‘Those were the days’ ...

by Julia Cocoa

     In class with me sat Alma Luce, an outstanding student. Her mother often stopped at our school to sit and observe her daughter. We all wondered about this, since no other parent came to see us working at our desks. She always referred proudly of her daughter as “my Almy.”

     Another neighbor, Ray Vogtli, later established the Gravel Works on Broadway. Nearer to us, the Bunnells operated a truck farm, and the Hansens ran a cheese factory. Across from us, the Rosen family lived in the old wood schoolhouse that was replaced by our red brick schoolhouse. That wooden structure was moved to the location where it now stands.

     The first Mrs. Rosen died leaving behind three sons: Joseph, Greg (Pete), and Sigmund. Their mother may have died during the flu epidemic as the ages of those first three children fit the time pattern. Their father then married a widow from Niagara Falls. Her daughter, Lily, and I became good friends.

     On moonlit nights, we especially liked to toboggan in Hansen’s pasture. That pasture had a unique pair of hills. They allowed the most pleasure with the least effort. On a length of metal, corrugated roofing material, curled up on one end, we zoomed down the hill, over a short dip, and halfway up the other hill. We had only a short tow up before sliding down again. Today, some 75 years later, as I think back on those moonlight evenings, frolicking with my friends on the snow, a mysticism wraps itself like a fog around my memories of long ago; of moon glow on virgin snow.

     In a low place near our house, water collected, and in winter the ice there became for us a rinkwhere we “shinnied” with makeshift hockey clubs made from young trees bent just above the roots. Father built each of us a “go-devil.” This was essentially a seat on a ski, a ski that he made by cooking a length of wainscoating, then inserting that into a press until dry. It required a little practice to get the “hang” of riding it and remain seated upright on the narrow slat of a seat.

     Johnny Andolsek Sr., a student in the upper grade, and though only 12 or 13, was the janitor at our school. He often slept on a bench near the furnace in the basement on extremely cold nights to keep the coal fire burning. He and his older brother Lawrence (Larry) built a 10-foot-long toboggan. One set of runners they built onto a platform. This then they attached to the front end of that long 2-inch by 10-inch by 10-foot board by a swivel. This served to steer the sled. The rear platform and its runners were stationary. A group of us often inveigled John and Larry to let us ride with them. They agreed, but had to pull the sled up the hill after the ride, no short distance.

     At this time there was very little traffic, and we gambled on that. We sat, one behind the other, our arms wrapped over the legs of the rider behind us, and hands gripping the long board. The last one shoved us off. Then he jumped on as we began our descent down Crandal Hill. We turned right onto Dugway Hill, down that rugged, unpaved road to Beech Street. When snow and ice were in super-fine sledding condition, we turned the corner on Beech and coasted all the way to the Moench Tannery. This was a distance of about a mile. What along, uphill haul we had exchanged for a glorious ride that had lasted so short a time!

     That same winter Henry Suski and Ralph Hancock “belly-gutted” on a sled on these same roads, but at the foot of Dugway, they lost control and hit a telephone pole, head on. Ralph bit off the tip of his tongue, and Henry suffered a broken arm, You can bet the sled, too, needed extensive repairs.