The Time Passes

The School year of 1918-19 was my last year at Evergreen school. Esther was in the sixthgrade, I in the seventh. I was trying to be grown up by pinning up my hair and wearing longer dresses. Benta was a senior, Mabel in the eighth grade. They did light housekeeping and stayed in town during the week.

It was about this time that Mama’s health began to fail. She contacted a severe case of bronchitis for which no doctoring or any amount of cough syrup would relieve it. It developed into asthma from which she suffered the remainder of her life. She wasn’t able at times to do the housework and mixing the huge batches of bread she used to bake became impossible. How well I can remember coming home from school to see six or eight huge crusty brown loaves and an enormous pan of biscuits cooling on the kitchen table.

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Mama Johanna Uglem in 1913

We had no need to ask – who could resist a slice of bread or a warm biscuit spread with butter and sugar! No one said “You’ll spoil your supper.” We were always ready for meals, and didn’t have to be called more than once. There was always enough to eat, although I didn’t fancy the cornmeal mush or Johnny cake suppers.

If the older girls were home they took over the bread making but there were times that we smaller ones tried to knead the dough. We didn’t find it too easy but bread we had to have. I preferred stirring up a chocolate cake to mixing bread anytime.

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Emil Theodore Uglem in 1913

About this time, too Emil came home mentally and physically ill. No one knew what had happened to him or at least we kids never heard. He was at times depressed, at other times in an angry mood, smoked too much, even in bed, which we realized was a fire hazard. He tried to adjust at home but didn’t seem to recover so he was taken to the State Hospital at Yankton. There he seemed to settle down under doctor’s care and observation. He worked in the kitchen and dining room, or in the gardens, not being able to do heavy work.

Older members of the family sent him letters and gifts but I can’t remember that I ever wrote to him. In fact, I don’t recall writing to any of my brothers at that time. I think I felt that no one cared to hear from a kid sister. Emil never came home again so he maybe still had periods of depression but all reports that were received were that he was doing very well. I’m positive that any one living in this day and age could have been cured with treatments and returned to a normal life. Esther and Otto were the last ones to visit him. He had a good visit with them and Otto felt that he shouldn’t have been in the hospital. But he was satisfied. That was his home. He died there, I’m not sure exactly what year. I can remember so little about him as he was in North Dakota so many years and didn’t come home often. But I remember that he was full of fun and a nice big brother.

The fall of 1919, Mabel and I did light housekeeping in town, in two upstairs rooms in Sarah Hoppe’s houses. The rooms were so cheerless, sparsely furnished and cold in the winter. For the first time in my life I was homesick. We took enough food from home to last the week and if the folks came to town during the week they left a treat for us on our kitchen table. I didn’t like going to school in town, in a room full of strange boys and girls. They weren’t exactly all strangers and I knew two girls from Sunday School, Alice Jukon and Ellen Mattern, There was another girl from the country, from the same school district, in fact. Even tho’ we had lived only five miles apart we barely knew one another. She went to a different school and was a member of the Methodist Church. So different were the associations of those days from what they are now! One day we were visiting in the cloak room before the bell rang and we discovered we had the same birthday and were twins in fact – both born Feb 20, 1906. So we became close friends and remained inseparable all thru our High School Days also. She was Inez Wilkinson. Her hair curled naturally, so I started curling my hair too, putting it up in rags to make curls and I wore it that way until I was a Junior.

Our teacher was Alice Mitchell, a little old maid, strict as they come. There was always perfect order in her room. She had a funny habit in her speech of ending every sentence with “heh” but we soon got used to that. It wasn’t long before I got acquainted with all the kids, liked to study and learned a lot that year.

The 8^th grade gave a one act play that year, and Inez and I, and Ruby Porter were the characters in it called “Mechanical Jane”. Ruby was our Robot housekeeper and her actions were so real and hilarious, she was the star of the play. Inez and I were two old ladies who needed a housekeeper. I don’t remember how the play ended but I guess things didn’t work smoothly for us with our robot. She maybe wrecked the furniture so we had to fire her.

When school was out in 1920 and I had graduated from the 8^th grade I took my first job of baby sitting and house work. Minnie Matson came over one day and asked Ma if she could hire one of her girls for the summer. She was going to take the place of a hired man and wanted a girl to take care of her six month old baby and she would take the two older children, who were pre-schoolers along to the hay field. She would do the cooking too, all I needed to do was care for the baby and wash dishes. She would pay $2.50 a week. It sounded good. Now I could earn my own money for my clothes for High School the next year.

I wanted the job and got along fine. I did as I was told but it wasn’t long until I was expected to have dinner on the table when they came in from the field. That became a problem as the baby was very cross and wanted to be held, or rocked in her carriage. I was told to wash the dishes, then cleaning jobs were left for me, also. One thing I especially remember were all the glasses of nice jellies she had stored on the pantry shelves. I suggested that we should sample some of that jelly but Minnie said no – we had to finish that apple butter first, That was in a gallon stone jar. So I put a dish of that jam on the table for every meal and no one touched it. As long as I was there we never tasted the jelly.

Things went from bad to worse. I believe I stayed three weeks. One day Ma called me up and I was crying, so was the baby, as usual. I told her what was happening and she came over. In no uncertain terms she told Minnie what she thought of her, expecting so much from a fourteen year old girl. She took me home and Mabel took my place then. She seemed to manage better than I had, or maybe Minnie took on more of the housework and less in the hay field.

Julius and Nora were married in June, 1920 at Nora’s home north of Oldham, where Duane and Verna now live. Nora had taught in country schools near Oldham so here was another teacher in the family. They lived on a neighboring farm.

The same fall the house in town was built and before winter set in we moved up there. There seemed to be so much room, with a large dining room and living room with sliding doors in between. Three nice bedrooms upstairs, one downstairs, a full basement. Electric lights and a drain into the city sewer were the only modern facilities so far. A cistern, with the pump in the kitchen sink was our water supply. It was nice, tho’, to drain the wash machine, without having to carry water outside. The bathroom wasn’t furnished for a few more years, so as we were accustomed to a “path” we didn’t mind that part of it.

Pa kept a cow in town for the first year and sold milk for ten cents a half gallon. He drove out to the farm often until Julius and Nora moved on it.

As we were moving in to town, I remember him driving in with a wagon, hauling small articles. We had a black and white cat named Liberty. On Pa’s last trip he put her in a sack and laid her in the back of the wagon. It had low sides, only a foot or so high. When he got to town he went to the back of the wagon to get the cat, but Liberty and the sack were gone! He started back to the country and found cat, still in the sack, two miles out of town. Liberty didn’t like life in town and disappeared the following spring. We loved that cat and tried keeping other cats but none of them would stay. I had another gray tiger cat I named Kynewulf. He stayed with us longer than usual but he finally left us too. He liked Ma’s rocking chair for his naps and if she was using it when he thought he should be taking his nap he would sit at her feet looking up at her so pleadingly she would get up so he could take over.

The greatest event of the summer each year was the week of Chautauqua programs. It was the best entertainment available at that time. Programs consisted of plays dramas, concerts, lectures, solo music acrobatics, animal acts – anything but a full circus. I always managed to have money for one program at least and that was always a musical of some kind. The huge tent was set up on the school ground. The audience sat on backless benches. Paper fans were passed out at the door, that being the only air conditioning there was under that hot tent.

Another big event was the Annual Watermelon Day, Lake Preston’s Labor Day celebration. A carload of free melons was served to the crowds of people in the afternoon, free of charge. Long tables were set up in the little park by the Northwestern depot and business men were kept busy slicing melons. Groups of family members sat under the trees to eat. The rinds were packed in flour sacks to take home to be made into pickles.

A carnival was set up on Main Street and it changed the town into a very different world to us. A ride on the Ferris Wheel and the Merry Go Round was about the limit of our spending unless it was trying to win a Kewpie Doll by throwing darts. I was never good at that so never won one. It was just fun, wearing a new dress made to wear in the school year just beginning, and walking the streets, seeing so many people all having a good time.

I was confirmed the summer of 1921 by Rev. C. M. Westermoe. There were ten or eleven in the class. The day of confirmation we stood in a line before the church audience answering questions, to show how much we had learned. I hope I didn’t miss a question that was asked me. I was too nervous then to remember now whether I did or not. Tena made my dress, a white voile with panels fastened to the waist line over a gathered skirt. Each panel was embroidered with a rose design in a heavy silky floss. The same design was embroidered on the front of the waist. I dyed the dress pink later as white wasn’t being used so much anymore. Yes, I still have the dress, laid away in a trunk in an upstairs closet.

Mabel, Esther and I all had baby sitting jobs or did housework after school and Saturdays. There was no time for loafing or just hanging around with other kids. We all had our friends and attended school and church functions but there wasn’t the feeling then of young folks having to be on the go to have fun. There wasn’t the easy access to beer in those days. We didn’t even know what a Beer Party was. None of my classmates went to dances, even tho’ there were plenty of them held there in town. We didn’t need to go to them to have fun. Our teachers were of good moral standards and we had a healthy respect for them.

Bentena was the first of Ma’s girls to marry. It sounds strange and it seems even stranger that I can’t remember when and where she and Johnny were married. I know that she taught school a year or two first as she had saved money to buy some furniture. They moved into a new house north of Johnny’s folk’s place, several miles south of town. We liked to go out there and spend a few days during the summer, helping Benta in her garden and she let us do some baking.

I remember that Sylvia and Louis were married after we moved to town. The ceremony was performed in the living room. They went to Luverne Minn to live. The piano belonged to Sylvia but she didn’t want to take it with her, thus leaving us without a piano. She bought herself another one and told Mabel, Esther, and me that she would sell the “Mendenhall” to the first one of us who was willing to buy it when we started earning money. I think it was meant for me from the time she offered it and when I started teaching I paid her $25 a month. $150, I think I paid for it. I didn’t move it until I knew I would be settling down in the West River Country for the rest of my life. What a blessing it has been to me and to the many many boys and girls who came to me for piano lessons. I maybe never would have owned one if this one hadn’t been offered in that way. For more than forty years, I gave lessons, starting at the price of 25 cents per half hour lesson in 1930, and when I quit in 1972 because of my arthritis I charged $1.00. My first pupils were Daisy and Violet Wilkenson, Lily, Irene, and Esther Eggsbo, Grace and Tena Strait and Fannie Huiner.

Getting back to the High School years and other events in the 20’s, times got hard, a depression was on hand, money was scarce for farmers and businessmen alike. The new house had cost a lot of money so Pa had his worries and he was not getting any younger, Ma was sick so much of the time but kept her usual patience. Many nights she sat at the kitchen table, resting her head on her arms all night, it seemed easier to breathe in that position. The only relief she got from the asthma was a powder of herbs and plants that she emptied in a saucer, set it on fire and inhaled the smoke. It smelled like burning alfalfa.

We girls helped as much as possible, earned our own money and did the housework. I wish we could have done more for our folks, to make life a little easier for them.

I earned 25 cents an hour cleaning house for a doctor’s wife on Saturdays and babysitting for their little girl when they went out for an evening. Then I also ironed clothes for another lady every week. It took at least two hours each week so I went home with 50 cents in my pocket. She entertained quite often and called on me to help prepare the meal and then serve it and wash the dishes. I enjoyed this type of work and learned some new tricks about cooking and serving.

The folks first grandchild was Laurel, Julius and Nora’s baby, born Dec 31, 1921. What a precious little girl she was! She learned to talk about the same time she started walking. She was left at our house when her folks came to town for shopping and you can be sure she never lacked for attention. I remember her best of the nieces and nephews, as the others were born after I left home or whose parents didn’t live nearby. Bethel, Benta’s and Johnny’s girl was the second grand daughter and she was equally sweet and lovable.

Calmer brought his girl friend, Clara Johnson home to see us one summer, and they were married shortly after that, in North Dakota, where her folks lived. She was a lively, happy girl, very good company for Calmer, who liked fun and action. One time, years earlier, when he came home, the table was set for dinner with a glass of water at each plate, he provoked the cooks by walking around the table and drank every glass of water. Another time he took the coffee pot off the stove and drank from the spout. He liked to hear the girls when they sputtered at his crazy antics.

I have a beautiful memory of church bells ringing on Sunday mornings! The Lutheran, Methodist and Congregational churches were practically in the same block, the Congregational on South Main Street, the Methodist a block east on the opposite side of the street and the Lutheran across the street to the east. The bells rang in a rhythmic cadence, first the Lutheran, they had the deepest tone rang a certain number of “dongs” then a middle tone bell, the same spaced number of times and then the third bell which was the highest pitched. This ringing continued for perhaps five minutes at 10 A.M. for Sunday school and again at 11 A.M. to call worshippers to church. It is something I have missed these past 54 years — (the ringing of bells) so far out in the country. Our country churches here do not have bells. Another sound I have missed is the whistle of a train. It still thrills me to hear one when I’m in town but the Diesel engines of today don’t have to musical quality that the old locomotives had. Today in the news we hear that the Milwaukee railroad is bankrupt and will cease to operate. If another company doesn’t take over it will mean no railroad in South Dakota. In the same news it said the Milwaukee hauls 2,000,000 tons of lignite a year to the Power Plant in Big Stone. How can that Plant operate without the railroad?

Alice Walline was a classmate when I was a freshman and she was such a happy, cheerful girl, well liked by all of us. Her dad operated the creamery and they lived in rooms at the Park Hotel across the street from the school house. Her mother was dead and they seemed to have no other family. They ate their meals at a caf� so there was very little home life for them. Her room was a hangout for teenage confabs on Saturday or Sunday afternoons and sometimes our English teacher, Maude Rowcliffe, who also lived at the hotel joined us, usually bringing her embroidery work and joining us in our talks.

One day in the summer after our Freshman year some older girls asked her if she would like to go swimming with them at the railroad bridge, where the channel from the lake was quite deep. She asked her dad for permission and he told her she better not go. For some reason, she disobeyed, maybe the older girls kidded her for being “too good” or being “chicken”. She went, and even though she could swim a little she went under in the deep water and never came up. The girls tried to find her but had to give up.

The Freshman class went to her funeral as a body of mourners, which we truly were. Her father sold his business and left the vicinity. What a cruel waste of life this was.

We spent some summers on the farm, even after moving to town as Julius and Nora homesteaded near Belvidere. Mabel worked in town and Esther and I were on the farm for one or two summers. As I remember, we were both places at once – kept a garden in town, too. I don’t seem to recall these days as well as earlier ones.

High School was a breeze – I could have worked and studied harder, I know – but I got good grades, especially in Math and English. I liked French and took two years but should have studied more and should have taken Latin too, as Mabel did. They were the only Languages taught. I wasn’t interested at all in Ancient History (I’m sorry now) and Civil Government I simply detested. Biology was interesting as was American and Modern History. My favorite subject was English and Mrs Rowcliffe was my teacher all four years.

By the time I was a Junior, I was sewing some of my school clothes. Inez was a skilled seamstress, making all her own clothes so I tried to do the same, of course. We spent week ends together, either at our house in town or at her home in the country. We embroidered, sewed, baked, made candy, and had a dream of going to Alaska to teach school when we got our certificates. That year we bobbed our hair. I used a curling iron on mine but she didn’t need one. We read books together, some times she went with me to church and Luther League, sometimes I went with her to the Methodist church and their Young People’s League. In a way we were both jealous of each other’s friendship and didn’t want anyone else “butting in”. I can’t remember that we ever had any quarrel or serious differences.

I worked out during the summer now, as it took more money for school since I was an upper classman. None of my friends had a large assortment of clothes but some of course were better dressed than the average. I didn’t envy any of them. I liked the better dresses that Tena sewed for me when I was a Junior. It was a fad to wear 3 buckle overshoes in the deep snow of winter but we never buckled them. We flopped thru the snow with the things unbuckled. Was it our part in trying to be “Flappers” the term given to teenagers in those days.

Above all, in my High School education was the Music we learned. We had a girls chorus for three years and an orchestra when I was a Junior. Our director was Mr. Rhodes. I played violin, took private lessons from him as did most of the members of the orchestra. We were all beginners but in just a few months we were performing quite well and such interesting music we played! Esther played the Viola, Inez the cello, her sister Irma the flute and her brother Guy also played violin. Had taken lessons previously so played first violin. Besides these stringed instruments there was a bass viola, oboe, saxophones, cornets, piano, clarinets, and others.

Esther and I sang many duets, she the soprano, I sang alto. We sang for funerals, were even called on to sing in Norwegian. Alice or Ruth Julson and I also sang duets for school programs and Inez and I played many piano duets. Esther and I sang also in the church choir. One year a group of young folks gave a cantata at Christmas in our church. We sang in an Easter Cantata given by all the singers in town. I still have a copy of that lovely production. Another year the town singers gave a Musical called “One Hundred Years Ago. We performed in that, too and as I say this musical education helped me so much when I began teaching, myself.

Our orchestra was short lived, tho’. We had all hoped to carry on into our Senior year but the School Board agreed that there weren’t funds to re hire our director or buy more instruments. I just borrowed a violin and returned it after that year. I borrowed it from Louis Shelby and could have bought it for $5.00 but I didn’t have the money and besides, I felt that I had no more use for it.

In 1922 I listened to Radio for the first time. By head sets, two could listen at a time. The station was KDKA, Pittsburgh. Reception was very poor – mostly static and a few strains of faint music now and then. It improved rapidly as more stations began operating.

Mabel graduated in 1923 and signed a contract to teach a country school north of town. So many of the girls went into teaching directly from High School those days and there became a shortage of schools instead of a shortage of teachers. The girls who had attended country schools themselves made better teachers I think than those who had received their education in the town schools. It was while teaching in the North Preston area that Mabel met Clifford. He was visiting his relatives who were patrons in her school. They were married in 1925 and went to live in Newport, Minn. Newport is exactly what the name implied – a new town, a new suburb of St Paul, just being built. They helped organize the Lutheran congregation and Mabel became the first pianist. She learned the notes by herself and thus was able to play the songs she hadn’t heard before. I never got to visit her at Newport but they came to see us once when Norma was a little girl. They also stopped here on a trip to Yellowstone Park in later years and again shortly before moving to California. Today, both Mabel and Clifford are in a Convalescent Hospital in Newport Beach, Cal. Mabel still plays piano at age 75, after two severe strokes. She plays for the other patients for “Happy Time” and often fills in as pianist for Sunday Morning services at the hospital. Clifford is recovering from a stroke also. Norma and some of her family live nearby and visit them often, even take them out to lunch and shopping trips.

In 1923 I was a High School Senior. There were nineteen of us. Some had dropped out, one or two moved away but for those days it was an average size class. We were seated alphabetically in the assembly and marched out to classes imperfect order so the ABC and D’s got the back seats in class. We in the TUVW range had to sit practically under the teacher’s nose, which didn’t hurt us at all, but I think we had to answer most of the questions. One of the girls in the back now bragged to the rest of us how easy it was to cheat and how she did it, if she knew we were to have a daily written test. She became the Salutatorian and I was very close behind as third highest in the class. I got my grades without cheating but could have done better if I had studied more.

Some high lights of that year was our class play, and our Skip Day where we went in a truck to Lake Kampeska. Our class advisor, Maude Rowcliffe went with us. The five boys in our class were the basketball team so of course the fourteen girls were at every home game cheering them on. I don’t recall that they made any great record but there was a lot of action, nevertheless. I can’t remember that I ever went to any out of town games as the folks wouldn’t approve of it.

I took a teacher’s training course and practice teaching in my senior year as did half of the girls or more. When we graduated we received a Second grade certificate which qualified us for two years teaching. Our teacher was the school Superintendent, Mr Rich. He was invariably late for class and came poorly prepared to help anyone aspiring to teach school so if any of us became teachers with good qualifications it was all our own effort and nothing we learned from him. We did our practice teaching in the grades.

I didn’t teach the first year after I graduated tho’. There was a surplus of teachers and some of the country schools were closed. So I didn’t try very hard to get one. I stayed home that summer working out as usual for $6.00 a week, or 25 cents an hour. That fall Esther was a senior and we boarded another senior girl for $10 a month so I helped with the work at home besides my regular jobs around town. Esther and I were the only girls left at home except for the times Tina was home between her jobs. She took in sewing too and was kept busy. I enjoyed sewing also and the styles of the day were so simple a dress could be made without using a pattern. The “Middy Blouses” were still in style. These were made of Navy blue wool, slip over in sailor style. The big collars were trimmed with white braid, as were also the cuffs of the long sleeves. We wore pleated skirts, also wool, so it meant a lot of steaming and pressing to keep our outfits looking neat and clean.

Our graduation outfits were white pleated skirts and white blouses. They looked every bit as pretty as the caps and gowns worn these days and they were our own to keep and wear. There were no synthetic fabrics those days – no nylon, no rayon, no polyester – just plain cotton, silk and wool.

I think it was about 1923 that silk stockings became available at a price that High School girls could afford. The silk was only on the leg of the stocking reaching to the knee. The upper part and the foot was made of cotton. They came in black and shades of tan colors and were definitely not run proof. We became quite adept at sewing up runners, using a fine thread and a small stitch to match the silk. I don’t remember what they cost per pair but I know that a pair of silk stockings were treasured and lasted a long time. Our school stockings were of lisle, a fine cotton and black was the most popular color. As the styles changed to shorter skirts the silk, out of necessity had to go above the knee. Who ever dreamed back in 1923-24 that some day nylons would be upper thigh length and attached to a Panty! Why, in those days we hadn’t even heard of rayon bloomers!

Esther graduated in 1925 the second highest in her class. She made plans to attend Augustana for two years, along with her two best friends, Berdine Thompson and Evelyn Omdalen.

Inez and I spent a lot of time together that summer also and the winter of 24-25 she taught a school east of town. We missed our High School boy friends who were away at School so the “Big 4” club that had such good times together was split up – thus a school day friendship was changed by passing time. She went to Minneapolis and found a job in a Millinery shop, doing the type of work she loved. She married a Lake Preston boy and Minnesota became her home from that day to the present. The last time we met was in 1927 at an Alumni Reunion but we corresponded regularly through the years until 1974 when she quit writing.

In the summer of 1925 I wrote to Pete and asked if there were any jobs for teachers in Perkins County. I was glad to get a letter from Pete and Julia saying there was a shortage of teachers there and there was a vacancy in their own district.

John came home from North Dakota when his school term was finished, driving a new Model T Ford coupe. He was going out to see Pete and suggested I should go along. No coaxing was necessary. I was Rarin’ to go! I had never been west of Huron and a trip across the Missouri seemed too good to be true and I had hopes of becoming a teacher after all. Ma agreed to go along to spend the summer as we all thought the change to higher altitude and to a lighter and clearer atmosphere would be a help for her asthma. At least that is what John said. He always loved the West, Mom and Dad had never been apart for any length of time and Pa didn’t like the idea of her going so far away and he was sure the trip would be too hard for her. Tena and Esther would be home with him and John and I didn’t plan to be gone more than two weeks at the most so he finally got used to the idea of her leaving him, hoping too that it would make her feel better.

We left home very early one morning, on a lonely sunny spring (or early summer) day. We had a lunch packed and coffee in a thermos jug. There were no rest areas along the way, not even rest rooms at the gas stations but we stopped at a schoolhouse somewhere on the road and found the regular conveniences of the day there. We ate our lunch on a brief stop and kept chugging along. We crossed the Missouri at the old Whitlock’s Crossing and I was thrilled to see the many purple buttes looming up in the distance as from a mirage. I remember asking John if they were hay stacks. By the way, there was no pavement – only gravel roads all the way. It was dark when we got to Bison but John knew the way to the Lundeen ranch where Pete and Julia were living as the Lundeens were in Norway for the summer. The steep sharp hills on the road north of Bison after dark were a frightening experience for me as I had never been on any road such as this one.

We arrived safely long after dark, over a prairie road the last few miles. Poor Mama was so tired from the trip and was glad to get to bed. She had a good nights sleep and rest and felt so good in the morning we were so thankful for that. The climate seemed to help her. She spent a happy comfortable summer, enjoying the ranch, the visit, the good neighbors, and the country in general.

I found out about the Cole School, which was four miles east of the ranch. I would have 16 pupils, every grade but the 5^th, my salary would be $90 a month for an 8 month term. There was a three room cottage for the teacher’s living quarters and two of the pupils would spend the school week with me. Julia told me it wouldn’t be an easy school to teach as there were 10 pupils in the first three grades but I signed the contract with no misgivings.

After visiting two weeks John and I left for home over the same dusty road, leaving Ma with Pete and Julia. We knew that Pa would soon get lonesome and come out to join her and sure enough – before the summer was over he left by train and they came back to Lake Preston before school started.

At last I was becoming acquainted with my two oldest brothers. They who had been like strangers for so many years were to become closer to me than I could ever imagine possible.

Esther and I spent the summer getting our wardrobes ready for school, with Tena’s help, as usual. I worked to earn my train fare back to Hettinger, I think a one way ticket was about six dollars. Connections were very good. There was a wait of only a few minutes at Bristol where the “Galloping Goose” met the Flyer on the main Milwaukee line.

This story is like trying to fix the pieces together on a quilt as I forget some details but I seem to remember that I went along to Sioux Falls when Julius took Esther to Augustana. So my school maybe didn’t start until later late in September. It was shortly after Esther left that I packed my new black leather traveling bag with my belongings, took my ukulele and left home, too. Before leaving I made an agreement with Sylvia that I would buy the piano for $150, sending the money in $25 monthly payments. It turned out to be the wisest investment in my whole life.

The train arrived in Hettinger at that time about 3:00 AM and Pete was there to meet me. He had a small car, I don’t know what make it was but it was on the order of a Sports Car. Julia liked to drive with a horse and buggy and didn’t need any help to hitch up, either. We took many drives together that year.

The school cottage was sparsely furnished but I tried to make it cozier with some pillows I had made and a dresser I made from a large wooden box with a bright cretonne curtain across the front. The two girls who stayed with me were Inga Ekemo, a sixth grader and Annabelle Filson a beginner.

The children were all good and obedient, I had no discipline problems, but I soon found out, as Julia said, that I would be kept busy. For one thing, there was a shortage of books and other material that would make learning more interesting. The girls in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades needed a lot of help. My own country school year’s experience and suggestions from Julia was a great benefit to me. I’m sure I fell short of being a good teacher. Maybe everyone has a lack of self assurance when they are just learning. I know when I had to study grammar, and diagramming sentences, recognizing parts of speech and all that, in order to teach it to someone else. I hope they remembered what I tried to tell them.

When school became monotonous we planned a little party, sometimes just the school for an afternoon, or got a program together for the parents. Once or twice during the year we had a square dance evening. The music was a violinist and one of the men did the calling. This was entirely new to me but even the smallest kids knew the steps and did much better than their teacher. Our school had an organ, and at a basket social we raised enough money to buy a phonograph and some records. My ukulele was used in every program and as I remember, all the children could sing and loved the music.

The only pupils who lived near enough to the schoolhouse to walk were the two Basford families. The four Hanson girls drove a horse and came in an old buggy. The Seifert boys rode a horse without a saddle and Teresa and Mike Sweeney also rode on one horse. One morning coming to school they raced, and the younger Seifert fell off and cut his eyelid. I had to send them home and his father took him to a doctor in Bison who had to put several stitches in it. They had been told not to race and I don’t think they ever did it again.

There was to be a Saturday night dance at the Cole Hall and everyone was planning to go – kids, parents, grandpa, and grandma, too. Of course, the teacher should go, but she had never been to a dance in her life. Pete and Julia said they wanted to go so of course I would go and watch, anyway. The Hall was like something I had never heard before. It was real country music and I learned to like it. The orchestra was the Hanson brothers, playing the organ, fiddle and I think, a banjo.

I learned the Two Step or Polka was an easy dance and was brave enough to step out for a dance or two. There were schottisches (I don’t even know how to spell it.) square dances and Fox Trots. At this dance I met two Lake Preston girls, Gretchen Wood and Ona Dolvin who had been teaching in the country for two years. I met them again at Teacher’s Institute in Bison that fall.

The winter was quite mild and roads were possible so the couldn’t have been much snow. Julia and I made the trip to Lodgepole every Saturday Morning for mail and groceries. As always, she drove in the buggy and we even made the trip to Bison Institute in the same fashion. Julia was an outdoor woman, rode a horse every day, checking on the sheep and the harsh dry sun had burned her skin to a deep tan. I had resolved that I wouldn’t allow my complexion to become so burned and brown, so I had bought a large jar of lemon cream before leaving Lake Preston, thinking it would keep my skin bleached. Of course I wasn’t out in the sun as much as she was but I learned to saddle and ride her horse. Sometimes on Saturdays and Sundays I rode around the sheep for her.

The Lundeens came back from Norway before school started but lived in Hettinger as Helen and Agnes were in High School. They moved back to the ranch in the spring and Pete and Julia went back to their homestead which was about two miles south of the ranch. Their close neighbors were the Rucker family, Lea, Mae and Lola. In fact, Mae was the first woman I met after arriving in the county. One day she came riding at a gallop to spend the afternoon with Julia and Ma. I found her most interesting.

During that first fall, a Norwegian Newcomer who knew no English worked on the ranch. His name was Ole Smukestul. It was fascinating to hear him talk and I learned some new Norse words. Later, Suene Bakki worked for them. He was very well educated, spoke English fluently. In a few years he had a job with the Government and was traveling over the world. He married Dorothy Anderson, a grand daughter of Mrs Nels Gjeuldson, I believe.

Every three weeks there was a Lutheran church service held in the homes. The pastor was Rev. G.N. Lien who had recently married a Minnesota girl and their parsonage was near Ellingson. The name of the Cole Congregation was “Scandia” and there were the Hedstroms, Ekemos, Faldes, Gjenildsons and Lundeens and Pete and Julia who took their turn hostessing the service and the lunch that followed. Rev. Lien had six congregations, the Zion, Golden Valley, Ralph, Glendo, Duck Creek and Scandia. The roads being what they were he could manage only two on a Sunday. If the home had an organ where the service was held I was happy to fill in as organist. This meeting every third Sunday was a happy get together during the coffee and lunch. Neighbors didn’t get together too often otherwise over roads that were mostly prairie trails.

I went home for Christmas, boarding the train in Hettinger early in the morning and was in Lake Preston in time for supper. How good it was to see the folks again and Esther and Tena were there. Also to see my school friends and exchange tales of our experiences since we parted the summer before. There was an alumni reunion at the New High school Auditorium and that turned out to be the last reunion I had with Inez and the other friends. The two weeks sped by, soon I was back on the Galloping Goose to meet the Flyer in Bristol.

The rest of the Winter passed smoothly enough, as the daily routine unwound with classes in Reading, Writing, History, grammar and discipline unraveling in fine threads. The longest time of any school year are the months between Christmas and Easter. Winter usually shows its teeth as the days lengthen in January. The cottage stayed chilly and I got tired of carrying coal for three stoves – a huge heater in the schoolroom and two in the cottage. The little girls and I moved all our kitchen supplies into the main room, thereby feeling cozier and warmer.

As spring approached, the sun came up earlier, there were still two hours of daylight left after school was out. Our cottage began to seem like a dismal, lonesome place. The girls were getting homesick so we broke up our light housekeeping. Annabelle was to ride with the Hanson girls in their buggy, Inga and her sister Bugetta would also drive with a horse and buggy. Bugetta had been riding horseback. I moved back to the ranch, walking the four miles morning and night. The trail I followed went by the Ed Basford place and Irean the eight grader and Mazel who was in the sixth grade joined me in the walk the last mile or so.

Finally, the last day of school arrived, the lower grades had finished their work for the year but the 7^th and 8^th grades had a two weeks wait before they could take the county exams, being we had only an 8 month term. We could surely have used another month all the pupils needed more work, but I suppose the district was short of money and had the idea they were being thrifty.

Pete and Julia had moved back to the homestead by this time and Mr and Mrs Lundeen were on the ranch. Pete was there, tho’ every day, helping with the lambing. I stayed there the two weeks, until it was time to give the exams.

Seeing the new lambs on the hillsides around the barn was a new experience to me. I loved to watch them play, chasing each other up and over the cutbanks. The buttes and hills took on a tinge of green, showing us that spring was here. I missed seeing the trees of eastern South Dakota but the roughness of the country’s terrain seemed to me a fine substitute. I remembered on my first trip to Hettinger with John the summer before, As we came over the hill, I exclaimed, “Look at the grove of trees down there.” “Sure there are trees,” John said. “The North Grand river runs there and it has many trees along the bank.” Another lovely interesting experience. The country was full of surprises, I liked to see the tarpaper shacks and the sad houses that were still being used but they didn’t appeal to me as a house to live in.

During the winter I had met another young Norwegian, this one, tho, was a native. The first time I saw him was at a dance at Lodgepole. I had gone with the Lundeen family. I played piano for a dance or two accompanying another Norski, John Nelson, who was an export on the accordion. It was at one of these dances that I met Ike personally and he took me to supper. I found him to be quite attractive, and different from the other men I had met. I enjoyed hearing him show off his knowledge of the Norwegian language and I tried some of my dialect too. His parents came from Trondhjean and Ike was less than a year old when he came to America.

In the early spring he came with Eric Johnson to the Lundeen ranch to do some breaking and he came to the schoolhouse a time or tow to see me. One night, after I had left the cottage we went to Bison to the movies – silent movies in those days yet, and one evening I went home with him to meet his folks, his sister Clara and his cousin Annie Isakson from Corsica who had come out the fall before to teach the Besler school and boarded with his folks. I don’t think his folks were very pleased that he was keeping company with a school ma’am, having the idea that all school teachers were gold diggers and were to be avoided.

Pete and Julia didn’t approve, either. They thought I should forget all about him when I went home for the summer. As always, I showed I had a mind of my own and no one was going to tell me what to do. But I fully intended to go home, either take teacher’s examination or go to school and forget about the west river country. I found negatives among the collection of pictures at the ranch, pictures of cowboys, horses, Brekenridge’s sod house, the sough Grand river in flood because of an ice jam, Lundeen’s place, their sheep and had pictures of my pupils to show my friends.

After giving the 7^th and 8^th grade exams I left for home – but wearing a new diamond ring. Oh my! Another surprise! On arriving home I realized that the folks didn’t approve of me and my plans of settling down so far from home, in a part of the country that they considered an untamed wilderness. They couldn’t see its potential as I could. To me, the west river country was a place for opportunity and progress. I felt like myself while I was there – my independent spirit showing itself at last. I had written to them, telling them about Ike and his folks, and I was sure they would be pleased that I was interested in a Norwegian Lutheran. As I grew older and my own family grew up I understood how they felt. It isn’t easy to be parents and see your children leave the nest and maybe go to live among strangers.

The family was preparing to move to Sioux Falls that summer having rented the house to Gabriel Ostrovts. Pa was busy painting the rooms, and plumbing was being installed in the bathroom. Esther was ready for her second year at Augustana and they had rented a two bedroom house near the campus. Pa was going to try his luck at being a salesman, selling nursery stock.

I packed the things I wanted to keep in a large box to store in the basement until I would need them. Many things were also stored in the attic.

Moma didn’t want to move, and she was far from well, but as she always did, she took it all in stride, hoping all would go well, trusting in God to make it so.

Then I got a letter from Clara, asking me if I wanted to come out and go along to the Black Hills. She and Ike, and Ole Gunderson were going, in Ike’s Model T truck. Camping out would be fun – of course I wanted to go. I had an opportunity of a free ride out there too, as Benta and Johnny, Julius and Nora were also going to the Hills and would go to Perkins County first.

We left early one morning but it was dark by the time we got to Bison. It was up to me to be the trail blazer from then on. I wasn’t too well used to the road we took out of Bison and North – I think it is the White Butte road now. As we turned onto this road we ran into toad construction – after dark, making it seem worse than it really was. I knew we were on the right road and there was only one bridge on that road across the South Grand so I felt quite safe.

As we crossed the bridge I told everyone to watch for a prairie trail that led west to Rucker place and then on to Pete’s. It was only a mile or so farther on that we saw it, and I hoped it was the right one. I knew it all depended on me so I was relieved and almost cried when we saw a light in the window at Rucker’s and just across the fence was another light shining in the kitchen window of Pete’s and Julia’s three room shack.

I don’t remember how we all bedded down for the night, someone slept on the floor for sure. The next day Ike came to get me and we made ready for our trip to the Hills. This was a real thrill to me. I had seen the Slim Butte earlier that spring but the Hills were so beautiful and enchanting. We had a ride on the train through Spearfish Canyon with several stops wherever the engineer saw something of interest. We picked flowers, stopped at Bridal Veil falls and even through this was in late summer we stopped at a cave where there was snow left from the winter before.

On our way home, back to Lodgepole, there was a rattlesnake on the road somewhere south of the Buttes. It was such a novelty we stopped the truck to get a better look. Ike killed it. Then had his picture taken with it.

At that time there was miles and miles of gumbo between Bison and the Hills so no one wished to travel during a rainy spell. We had good weather and roads were good.

Getting back to Lodgepole, it was time for me to leave, realizing that I was needed at home. Ike was afraid of losing me – I think – so we decided to go to Bison, buy our wedding license, go to the preacher’s house, then I would leave and he would come to Sioux Falls later in the fall. We didn’t tell his folks – now it would be called an elopement – We just felt like it was our own business and nothing else. We married August 14, ’26 at Bison by Rev. Jurgen at the Parsonage.

I left for Lake Preston a couple days later, after telling his folks, Clara, Louise, and Aaron the big news. We eluded the chivalrie party that came to look for us at Louise and Aaron’s, by hiding the truck behind the barn and I’m glad we did.

So I helped pack at home, storing my piano at Heggelunds who lived across the street. The folks didn’t like the idea of that quick wedding either, but in the busyness of moving they didn’t have much to say. Esther totally disapproved, as she and I had planned once to make teaching our careers. I still planned to teach but gave up the idea of going back to school.

Settling down in Sioux Falls, we had a boarder, a distant relative from Elk Paint, named Mamie Eidem, also a student at Augustana. Pa walked the streets with his brief case and he made some surprisingly good sales. He came home tired as he wasn’t used to so much walking.

Ma was not satisfied and was homesick for Lake Preston so the folks went back later in the fall. Tena stayed part of the time and I stayed until the folks moved back home. Then I went to Luverne to visit Sylvia and Louis. Warren was a baby then and I tried to make myself useful around the house.

Ike came shortly before Christmas, met all the folks and after a few days visiting around, I got the piano ready for shipment to Hettinger, got my big box out of storage in the basement of the house and we took the train back to the west to spend the rest of our life and grow better and wiser with the country. In these fifty three years we have seen many improvements and I still say it is superior to any East River community I ever lived in.