The Christmas of ‘39’
Luke 2: 9-11
“Don’t go in there!”
“It’s dark down in there.”
“Dack, I want to go home now. It gettin’dark
out here.”
All this whined by baby brother Billy. His two older brothers
called him Will. It was twilight and he was cold. Jack was Billy’s hero but he
was about to turn three and still couldn’t make the ‘J’ sound, and by the time
he could, he didn’t want to.
I was dark in there, Jack thought to himself. But at
eight and a half, he was already a leader, a dare devil, adventuresome and
playful besides.
“Something’s growling at me,” Jake repeated in a recurring
whisper emphasizing a different word each time because he was sensing an
unknown power all around him. He was whispering so as not to disturb it
further, whatever it was.
“Bob, grab a hold of my ankle. Hang on with both hands--no
matter what! There’s some critter back in here an’ I’m gonna bring it out,” he
whispered back as the cave mouth swallowed all but one ankle.
Jack had explored all the caves in the woods behind their small
rented house. It was a fringe benefit of his assigned job of checking the
rabbit traps each daybreak and twilight. At 8 1/2, Jack showed no fear. Not
yet. This limestone cave had a small pinched mouth with a pouty lower lip.
Their middle brother, Bobby at 6 1/2 would follow instructions
with steadfast, quiet efficiency beyond his years.
“What is it, Jack? What’s back in ther’? You be
careful,” Bobby said to the ankle, being choked with both hands. Meanwhile,
Bobby was already confiding in young Will.
“Will, it’s either a dragon or a bobcat. I wish he’d let it
alone whatever it is.”
“I’m scared,” was all soon-to-be-three Billy could muster while
his lower lip began to quiver at the oncoming darkness. He was becoming
increasingly afraid of the unknown that was in there and now all around him out
here as well.
By the autumn of 1939, a dingy, gray shroud of fear had spread
through the Heartland Hills like a cancer on the soul. The economic specter of
Depression stalked the
“Damn!” the dwarfish cave mouth swore softly. “Pull now, Bobby,”
it commanded. And Bobby did.
Immediately the disinterested mouth disgorged Jack, who twisted
blithely up and out while cooing to a round ball of fur that smelled like
baby’s breath. Swiftly he groped and dislodged two others, so of course their
mother came out grumbling, and mumbling through both sides of her upturned
mouth.
“That’s not a dragon,” young Will
declared by fiat, quickly overcoming all his fears.
“That’s a doggie.”
And she was too; a beautiful young collie that had been dumped
off and just had her first litter of three pups, born in a cave.
“Damn!” Jack stabbed the darkness in audacious disregard for
their mother’s best efforts and only now discovering that the second and third
were still born.
“I’m tellin’” was all Billy could come up with to keep from
crying. His two older brothers ignored this latest threat in their important
preoccupation. It was a half-hearted idle threat that he quickly forgot in the
exuberance the three shared over their new playmates.
On came the fall of 1939 promising to be the fall of them all.
For this family there seemed to be no solutions. They faced threadbare moments
which stacked end to end became domino-dreary days of hopelessness mixed with
sleepless nights in shades of gray. The gray-backed fear became a living thing
and it dwelt among them.
The two oldest children were girls whose names Will proudly
announced were Elmie, 12 1/2 and Vee, 10 1/2. Most of their time was spent
helping their mother. The girls were thrilled with the new gifts, the young
mother and her son.
“We must
name both and the names must be just right,” Vee determined, fully realizing
that Jack would probably tell them what the names would be. Though both sisters
were delighted with Jack’s accomplishments, the children’s’ parents were less
than pleased.
“Both must be destroyed. And soon!” Dad
decreed. Mother nodded, studying her oldest son’s face carefully.
But Jack instantly became the children’s advocate and
enthusiastic spokesman.
“Lucy will keep field mice out of the house he began. And Laddie
will quickly learn, too.” he continued on with increasingly spurious arguments,
tenuous as they sounded, even to him. Saving the best rationale till last, with
temerity, he summarized using an eight and one half year old’s solid logic.
“The best part is--they can be my Christmas present and Bobby’s,
and Will’s too.” Jack’s boyish exuberance was getting the best of him as he
turned to his little brothers with a quick look of smug self-satisfaction.
Bobby winced and all Wills said was “I’m hungry.”
From somewhere the older kids brought home an old Sears catalog
and every evening the girls or the boys would take turns looking at it.
Decisions were made. Decisions were changed.
Elmie wanted a book, Vee an inexpensive doll. Jack found a
scooter, which cost $2.79, but he quickly announced he’d share with Bobby.
Bobby winced. Young Will said he wanted a push toy or a searchlight truck for
.69 but what he really wanted was an all steel streamlined car for $1.39
(whatever that meant). The Sears wish book somehow kept these children alive
when it seemed nothing else could. Hope was all they had.
“It’s Christmas time,” Jack proclaimed. One big eye snapped open
and instantly focused on the strategically placed Sears wall calendar.
“Not yet,” Bobby responded popping open his one good eye, “It’s
only December 10th.”
Jack swung both feet out of bed, touched the icy floor and
almost yelped before he remembered Billy, sleeping soundly between them. All three
boys slept in the living room and since Bobby had fallen back to sleep, Jack
slipped into red long johns and socks while absorbed in kitchen sounds and
aromas.
Their Mom and Dad were talking softly; Dad between slurps of
coffee, made mostly from chicory. But it was hot.
“I didn’t bring my children out of that city to live like wild
creatures and starve in these hard scrabble hills,” mother snapped.
“But had it not been for that Parker boy throwing the dart, we’d
all be in those rat infested flats, yet,” Dad quietly edged.
At that, she exploded with no sound whatsoever, save the chair
that fell backward to the tattered linoleum floor.
Jack could taste the anger-flash from the kitchen, but who was
she angry at, he puzzled?
Mom stood statue-rigid facing the sink, her back to the table.
Her only movement was to draw both forearms with fists clinched up to her chest
and back down again slowly, repeatedly.
Jack knew she was quietly sobbing. What he could not sense was
just who was she so mad at and why? Was it Dad? Was it the kids? Was it
herself? Was it life? Or was it God?
In semi-darkness he nimbly made a paper airplane from a
Carson-May-Stern toy ad and sailed it towards the kitchen table. It landed
gracefully beside Dad’s coffee cup. Dad turned his head ever so slightly but
just enough for Jack to see the start of an approving smile. (There may have
always been a special bond between father and first-born son that neither
acknowledged). Dad went outside. That was his way. All Jack said aloud was,
“I’m hungry.” That was the last thing she needed to hear--and yet it brought
here out of her most recent darkness.
Later that day the boys were busily stuffing the cracks in all
walls with newspapers, under Jack’s supervision, giving attention to interior
face boards around windows and doors just as Dad had told them. “No flying
now,” Dad said.
“Look at these scooters,” Jack exclaimed and from then on all
three became much more interested in the toy ads than their task.
“I need your guarantee you will deliver these toys before dark
on the twenty-fourth. No later.” Cousin Margaret assertively jabbed at the
young driver, who was enjoying the banter. Their first cousin was city-born,
twenty-four, a graduate of
The big, robust Irishman laughed.
“Look, lady, I’ve got kids, too and I intend to spend Christmas
Eve with them. So, you bet I’ll get down to
Mike Kelly was an Irish teamster from
Margaret was a seamstress; a good one. She had used every lunch
hour in December to shop toy departments in bustling Wellston. Her net salary
was ten dollars every week, so she paid for each toy as she selected it and her
total expenditure came to $10.82; delivery included, to be delivered by truck
on December 24 from Carson-Union-May Stern, Wellston branch.
Margaret felt good. Everything was set. Now, she planned to ride
to the country with Aunt Mary and Uncle Pat and enjoy Christmas Eve with Aunt
Maggie’s kids, somewhere.
“Why did you just keep having babies?” Margaret had asked the
kids’ mother only that summer, in one of many private moments.
“They were our hope,” Mother replied simply. Nothing more was
said.
At their dinner of vegetable soup and corn brad, Mom announced,
“I know what we must do.” She had been humming ‘What a friend we have in Jesus’
all day and the silent rage seemed to have diminished her a bit more before it
vanished.
“Well, what is it, Mag, and we’ll do ‘er,” Dad quickly acceded.
“We’ll bring our desperation with us and lay it at the feet of
Jesus and the
“This Depression drove our family to its knees and that’s where
we should have been all along.”
“Let’s hear some more ideas, Mag; it sounds like you’re on a
roll,” their Dad responded, cheerfully, playing to five pairs of ears.
“Well, we’ve got to move or starve, so we’ll move-in with my
folks and you will be closer to day work in
With that, Buck’s countenance collapsed; mostly because he knew
she was right about all of it.
This time it was young Billy who broke the table tension.
“Momma, I hurt in my heart,” was all he said and he said it plainly.
On the morning of December twenty-fourth, Margaret was ready to
ride to the country and enjoy Christmas with Aunt Maggie’s five children.
“Where are they?” She wondered aloud, waiting for her ride. Uncle Pat was never
late.
“Damn! This street I’m lookin’ for ain’t on my map,” Mike Kelly
exploded, after checking the delivery address in Pevely,
In the hill country, the family was moving once again.
“Now, don’t you move just rock and watch,” Mother said as
she tucked Billy into his white wicker rocking chair in the middle of the front
yard. “Billy, sing ‘Jesus Loves Me’ or ‘Cherry Pie’,” she suggested as she
returned loading their car. He was content. He loved that rocker.
‘Can she bake a cherry pie, charming Billy?’ “I like that part,”
he thought to himself.
“Momma, my heart feels better,” was all he said.
They were not taking much, only what
Dad could tie on top or squeeze into the trunk.
“She’s yours,” Dad told their nearest neighbor when he took the
cow over there.
There was a lot for Billy to watch. He kept singing to himself.
“Damn! This here tears it,” Dad shot out. All five children knew
he was furious and they must be silent. Billy stopped singing but kept rocking,
humming to himself.
“What is it, Buck?” their Mother ventured as she hurried out of
the house one more time and her five little rabbits hunkered down. None had
heard him this angry.
“The block froze up last night on our Buick. It’s cracked and I
don’t see how we’re gonna make it that sixty one miles.”
“We will make it! Jesus wants us to make it,” she resolved.
And he immediately became equally resolute.
Just then Pastor Couch drove up the hill from the
“Remember, we’re all just pilgrims here, anyway. We are just
passing through.”
Jack snickered as he pictured himself and bobby wearing those
funny black hats.
“Everyone, gather round a minute,” Reverend Couch directed in
his best pulpit voice.
He unloaded a gift basket form the church; more than a gift
basket, really, and larger. “Look here,” he said and four children looked. The
congregation had sent mostly food; apples, nuts, cookies, canned soup, oranges,
even some hard candy and a small toy for each child.
Uncharacteristically, Billy hadn’t moved. He felt secure. he was all bundled up so he just kept rocking. He was
content. After all, his entire life he had always been the center of their
attention and he knew that, very soon all six would share whatever they had.
“Let me help load,” suddenly focused, Jack urged Laddie into the
preacher’s car with a piece of cookie. The puppy jumped in eagerly and his
mother followed.
Apparently, Jack had already turned his persuasive powers and
abundance of boyish charm loose on Reverend Couch, who had too quickly
acquiesced.
“There, that’s done,” Jack declared with finality as the pastor
drove down the hill. He had kids too and the collies seemed to know it. He was
a good man and they knew that someday, they would see him again.
“‘When we all get to heaven’, let’s all sing,” Mother
instructed, as they drove away. With Jack as their tour guide his siblings were
all looking for adventure.
“Don’t look back,” Mother said. So five pairs
of eyes tried to. Then they all sang while their Dad missed some of the
lyrics because of his preoccupation with the engine temperature gauge. ‘Will
The Circle Be Unbroken’ was his favorite.
‘When we all see Jesus, we’ll sing and shout the victory’. She
kept them going with the chorus. “Sing, Billy,” she encouraged.
“‘Froggie went-a-courtin an’ he did ride uh huh, mum huh’”,
Billy was playing to his captive audience.
Buck chuckled between mumbled “damns”. The froggie song was one
he had taught their youngest.
“Oh, children, look there,” Mother pointed distracting all of
them, again from their Dad’s increasingly poor word choices regarding engine
performance. All seven looked as they approached a road sign that read BLESSED
HOPE MISSOURI ahead.
“I never heard of Blessed Hope in
“I have,” Mother said.
Dad kept going, slowly leaking water along the way. Jack noticed
that the last twenty-five miles, he had to stop more often because the bid ‘36’
Buick V-8 had started leaking oil droplets, as well. This was very bad.
With forbearance and God’s Grace, he somehow managed to pull
into Grandma’s drive for the planned rendezvous by
“Got anything to eat?” Vee asked.
“Where are your manners, child?” Grandma responded and
immediately began preaching about acceptable Victorian manners to an
inattentive group of sullen children.
Just then Uncle Pat drove up, Aunt Mary
quickly appraised the situation, pulled their mother aside and gave her money
for food. Then they drove her to a nearby grocery.
Within a few minutes jovial Mike Kelly drove up.
While the children were inside eating, Margaret quickly looked
over the shipping bill.
The store
had run out of the specific toys she had selected and paid for, so Mike, with
his usual initiative had upgraded the quality on his own.
“I can’t pay you for these,” Margaret protested angrily, when
she quickly notice price differences.
“Here we go again,” Mike laughed, rolling his blue eyes for
emphasis.
Elmie got her two books and more. Vee got her doll, a very
expensive doll. Jack and Bobby instead of sharing a scooter would share the
deluxe model Radio Flyer red wagon. Billy seemed both amused and perplexed by
it all.
Instead of some kind of push toy, Make had selected a bright red
train engine he could sit down on and push/ride. And it had a Raggedy Andy doll
to ride in the coal car seat. Unbeknownst yet to either of them, Raggedy Andy
was destined for fame as young Will’s loyal sidekick and forever bestest
friend.
Of course the children did not yet know what was in the boxes.
The oldest four were still inside eating and probably still being lectured abut something or other, while they finished off on hard
candy.
The driver, Mike Kelly, seemed to be enjoying this last stop and
the chance for more banter.
“Look, Lady, ya want me to unload these toys here or not?” he
said over his shoulder as he proceeded to unload the boxes on the gravel drive.
Then he thrust out a clipboard of paperwork with hers on top.
“Sign at the bottom by the X to show you received them.”
Feeling frustrated and somewhat speechless, Margaret took the
pen and signed. She couldn’t help but notice his bold diagonal writing scrawled
over the top--Paid in Full--Mike Kelly.
Without another word, he got into his truck and backed out of
the drive. But as he pulled slowly away, Mike Kelly rolled down the window and
just to her said, “Merry Christmas, Marg.” The he flashed that trademark Irish
smile and yelled “Merry Christmas to all,” as he drove away, whistling.
While the older four children ate inside, Billy insisted on
sitting in his rocker by the porch, so mother covered him and he sat and
rocked. Only his face was uncovered wearing a snicker of a smile as if he alone
knew a secret about their immediate future.
Just then the four kids cam pouring out
of the house, Jack leading the way. “It’s real hot in ther’,” he said, envying
little Will’s outdoor seat of command.
“Children, you see that church steeple over there? That’s the
Just then her brother Will drove up. “I’m taking you all out to
our farm for Christmas. Follow me,” he said, without leaving his car.
Margaret loaded the gifts into Uncle Pat’s car and rode with
them.
After the family was on the way in their faltering Buick, Jack
interrupted the unusual silence. “I’m glad, cause
Grandma didn’t even have a tree.”
Then Vee, still smarting from her recent lecture on good manners
added, “Yeah, and no Christmas decorations of any kind.”
Mother quickly changed the subject. “Everyone, let’s think of
all this traveling like the time at the first Christmas when Mary and Joseph
were on the road to Bethlehem and when they arrived God came down.”
“This is our family’s journey of hope.”
At that, Buck broke his long term of silence. “Good, Mag. You
just keep on doin’ the thinkin’ for us and we’re gonna be just fine.”
All five children basked contentedly in their parents’ mutual
love and respect.
“Oh, I am sure there will be new days filled with sorrow, but
for our family in this place, let us praise God for His greatest gift of all,”
she said softly.
There wasn’t a sound. Everyone listened to the stillness and
what she said.
“We all have this moment. Our family is alive in the now of
things—and that’s enough. That IS enough.” Then she fell silent as they pulled
into the farm gate at dark.
“Christmas after all,” Jack exclaimed, “And its
even starting to snow!”
Sixty-four years later in reflection, at Christmas, Will thought
to himself:
“Yes, that’s the one I hardly
remember,
yet will never forget.”
Joie de Noel!
POSTSCRIPT
RE: The
Christmas of ‘39’
This story
was finally written down for countless generations of children who will follow
and for all who need a special reason for hope at this
Season of New
Beginnings.
