"There was a big conflagration.
Everyone was panicking - leaving town -
streets were badly congested.
I went into a building - there was an
old fire-engine - No. 1665 - I started
the thing up and found it was working.
"I drove towards the fire, because the
streets were congested, I drove across
yards - this was a ritzy section -
either Pasadena or south-west L.A. -
I tore down fences - at times I got
stuck in back yards - someone would
always try to stop me - but I just
barreled right thru'.
"By radio, I was always directed on where
to go - even then I would find myself in
a building and have to fight my way out.
I don't know how or why I would get into
a building.
"Pretty soon I had a crew on board -
whenever I stopped there was someone
willing to come along to help -
we kept going on towards that fire.
"Soon I was called on radio to travel on
a big circle - a road that made a big
circle around a city or something. I
don't understand that - but we made
this big loop - then we came back to
the straight road - we took off on it
barreling down that road - -
Then I woke up."
n.b.: The foregoing was dictated to Dorothy on Tuesday October 28, 1986.
Dorothy's further notes are:
August 30, 1987 - the biggest fire of the Tuolumne/Calaveras Fire District,
broke out.
August 31,1987 - Dad died.
Sunday, February 28, 2016
Sunday, February 21, 2016
The Capture of Little Buck
Feb 20 - Phill and Scott took me to Simi Valley Adventist Hospital.
Feb 22 - Corrective surgery for hernia
Feb 28 - Prostate surgery
March 5 - Home with Phill and Pat
March 8 - Taken to Alhambra with Virginia
(This was Dad's record of his hospitalization in 1983.)
Feb 22 - Corrective surgery for hernia
Feb 28 - Prostate surgery
March 5 - Home with Phill and Pat
March 8 - Taken to Alhambra with Virginia
(This was Dad's record of his hospitalization in 1983.)
Sunday, February 14, 2016
To A Smiling Girl
With your smile enchanting,
And your disposition mild,
Other's lives enhancing.
Always cheer to others giving,
Always fresh and gay,
Always making life worth living,
Brightening up the day.
Should you ever feel discouraged
Keep this thought in place:
Others always feel encouraged
By your beaming face.
- J. F. Baker, 1943
Sunday, February 7, 2016
Things I Remember
The following is transcribed from a cassette dad made in August of 1979. I could not decipher some of it hence the ellipses.
[Indecipherable]...used to enjoy coming to our house, picking me up and holding me on their laps and I would lay my head on their ample bosoms and again enjoy the natural curve.
[Indecipherable]...fact, I told Mother after the visit of one such lady that "Mrs. Smith had such nice pillows."
The events of 1894 seem to have passed me by as I do not remember anything that occurred that year.
The next year, however, several things are remembered. One, is the flood of the Scio River. We were then living either in Scio or Jewett, Ohio. I was born in Unionport, which is closer to Steubenville. The river overflowed from the floods which is normal in that part of the country every spring, and we lived in a two-story house. All of the furniture was moved to the second floor, including the stove. Living on the second floor was not difficult, because the chimneys were built with stove-pipe inlets at every floor, even in the basement.
I remember, distinctly, how fearful my Mother was that I would fall into the water down the stairs because the water-level was up to the top step of the stairs and every chance I got I would go out into the hall to see that water. It amazed me that the stairway and the hall below were underneath the water. And I also remember my Father coming home for dinner and a boatman brought him...I would stand at the window on the second floor—and saw him coming in a boat, and as they brought the boat up to the window and he stepped over the window sill from the boat into the room. That, again, shows that the water was up almost to the level of the second floor. I don't know what we would have done if the water had risen any higher.
We burned coal for heating and cooking in those days and we had kerosene lamps to see with and it was the only thing we needed during the flood was the boatman who would bring sacks of coal, a can of oil for the lamps, and whatever groceries we needed. I don't know how long this lasted, but to a youngster, it would seem a wonderful adventure. I believe this occurred in the spring of 1895 because that was the year my sister was born and she came in November, and I don't remember her being present during the flood, so apparently, this was the spring flood of 1895.
I remember an incident which occurred in 1896 when my sister was anywhere from six months to a year old—well, no, she couldn't have been that old maybe three to six months. We were again living in a two-story house, in fact, all houses seemed to be two stories in those days. There was always a basement, or cellar, and the first floor was used for living purposes and the second floor was bedrooms.
On this occasion, my Mother was washing in the basement. The washing was done in those days without any electricity by rubbing the clothes on a washboard. The washboard being set in a tub with the clothes, water, soap, all in there together. My sister, Edna, who I called "Ledda," was asleep in the bedroom on the second floor. That was two flights of stairs up from where my Mother was washing. She kept me in the basement with her so as to keep me out of trouble, because I was the adventurous sort and was always getting into some kind of trouble. "Ledda" began to cry, she woke up crying, and my Mother made the mistake of telling me to go see why "Ledda" was crying.
I had to crawl on hands and knees to get up to the second floor because I was still not too good at walking. I certainly couldn't walk up stairs, I could climb up, but couldn't walk. So, when I got up there and went into the bedroom, like any baby, she was lying there hollering with her mouth wide open. I couldn't figure out any way to stop her from crying. In those days all bedrooms had a commode, which was a piece of furniture with doors in the front, inside there was a slop jar and a chamber, and on top was a large bowl, inside of which was a pitcher, always full of water. There was a soap dish to hold the soap. All of these articles were made of what today we call ceramic. They were all decorated the same and were matched sets. These were in every bedroom in those days.
The only thing I could figure to stop Edna from crying was to pick up that pitcher of water and throw it in her face. But the trouble with that was that she was crying with her mouth open and she got a mouthful of water. With water down her lungs she stopped crying all of a sudden. Well, my Mother, when she heard that crying suddenly stopped, she became frightened and came tearing up two flights of stairs just in time to take "Ledda" by the heels and hold her up and let the water run out of her.
Apparently, that is just how close I came to drowning my sister.
I can't remember any incidents that can be definitely placed in 1896 and '97. So at this point I would like to describe how we children were dressed in those days. The boys wore dresses, just like the girls, and they wore two or three petticoats underneath the dresses, just like the girls. I wore long yellow curls, just like the girls. I was sixteen or seventeen years old before I had my first pair of trousers. I did graduate into pants about seven years old, maybe it was a little younger, maybe five years old. There is a large picture which shows me dressed as I have described in the fancy white dresses. For morning wear, there were various colored gingham dresses, but for afternoon and evening wear, we were dressed in fancy white dresses. Actually with bonnets on, whenever we were taken outdoors, you couldn't tell the boys from the girls in those days. Just think of the tremendous amount of extra work that mothers made for themselves with all that washing and ironing to do with the fancy dresses.
1898 was an election year, of course, and everybody talked politics. I would have been about five years old and I remember very distinctly that we lived in a place where the front porch extended out to the sidewalk. There was no front lawn. And the porch was about five or six feet above the level of the sidewalk. We lived on a street where the engineer, Mr. Carmody, of the railroad and his firemen would pass every day at noon on their way to lunch. This was in Cadiz, Ohio, and Cadiz never had a main line railroad. It was a branch line on the Pennsylvania Panhandle that came up to Cadiz, which was the end of the line.
There was only the one train which went back and forth a couple of times a day, I believe. Mr. Carmody was the engineer and he lived in Cadiz and it was no problem for him to put the engine and train on the siding and leave it and go home for lunch. He would pass our porch everyday and I was in the habit, in pleasant weather, of playing out on the porch and he would always speak to me because Father was well-known by the railroad men inasmuch as he traveled so much on the railroad and they were all good friends.
Mr. Carmody would stop and talk to me everyday when he went by and, of course, politics being the topic of the day, he would ask me questions about, "What are you a Democrat or a Republican?"
I remember asking my Father about these matters, so he gave me some information so I could spiel off a rigmarole that made Mr. Carmody laugh. He would ask, "What are you a Democrat or Republican?" I would respond, "I was a 'emocrat because Grandpa was, Poppa was a Republican, Mother was a lady, and 'Ledda' was just 'Ledda'." This was my first introduction into politics.
[Indecipherable]...used to enjoy coming to our house, picking me up and holding me on their laps and I would lay my head on their ample bosoms and again enjoy the natural curve.
[Indecipherable]...fact, I told Mother after the visit of one such lady that "Mrs. Smith had such nice pillows."
The events of 1894 seem to have passed me by as I do not remember anything that occurred that year.
The next year, however, several things are remembered. One, is the flood of the Scio River. We were then living either in Scio or Jewett, Ohio. I was born in Unionport, which is closer to Steubenville. The river overflowed from the floods which is normal in that part of the country every spring, and we lived in a two-story house. All of the furniture was moved to the second floor, including the stove. Living on the second floor was not difficult, because the chimneys were built with stove-pipe inlets at every floor, even in the basement.
I remember, distinctly, how fearful my Mother was that I would fall into the water down the stairs because the water-level was up to the top step of the stairs and every chance I got I would go out into the hall to see that water. It amazed me that the stairway and the hall below were underneath the water. And I also remember my Father coming home for dinner and a boatman brought him...I would stand at the window on the second floor—and saw him coming in a boat, and as they brought the boat up to the window and he stepped over the window sill from the boat into the room. That, again, shows that the water was up almost to the level of the second floor. I don't know what we would have done if the water had risen any higher.
We burned coal for heating and cooking in those days and we had kerosene lamps to see with and it was the only thing we needed during the flood was the boatman who would bring sacks of coal, a can of oil for the lamps, and whatever groceries we needed. I don't know how long this lasted, but to a youngster, it would seem a wonderful adventure. I believe this occurred in the spring of 1895 because that was the year my sister was born and she came in November, and I don't remember her being present during the flood, so apparently, this was the spring flood of 1895.
I remember an incident which occurred in 1896 when my sister was anywhere from six months to a year old—well, no, she couldn't have been that old maybe three to six months. We were again living in a two-story house, in fact, all houses seemed to be two stories in those days. There was always a basement, or cellar, and the first floor was used for living purposes and the second floor was bedrooms.
On this occasion, my Mother was washing in the basement. The washing was done in those days without any electricity by rubbing the clothes on a washboard. The washboard being set in a tub with the clothes, water, soap, all in there together. My sister, Edna, who I called "Ledda," was asleep in the bedroom on the second floor. That was two flights of stairs up from where my Mother was washing. She kept me in the basement with her so as to keep me out of trouble, because I was the adventurous sort and was always getting into some kind of trouble. "Ledda" began to cry, she woke up crying, and my Mother made the mistake of telling me to go see why "Ledda" was crying.
I had to crawl on hands and knees to get up to the second floor because I was still not too good at walking. I certainly couldn't walk up stairs, I could climb up, but couldn't walk. So, when I got up there and went into the bedroom, like any baby, she was lying there hollering with her mouth wide open. I couldn't figure out any way to stop her from crying. In those days all bedrooms had a commode, which was a piece of furniture with doors in the front, inside there was a slop jar and a chamber, and on top was a large bowl, inside of which was a pitcher, always full of water. There was a soap dish to hold the soap. All of these articles were made of what today we call ceramic. They were all decorated the same and were matched sets. These were in every bedroom in those days.
The only thing I could figure to stop Edna from crying was to pick up that pitcher of water and throw it in her face. But the trouble with that was that she was crying with her mouth open and she got a mouthful of water. With water down her lungs she stopped crying all of a sudden. Well, my Mother, when she heard that crying suddenly stopped, she became frightened and came tearing up two flights of stairs just in time to take "Ledda" by the heels and hold her up and let the water run out of her.
Apparently, that is just how close I came to drowning my sister.
 |
| Baby John Baker, 1894. Holding his father's pocket watch. |
1898 was an election year, of course, and everybody talked politics. I would have been about five years old and I remember very distinctly that we lived in a place where the front porch extended out to the sidewalk. There was no front lawn. And the porch was about five or six feet above the level of the sidewalk. We lived on a street where the engineer, Mr. Carmody, of the railroad and his firemen would pass every day at noon on their way to lunch. This was in Cadiz, Ohio, and Cadiz never had a main line railroad. It was a branch line on the Pennsylvania Panhandle that came up to Cadiz, which was the end of the line.
There was only the one train which went back and forth a couple of times a day, I believe. Mr. Carmody was the engineer and he lived in Cadiz and it was no problem for him to put the engine and train on the siding and leave it and go home for lunch. He would pass our porch everyday and I was in the habit, in pleasant weather, of playing out on the porch and he would always speak to me because Father was well-known by the railroad men inasmuch as he traveled so much on the railroad and they were all good friends.
Mr. Carmody would stop and talk to me everyday when he went by and, of course, politics being the topic of the day, he would ask me questions about, "What are you a Democrat or a Republican?"
I remember asking my Father about these matters, so he gave me some information so I could spiel off a rigmarole that made Mr. Carmody laugh. He would ask, "What are you a Democrat or Republican?" I would respond, "I was a 'emocrat because Grandpa was, Poppa was a Republican, Mother was a lady, and 'Ledda' was just 'Ledda'." This was my first introduction into politics.
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