut-job would stick razor-blades or straight pins or poison into candy.
Secondly, I loved to dress up and pretend to be someone else. I really didn’t like who I was; I didn’t like my life. This was the one holiday when it was acceptable to pretend to be someone else. One year, I was a pilgrim lady. My mother would make our costumes, and I think I used this costume for a reenactment of Thanksgiving the next month. I never had a desire to be a fairy princess. An American Indian princess, yes. I was enamored of Princes Summer-Fall-Winter-Spring on the Howdy Dowdy Show. But my all-time favorite pretending was dressing up like a gypsy. I loved wearing the long, colorful skirt, loads of necklaces and bracelets, and a colorful scarf around my head. Also, in central New York State where it was often very cold on Halloween, as well as dark at an early hour, I could wear several shirts and a pullover sweater, and not have to wear a coat, thus covering up one’s costume. The whole point of dressing up was so that people could see what you were pretending to be, and they could then ask the obvious question, “And who are YOU supposed to be?” Duh! What do I look like? I’m wearing a gypsy costume, so OBVIOUSLY I am supposed to be a gypsy!
We lived in what most people would have considered “the country.” There were no sidewalks and it was pitch dark--no street lights. So generally, NO ONE came to our house to ring the doorbell. The house was situated far back from the road, with woods on either side of our property. When I was rather young, in the early primary grades, my father took me to my aunt and uncle’s house in the city, and I went trick-or-treating with my cousins. We also stopped at my grandparents’ house so that they could see our costumes. Grandma often made popcorn balls for us: popcorn rolled in caramel and formed into balls. When we were older, my father would drive us down our road to the more populated area, where we would ring doorbells for candy.
I was always thrilled when we went to the Roberts’ house on our road. Mrs. Roberts always made popcorn balls. Then she wrapped them in colored plastic. I adored popcorn balls. Some people went all-out, preparing little bags filled with candy. Some people made cookies. Others gave candied apples or caramel-covered apples, wrapped in colored plastic. They were soooo good. I also loved bubble-gum and red licorice. Not the black licorice. I HATED black licorice or those candies (Good N’ Plenty, I think) that were licorice covered in a hard sugar shell. So any black licorice or Good N’ Plenties went to my mother who LOVED licorice. And I also hated anything with coconut in it, but my mother loved coconut. So the two types of Mounds candies, which were coconut candy bars--one milk chocolate, the other dark chocolate--went to my mother. Most chocolate candy was milk chocolate, which is NOT my favorite. For me, chocolate has to be DARK, DARK, DARK and NOT sweet. And today research shows that dark chocolate has antioxidents and is actually not bad for you in moderation. (I knew I was right!)
My Poor Sabrina. For her Halloween was usually a disaster. It seemed that she was always sick on Halloween. We would get her dressed and go to one or two houses and then go home because she was sick. But one year, when she was around 8 or 9, she had a great idea for a costume: she took a cardboard box, decorated it with colored squares of construction paper, and voilá, she was a Rubic’s Cube! Unfortunately, she was sick that year, too, but did wear her costume as she helped hand out candy. My favorite costume of her’s was one she had when she was about 3 years-old. I bought it; it was a Snoopy costume. She was so cute, but sick with a strep throat. So after 2 houses, she was done, and went home to bed.
So much for Halloween.
I decided that I needed to write about a very important person who was in my life for a mere short 20 years--my Grandpa Samson.
Grandpa was born on April 13, 1884, in Mohawk Hill, in New York State, on the Tug Hill Plateau region. John Walter Samson ("Grandpa" or "Pop," as he was known to his sons) was the fourth child born to Bernard Samson, who immigrated to the USA from Luxembourg as a child, and Maria Witzigmann, who was of Swiss descent. Grandpa had two older brothers, Louis (pronounced "Louie," in the French manner, and Joseph; an older sister Anna; and five younger brothers, only two of whom survived to adulthood (Martin and Nicholas). Louis, and Martin never married. My grandfather was very close to his sister Anna, who married George Kraeger and lived at, worked on, and eventually inherited Anna's Uncle Michel Samson's diary farm in Constableville, NY. Uncle Louis was a lumberjack; Joe married and farmed on Mohawk Hill (maybe on his father Bernard's farm?); Martin never married, but I don't know what his profession was (haven't investigated that far yet); and Nick married Josephine Bernadt, a second cousin related to his grandmother, Anne Bernadt, my great-grandfather Michel Samson's wife who had emigrated from Luxembourg with her husband and children (apparently at least one of her brothers had also emigrated; this was Josephine's grandfather, most likely). Both John and Nick were carpenters.
My grandfather met my grandmother Rosa Shibley (Rose) when she was a teacher in a one-room schoolhouse after she had completed Normal School, which was teacher training school/college. She was four years younger than Grandpa, and they were married in November 1911, when she was 23 years old and Grandpa was 27. They moved to Utica, NY, the largest city in the area. My Uncle Nick and Aunt Josephine also moved to Utica; they never had children and were very close to John and Rose.
About 10 months after their marriage, John and Rose had their first child, my father. When I asked Grandma one time why they had named my father "Floyd," which we thought was an odd name, she replied, "That was your grandfather's idea; after that, I named the children." How funny!
Most of my very early memories are rather vague, almost dreamlike. So these memories describe what was happening and my feelings about what was going on around me in those early years before I went to school.
Before I went to school, I mainly stayed at home with my mother, brother, and sister. We rarely went anywhere during the week except, on occasion, my mother would take my father to work and we would go to the grocery store. Generally, my father did the grocery shopping on his way home from teaching high school. Grocery shopping couldn't have been a very pleasant experience for my mother, with three small children under the age of 4. On the Sundays, we went to church, and sometimes we went to my grandparents' house or occasionally to my Aunt Elsie and Uncle Bob's house.
I remember visiting my relatives, and I remember going to Our Lady of Lourdes Roman Catholic Church, the church my grandparents and aunt and uncle and cousins attended as well. I can remember being in the car, riding in the back seat. There were no child or infant seats, and there were also no seatbelts. My mother held the baby in the front seat while my father drove. My mother smoked cigarettes constantly and always leaned her head against the passenger's side window.
Every day all day, it was my mother, Pat, Joanne, and me in our house in the woods. As little as I was (under the age of 3), I was allowed to go outside alone to play by myself. I suppose my mother was keeping an eye on me while I was outside, but I knew where I was supposed to stay and where I could not go--in the woods or in the garage. There was really no place to go to get lost. I was a very obedient child and did what my parents told me to do and didn't do what they told me not to do.
In the winter, I was bundled into my bulky snowsuit, boots, hat, and mittens and sent outside. I stayed mostly on our long driveway when the snow was very deep, until my father had made a little area in the snow where I could play. And the snow in upstate central New York State was often very deep. On the weekends, my father would pull me and my siblings for rides on the tobaggan or the sled. I also had tiny ice skates that strapped onto my boots. I loved to ice skate. We all used to love to watch my father plow our long driveway after a snowstorm. He used a put-together plowing trucklike machine that we referred to as "The Doodlebug." It was an open truck with one seat that was rather high, and it had a large wooden board on the front that was the plow. It was a very odd-looking machine, but it did a good job of plowing our long driveway.
I must have been quite a sight in my winter gear when I was very young. I had a red snowsuit with red boots, and wore a scarf and mittens. My cheeks would always turn bright red from the cold. I remember my legs chapping when the snow went down into my boots and my legs became wet and the boots rubbed against them. The best part of my winter play outfit was my coonskin cap. It was made of raccoon fur and skin, covered the entire top of my head, had earflaps to cover my ears, and had ribbons that tied under my chin. It also had the tail of the raccoon that hung down in the back. These types of caps were very popular during the early 1950s because of the movie about the folkhero Davy Crockett, who worn such a cap in the movie. Most of the caps sold were made from fake fur, but my father had this cap made for me. It kept my head nice and warm (and I was très chic). When I was very young, I carried my stuffed toy cat with me even outside. It also went to bed with me. As far as I can recall, it was just called "Kitty."
