Category: Minnesota Life

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Memorial Day

 

 

Before Memorial Day became  known as “The Day The Pools Open” it was called Decoration Day. It was a day to decorate soldiers’ graves in honor of their memory. In my small town, families decorated the graves of loved ones in the local cemetery, whether they were soldiers or not. I loved going to the cemetery with my mother and grandmother on Memorial Day to plant flowers on the Hunt family graves.

I’ve always liked going to cemeteries. They are never spooky or depressing. Being from a small town, I knew most of the family names at St. Mary’s Cemetery in North St. Paul.. They were the names of my classmates at St. Peter School. Schmidt…Roy…Luger…Olson …Scanlon … Knospe. They were all there. Some of my classmates were there on Memorial Day, too, planting flowers just like we did.

I don’t remember what kind of flowers my mother planted every year. I don’t remember if she planted the same thing or not. I think they were probably small and easy to grow. Maybe zinnias or marigolds?

Mostly I remember there was a small grave next to the Hunt family plot. It was smaller than the other graves and was always decorated with yellow pansies. Every year my mother would tell the same story. The grave belonged to a little boy who died before he was old enough to go to school. His mother and grandmother came every year and surrounded the grave in yellow flowers because it was his favorite color. It was the most beautiful grave I’ve ever seen.

As I got older, and learned to ride a bike, I often rode through the cemetery in the evening, after dinner. It was a quiet, friendly place, near Silver Lake. Later, after I moved to Denver, my grandmother was also buried in st. Mary’s Cemetery, next to her husband and her son, my mother’s brother, Frank, who died when he was thirteen. I haven’t been back to St. Mary’s Cemetery in a very long time. I wonder if anyone still plants flowers there on Memorial Day?

Now both of my parents are buried at Fort Snelling military cemetery. It is an especially beautiful place on Memorial Day. There are flags on every tombstone to honor the soldiers and their spouses.

My father was proud of his service in the Navy during World War II. He wanted to be buried at Fort Snelling and six years ago my mother was buried there alongside him.

There is something very solemn about Memorial Day. Yes, it is the day the pools open. But It is also a day for remembering.

After planting flowers on Memorial Day, we would have a picnic in our back yard  ~ the first picnic of the summer.  The menu wasn’t fancy and it was always the same: hot dogs, potato salad, chips, beer and soft drinks. At the end of the day, my Dad would take out his trumpet, stand in the front yard and play Taps. It was a signal that it was time for bed. Summer had started.

TAPS: Gone the sun, from the hills, from the lake, from the skies.

All is well. Safely rest. God is nigh.

 

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Auditions

I started piano lessons with Sister Aimee when I was six years old. We lived in a duplex across the street from St. Peter Catholic Church. The convent and grade school were a few houses away. My grandparents lived upstairs.

Because we didn’t have a piano, I practiced on an old piano in the church basement, where the church custodian lived. He drank whiskey from a bottle and smelled terrible. I thought he was creepy and I tried not to think about him as I practiced my lesson, alone in the church basement.

When I was eight years old, we moved into our own home two blocks away. My Aunt Margaret gave us a piano, so I didn’t have to practice in the church basement any more.

Sister Aimee was my teacher for the next eight years. She taught only classical music. Popular music was strictly forbidden. In addition to teaching seventy children to play the piano, she also taught music at the Catholic school and directed both the church choir and the children’s choir. She put on an elaborate Christmas pageant every December and an operetta in the spring. I don’t think she ever slept, which probably accounted for her demeanor, which was nothing short of terrifying.

Sister Aimee was tall and skinny. I don’t remember ever seeing her smile. She would check the length of our fingernails before every piano lesson. If they were too long, by her standards, she would grab our hands and forcibly cut the offending nails. The sound of fingernails clicking against piano keys drove her crazy. It was not the only thing that put her over the edge.

Every spring Sister Aimee scheduled an audition at the MacPhail School of Music for all of her students over the age of eight. We were judged by highly trained classical pianists. Thinking back on it, I realize now that Sister Aimee felt that she was the one being judged. If we failed, she failed. She wasn’t going to let that happen.

All year we prepared for our spring audition. We had to memorize ten songs, in varying degrees of difficulty. We had to come to the audition wearing our best clothes, not our tacky school uniforms. By February the pressure was palpable.

Every Monday, Sister Aimee reminded me that I was one of her worst students. Then she would recite a litany of her worst pupils. “You and your brother, Madonna and James Francis, and the Tracys. All of you have lessons on Mondays, so I don’t have to think about you the rest of the week.”

What a strange teaching technique! All of this came to an end when I was in the eighth grade. It was a Monday, as usual, and I entered the piano studio with a sense of dread. The audition was less than a month away.

“What did you work on special this week?” Sister Aimee wanted to know.

“Nothing,” I replied. I meant that I had worked on all my pieces. I didn’t work on anything special. She thought I meant I had not practiced at all.

Sister Aimee went berserk. “Don’t look at me in that tone of voice,” she shouted. “Take off your glasses.”

I did as I was told. I took off my glasses and Sister Aimee slapped me across the face. Hard! And then she continued to slap me. Back and forth she slapped, until finally she caught herself and told me to go home.

My mother knew something was wrong when I came through the door. My face was red and I had been crying.

“What happened to you?” she asked.

“Sister Aimee hit me.”

“Why did she do that?”

“Because I didn’t practice anything special this week.”

When my father came home from work that night, I heard my parents talking in their room.

And then a miracle happened. My father, who rarely spoke to anyone and never used the telephone, picked up the phone and called the convent. He asked to speak to Sister Aimee.

“Sister, this is Bob Jones. Mary Lynda and Robert will not be taking piano lessons any more.” Then he hung up.

The following Saturday, my brother and I were in the car, going to meet our new piano teacher, Hod Russell. Hod was one of the very best Dixieland Jazz piano players in the Twin Cities. He was a kind and gentle man. He told my mother that my brother and I were two of his very best students. I took lessons from Hod for the next four years. I never opened another book of classical music. I never had another audition or recital. Music was my joy and my salvation.

The moral of this story is obvious: Often the worst moments of your life turn out to be the best. In my case, that has certainly been true.

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Hero

My mother grew up on a farm in Minnesota during the Depression. There were eight children ~ two girls and six boys. My mom was the youngest. Uncle Bob, not quite two years older, was her best friend and ally against their older twin brothers, who conspired to make their lives absolutely frightful. The twins taught Bob to steer a car when he was five, and my mother, in the back seat, was three. On Christmas Eve the twins sat outside with their air rifles, threatening to shoot Santa out of the sky, while my mother and Bob clutched each other and cried. Bob consoled my mother from a very young age and spent the rest of his life taking care of people. He was a hero.

Uncle Bob was one of the few young men who didn’t serve in WWII. He desperately wanted to enlist but my grandfather wouldn’t allow it. Grandpa wrote a letter saying that all his other sons were married with children. Bob was the only one left to help him run the farm. Without Bob’s help, my grandfather wrote, he would lose the farm.

According to my mother, Bob was devastated. He wanted to go to war, like his friends. He was determined to leave the farm as soon as he could. Eventually my grandparents sold the farm and moved into town. Bob went to work as a mechanic at Thornton Motors, a local Chrysler/Plymouth dealer, one block away from the North St. Paul fire station.

During the war, Uncle Bob continued to help his family. Because my father was in the Navy when my brother was born in 1944, Uncle Bob drove my mother to the hospital. He was still her main confident and friend as she raised my brother and I alone until the war was over and Dad came home again. 

As he watched the other young men return home, Uncle Bob didn’t feel like a hero. Because he wasn’t a veteran, he wasn’t allowed to join the American Legion or the VFW, although he was always welcome to come inside and drink with his friends.

Until he met my Aunt Leslie, the fire station was Bob’s life. He drove the fire truck and made sure it was in good working order.

Because he worked just one block away, Uncle Bob was always the first person to arrive at the station when the siren sounded. He jumped into the truck  and took off. If another firefighter happened get there in time, he would hang onto the back of the truck for dear life as Bob raced to the fire. Other volunteers called the town telephone operator to find out where the emergency was. By the time the other volunteers drove themselves to the fire, Bob was already there, taking care of everything until they arrived.

Later, when the fire call was over, the men met back in the station, drank beer and rehashed what they had just seen. Bob always had a great sense of humor and a huge circle of friends. He was handsome and charming. He was hard-working and kind. He was the guy who drove the fire truck. He was the town hero. 

Eventually North St. Paul hired a paid chief of police. Uncle Bob wanted that position, but he didn’t get it. My family believed that Bob was the most qualified, but didn’t get the job because he wasn’t a veteran.

Unlike my mother’s other brothers who married young, Uncle Bob waited until he was in the late 20’s to get married. When he met Leslie Webster, the whole small town was buzzing. Leslie was the granddaughter of  the town doctor, Dr. Cowan, and the daughter of Bud Webster, the president of the school board. They lived in a big house near Silver Lake. Leslie was young and beautiful. Bob finally found the girl he wanted to marry. 

My brother and I were in Bob’s wedding. I was five years old and my brother was four. The reception was held in a big barn-like building. My only memory of the wedding was the shivaree, performed by Bob’s friends at midnight. Suddenly, in the midst of the celebration, there was a horrible racket outside. There were whoops and yelling like I had never heard before. Bob’s drunken friends were banging on pots and pans with spoons and other utensils in some sort of  mock serenade. My brother and I were terrified. Uncle Bob laughed as he comforted us and warned that we needed to keep his friends outside. If they came inside they might steal the pretty bride. 

Bob and Leslie had four children and lived in a big, beautiful home near Leslie’s parents. Uncle Bob was a devoted husband and father. He loved Aunt Leslie and very much enjoyed spending time with his children. Mom and Leslie were good friends. Dad and Uncle Bob had great times together. 

In 1963, Bob was promoted to branch manager of LP gas sales for Skelly Oil. The job was based in Barron, Wisconsin, near the Minnesota border. Bob accepted the job, but wasn’t happy about leaving North St. Paul. My grandmother was very ill and being cared for in the town nursing home. Bob drove his family back to North St. Paul most weekends to visit her.  It was hard for all of us to see Grandma dying in that small bedroom. I think it must have broken Bob’s heart. 

In 1967, Bob was transferred to Berlin, Wisconsin, a town much further from North St. Paul than his previous assignment. Bob’s job was stressful and he dreamed of returning to North St. Paul when he retired.  But that never happened. In 1977, at the age of 57, Uncle Bob had a massive heart attack. Everyone was devastated. We lost a hero. 

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Small Town 4th of July

The 4th of July was an all-town celebration in North St. Paul, a town that covered one square mile when I lived there. Early in the morning, while my parents were drinking multiple cups of coffee and smoking cigarettes, we kids washed out bikes and decorated them with crepe paper. We wove crepe paper through the spokes and tied streamers onto the handle bars. The boys put playing cards on clothespins and pinned them to their wheels. As they rode up and down the block, the noise from the playing cards sounded like motorcycles. Or at least the boys thought they did. We didn’t organize an actual parade. We just rode up and down the street, until our parents were moving and something more exciting happened.

One year, when I was about six years old, there was an actual parade down main street. The parade included the North St. Paul High School marching band, a group of men from the VFW and the American Legion, and a convertible from Thornton Motors with Miss North St. Paul waving from her perch in the back. Because my Uncle Bob Hunt worked for Thornton Motors, he arranged for me to ride next to Miss North St. Paul. I wore a white dress and a silk sash that dubbed me “Junior Miss North St. Paul.” The parade route was short, so my reign lasted only about ten minutes.

The parade also featured a float made by the Silver Lake Store. Because Leo Fortier’s uncle owned the store, Leo got to ride in the back of the float. He wore a straw hat and dangled a paper fish from the end of stick, pretending he was fishing. My brother Bob and other neighborhood boys, walked beside the float, along the parade route that stretched three blocks from the VFW club to Sandberg’s Mortuary. Bob remembers being exhausted by the time the parade was finished.

The family picnic began at lunch time. Before Highway 36 cut the town in half, the picnic was held in a large, beautiful park next to the railroad tracks. Later, the picnic moved to Silver Lake, where if you went early in the day you could snag a picnic table. My mother packed a lunch of potato salad, jello, coleslaw, chips and brownies. Men from the American Legion grilled hamburgers for sale in the park. Our cooler was filled with soda for the kids and lots of beer for the adults.

Sometimes my Aunt Fran and my grandmother joined us at the picnic table. Adults visited with one another while we swam, chased each other in the sand, and probably argued over trivial matters.

VFW members sold raffle tickets, as they walked through the crowd of families. Hal Norgard stood up in the back of a truck, and in his booming basketball-coach voice, announced the winners of the hourly drawings. At about 3:00 the Bald Eagle Water-Ski club put on a spectacular show of beautiful girls in modest one-piece bathing suits, performing all sorts of amazing tricks on water-skis. Since we didn’t know anyone with a boat, I never learned to water-ski. Given my athletic ability, it’s probably just as well.

As the sun went down, we pulled out a bucket of worms and tried fishing off one of the docks until it was time for fireworks. Huge, loud, booming, once-a-year fireworks! Maybe they pale by comparison to today’s pyrotechnics, but to us they were absolutely magical.

Later, sometime in the 1960s, the 4th of July picnic became an Ice Cream Social in August. My Dad’s Dixieland band, the Polar Bearcats, played for the crowd from a platform in the park, as the Ladies Auxiliary sold ice cream cones. By August the lake had turned green from algae and “dog days” had arrived. Gone was the smell of hamburgers on the grill. I was in college and working at Camp Hitaga in Iowa, so I missed the party. I still love watching fireworks, and remembering the fun we had growing up. Like most things, the 4th of July will never be as much fun again.

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The Talent Contest

I’m not sure whose idea it was for my brother and me to enter the talent contest. I’m pretty sure it wasn’t mine.

I was in eighth grade and Bob was in seventh. My mother pointed out a notice in the Ramsey County Review:

TALENT CONTEST FOR CHILDREN AGES SIX TO THIRTEEN. PRIZE IS $10.00!

$10.00 back in 1956 was a lot of money. It is equivalent to $100 today. 

“You kids should enter the contest,” my mother said. “I think you would win.”

Bob and I had been playing duets for years. My father had recently brought home a book of Latin duets with very complicated rhythms. Bob and I had a lot of fun plowing through the duets. Bob played the accompaniment because he had a better sense of rhythm than I did. I played the melody because my fingers were faster. (And often more accurate. Just sayin’.)

We entered the contest and squabbled about what song to play. It was between Perfidia and Tico-Tico. Tico-Tico was faster, but we usually played it so fast we were completely out of control. We probably played Perfidia too fast, too, but at least we knew we could get through it in front of an audience.

Bob and I practiced our duet every day. We argued about who was making the most mistakes. We speculated on how many people might be in the audience and if people we knew would be our competition. Mostly we dreamed of what we could do with the award money if we actually won.

The day of the talent show, Dad drove us to North High School, The show was going to be on the stage located at one end of the gymnasium. Folding chairs were set up in rows for the audience. Someone from the newspaper was in back, handing out programs. 

Bob wore a suit jacket and I wore my best dress. My parents, my sister, and Grandma Hunt were in the audience. I glanced at the program and saw that we were the last act of the day. No one else was playing the piano.

Other acts included a young magician, a girl who sang You Are My Sunshine, and a variety of other acts that included tap dancing, cartwheels, and twirling batons. As I watched the performers, my heart sank. I was certain Bob and I hadn’t practiced enough. What if my fingers slipped on the keys? What if one of us lost our place in the music? What if I couldn’t turn the page fast enough? 

When it was our turn, Bob went to the side of the stage to help the announcer pull the piano onstage. It was an old, dusty upright piano. As soon as Bob gave it a shove, one of the legs fell off. The leg was mainly decorative and didn’t really support the weight of the heavy piano but the audience didn’t know that. 

The audience gasped. Bob kicked the fallen leg across the stage. The announcer retrieved the leg and propped it back the piano. We sat down on the piano bench, looked at each other, opened the book and started to play. Somehow we made it through Perfidia without a mistake.

We stood up, bowed and took our place on the chairs with the other acts as we waited for the judge’s decision.

“The winner of the 1958 North St. Paul First Annual Talent Contest is …. Mary Lynda and Robert Jones!” 

We won!

Bob and I walked across the stage and accepted a small trophy and a check for $10.00. It was my first and last talent contest. It is still a thrilling moment to remember. I wonder if we would have won if the piano leg hadn’t fallen off.

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Peonies

The official flower of the Jones family is the peony. Just kidding. But if we had an official flower, it would definitely be a peony.

After retiring from the Northern Pacific railroad, my grandfather, Robert Jones, bought a small log cabin in West St. Paul where he began growing peonies. Acres and acres of beautiful peonies.

Grandpa Jones cultivated new species. He entered them in local and national peony shows. He and my grandmother sold bunches of flowers and whole peony bushes to people who stopped by his cabin. He became renown throughout the country and was a prominent member of the Minnesota Peony Society. I’m sure that many of his peonies are still growing throughout Minnesota and are in full bloom as I write this story.

Sometimes my brother and I were sent to the cabin for a week in the summer to help Grandpa work in the peony gardens. There were flowers of every color ~ pink, red, white, and magenta. It’s what Heaven must look like, with just a few angels floating around on clouds for special effects. Our job was to sit in the wheelbarrow, on top of weeds and debris that Grandpa dumped onto the trash pile away from the house. We laughed when the ride was over and we were dumped in the trash pile along with the weeds.

The cabin was tiny, with just a living room and one bedroom on the main floor. In the basement there was a small kitchen and the only bathroom. The steps from the bedroom to the bathroom were steep ~ too steep to navigate at night. If we needed to use the bathroom, we peed in a coffee can, which my grandmother carefully emptied the next morning.

My grandparents had only one narrow bunk bed in the bedroom. Grandpa slept in the top bunk with my brother, Bob. There was no railing on the bed, but Grandpa’s body kept him safely next to the wall. I slept with Grandma on the bottom bunk.

One night Bob and I went to sleep early. When it was time for her to come to bed, Grandma changed into her nightgown and was kneeling beside the bed, saying her nightly prayers, just as Bob rolled over and fell on top of her.  In my Catholic family, it was considered a miracle. Grandma’s prayers saved his life.

Grandpa’s most famous peony was a soft pink, double show peony, the Shirley Jones Peony (Seedling # P127) named for his daughter, Shirley. For her wedding, Aunt Shirley carried a lovely small bouquet of white flowers. The pink peonies named in her honor were on the altar and throughout the church.

Bob and I were in Aunt Shirley’s wedding. I think we were four and five years old. People commented on the beautiful bride and all the gorgeous flowers.

Most of the guests also murmured as my brother walked down the aisle sporting a big black eye. It was my fault. The day before the wedding, we were chasing each other around the yard. I came through the front door first and slammed the screen door shut, right in Bob’s face. It was too late to get another flower girl and ring-bearer. The wedding went on, as planned, 

Grandpa sold the cabin sometime in the early 1950’s. After my grandparents died in 1954 and 1956, my Aunt Margaret and Uncle Pat moved into their home at 731 Delaware Avenue. Grandpa’s office was still  in the basement of the home.

I loved going to the basement and seeing Grandpa’s big ledgers, where he kept careful records of all the flowers he owned and sold. One whole wall was covered with ribbons ~ white, red, and blue ribbons with the year they were awarded in the Minnesota Peony Show. And right in the middle were the biggest ribbons of all: the purple Best of Show ribbons

Robert and Irene Jones, two quiet people who raised children and flowers, left their mark throughout Minnesota with their gentle spirits and their beautiful peonies.

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An Accident

When I was five years old, I fell out of a moving car speeding down the road one summer afternoon. I still have a scar in my right eyebrow and on my elbow. This is what I remember. I might have some of the details wrong. I never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

It was a beautiful Sunday afternoon. My mother and her friend, Jo Scanlon, decided to take my brother and I for a picnic at Tanners Lake, in nearby Oakdale Township. Bobby was three years old and would turn four in November. My mother was probably pregnant with my sister, but we didn’t know that at the time. No one used the “p” word back then. And there were no prohibitions against cigarettes or alcohol when someone was “expecting.”

Jo Scanlon and my mother were good friends from high school. That summer they were both twenty-six years old. Jo, an unmarried secretary working at 3-M, was short and trim. Her hair was reddish-brown and her face was covered with freckles. Jo and my mother gave each other “perms,” so their hair would be fashionably curly. 

My mother packed a picnic lunch, including plenty of beer, and Jo picked us up in her car. Tanners Lake was on private property and we paid a fee to go to the beach. The day started off badly when crows noticed that my mother had painted Bobby’s toenails a bright red. He screamed as the crows pecked at his feet.

“Here, cover your feet with sand and they will leave you alone,” my mother said. She and Jo went back to sitting on the picnic blanket, smoking and drinking as they sunned themselves at the water’s edge.

Bobby and I played in the water all afternoon until suddenly my mother announced, “Quick. We need to go home. Your father is getting off work soon. We need to get home before he does.”

As my mother hurried to pack up our picnic lunch, Jo went to a nearby stand to buy us a bag of popcorn to share on the way home. We piled into the back seat and Jo took off. The adults were laughing as Jo turned a corner at a high rate of speed. I bumped against the door handle, which wasn’t locked, and fell out on the ground. Popcorn scattered all over the back seat.

“Stop the car!” my mother yelled. “Lynda fell out.”

A woman, who lived nearby, saw what happened and ran toward us with a towel in her hand. My forehead was bleeding badly.

“Here take this towel. You need to take your little girl to St. John’s Hospital. Go right away.”

My mother held me on her lap as Jo raced to the hospital. Meanwhile, my mother was yelling at Bobby. She accused him of pushing me against the door, but that’s not what happened. The door was not locked and I fell out. It was as simple as that. Both Bobby and I were crying, not knowing what was going to happen next.

As we passed Seventh Avenue, Jo saw my father’s car leaving the drug store where he worked. She frantically honked on the horn, but my father never saw us as we sped past him, on our way to the hospital.  

My mother used a pay phone to call my grandparents, who lived upstairs from us. She told Grandma to watch for Dad and tell him to come right down to the hospital. The gash in my eyebrow needed stitching. My elbow was bleeding, but not broken.

 

Dad arrived about thirty minutes later. He told my mother and Jo to take Bobby home. “I’ll stay with Lynda and call you later.”

I was in the hospital for a couple of days. Dad visited me every day. He brought me comic books and candy bars from the drug store. My best friend, Betty Lennon, heard about the accident and her family sent me a telegram. Meanwhile, Bobby was grounded and not allowed to play with his friends until I came home.

My brother later told me, “It was one of the worst days of my life. I spent two days just walking around the dirt in our backyard. I didn’t know if you were ok. I wanted to be in an accident, too. I wanted someone to send me a telegram.”

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Silver Lake Store

I grew up in a small town in Minnesota during the 1940’s and 50’s. Children of that era were raised in a parental style that is best described as “benign neglect.” 

My family lived in the lower half of a duplex. My grandparents, my mother’s parents, lived upstairs. We didn’t have a car or a television. We had indoor plumbing but no bathtub. We took our baths in a big wash tub, filled with hot water from a tea kettle heated on a wood stove. My mother and grandmother washed clothes in that same washtub and hung them on a clothesline in our backyard. We had a telephone, with multiple families sharing the same line. My mother listened to news on the radio all day long. I remember it as a time of great joy and tremendous freedom. 

Looking back on it, no wonder mothers didn’t have time to entertain their children. No wonder we were told, “You kids go outside to play. I’ll call outside for you when it’s time to come home.”

There were not many girls in my neighborhood, so I mostly hung out with my brother and his friends ~ Leo Fortier, Davey Cournoyer, and Carl Olson. At least once a day my mother sent me to the Silver Lake Store, about a block away, with a note and some money to buy whatever she needed ~ a can of coffee, a package of Kool-Aid, maybe milk or a box of Jello. A pack of cigarettes was also often on the list. Occasionally, Mom would let me spend a penny or two on penny candy.

My favorite candies were root beer barrels. At two for a penny, they were a bargain. My brother and I were always hunting for pennies dropped in the dirt or behind couch cushions, so we could buy candy that cost more than one penny ~ wax lips for me and baseball cards for him.

One day, Bob, Davey Cournoyer, Leo Fortier and I were especially bored and looking for something to do. One of us suggested forming a club. We wanted to call it the Be Bad Club. We were tired of being good and we wanted to see how it felt to do something bad. I was about seven years old and the boys were all six. As the oldest, I should have known better but it sounded like fun.

We hatched a plan to walk into Silver Lake Store and throw all the bread on the floor. When the owner saw what we were doing, he yelled at us and we ran out the door. We raced down the alley to Leo’s backyard, laughing all the way.

Later, we couldn’t think of any other bad things to do so we formed the Be Good Club. The Korean War had just started. We considered ourselves practically angelic as we knocked on people’s doors and asked them if they wanted us to tell them about the war. Most people just shook their heads and said, “No! Go find something else to do.”

When I was eight years old, we moved to a new home, about two blocks away from my grandparents. Our new home had a bathroom with a bathtub. My mother had a wringer washing machine in the basement. She spent all day Mondays washing clothes and hanging them on the clothesline by the side of our house. On Tuesdays, she ironed. It’s what most mothers did. When I was nine years old my father bought a car and later we got a television.

During the summer, my brother and I continued to roam the neighborhood, often the two blocks between our new house and my grandmother’s house, where we used to live. My brother rounded up his friends to play baseball in the open field next door. I helped my mother do the laundry and I learned to iron. My mother sent me on errands to Silver Lake Store at least once a day. I loved it.

One day Dad came home from work with a canister and asked me to take it to the store. The canister was meant for people to donate money to help people with cerebral palsy. I needed to ask the owner if it was ok to put the canister next to the cash register in his store. I was horrified. I was so painfully shy, I was later diagnosed as an “elective mute.” I could talk to people my age, but never to an adult.

I was terrified at the thought of actually having to speak to the owner. I had been coming to the store daily for years, but for all those years I just handed the owner my list and he filled my order. The day I took the canister to the store, I wanted to talk but I couldn’t find the words to say out loud. I came home with the empty canister and told my Dad that the owner said “No.” I felt terrible. I went to confession and told the priest that I lied to my father. 

A couple of weeks later, we were out for a drive when we saw a young man struggling to cross the street. He was on crutches and he shuffled his way across the street. 

“What’s the matter with that guy?” my brother asked.

“He has cerebral palsy,” Dad answered. 

To this day, I wish I had been able to talk to the owner of the Silver Lake Store. I wish I could have done something to help the man on crutches, trying to cross the road in front of our car.

Silver Lake Store was never the same for me again.

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Doc Evans

My father, Bob Jones, worked an average of 72 hours/week as a pharmacist at Swanson Drug on the east side of St. Paul. He worked three nights a week until 10:00 p.m. and every other weekend. On the Sundays he wasn’t working, we went to my grandparents’ house for dinner. My mother wasn’t happy about the arrangement, but I loved seeing my grandparents and my Aunt Margaret every two weeks.

When my grandparents died in the mid-50’s, we needed a new place to go. My dad found the perfect replacement: The Rampart Club in Mendota, Minnesota. Doc Evans, a local Dixieland celebrity, played there during the week. On Sunday afternoons, he opened the restaurant to families with children. There was free popcorn and pizza for sale. The restaurant smelled of beer and cigarette smoke. My most vivid memory, however, was the sound of toe-tapping, happy music.

My father was a pharmacist, but he was also a trumpet player. Someone stole his trumpet while he was in the Navy, and we never had enough money for him to get another one.  For years, Dad rode the streetcar to work. We were one of the last families to get a television. Any extra money went to pay for piano lessons.

When my grandparents died, they left my parents enough money to pay off our mortgage ($9000.00) and to buy my Dad a trumpet. Because we no longer went to my grandparents’ home on Sundays, there was time and money for family trips to the Rampart Club

These are some of my happiest memories. Doc’s band was one of the best in the Twin Cities, an area known as a mecca for good musicians. Doc was an excellent cornet player and band leader. You can still hear his music at: www.docevans.com. 

Two musicians, in addition to Doc, stand out for me. One was a blind piano player named Dick Rambert. It was the first time I realized that someone could “play by ear.” It was a skill that our teacher, Sister Aimee, strictly forbid. She insisted that we read music, instead, “like real musicians.”

The other musician who made us smile (and sometimes laugh out loud!) was Red Maddock. Red was a drummer and singer. He was also a clown. Doc, a serious musician, wanted us learn about the songs he played each Sunday. While Doc was teaching us music history, Red would sit behind him, twirling his drumsticks and making faces. Some of his songs had bawdy lyrics that only the adults understood.

Occasionally, other musicians would join Doc on Sunday afternoons. Harry Blons, a wonderful clarinetist, and Hod Russell, an incredible piano player, would sometimes add to the fun. Harry had his own band and Hod was his regular piano player. When they joined forces with Doc Evans’ band, the music was fantastic.

At some point on Sunday afternoons, Doc would announce it was time for “Name That Tune.” My father cringed. There never was a Dixieland song that he couldn’t identify just by hearing the first four notes, but he was too shy to shout out the answer. He pretended he didn’t know the answer or that he needed to go to the bar and order us a pizza.

Dad should have whispered the name of the song to my brother who would have gladly shouted out the answer. I was in Dad’s camp, being every bit as shy as he was. I would have rather cut off my right arm than raise it in the air.

After an unfortunate incident with Sister Aimee, in which she finally lost patience with me and slapped me ~ HARD ~ across my face, my father finally broke his silence and actually spoke. He called Sister Aimee on the phone and told her I would not be returning to classical piano lessons. Then he called Hod Russell and asked if he had room in his schedule for one more student. ME!! I was ecstatic. No more Beethoven!  My days of auditions and recitals were over. I was going to play Basin Street Blues and St. James Infirmary.

Thanks Doc! And Dad! And Hod Russell! You changed my life. Your music always made me smile.

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May Crowning

In the late 1950’s there was a housing boom in North St. Paul. The new development, called Saratoga Hills, featured row after row of three bedroom ramblers with detached garages. There were probably fifty to one hundred houses on what had been Eddie Zick’s grandpa’s farm.

Eddie Zick was a notorious bully at Silver Lake beach. He thought it was really funny to hold someone’s head under water until that person went limp, after struggling for what seemed like ten or twenty minutes. Eddie only picked on kids who were at least 2-3 years younger and 20-30 pounds lighter. Why the lifeguards never caught him or banned him from the beach was a mystery to all of us..

As a result of these new homes, there was an influx of new kids at St. Peter’s school. Some families moved from North St. Paul to similar developments in Maplewood and Oakdale, so our class pretty much stayed at 45 students ~ 17 boys and 28 girls.

There is a saying in education that a new kid in school is either instantly the most popular kid in the class, or they become invisible. Invisible was the case for Judy Mederholtz and Jean Tabalish. Penny Sauro and Terry Dixon, on the other hand, were now #1 in the eyes of all of us who had been classmates since first grade.

Penny started St. Pater’s in the fall of 1957. We were in the eighth grade. Our teacher, Sister Esther, called every one by their proper name. Johnny Noye was John. I was Robert. Tommy Sindelar was Thomas. Keith Schouveler was still Keith and Gary Mogren was still Gary.

Sister Esther insisted on calling Penny Sauro, “Pen-a-lope” which sounded like Antelope. Everyone would laugh when Penny corrected her, “My name is Pen-nel-o-pee.” Sister Esther told us that when she was a little girl, the heroine in her favorite book was named Pen-a-lope and she was sure she was right. This whole thing went on for several weeks.

“Pen-a-lope.”

“My name is Pen-el-o-pee.” Everybody laughs.

Finally Sister Esther, never admitting defeat, started calling her Penny.

This wasn’t the only reason Penny Sauro was the most popular girl in our class. Penny was truly beautiful, easily the prettiest girl in the room and also physically the most mature (if you know what I mean.) She didn’t take any s__t from anyone, including Sister Esther.

“You are as bold as a brass monkey, Miss Sauro,” Sister constantly scolded.

Terry Dixon also joined our class in late fall or early winter. He was Terrance, not Terry. He was also physically more mature than most of us and wore his hair in a long duck-tail. All the girls were in love with him from the first day he walked into class.

Keith Shouveller told everyone that he was going to “beat the crap” out of Terry at noon recess that first day. But Terry weasled out of that, telling Keith he was “a lover. Not a fighter.” Keith was still the toughest guy in class.

School was over at 3:00 p.m. each day. One day Terry’s mom picked him up at 2:15 for a doctor’s appointment. We found out that Terry wasn’t going to the doctor, but to Channel 5 TV, so he could be on the “Take Five” show that came on every school day at 4:00. It was St. Paul’s version of American Bandstand.

The boys had to wear a coat and tie. The girls wore a dress or skirt and blouse. We all hustled home after school to watch the program. There was Terry in the middle of it all, dancing with all the pretty older girls. You had to be in high school to get on the program and Terry told them he went to North High, not St. Peter’s. He looked like a high school student and it wasn’t a problem. It was the first time we heard the song, “Tequilla.”

Sister Esther and none of the other nuns watched the show that day. Terry was a hero and no one was ever the wiser.

That spring, the eighth grade class got to elect the May Crowning Queen. It was the biggest event of the year. The eighth grade class assembled in the shape of a rosary and marched across the street and into the church. We all sang  special hymns:

“Bring flowers of the fairest….”

“Immaculate Mary, our hearts are on fire…”

Father O’Reilly held benediction and the May Crowning Queen, in a pure white dress and veil, climbed on a ladder and placed a crown of spring flowers on the head of the Virgin Mary statue. From first grade on, every girl hoped that when she got to be in the eighth grade, she would be the May Crowning Queen. As the girls got older, they realized that it helped to be tall.

The week before the first Sunday in May, 1958, Sister Esther handed out the ballots. Every one in the class voted for Penny Sauro. We eagerly waited for the end of the school day to hear Sister announce the winner. At the appointed time, Sister Esther said, “now boys and girls, listen up. The winner of the election for this year’s May Crowning Queen is ~ Jane Adams.”

Nobody clapped. We were stunned.

Everybody whispered, “Did you vote for Jane?”

“Are you kidding? I voted for Penny.”

“So did I!”

That Sunday the May Crowning went off as usual. The hymns were sung. Benediction was performed. And Jane Adams crowned the Blessed Virgin statue with flowers.

Nobody’s parents called the school or the parish office. Most kids never told their parents, but we talked about it on the playground for weeks. In the end, Sister Esther won.

After high school Jane Adams joined the Sisters of St. Francis and became a nun. Eventually she left the convent and was married. She raised a family on the shores of Silver Lake, right across from the swimming beach.