pages 76-81

That afternoon, as I planned to walk back, Pruden said, “I’ve got some time off and I’ll take Sallie and you for a drive and then go into town.” When we started out we went up a hill and continued until we were up on a very high hill. Here we stopped and took in the country. Over there said Pruden is what they call the Montana Bad Lands, only fit for grazing and not too good for that. He pointed in the distance toward an Indian reservation and the army fort about eight miles out of Havre. It really was a beautiful country, green as far as your eyes could look, but there was something lacking, houses and trees on either side of the road. Instead, the houses were miles apart and most generally built in a little valley, hidden or obscure from the road. There they would be a little more sheltered from the cold Montana winters. Its vastness was almost frightening but I loved it all. I wasn’t wanting to return East, for there was something here that drew and exhilarated one. The climate gave one a new feeling of being. It was cattle and sheep country where grain and hay were the main crops.
When we wound up in town it was dull and dreary to me, as towns always were. But my appetite was still keen from the drive and supper took on a delicious smell, coming from the kitchen, especially the rhubarb pie Ida had made from some rhubarb growing in the small garden back of the house. As we all sat down to the table my brother-in-law lost no time in complimenting her on the pie. She said, “oh go on, you act as though I had never made a pie before.” The baby, in her high chair, was growing fat and strong now. Pruden, looking toward the baby, said, “you’ve got us beat now but you wait. We’ll be having one of those sometime and I’ll bet it’ll be a boy. Anybody want to take me up on that?” Everyone was silent. Finally Harry said, “we’ll wait. Time will tell.”
After supper we all gathered around the piano in the parlor and had a good sing. Ida sang alto which always made the songs and hymns we sang so much prettier. It was wonderful, seemed like old times. It was the first time we had done that since being in Montana. For a moment I closed my eyes and we were all back home again having one of our usual good times around the piano. My two sisters played duets then Harry and two sisters played two trio pieces which were very pretty. Later on I added my bit by playing. I loved to play but I played in my own way, by ear. Everybody clapped and Said play some more. Pruden said, “play one of those ragtime pieces or better still play Frank’s favorite song, “A Hammock Built for Two, and sing it.” I did and I’ll put the words here:
A Hammock Built for Two, above the skies of blue
a boy who whispered Sue,
You’re the only little girl on earth will do.
A hug or sigh or squeeze,
A kiss floats on the breeze
as they kept on swinging
to each other clinging
in a Hammock Built for Two.

The above was the chorus. I’ll not bother to write the two verses. Father and mother were enjoying all of this to the utmost for they had a pleasant look on their faces, as they sat there with their arms around each other. These were their children grown up. They were proud of their family and their daughter-in-law and son-in-law and most of all, of their granddaughter.
It was somewhat late that night when my sister and husband started for home. A bright moonlight night but the air was still a bit chilly for June. In fact, it wouldn’t have been back home, but out here it was.
The next morning as I came down to breakfast, I overheard my parents talking and discussing the work situation. There was very little of the kind of work my father and brother did in this small sheep and cattlemen’s town. Without work my father soon became restless for he was a man that liked to be busy. Upon hearing of a considerable amount of building going on in Great Falls, father made a trip up there, found work, and rented a house. We moved up there and were soon settled in that beautiful city. It wasn’t long until father and Harry were contracting and building houses.
That summer, I still remember for we had such a nice time there going to church, parties and etc. Among the young people we met were three girls, daughters of a business man in that city. Their names were Elsie, Bertha and Constance. We went most everyplace together. Later on near neighbors of ours, a rancher’s wife, gave a party for their five boys and invited us. There we met two of their sons that we went with quite a lot that summer. Carl and Joe were very nice boys.
It was such a lovely city that my sister and I used to just like to take walks of evenings down its shaded streets. There too was a big copper smelter. Father finally got permission from some of the head ones of it to take us through. We got to see just how it was run and
copper refined. Even after our permit there were still places we weren’t allowed to go. They said just by getting a few drops of water in one of the copper molds caused the death of one man, blinded three and injured several. It was called the B& M Copper smelter. I was enjoying that summer intensely but I still missed those long pleasant walks out to the ranch on Milk River and the little white house against the hillside where my sister and husband lived. As a month and over had gone by I began to wonder how they were. Some days later a letter came announcing the birth of a fine, big boy along
in July, 1909. They gave him his father’s name bu the was nicknamed Buster which stuck with him for years. My parents were very proud of him for that was their second grandchild.
When their son was older Pruden and Sallie came to see us at Great Falls. As my brother-in-law put it they were just taking a few days leave from the ranch. They only stayed a couple of days but we enjoyed their visit so much. We told them what a fine looking son they had. “Well,” Pruden said, “he comes by it naturally. Just take a look at his father.” Then he laughed. Sallie said, “oh, yes!” Pruden went with Harry and father on the works. He thought that was something he would like to do or at least learn.
As Pruden, Sallie and little Buster left to catch the train to go back to Havre, but came back later and went with us to Portland, Oregon, we went to the depot with them and waved goodbye as the train pulled out. Then my sister and I stopped in town and did some shopping. Upon arriving home, I found the mail had brought me three letters, one from the Jim I met on the train, the Jim in Virginia and Frank in New York. They were all nice friendly letters. I put them aside to answer at a more convenient time and went to help mother with getting the evening meal. Wilhelmina sat down to play over some late songs we had purchased. They were very pretty and I was wild about learning them. One of them I knew somewhat because I had heard Carl whistling it. By listening to Wilhelmina play them I could soon learn to play them also. As the days went by I accomplished my aim. There were times that I just loved to play and sing for an hour or more.
One morning while finding nothing much to do, I was reading through a magazine and found where they wanted someone to get subscriptions to it. Thinking that was something to occupy my spare time, I started out early one morning. ‘It was then about the first of October and the mornings were rather chilly. Hurrying along from house to house I was surprised at most everyone, because at nearly every home I got a subscription to that little magazine. On my way back on one of those mornings, I met a large like lady whom I had seen passing our house quite frequently. With her that morning was her little girl about four years old with long dark red curls. She spoke and I returned the greeting. Then she paused and said, “the air is quite chilly this morning.” For a little bit I thought she was speaking of her little girl’s hair and in reply I said, “Your little girl does have beautiful hair.” She replied by saying, “yes, her hair is quite pretty.” Then I caught on. I thought to myself, she must be English for I had heard they left the “H’s” off where they should be and put them on where they shouldn’t be. I had been accused of Southern talk but this was a new turn of affair. I bid her good day and hurried on, wanting to finish my rounds for that day, then home to figure just what kind of a prize I would get. I had been sending in my subscription money and the magazine had sent me a book of the many prizes they gave. I began looking through its pages. There were dolls, roller skates foot balls and what have you. Finally when I got to the last page, there was the most beautiful set of dishes. I thought I’ll get those for my mother. Figuring up, I only had a few more subscriptions to get then I could turn the last of the money in and have the dishes sent. I danced around and hummed a tune for I was quite happy over the thoughts of what I was going to do. The time soon slipped by, and my order for the dishes had been sent.
It was getting very cold in that country and some men on the job were telling my father and brother about the new additions being added to Portland, Oregon, and all the building that was going on there so they planned to take off as soon as they finished the job they were on. My folks talked it over and they agreed if they could go where it was warmer and work most of the winter it would be better as we had nothing to lose anyway. Harry and father were finishing their last two houses and would not take on any more. Instead plans would be made for the trip. Mama agreed to sell the piano. She said we had hauled it far enough and we would get a new one when we arrived in Portland. She also parted with quite a bit of the furniture, thinking something new would look better for a change.
That day in the first part of November, 1909 arrived and we left behind a very pretty city and a host of friends. It was cold and blustery when we boarded the train for the City of Roses. I could see the pretty parks, the Margarette, The Gibson, and the one named after the famous Indian squaw, Sacajawea, that helped Lewis and Clark on some of their trips. As we hurried toward the depot, I thought of all the good times and picnics we had had there that summer. The train whistle blew, the bell started clanging and the conductor called out all aboard then the train slowly pulled out of the depot. This was a very nice trip for we went by the way of Wenatchee, Seattle, Tacoma, and Vancouver, Washington, and on to Portland. At Wenatchee the tram stopped for awhile. Here we got off during the stopover. The clouds hung so low it was almost like washing your hands in them. Outside the depot there was box after box of such big red apples. Wenatchee at that time was quite an apple country. At Seattle the train laid over long enough that we got to take a taxi and take in the city and out to the old exposition grounds. That was a nice
trip Seattle was such a pretty city. It was misting a bit as we took in the city. This was common in that country for that time of year. In fact, we found it somewhat misty the rest of the way to Portland but it was warm, grass green and flowers blooming. One could almost stand out in those mists and enjoy them like a warm shower.
We arrived in Portland the evening and went to a hotel. The next morning my father went out and bought an Oregonian paper. After we had breakfast we went back up to our rooms and started hunting a house. That very morning we found an ad saying house for
rent, mostly furnished. As mother had sold most of our furniture, that was just what we needed. Three bedrooms and bath upstairs, kitchen, dining room, and large front room downstairs and a big basement sounded just like what we wanted. My father soon had it rented and we moved in. It was a very pretty place, a half block from the end of the trolley line on Clinton Street. It was up on a hill and a lovely rolling grassy lawn with flowers and trees. Father and Harry were soon at work for there was lots of work. Soon going with us too, my sister her husband and baby son joined us there.
Around Christmas time one of the big department stores put an ad in the paper for clerks. My sister and I, having nothing to do, thought we would apply thinking we would work just until the rush was over. When it was over they asked us to stay on, out of the many girls they had hired for the rush. We worked until the first of March. The weather was getting so warm and nice outside. Wanting to have some fun and take in the pretty parks, Portland and places surrounding it, we quit.
Along in the first of April the lady that owned the house we rented made we girls acquainted with two nice Pennsylvania boys that had boarded with her for two years. She said she wouldn’t have made us acquainted with them except that she knew they were extra nice boys. That was the beginning of having a good time. My sister took to Ben and I drew Jim. That was the third Jim in my life. They were Eastern boys and we Eastern girls. They took us so many places that spring, to the large and beautiful Portland park, Council Crest, Portland’s big spring and summer resort high up on a hill overlooking the city, to Oregon City and through the paper mill so we could see how paper was made. We really enjoyed that spring.
In the meantime, father and Harry built two houses for one man and five houses as big as the one we lived in for another man. Along in the last of May my sister-in-law got word some of her relatives were quite sick. She cried a lot about it and was so homesick for them and home. So in the first of June, 1910, we stored our furniture and stuff and went by the Sunset Route that took us down through California. We started out from Portland going by Salem, Eugene, Roseburg and Grants Pass, down into Berkeley and Oakland, California. Here the train ran on a huge ferry to San Francisco. This was a lovely trip especially those mountains we went through on the start in California. On down to Santa Barbara and Los Angeles where the train ran about a hundred miles along the ocean. That was the first time any of us had seen the Pacific Ocean. This was a trip I’d never forget. We were eight days and nine nights on this trip. In Arizona we came to the little boarded up and down depot that was called Tucson. There was nothing around it for miles but a hot, dry desert. That year the heat was almost unbearable. We saw a few burros and a dead cow now and then. At the depot a woman and her little girl got on with a basket of lunch. Said she was taking it up the line to some men who were working. A Spanish boy standing on the depot was calling out his wares which were cow’s horns, painted and carved like a fish. I was told later that the little adobe town of Tucson was bypassed by the railroad when the railroad grade was surveyed and staked out. It was back in the desert some nine or ten miles. Father stepped off the train and bought a horn from the boy, as a souvenir. Dust rolled up in clouds as the train moved on. With the sun beating down, I wondered how anything could live out there at all. It was that way much of the day making the water cooler a favorite place. Finally after some miles the train slowed to a halt. There were the men working. The lady and little girl, with the basket of lunch, got off. I looked back as long as I could. The train pulled out and gained speed.
We touched the border of New Mexico and saw the monument that marked the boundary between Old Mexico, New Mexico and Texas. On into El Paso and on through San Antonio. Things looked better now. This was a beautiful city. Then on through Huston and on we traveled. In Louisiana were those beautiful old Southern mansions and some in Alabama just as pretty. We were stopped for an hour or more in that big, quaint, old, busy waterfront city of New Orleans. We left the train and got a taxi and took in the city. It was really a sight worth seeing. Out on the edges were big old plantations, well kept and worth a lot to see. Everyone felt rested when we were back on the train again and on our way. On through Tennessee and those beautiful rolling hills of Kentucky.
We had begun to miss that wonderful, Western climate. Here it was low, hot, humid and sultry. We had lived in that kind of climate all our life, but found something different by going west.
Our friends were all glad to see us and we they but we spent most of that summer in Baltimore, Maryland. My brother, his wife and little daughter spent the summer visiting with her folks. We enjoyed where we lived a home not too many blocks from one of Baltimore’s nice shady parks. There we spent a lot of time, especially my sister and I. We took daily walks through it. Toward August the sun began to bear down and in that damp climate the heat was somewhat too warm for any comfort. We visited with our friends once more and then planned to return by September.
We took the shortest way going back that time. When we arrived, we found a nice modem, three bedroom home one block from where we lived before. We were quite pleased because it was nice and also a very pretty neighborhood. It was really a nice home and we were quite busy for a week or better getting settled. The man my father and brother had built the five large homes for our first winter in Portland was ready for them again. They lost no time in getting back to contracting and building.
The trip coming back to Portland was pretty and nice but couldn’t compare with the one we had going East. One night in California on