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.
Showing posts with label Grandpa. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Grandpa. Show all posts
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Grandpa Samson: Part 5--A Gentle Man, But Practical
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.
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.
Grandpa Samson: Part 4--Food
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 Samson: Part 3--Grandpa and His Grandkids
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.
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.
Grandpa Samson: Part 2--My father
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.
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.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Grandpa Samson: Part 1--Early Years
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!
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!
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