[cs_content][cs_element_section _id=”1″][cs_element_row _id=”2″][cs_element_column _id=”3″][x_custom_headline level=”h2″ looks_like=”h3″ accent=”false” class=”cs-ta-center”]Originatly written 6 April 2011[/x_custom_headline][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”10″][cs_element_row _id=”11″][cs_element_column _id=”12″][cs_text _order=”0″]Only two couples, Ted and Ester Mills and Bert and Dave Brown span the life time of my parents. The other folks described here all come from the period when we lived near Walterville on the McKenzie River and in Springfield. I was just a bit more than 11 years old when we moved to the acre at Hendricks Bridge. We were living there when I graduated from high-school in 1954. Shortly after my graduation we moved to Springfield to the house on third street.
Other folks that I admired were mostly teachers at Wichita Elementary School near Milwaukie, Oregon and from Springfield High School in Springfield, Oregon.
[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”19″][cs_element_row _id=”20″][cs_element_column _id=”21″][cs_text _order=”0″]Ted and Esther Mills. Woodbine to Oregon to California.
Ted helped Mom and Dad move from Woodbine to Oregon in 1940. Ted was an entrepreneur and speculator. Had the Mountain Store on Broadway in Portland, a portable sand and gravel operation, managed/owned apartments in Eugene, eventually retired to Palm Desert/Palm Springs (?) California. Always owned big, fancy automobiles. Remember a 1948/9 Packard. Had a large, but stubborn Airdale that Ted used to walk by holding onto a leash through the window while he drove around the city. Would carry a beer bottle in the front seat to whack the dog across the snout when it refused to obey.
[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”28″][cs_element_row _id=”29″][cs_element_column _id=”30″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Bert and Dave Brown. Substitute family, virtual aunt and uncle. Work model
Perhaps two of the most important people in our life and family as we were growing up are Bert (Roberta) and Dave Brown. Bert and Dave were natives of Portland, Dave had been born there and Bert lived nearly all her life there.
We came to know the Browns during the war when Dad worked with Dave at Albina Machine and Engine works. I am not sure what Dave did, but Dad was a pipe-fitter who worked on LSI-L (Landing Ship, Infantry-Large). Bert and Dave lived south of Portland in the Wichita District of Milwaukie where Dave had a small nursery. I think to help pay for the gas driving back and forth to the ship-yard, Dave needed riders to provide the necessary gas rationing stamps to cover his costs of driving. At any rate we all became very good friends
We would visit the Browns when we needed to get out of the city. At the end of the war, Dave brought to Dad’s attention a rental property on Stanley Avenue behind the Brown’s place on Wichita Avenue. This was a three bedroom house with shed, garage on five acres of land. I describe this in another section related to the places that I have lived.
Bert and Dave became essentially surrogate family for us. Mom and Dad’s parents lived in Woodbine, Iowa, Dad’s sister and her family were also in Woodbine, Dad’s brother and his new wife lived in Seattle. Mom’s brother and sisters were also in the mid-west – Illinois and Iowa. Uncle John and Aunt Grace (Dad’s brother) were the closest in space, but we were not a terribly close family and saw them infrequently as I was growing up.
The Browns, perhaps by default, became our family. We lived near them from 1945 to until 1947 when we moved to the place on the McKenzie River east of Springfield. My brother, sister and I spent a lot of time with the Browns. We would pick up milk at a dairy (Senn Dairy) a bit further up Wichita Avenue and had to walk through the Brown’s place to get there. The Brown’s home was at the end of Wichita and to the south of them was the “swamp.”
Bert and Dave had no children of their own (at that time) and we sort of became their adopted kids. We would celebrate birthdays together and came to know Dave’s two brothers quite well. These brothers both served in the Navy during WWII. Dave was the oldest, Karl was next and Harry was the youngest. Harry lived with Bert and Dave while he went to school. The Brown boys mother had died quite young and Dave’s father had been blind for some time and had a difficult time providing enough to raise the two younger boys. I still recall the consternation when Harry joined the Navy toward the end of the war. Bert was concerned that he was much too young to be in the Navy and to be placed in harm’s way. Karl had served in the Navy during the war and was discharged briefly at the end of the War but went back into the Army during the Korean conflict. He eventually developed enough service time that he made this his career. During one of Karl’s tours of duty in Korea he met and married a Korean woman.
Bert was a constant and caring “aunt” for Mary, William and I. My youngest brother was called William until he was in the third grade and some began calling him “Willie,” immediately Mom insisted that he be known from then on as Bill because no son of hers was going to be called WILLIE. The Browns helped our family when times got tough and they gave us “jobs” as we were growing up.
About the time we moved to Wichita from Portland, Dave left his job in the ship-yard and moved full time into the nursery business. He had all along been growing hybrid tea-roses for the commercial market and doing quite well. Dave was very conscientious about his work and the quality of his product, the net was that he was sought out by distributors for his roses. To expand his nursery business, he decided to clear the wood lot to the north of the house of the fir trees that were there.
Everyone in the area heated and cooked with wood, though in Portland we had heated the house with coal. The trees that were cut from the wood lot were converted to stove/heater sized pieces and stacked to dry. Bill, Mary and I were “hired” to stack that wood. We were very proud of our effort and the success of our first “job.”
Later I would spend a summer living with Bert and Dave and working in the rose patch. Here I learned the art of inserting a hybrid tea-rose bud into the slot cut into the root stock and wrapping it tight with a rubber-band. This process was called “budding” in the industry. Dave would do the actual budding, I would come along after him, wrapping the bud to hold it tight against the parent plant so that it would eventually bond with it.
This was a fascinating process. I would first go along the row of root stock and scratch away the soil to expose the stem just below the soil line. The next step was to cut the “T” in the stem, and insert the bud from bloom stocks that had been selected from fully grown plants from the previous year. Each of these “sticks” would have a half dozen or so buds. The sticks had been selected earlier, the thorns removed and they had been stored in cool place and wrapped with damp cloth to keep them from drying out.
Dave was a taciturn individual but did enjoy others company. However, he also was very sparing of words. I still recall his advice to me when we were driving between the Brown’s home and rose fields: “If you don’t have anything important to say, then don’t say it.” In other words stop the idle prattle.
That summer we would get up early and eat a hearty breakfast. Bert would prepare lunches for us to take to the field. These were super sandwiches that generally consisted of a slice of roast beef, tomatoes, dill pickles, cheddar cheese and lettuce. A well-crafted sandwich was often nearly an inch and half thick – a challenge to get your mouth around! These were very filling and something to look forward to.
Toward the end of that summer Dave decided that I had become knowledgeable enough to drive his small John Deere tractor on a field that needed to be harrowed. I was very excited and very proud that he trusted me enough to do this task. I merrily went back and forth over the field, breaking up the clods that were created when the field was initially plowed. At the end of the day I drove the tractor back to the barn to put it away and shut it down. Oops! It would not stop, it went into what I later learned was “dieseling” mode. I had not been watching the temperature gauge and had allowed the radiator to run dry. The engine was so hot that even without the electrical impulse it continued to run. I was panicked and very sure that I had ruined the tractor. Dave just calmly got a water hose out and began to run cool water over the radiator until the engine cooled down a bit and then he began to add water to the radiator. Eventually the engine cooled enough that it stopped running. Dave assured me again and again that I had not ruined the engine. He was right, he continued to use that tractor for many more years.
Both Dad and Dave smoked at that time and they both liked to drink of a bit of bourbon. When Bert and Dave came down from Milwaukie to visit us Dad and Dave would take lawn chairs out and sit, talk, smoke and drink. Often they did not talk a lot but just sat and enjoyed one another’s company. The bottle was always close at hand and the glasses quickly filled as they emptied or got low on fluid. Often this would result in both getting a bit or even very drunk which did not please either Mom or Bert.
Bill, Mary and I would often get on a Greyhound bus in Eugene and ride it up US 99E to Milwaukie. There was not a bus station in Milwaukie, but the driver would drop passengers at a drugstore along the highway where they would meet their hosts or whoever was picking them up. We kids always tried to get a seat as close to the front of the bus and often that was the one right behind the driver. On one trip the driver was having fun with us and kept kidding us about looking for a “sky-blue-pink” pick-up. We did find the pick-up truck and he helped us get our stuff off the bus and into Dave’s new pale blue Chevrolet pick-up.
Dave was a Chevrolet man, I don’t think he ever owned any other kind of car. He also always had a car that was fairly knew. All during the war he drove a 1937 Chevy sedan that he traded in for a new car once the war was over – a 1947 Chevrolet. In 1949 he bought a pick-up that was his pride and joy – it was a “five-window” cab – the windshield, side windows, a rear window and two curved windows in the pillars on the back of the cab.
In addition to his nursery business, Dave was the meter reader for the local water district. He would drive the route and read the meter and record the readings. One summer I had the privilege of driving that pick-up on the route so he could hop out, get the reading, walk on to the next meter without having to walk back to where he had left the pick-up.
Bert and Dave adopted two boys who were about 8 and 10 years old. They raised Jim and Lee and involved them early in the nursery business. In a way the arrival of the two boys really ended my close association with Bert and Dave, though by this time I had gone on to the University and then into the Army.
In the late 50s Dave sold the property in Wichita and bought considerable acreage out at Mollala. Here he set up a full nursery business, growing all kinds of shrubs, trees and vines. He built that into one of the larger and most respected nurseries in the state. His reputation for fairness and quality led to his heading up the Oregon Nurseryman’s Association for several years. His sons eventually took over the business and still run it.
When Dave sold/transferred the business to his sons, he and Bert moved to a home in Clackamas where they lived for ten years or so. Eventually their health declined and they moved on to an assisted living facility where they could be independent but had access to necessary medical facilities should they need their services.
Dave’s father lived in Portland along Powell, his father was blind – a consequence of a failed cataract surgery. Dave was very faithful and caring of his father, always going to visit him at least once a week. I remember going along with him one time when we picked up his father at the neighborhood bar and took him home. His father was a rugged, good sized man who valued his independence and got about the neighborhood quite well with his white-cane. He always wore a felt hat and had his head tipped back as if he were trying to see you.
Every year I received a birthday card from Bert and an anniversary card after Mary Lee and I were married – a card came without fail wherever I lived – Springfield, Washington, DC, Germany, Eugene and Colorado. Dave died a few years before Bert and after that Bert’s memory began to fail. The last few years of her life I did not receive cards from her and I am not sure that she knew who I was at that time.
Their passing left a huge void in our lives. They had very much been a part of our family and I like to believe that we were also a very important part of their family over the span of some 50 years. [/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”37″][cs_element_row _id=”38″][cs_element_column _id=”39″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Ivan Collins. draftsman, orchardist, farmer and model craftsman.
I am not entirely sure at this time in my life when and under what circumstances our family came to know Ivan Collins. Ivan owned an acreage in Cedar Flat, actually just east of the junction of Cedar Flat Road and the McKenzie Highway. Mr. Collins place consisted of a small house, a garage, a workshop and perhaps 20 to 30 acres of filberts. We may have come to know the family because we helped rake and sack filberts in the fall.
Sometime after 1947, when we moved from Milwaukie to our place on the McKenzie River at Hendricks Bridge, Mom went to work for Ross and Merle Behner at their Richfield service station in Cedar Flat, just across the highway from Mr. Collins home. We may have made the connection there.
In any event we came to know the Collins family and were often invited to their home. Mr. Collins was a draftsman for the University of Oregon and worked in their physical plant, drawing plans for classrooms and smaller additions to building or remodeling projects for existing buildings on the campus.
Mr. Collins’ passion was the recording and preservation of horse drawn vehicles: wagons, traps, coaches and so forth. He would travel about the country in search of examples which he would carefully document and then create plans for their construction.
His shop consisted of a set of tools and devices all built to recreate the famous, exotic and common carriages and wagons in miniature. Every detail of a vehicle was carefully drawn and then reproduced in miniature, often using techniques and tools very like those used to build and maintain the real article. He made a tool that would bend the metal tire for the wheels that was an exact replica of the one used by wagon makers for the full sized vehicle. The wheels were carefully constructed from wood, with spokes, hub and rim in the same manner as their larger originals. The “iron” tires were then forged, heated and fitted to the wooden rim, just as their full-sized counter part would have been.
Fancy carriages such as the Hansom Cab were then very meticulously finished using materials, paints and lacquers used on the larger vehicle. These miniatures were made to one-eighth scale and matched their “parent” in every detail. They would include appropriate lamps that worked, safes containing actual gold-dust, a beer barrel filled with beer. The cross-country wagons used by pioneers coming to Oregon contained Snake River water in their water barrels!
When we visited Mr. Collins and his shop he had about 25 or 30 carriages, wagons, cabs and other vehicles all completed and standing on display around the workshop area. In 1945 Mr Collins was a foreman in the Lockheed Aircraft Plant in Glendale, California when his miniatures were brought to the attention of America by a brief story and photos of his work in Life Magazine (April 30, 1945, page 8, Speaking of pictures). The text that accompanied this display stated that “After ten years of making these things [miniatures], he is looking for a patron who will finance him so he won’t have to do anything else. Collins’ ambition is to finish 100 of these before he dies.” Mr. Collins was 39 at the time.
In the late 1953 his work was again brought to the attention of America through an article published in Popular Science (see the July 1953 edition, pages 84 and following). By this time he had left California and was employed by the University of Oregon.
Toward the end of his work career he moved from draftsman in the physical plant to craftsman in his own shop in the basement of the Erb Memorial Student Union on campus. Mr Collins was then employed by the University to continue his work on the miniatures till his death in 1971.
Mr. Collins appeared to me to be a large, cuddly bear of a man. He had a head of full dark hair, marked with distinguishing streaks of white. He nearly always carried a pipe and smelled very comfortably of pipe smoke and tobacco. Perhaps this is what keeps him in my mind as it would have been very similar impression of my Grandfather.
Mr. Collins was a very humble man, but a very, very skilled craftsman. He was always very pleased to share this knowledge and skills with anyone who asked. As the article in Popular Science suggests, he would move very slowly across the country as he checked old barns and sheds for the remnants of vehicles that were a part of our historic past. His passion and purpose was to document these icons of early American life before they vanished entirely from the scene.
A record of his work and display of his detailed miniatures can be found at the Oregon Historical Society Museum in Portland, Oregon.[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”46″][cs_element_row _id=”47″][cs_element_column _id=”48″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Mrs. Blackburn. Principal, teacher, friend.
In 1945 our family moved from our flat on Grand Avenue in Portland to an acreage east of Milwaukie, an area known as Wichita. I had completed the first three grades at Holladay school before we transferred to Wichita.
Wichita Elementary school was overseen by a woman who upon first sight appeared to be overwhelming: Mrs Blackburn. Mrs Blackburn was the principal of the school, taught 6th grade and penmanship for all students. We would be released from our classroom to go to Mrs Blackburn’s room where we would be drilled for an hour in the intricacies of the Palmer Method. This script is full of flourishes and fancy curls.
Mrs. Blackburn was a tall woman – at least to a 4th grader. Her dark hair was carefully permed to fit close to her head. She commanded attention and received it as well. She was a firm believer that all children could learn and must learn the Palmer Method of cursive writing.
I had learned to write at Holladay school in Portland and had a passable cursive style for that age and skill. I had also learned to write a single loop ‘e,’ that was quick, efficient and recognizable. However, Mrs Blackburn insisted on the three loop ‘e,’ particularly at the end of a word. I had a great deal of difficulty with the fancy loops and forms of the letters, especially the capital ‘M,” ‘N,’ and ‘W.’ For reference see the second ‘W” in the examples to the right. Perhaps because of this difficulty, I frequently would practice page after page of a particular letter that was giving me trouble. I continued to do this long, long after I left the purview of Mrs Blackburn.
Mrs. Blackburn appeared to be very stern and very proper, which she indeed was. However she had a love of teaching and also of her students. She would show a kind and gentle side to any who were hurting or troubled and would guide them through the rough spot, encouraging them to always do the best that they could. Though I never had her as my primary classroom teacher the two years that I was at Wichita, I can still hear her booming voice and feel her commanding presence.
My two classroom teachers at Wichita were Mrs Williamson, 4th grade and Mrs. Cody, 5th grade. Both were good teachers and kept us on task.[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”55″][cs_element_row _id=”56″][cs_element_column _id=”57″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Frank Ellefson. Teacher, band-master at Springfield High School.
Uncle Bill, Mom’s only brother gave us his silver and gold Martin trombone which mom said I could play in high-school, but first I had to learn to play the piano. I took lessons from Mrs. Marlat who lived in the last house on the road before it went into the Scott farm at the end of the road. At this time (1947 to 1954) we lived at Hendrick’s Bridge and a gravel road the went west from the McKenzie highway[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”64″][cs_element_row _id=”65″][cs_element_column _id=”66″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Miss Wilson. Teacher and task master (taught advanced math at Springfield high-school).
She was disappointed that I did not go beyond advanced algebra at Springfield High-school. I enjoyed her class in advanced algebra but gave it up in my junior year so that I could work on the school newspaper and play trombonein the marching band and orchestra that year
She did write me a good reference letter when I applied to the University of Oregon.
Much later when I returned to graduate school in Sociology at the University of Oregon, I came to regret that decision as I struggled to learn and understand statistical mathematics[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”73″][cs_element_row _id=”74″][cs_element_column _id=”75″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Mr Reed. Neighbor and friend.
A bachelor who bought the acreage across the road from us and lived in a little house just a few hundred feet from the McKenzie River. Had an orchard of filberts that was never cared for nor harvested in the time we lived there. He made a point of picking up the three of us (my sister, bother and I) and taking us to Sunday school at the small Walterville Presbyterian church.[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][cs_element_section _id=”82″][cs_element_row _id=”83″][cs_element_column _id=”84″][cs_text _order=”0″]
Mrs Willan. widow of mill owner, cut, stacked, stored wood for her.
She was Sunday school teacher at local mission church in Walterville. Had lived at Walterville since the very early 1900s, described crossing the river in late summer and fall in a Model-T Ford by fording the river in the vicinity of the Hendrick’s Bridge. Her husband had built and operated the sawmill near where her home was, that sawmill was steam powered at the time we moved to the valley in 1947. Eventually she sold the mill to the Zabriski family who continued to run the mill and to log in the valley to supply the mill with timber to cut.
I often thought that the Zabriski’s may have been a bit of a model of the Stamper family in Ken Kesey’s book about gyppo logging in Sometimes a Great Notion.[/cs_text][/cs_element_column][/cs_element_row][/cs_element_section][/cs_content]