Uncle Stewart and the Strawberry Shortcake

In 1963, Harriett took her daughter, Christie, back to Iowa for one of their frequent visits.  This little incident happened during that visit.

~~~

Elizabeth and Harriett were together again at Elizabeth's home in their old home town in southwest Iowa and enjoying every moment of it.  Harriett, now a school nurse in California, was visiting with her teenage daughter, Christie.  It was almost lunchtime and the three of them were in the kitchen fixing lunch and giggles kept  erupting like bubbles coming up out of a thermal spring.  Sisters, Elizabeth and Harriett, had been victim to uncontrolled fits of the giggles since girlhood.  Their Father was an attorney and a judge.  He was known to be quite strict and tough.  If giggling erupted at the table, the girls were sent to sit on the stairs until the fits were under control.  Now, Harriett's daughter, Christie, was just as vulnerable to the giggles as were the sisters and the three of them happily shared their senses of humor.  

"Stewart said he was hungry for strawberry shortcake for dessert so I got some strawberries this morning.  Sister Mildred still had some she would give me so I picked them up while I was out." said Elizabeth giving them to Christie to clean.  

"It's August!" said Harriett, "I'm amazed you could find any.  Stewart is working so hard during Rodeo Week, he deserves a treat."  

This small town in southwest Iowa hosted a world class RCA Rodeo in August every year.  Stewart was the chairman of the Rodeo Board and his duties kept him at the Rodeo grounds many long hours during rodeo week.  Stewart was a large man with a gruff exterior.  A Swede by ancestry, his language and public persona were rough.  But there was a diamond under the rough exterior, a diamond with the heart of a marshmallow.  Stewart and Elizabeth had married twelve years before and were very happy together.  The entire family loved Stewart though the adults gave him a wide berth when his usual grumble moved up to a roar.  Children, however, ignoring the noise walked up to him and tugged on his sleeve.  The child that did always got whatever it was he wanted too.


Christie had risen early to fix fried chicken in the cool of the morning as had generations of women before her in the summer heat.  The chicken was crisping in the oven now as she mashed potatoes.  She had made gravy as well and that was keeping hot at the back of the stove.  Elizabeth was setting the table as Harriett poked around the refrigerator looking for something.  "Elizabeth," said Harriett, "do you remember where we put those baked beans I made.  We were going to heat them up for lunch."


"I put them in a dish and in the oven about 20 minutes ago, Mother." said Christie.


"Well, that's good, because I forgot all about them until just now," replied Harriett.  And she went in to help Elizabeth set the table.


"Harriett, when you went to the store this morning did you get the whipping cream I asked for?" asked Elizabeth.  "Christie could whip that while she has the mixer out."


"No need," replied her sister, "I got a can of whipped cream, no whipping just shake it and squirt it out."


"Oh, no!"  Elizabeth cried.  "I just can't do those can things.  My finger isn't strong like yours and Christie's, I didn't play piano.  I've never been able to do them right.  Well, you will just have to put the whipped cream on the shortcakes right before we serve them."


"You're just being silly," urged Harriet, then looking at her sister's face said, "Alright, I'll do that.  Don't worry.  I'll do the whipped cream.  He is in for a real surprise."  And smiling to herself went into the kitchen.


And just then a car door closed in the driveway and the three ladies went into motion as one putting the food on the table.  And by the time Stewart got inside the back door his lunch was on the table.


Lunch was very pleasant.  The food was good and Stewart told them of all the happenings at the Rodeo that morning.  He told Christie he would take her to the Rodeo with him that afternoon.  Christie was 16 years old and very attractive.  Stewart wanted to be around whenever she was anywhere near any of the cowboys.  He just felt better that way.  And soon it was time for dessert.  Dishes were cleared from the table and good to her word, Harriett put the can of whipped cream by her place at the table and went back to the kitchen to ladle strawberries over the cakes.  With a big smile Elizabeth put Stewart's dessert down, "Surprise!," she said happily.


"Strawberry shortcake!" exclaimed Stewart.  "I've been wishing for this.  Put some whipped cream on mine, Elizabeth, I can't wait!"


"Harriett is going to do the whipped cream, you know I don't do that well.  Something about my fingers...." said Elizabeth, her voice fading as she gazed at her hand


"Oh don't be silly dear, you need to get over that idea.  Come on just squirt a little bit right there on top," Stewart said a bit sternly.


As she started to shake the can, Harriett and Christie came into the dining room with the rest of the desserts.  Elizabeth started to put the can down for Harriett to do the whipped cream but Stewart interrupted the move saying, "Just put some whipped cream on there Elizabeth.  Just do it!".  And so as Harriett and Christie sat down at the table Elizabeth began to put whipped cream on Stewart's dessert.


To this day nobody can explain exactly how it happened but that whipped cream must have ricocheted off a strawberry and hit Stewart right in the face!  Elizabeth looked up to see what had happened to the whipped cream that was supposed to be on the dessert and saw it on her husbands face and froze on the nozzle.  She began to kind of rock up and down saying, "Oh my gosh, oh my gosh, oh my gosh......".  And as Stewart's face got redder and redder she covered him deeper and deeper in whipped cream.  Up and down, pass by pass ..his face, his glasses, his hair, shirt, pass by pass deeper in whipped cream.  Harriett came out of the shock of it first and grabbed the whipped cream can out of her sister's grip, running to the kitchen for a dish towel for Stewart.  Harriett returned a stack of towels in her hands and saw her daughter, blue eyes big as saucers but with the beginnings of a grin on her mouth.  Harriett knew that if any one of them even snickered, Stewart would explode.  He was red as a fire plug and just barely holding himself together.  At the moment that Harriett gingerly reached over with the towel to begin to dab at the whipped cream on his face, Stewart took his hand and cleaned some whipped cream off his face and flicked it onto the table in the classic comic movie gesture.  Except he wasn't being funny, he was trying to see.  Christie was young and couldn't control herself any longer, as the snork began in the back of her throat. she ran out of the dining room, through the kitchen, around the corner and half-way down the basement stairs and there she sat collapsing into body shaking giggles.  She knew where she belonged.


Meanwhile, back in the dining room, Stewart had grabbed the towel out of Harriett's hands and mopped at his face, removing his glasses completely.  Once he could see, he VERY quietly excused himself and went into the bathroom.  As soon as they heard the door shut, Harriett and Elizabeth ran for the basement stairs!


"You RAT!", said Harriett looking straight at her daughter, a big smile spreading on her face, "deserting us with the dessert!"  And that was the beginning of one of the longest group giggles in family history!

~~The End~~

Crandall Note: The strawberry shortcake caper became famous in the family.  And this visit was always remembered because of that.  But it was momentous for Christie because she got her first car.  Uncle Stewart bought Aunt Liz a new car (believe it not, after the great shortcake caper not before!) and sold their old car to Christie.  Hope you enjoyed this little family story.

Until next time.....happy searching.

FIRE!!!

This story takes places in the early years after WWII.  Prosperity reigned and the store owner's problems were in getting the goods to sell to the soldiers now home and beginning their families or starting afresh with  loved ones that had been waiting anxiously for them.  Baby girl Johnson would later be called a Baby Boomer.

~~~

Deke Johnson loved to fly.  It was just part of his being. When he was in high school he had worked in the submarine factory to earn the money for flying lessons.  He knew that if he already knew to how to fly, when he enlisted in the Army, they would let him fly.  He was an orphan and he just knew the Army was a good place for him.  He could serve the country that had served him so well and it would be the family he had missed since he was 11 years old. So he worked in the submarine factory and saved money and learned to fly.  He went into the Army and told them he would fly anything, anywhere, just let him fly.  And they did.  He flew a C-47 over the "Hump" in Asia keeping the Burma Road open in the air.  A great world war was raging and he was doing his bit.  Then so many pilots were doing their bit that the airlines were having trouble getting troops from here to there in the continental U.S. and the Army had to lend a large group of pilots to the airlines.  Transporting the troops from one coast to the other was critical and those pilots were needed badly back home.  None of them wanted to go.  They were fighting a war and were reluctant to give that up.  They drew straws.  Pilots were drawn from air supply units all over the world.  Deke went to work for American Airlines.

The airline sent him to Love Field, Dallas, Texas.  He flew from Dallas to Chicago and back again several times a week.  He also flew a "milk" run across the southern states through Atlanta up the east coast to Washington, D.C. then across to Chicago and back down to Dallas.  One day he went into the Crew Room in Chicago to get ready for the flight back to Dallas and saw Harriett.  She was the prettiest little thing he had ever seen and no bigger than a minute.  She was an R.N., all the stewardesses had to be, with warm brown hair and sparkling green eyes.  He was a confirmed bachelor and this was a prize he was determined to win.

They were married just as the war ended.  They moved to Osceola, Nebraska, bought a hardware store, a house and a Piper Cub.   Deke and Harriett flew every other weekend to visit her family in a very small town in southwest Iowa.  The town was too small to have an airport but Harriett's brother-in-law was also a pilot and they could land at the airstrip on his farm just outside of town.  Two years later a baby girl became part of their little family.  Everyone joked that her Daddy was a pilot and her Mama had been a stewardess and she was air born.

For many long weeks they didn't make the trip to Iowa.  But as the baby girl turned 3 months old they decided it was time and the three of them flew off for the farm in southwest Iowa.  Harriett's sister, Lillian and her husband, Freese, had 7 children.  Harriett and Lillian were from a family of 12, Harriett being the youngest.  Lillian's eldest son was the same age as Harriett.  And Freese was a farmer and pilot and very good at both.  He had his own Piper Cub in a hangar up on the hill by the airstrip on his farm.  It was to this airstrip the little family headed.  It was a breezy day and the little plane bumped around through a sky that blue which only a Midwestern summer sky can be.  Past fluffy white clouds they bumped, over green fields laid out like a patchwork quilt below them.  It was a picture perfect day and the baby girl burbled happily on her Mama's lap.

"Somebody over by Lillian decided to burn their trash today," commented Harriett as she pointed out the wispy column of smoke to Deke.

"Whatever they are doing, they just started it.  It was clear up until a moment ago."  replied Deke.  He was a city boy and did not understand about burning trash on a farm.  

But as the little airplane came closer it became clear that the smoke was not coming from the Crandall farm a mile and a half away, nor from the other house on Freese's farm but from Freese and Lillian's place.  And it wasn't someone burning trash at all. The smoke was coming from the southwest corner of the house!  

Deke flew low over the house and sure enough - smoke was streaming out of the screened in back porch.  There was fire either on the porch or in the kitchen and nobody seemed to know!  There was no one grabbing a hose to spray the fire with water.  Nobody was coming out of the house at all!  

Deke turned the little airplane quickly, circled around and buzzed the house again, lower this time.  As the plane climbed out the landing gear trimmed leaves off the top of the big elm tree in the back yard.  And again they circled and buzzed the house!  More elm leaves drifted to the ground.  This time they saw Freese come out the door running for the hose.  Deke climbed up again and turning into the wind landed on the airstrip on top of the hill.

"Here, Harriett, put your feet on the pedals on the floor there.  I don't have time to tie the plane down, I have to help Freese put the fire out.  It's windy and you and the baby will have to wait here and keep the plane on the ground with the flaps until I can get back," and, instructions given, Deke ran down the hill toward the house.

Harriett pushed first one foot forward and then the other to see what happened as she moved the flaps at the back of each wing of the airplane.  One flap moved downward and then the other moved down and little plane began to rise up off the ground and Harriett quickly moved the pedals the other way.  As she did the plane settled to the ground again.  And as little gusts of wind blew up, so did the plane and she had to adjust the flaps again.  

Running down the hill, Deke saw Freese pull the hose into the house, through the porch and into the kitchen.  Deke grabbed up a bucket on the back porch and headed in there himself.  Freese was spraying the kitchen stove which was completely enveloped in smoke.  Deke ran to the pump at the sink and filled his bucket and threw the water at the stove and started pumping again.  At first there was more smoke, then less and less until at last there was just the wet smell of a fire just drenched.  As they came out of the house, they heard the siren of the fire truck pulling up the farm road to the house.  Both men went over to the fire truck and began telling the firemen what had happened.  Lillian had dinner cooking on the wood stove in the kitchen.  The family had gone to the front porch to enjoy the warm breezy afternoon while they waited for dinner.  The breeze being from the north, they had not smelled the smoke when one of the pots on the stove caught fire.  They saw the little plane buzzing the house and Freese got up and went through the house to go out the back and go up the hill and meet their visitors.  And he found the fire!  The firemen all agreed that it was a good thing that the little plane happened along when it did.  The house was a wooden farm house as most all were in that area.  They were amazed at the small amount of damage in the kitchen due to Freese and Deke's quick actions and that fact that it was a really good sturdy iron stove.

The men all came back out into the yard and one of the firemen observed, "Deke that little plane of yours sitting up there on the hill looks just like it's flying."

Freese and Deke looked at each other and said in unison, "HARRIETT!"  And much to the fire men's puzzlement ran for the top of the hill.  

As she sat in the plane for what seemed like days, the thought occurred to Harriett that she was flying an airplane on the ground.  And that thought struck her as very funny.  She looked down and said, "Baby Girl we are flying an airplane on the ground!"  And the baby girl gurgled.  And Harriett giggled.  And she kept giggling.  And then she thought, "Oh heavens, I'm sitting flying a plane on the ground and giggling."  And that was the end, she began to outright laugh and she couldn't stop.  The whole situation was just so strange.  Her sister's house had been on fire, though she couldn't see any smoke now.  And here she sat on top of hill, flying an airplane on the ground with a baby in her lap.  She laughed until there were tears in her eyes and then she laughed some more.  The breeze came up and the plane lifted up and she adjusted the flaps and laughed some more.  

Then the door of the little plane flew open and her husband was there looking very concerned.  Seeing the tears in her eyes he asked, "Harriett, are you alright?  I left you for so long, over 90 minutes!  Are you alright?  Is the baby alright?  I'm so sorry!"  And as Freese took the baby girl from Deke, Harriet giggled again.

"I have to go the euphemism, Deke Johnson," said Harriett her green eyes snapping, "and if I don't get there quickly you will be a very sorry man."  And as she began to run down the hill to the house, she was overcome by giggles again.  

~ The End ~

Crandall Notes:  O.K. you got me, yes, I am Baby Girl Johnson.  Deke and Harriett are my Father and Mother.  Uncle Freese, Aunt Lillian and the 7 cousins, all mine.  Bless 'em.  You won't find any better.  I have many happy memories of flying with my Daddy and my Uncle Freese.  I hope you enjoy this little flying story.


Until next time - Happy Searching!

Copyright 2011 - All rights reserved

2 Sisters, 1 Horse

This true story happened to Elizabeth and Harriett, Crandalls both, in the mid 1920's.  

~~

Once upon a time in a very small town in Iowa, there lived a very large family.  In the family there were the Father and the Mother and 6 boys and 6 girls.  Some of the children had grown up moved on to start their own lives and families, but there were still 4 boys and 2 girls at home.  The 2 girls were the youngest of the whole family.  One day as a treat for the girls, the father borrowed a horse from a farmer in lieu of a debt the farmer owed him.  And the little girls squealed in delight.  The little girls were named Elizabeth and Harriett.  The father said, "Now girls I want you to take turns riding the horse.  Elizabeth you are the older and I expect you to share and let Harriett ride her share too."  And he went inside to work on his papers.  

Elizabeth turned to Harriett and said, "I'll go first and then I'll let you ride.  You wait here in the shade of this tree."  And Harriett nodded and waited.  Elizabeth rode the horse through their very, very big back yard, past the cherry tree,  past the gooseberry bushes, down the side fence past the apple tree all the way to the chicken yard at the very back and then around the clothes line and carefully avoiding her Mother's vegetable garden coming back up the other side through the hollyhocks behind the garage to where Harriett waited.  Riding the horse was so much fun, Elizabeth didn't want to get off.  But she had promised her Father that she would take turns with Harriett. And so she did.  She came back to where Harriett waited and got off the horse.  She told Harriett to ride the same places where she had ridden and helped her up onto the horse.  

Harriett rode off.  But she was 2 years younger and not as good at riding as Elizabeth.  Harriett let the horse get her too close to the cherry tree and she got smacked in the face by the branches.  And when they passed the gooseberry bushes she got her ankles scratched.  The horse went right under a branch of the apple tree and Harriett had to duck down fast! They passed the chicken yard safely enough but the clothesline was coming next!  Harriett ducked down in anticipation of coming disaster but the horse turned and went around the clothes line.  And headed for the fence of her Mother's vegetable garden!!  "Turn him to the left," yelled Elizabeth.  Harriett pulled the reins back and to the left and the horse went a little faster - straight ahead.  At the last moment, the horse turned toward the hollyhocks.  Harriett had to grab the pommel of the saddle to stay on the horse so sharply did he turn.  And they were off for the hollyhocks.  Right into the hollyhocks and through the lovely pink flowered stalks to the garage.  Then, finally, they got to the place that Elizabeth waited.  "Oh my, Harriett, you need to learn to use the reins more, you didn't even try to turn the horse until you got to the garden."  

"I was so busy getting smacked by the cherry tree and scratched by the gooseberries and ducking under the apple branch, I forgot about the reins." Harriett said, her knees shaking as she got off the horse.  "I wouldn't have remembered at the garden if you hadn't yelled to do it."

At that moment the back door opened and their Father came out, his eyes snapping.  "Girls!  Your Mother tells me her hollyhocks are trampled flat!  Have you been riding that horse over her flowers?"

Harriett looked at Elizabeth and Elizabeth looked at Harriett and they both looked at their Father.  "I d-d-d-didn't mean to, Father, the horse just kind of w-w-w-went there,"  said Harriett in a small shaky voice.

Then as their Father took a little better look at Harriett, his eyes softened and he said, "You do look a bit the worse for wear.  Perhaps we should put the horse away now."

"Oh no, oh no, we want to ride more!" said both girls together.

"Well, alright, but I think you should both ride together and Elizabeth can rein the horse.  Maybe you are still too small to ride by yourself, Harriett."  said their Father.  

And so the girls got back on the horse, Elizabeth in front and rode around the yard several times without incident.  And they were making their 5th circuit of the yard past the cherry tree, when the horse edged a bit too close to the gooseberry bushes.  But Elizabeth turned the reins and he went away from those thorny bushes and headed straight for the middle of the apple tree.  And again Elizabeth tugged on the reins and the horse turned and passed the chicken yard at the very back and headed toward the clothesline.  That horse headed straight for the clothesline and he was speeding up too.  Elizabeth tugged on the reins and the horse just kept going toward the clothesline.  Elizabeth said very loudly, "Duck down, the clothes line!"  And she ducked down.  But Harriett was looking at all the pretty hollyhocks laying on the ground and feeling sorry that she had not kept the horse out of them and she did not even hear her sister talking to her.  And that horse went right under the clothesline with Elizabeth laying down close to his neck.  Harriett stopped very quickly as the clothesline came up tight right under her chin and then stretched a little bit as the horse continued on.  And suddenly she was not on the horse any more,  she was hanging on the clothesline like a clean wet dress. Then the clothesline was springing back the other way and Harriett was going with it.  Back though the air toward her Mother's garden where she lit with a thump right in the middle of a cabbage plant.

Out of the corner of her eye, Elizabeth saw Harriett go off the back of the horse on the clothesline.  Elizabeth wondered that Harriett didn't even make a squeak as it happened.  As quickly as ever she could she turned the horse around and yelling for their Father and Mother headed back for the garden where the dazed Harriett was sitting on a cabbage plant. 

Their Father and Mother came out of the back door and ran for the vegetable garden.  "Are you alright, Harriett?" cried their Mother.  "What happened?" called their Father.  As they both started checking Harriett for damage and injury Elizabeth explained how the horse went under the clothesline and how she told her sister to "duck" but she hadn't.  And she told then how the clothesline went right under Harriett's chin and then kind of stretched forward.  And it quit stretching forward and Harriett flew backward into the garden and thumped down onto the cabbage plant.  Elizabeth saw that her Mother was close to tears as she saw that Harriett was not badly hurt and said, "Dear Mother,  did we break the cabbage?"  

Later that afternoon the Dr. had assured them all that Harriett would be fine.  She would have a sore throat for a few days but there were no broken bones and she would recover well.   Harriett was enjoying the little pad of paper they gave her to write communications.  And as the Dr. was leaving, she scribbled very quickly, "May I ride the horse, please?"

~ The End ~

Crandall Note:  Harriett was my mother.

Hope you enjoyed this little family story.  Until next time - Happy Searching!

Copyright 2011, All rights reserved

Stories

I just love a good story, don't you?  In putting this blog together I have done a lot of thinking about stories.  Family stories, the very best kind.  They are true, at least as true as a person's memory, full of humor, pathos, sympathy, empathy, sorrow, joy, anger, happiness and most of all love.  When I started down the path of looking for ancestors, I thought I would find a few stories and rubbed my hands together in expectation.  I never expected veritable river of stories and information that began to flow right to my electronic front door.    In fact, I was going down for the third time, drowning in new information when a cousin I had just met through her own constant genealogical search, grabbed me out of the uncontrolled flood and set me upon a nice dry organized path  I have found so many wonderful stories on that path that I will be sharing with you.  Many of them are my stories, many are your stories.  And if you have ever tried to find an Aunt Susie from Peoria, this is your personal story.  


If you start trying to find Aunt Susie with any seriousness at all, expect to meet new people, not just discover past family members.  There are cousins out there who like you want to find out about their family and they will find you!  That is a really good reason why you should always document ancestors you find before you decide they are a "keeper" for your family tree.  I had met and enjoyed so many cousins I never knew before.  And some I knew as a child and lost track of completely.  It has been wonderful.  And because I did document each new addition to my tree, I knew they really were my cousins.  Oh yes,  I went down a couple of wrong paths at the start.  It is so exciting when you first go into Ancestry.  It seems like it will take about a week and you will have your entire family history down.  WOW!  Whoda thunk it?  Then you discover there were really 3 Susies in Peoria and only one of them was really your missing Aunt.  Uh oh.  And that's when you learn about documentation and chasing down leads and census information and all those magical terms.  You are on the road to being a genealogical researcher and it's fun!  The discoveries are triumphs.  And it can get tedious too.  It's like popcorn.  Not all the seeds pop.  But the ones that do are really good.  I will look forward to your comments.  I will guide some future scribblings from them so let me know what are your likes and interests.  If I don't have direct experience with them, I can guarantee that I have friends who do.  Happy searching.