MY FATHER'S DAUGHTER, PETE
Click on Freda's Name Above For Photo of Author
"I would like to dedicate this book to my four sons, Vergil, Jerry, Lloyd and Melvin who taught me, loved me and tolerated my inadequacies as a mother."
INTRODUCTION
We were not surprised that she wanted Hilda, we already heard her say so. But our darling little sister, Cleta, and four month old Melvin, too?
Thoughts raced through my mind. If we needed to separate, almost anyone would feel sorry for Zelda and want to take her. Another family which needed help would like to have Letha...She was so responsible. Dad would want Marvin to stay with him. That would leave me to stay at home and try t keep house, for no one would want me.
Suddenly Letha spoke up: "I think we should stay together."
We all agreed, never Dreaming what was ahead for us.
PREFACE
My Children may understand me better when they realize the struggles I went through. I am apprehensive about this story for my own children can write their own story about the difficulties they had. Mine is a story that I felt compelled to share after years of thinking and writing.
I must apologize to my siblings, for my memory may be at fault. We all see things differently and react to events in our own special way.
EARLY YEARS IN OSCODA COUNTY
Legend tells us that my father cried when I was born that third of April 1909. I was never aware of any rejection, for most of my early memories are about times spent with him. Perhaps that is why he called me "Pete." I turned out to be a rambunctious tomboy.
Some of my early lessons were obviously necessary. When I stood before a fresh cow-pile, not wanting to walk in it. Mama came out, whacked me on the bottom and told me I could just go around it. I learned the hard way that I should not play mashing potatoes in the potty chair. The balloon sailing over was not a sheep. Good little girls do not hit the baby sister.
We often visited our neighbor, Grandma Nusbaum. Mama made us wear bright colored bonnets so she could watch us down the road.
Dad took me on a long trip when he delivered logs to some far away place. It seemed to take forever. Our conversation consisted mostly of questions about my comfort.
One visit to Uncle Henry Hershbergers in Mio I will never forget. I could not chew food very well, but wanted some celery. I was found under the table where I crawled to dispose of the celery.
One day we rode in our covered surrey to visit neighbors and have dinner with them. We drove through a large wooded area and over a creek. I was terrified and wanted to get out to walk. While the women prepared dinner the men waited in the living room. I wanted to sit on Dad's lap, but there was a carpet over the floor. It must have been tacked down, for it appeared to be stretched at the corners. I felt that I would sink down if I crossed over it. It did not appear to be solid like the floor. Dad sensed my problem and guided me around the rug on solid wood.
Sometime later we moved to a nice home in Kneeland. Some claim that we had moved the house there, but to me there was a great difference in the arrangement of the rooms.
Dad started the first creamery in the area in Kneeland. He collected cream from the farmers, tested it, and took it on to be churned into butter.
We had moved to the log house one and a half miles west of Kneeland.
Christmas in that Kneeland home was memorable. We three girls received dolls, beautiful ones with ceramic heads. Mama and Dad gave us a miniature cook-stove. Mama built a paper fire in it and it seemed she cooked some oatmeal on it.
Letha and I played "church" on the stairway one day. We sang "Count Your Many Blessings" but changed the words to "Count your many playthings."
We had whooping cough there. I remember carrying a tin can to catch the vomit. I worried that God would not let us into heaven if we died and still were coughing and vomiting.
While there we visited the Lantz home. Emerson and Esther's mother had died and mother wanted us to be especially nice to them.
THE LOG HOUSE
One day Letha and I crawled up to the top of our davenport and drew pictures of stick people as high as we could reach. Right on the wallpaper! We were not punished, but were given proper materials so we could keep on drawing.
Visits to Grandpa and Grandma Hersbergers were a special delight at this time. There was always good food, and Grandma's kitchen was a cozy place. Here colorfully decorated glass wind chimes were especially delightful.
One big reunion of the Miller family at the Jeff Miller farm is memorable. I was told that I had to recite a poem. A curl was fixed to hang over my forehead and I recited this little ditty:
That was embarrassing. From then on I knew they thought I was capable of being horrid.
In the late summer of 1914 our parents made plans to move to Indiana. Dad was asked to help his father on the big farm between Ligonier and Topeka. We had to have a sale. Nothing bothered me so much as selling a little dish cupboard that Dad had made for us girls. I tried so hard to persuade them to let us take it along, but it was sold.
During the time of the sale Dad had injured his hand. Blood poison developed. We could not go to Indiana until he was healed, so we stayed with our grandparents. Dad was in bed upstairs. He had to hold his hand in a pail of water and ashes, if I remember it correctly.
Eventually, we were traveling by train. There were tearful hugs, but also a sense of adventure, not knowing what lay ahead.
INDIANA, HERE WE COME
Our grandparents had prepared for our coming by adding rooms to the north side of the brick house. They had four rooms and a bath downstairs and rooms upstairs. Only a door and a hallway to our upstairs bedroom separated them from us. We were amazed to find a bathroom, but we were not privileged to use it. We had electric lights. A large tank collected water in an upstairs room, so we had running water to the kitchen. Our rooms consisted of the living room, kitchen and dining combined, and one bedroom downstairs and one upstairs.
The farm was a typical Indiana farm. The large barn had a buggy compartment, a large cow part, haymows, bins for grain and a section for the horses. A silo held silage for the cows. It seemed that all the other buildings were connected by board walls, the barn to the pig pen connected by a watering trough and the pig pen a board wall connected to a shop. There was a milk house connected to the living quarters, also by a board fence.
JOHN AND FANNY STUTZMAN
