Waldron Cemetery Family Gravestones

The Waldron Cemetery in Waldron, Michigan

My sister Joy.

Dad and Mom

Aunt June was Dad's sister.

Frank was my cousin who died in infancy. He was the son of Clair and Martha (Newcomer) Merrifield. Aunt Martha was Dad's sister.

My Grandparents, Guy and Sadie (Gray) Newcomer.

Rex Eugene Newcomer

Rex E. Newcomer
August 10, 1917 - December 20, 2012

Rex E. Newcomer, 95, of Waldron, Michigan passed away, Thursday, December 20, 2012, at Hospice of Lenawee County in Adrian, Michigan. He was born August 10, 1917, in Waldron, Michigan the son of Guy and Sarah (Gray) Newcomer. He married Mildred M. Bavin on March 20, 1943, in Waldron, Michigan and she preceded him in death on December 5, 2012.

Rex graduated from Waldron High School, Class of 1935, was a lifelong farmer and retired from Daisy Parts in Hillsdale in 1982, with many years of service, was the Wright Township Treasurer for 6 years, Wright Township Supervisor for 10 years and a member of Waldron Church of Christ. He and Mildred wintered in Arizona for many years and his hobbies included golfing and woodworking.

Surviving Rex is one daughter, Carol M. Newcomer and her husband, Michael Cox of Morenci, Michigan; two sons, John M. (Carol D.) Newcomer of Chantilly, Virginia and James W. "Bill" (Nancy) Newcomer of Ada, Michigan; eight grandchildren, twelve great-grandchildren and several step-grandchildren and step-great grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his parents, wife, one daughter, Joy Anne Newcomer, four sisters, Martha Merrifield, Gladys McCully, Florence Ruffer and June Newcomer.

Funeral services for Rex Newcomer will be Sunday, December 23, 2012 at 3:00 p.m. at the Waldron Church of Christ with Minister Don Crain officiating. Interment will follow in the Waldron Cemetery. Visitation will be at the Waldron Church of Christ on Saturday from 4 p.m. until 7 p.m.

Those planning an expression of sympathy may make memorial contributions to the Waldron District Library or the Waldron Church of Christ. Arrangements were entrusted to Eagle Funeral Home in Waldron.

(Eagle Funeral Homes)

Mildred Marie (Bavin) Newcomer

Mildred M. Newcomer
January 29, 1920 - December 5, 2012

Mildred M. Newcomer, 92, of Waldron, Michigan passed away, Wednesday, December 5, 2012, at her home. She was born January 29, 1920, in Ransom Township, Michigan the daughter of Cecil and Dollie (Britton) Bavin. She married Rex E. Newcomer on March 20, 1943, in Waldron, Michigan and he survives.

Mildred graduated from Pittsford High School in 1937, attended Wayne State University for three years and graduated from Hillsdale College with a Teaching Certificate. Mildred taught school for 31 years, 29 in the Waldron Area Schools.. Mildred attended the Waldron Church of Christ and her hobbies included painting, gardening, and reading.

Surviving Mildred besides her husband, Rex of Waldron, Michigan is one daughter, Carol M. Newcomer and her husband, Michael Cox of Morenci, Michigan; two sons, John M. (Carol D.) Newcomer of Chantillly, Virginia and James W. "Bill" (Nancy) Newcomer of Ada, Michigan; one sister, Gela Vreeland of Somerset Center, Michigan; one brother, George (Doris) Bavin of Pittsford, Michigan; eight grandchildren, twelve great grandchildren and several step grandchildren and step great grandchildren. She was preceded in death by her parents, one daughter, Joy Anne Newcomer, one sister, Joyce Stubli and one brother, Robert Bavin.

Funeral services for Mildred Newcomer will be Saturday, December 8, 2012, at 11:00 a.m. at Waldron Church of Christ with Minister Don Crane officiating. Interment will follow in Waldron Cemetery. Visitation will be at the Waldron Church of Christ on Friday from 4 p.m until 7 p.m.

Those planning an expression of sympathy may make memorial contributions to Waldron District Library or Waldron Church of Christ. Arrangements were entrusted to Eagle Funeral Home in Waldron.

Eagle Funeral Homes

The Last Ride

A little ritual had kind of developed between Dad and I over the last several years before his passing. We would go down to visit Mom and Dad. Sometime during the visit, I would take Dad for a ride. Usually those rides were around the more immediate rural area of the Michigan-Ohio border where they lived. The trips were of varying length, but served several purposes. It was a chance for Dad to get out of the house. It was a chance for us to talk about things; to have a father-son time. It was also an opportunity for me to see what was going on around the stomping grounds of my youth; to see how so many things had changed and how a few things had stayed the same; a way of reconnecting with my roots.

Those rides became more important as Mom's health and mind began to fail. On those rides Dad would tell me how Mom was doing. I could get first hand from him what was going on as the two of them aged and that aging slowly sapped their strength and vitality. We would discuss what some of their options were. It was a chance for me to reinforce some of the concerns and issues my sister had discussed with me regarding Mom and Dad's health and care. Dad needed the time out of and away from the house. He needed the respite from the care and worry over his now invalid wife.

It was this past November (2012) and the Thanksgiving Holiday was coming up. It had been more then a few months since our last visit to Mom and Dad, and I knew we really needed to make that two and half hour trip down to see them. The Friday after Thanksgiving would be the best time to go, and so it was the plans were made. That Friday morning my wife and I made the trip down to see Mom and Dad.

Mom was laying in the hospital bed set up in the living room. She was not able to stand at all. She was at the point where an aid was coming in just about every day , and Hospice was checking in a couple of times a week. She was not fully "there" in her mind though able to carry on limited conversation. She was still at the point where someone would move her to a wheelchair and bring her into the dining room to eat at the table with the rest of us. As it was, we would have to help her eat.

At some point in the afternoon, Dad and I went for our drive. As usual, I would drive and dad would sit there in the front passenger seat. We went to town and drove around the village. Dad had me drive around by the grain elevator so he could see the new office and scales, and the new grain silo bin that had recently been erected. We went through the cemetery by the stone marking my oldest sister's grave, and the stone with Mom and Dad's names on it, but at that time with only the years of birth.

We drove out north of town, swung east a mile then north again to the other near by village in the area that was also part of the local school district. In that small village we passed by the old school building where I had gone to kindergarten. The decrepit condition of that abandoned school building was an indicative statement of how the whole area of that broader rural community had changed. We turned west at the main corner and wandered through the country side until we found ourselves back at Mom and Dad's house.

I played the memory game with Momma. "Do you remember when we would go to the Britton reunions at the old Grange hall?" "Do you remember when we would go up north to the lake for vacation?" Yes, she remembered, and she remembered those things happened a long time ago.

My last meal with my mother was that evening's supper. I sat there and was spoon feeding her, much like she had done to me so many years ago when I was the baby. After supper my wife and I left for the two and half hour trip back to our home. A week and a half later we got the phone call. Momma had died at the age of 92. That Thanksgiving Friday had been my last visit with her.

Two weeks and one day after Momma died, Daddy died at the age of 95. I got to see him two days before he died and that was good. But then he was invalid and there was no thought of going for our ritual ride together. It dawned on me today, some few weeks later, that the Thanksgiving Friday was not only the last time I saw Momma alive, but it was also when Daddy and I went on our last ride together.

RIP Mom and Dad...

(Cross posted to The Billy Goat Blog.)

The Newcomer - Tedrow Family

It has been my intent for some time to write a post about the Newcomer - Tedrow connection, with a special reference to the Newcomer - Tedrow - Oates line.

Mary I. Newcomer was born on July 6, 1886, the youngest child of George D. Newcomer and his second wife Malinda (Mikesell) Newcomer. She married Clair Tedrow, and I have record of three sons:




Robert Wave Tedrow (Nov 26, 1909 - May 28, 1996)
Roy Earl Tedrow (Oct. 6, 1911 - Jan. 4, 1940)
George Monroe Tedrow

My father's dad was Mary's brother, Guy Vernon Newcomer. I have memory as a young lad of our going to visit one of dad's Tedrow cousins on their farm near Delta, Ohio.

Robert Wave Tedrow married Julia Elisabeth Willeman. They had five children:

Paul Eugene Tedrow
Dorothy Jane Tedrow
Mary Ann Tedrow
John Robert Tedrow (1940 - 1969)
Thomas Clair Tedrow

Roy Earl Tedrow married Eunice Johnson. They had two sons:

James Earl Tedrow
Richard Clair Tedrow

George Monroe Tedrow married Helen Garber. They had four children:

David Tedrow
Michael Tedrow
Jerry Lee Tedrow
Carol Tedrow

The above gives a basic outline of the Tedrow families connected to my Newcomer line. I now want to look at the Tedrow - Oates part of the family, as I have a particular connection with the Oates family.

Dorethy Jane Tedrow, daughter of Robert and Julia (Willeman) Tedrow, married Raymond Oates. They had a farm just north of Hartley Rd. on US-127 (Meridian Rd.) near Waldron, Michigan.

A big part of Raymond's farm business was selling hay to horse farms in the south; North Carolina sticks in my mind as one of the places he shipped hay to. He would go to local farmers in the area and cut a deal to buy the hay out of their field. He did the cutting and the baling, then would load the hay on semi trailers to be hauled to the buyers down south.

In 1967, the summer after I had graduated from high school, Raymond had bought some hay out of one of my father's fields. As it was, I needed a summer job to fill in until I went off to college in the fall, and Raymond needed an extra hand. So it was I spent the summer working in the hay fields, loading wagons, off loading into semi trailers, or stacking bales in the barn hay loft. By the end of the summer I was in the best physical shape of my adult life.

It was also in that summer I got to meet their children; Betty, Barbara, Ron, Bonnie, Beth, and Brenda. They were pretty young then, and I suspect they don't remember who I was. For myself, though I knew we were remotly connected somehow, at the time I didn't make the connection that "Mrs. Oates" was my 2nd cousin, and all these little kids were also part of "my family".

I went on to college and the rest of my life. Those "little kids" grew up, and recently I connected with Betty via Facebook. That summer job working for Raymond Oates was my first "real" job outside of our farm. It marked a turning point in my life as I transitioned from my high school teen years to adulthood.

One November Day

(Though I've published this elswhere, it fits well with the memoiers intent of this site.)

As I remember it, that autumn had been relatively mild. By mid-November most of the corn fields had already been picked. The leaves on the trees had dropped some weeks before. It was a time in that interlude when the high school football season, for better or for worse, was history, but the basketball season was yet to start.

For those of us in our relatively quiet rural Southern Michigan community, it was a time of routine leading up to the Thanksgiving holiday. Our community was somewhat off the beaten path; a good hour away from any big cities, and not on any major highways. There was a certain degree of isolation. TV, radio and the newspapers were the vehicles that brought the outside world into our midst. There were the vacations that would occasionally take us outside our normal boundaries. Also from time to time there might be a day trip to Toledo or Jackson, or maybe even Fort Wayne, but for most of us growing up in that rural area, the rest of the world was "out there".

That Friday started off like any other normal Friday. I got up early and went out to do what farm chores needed to be done. Sometime or other in the course of the usual morning ritual, I had breakfast, and got ready for school. Then it was off to school. The morning classes went by, and the lunch hour came. So far it had been a pretty ordinary normal day, one among the many others at that time of our lives.

Sometime around 1 PM or so, I and my fellow high school Freshmen classmates were in our Science class. For some reason our regular teacher was out for the day. Mrs. Welling was filling in as the substitute teacher. Mrs. Welling and her husband were retired teachers. Sometime in her life Mrs. Welling had received a certain amount of musical training. She directed one of the local church choirs, and occasionally sang special numbers. She was a petite slender lady which contributed to the nickname of "Mrs. Canary Legs" which we students sometimes callously called her, but not ever to her face or in the hearing of other adults. In truth she was a pretty nice lady. In all the times she substituted for the teacher in any of my classes, I never remember her saying any unkind words to any student, or ever in any way speaking sharply or roughly to any class at large.

I do not remember what the exact time was. It most probably was around 1:45 PM our local EST. I have no memory of what we were specifically doing in class at that time. Mrs. Welling may have been speaking to some aspect of Science, or we may have been doing some in class study time. We heard the school PA system come on. The PA system was always used for announcements of some kind or another related to school activities. In my mind, that was the expectation at that time. However, what we heard was something much different then anything we had ever heard on that PA system before. We realized the voice we were hearing was not that of the high school Principle, or the Superintendent, or any of the teachers. It was a voice on a radio. I don't remember the exact words, but to the best of my recollection they were:

"......We repeat. President John F. Kennedy has been shot while riding in a motorcade in Dallas, Texas.... At approximately 12:30 PM local time, the President of the United States was shot...."

We sat there as the radio broadcast continued over the PA system. It took several minutes to process the meaning of the words we were hearing. Assassinations are things that only happen in history, such as in the Lincoln assassination. They are not suppose to happen in our United States of America of 1963. How could this be? What was going on? Even then there was a certain detachment from what we were hearing, as though listening to some kind of fictional account.

But it was not fiction. It was real. It was actually happening! Any thought of continuing with the Science class was totally erased from everyone's mind. We just sat there listening. It was about 20 minutes after we first heard the news of the shooting when the voice on the radio announced a news update bulletin had just come in.

"President John F. Kennedy died at approximately 1 p.m. Central Standard Time today here in Dallas. He died of a gunshot wound in the brain."

We were stunned. Mrs. Welling had tears in her eyes. In the wisdom and perspective of her older years, she much more fully comprehended the meaning, importance, and impact of what we were hearing. She had already in her lifetime witnessed December 7, 1941 when the shocking news came through that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. In contrast, we as students in our youthful inexperience and naivete could hardly comprehend the tragic historic moment we were listening to over that PA system.

At some point the buzzer rang to signal the end of the class session. We left the classroom as in a daze. Any conversations in the hallway were subdued. We were struggling to comprehend what we had heard, what it all meant, and what was going to happen.

My last class of the day was Phys. Ed. We went to the gym, but no one bothered getting ready for gym class. We just sat there on the bleachers or wandered around the gym aimlessly, talking quietly among ourselves. At one point one of my classmates, in a demonstration of youthful folly, made a smart-aleck remark about cancelling school because the President was shot. The Phys. Ed. teacher angrily and curtly told him to just shut up.

Finally the school day ended. We headed home. My mother was a teacher at the school, so she had heard the news in the same way we had. My dad had also heard the news. The normal afternoon TV shows we liked to watch were cancelled. All the TV and radio stations were focused on the assassination. We started hearing the name Lee Harvey Oswald mentioned. He was now in the custody of the Dallas Police Department. President Kennedy's body was being flown back to Washington, DC aboard Air Force 1. Lynden Johnson had taken the oath of office, and was now President of the United States.

Saturday morning dawned. We did our usual farm chores, but I don't remember doing much else that day. The news came that President Kennedy's funeral would be on Monday, and there would be no school that day. Lee Harvey Oswald was still in the custody of the Dallas Police Department. The only thing else I remember about that Saturday was that it was sunny with mostly clear skies.

In looking back at that time, it's the routine details of your life you don't remember. Sunday morning came. I had probably gone to church that morning, but have no memory of it. I would have got back home a little before Noon, our local EST. What I do remember was watching the TV coverage of the assassination, funeral preparations, the public viewing of the closed casket in the rotunda of the Capital building, and all the rest.

Then the network broke away to the coverage in Dallas, Texas where the Dallas police were about to transfer Lee Harvey Oswald from the police headquarters to the county jail. There on the black and white screen in front of me, I saw police officers escorting a man into the basement of the police headquarters. Then another man stepped quickly forward and shots rang out. It was 11:21 am local CST, Sunday, November 24, 1963. As he was about to be taken to the Dallas County Jail, Lee Harvey Oswald was fatally shot before live television cameras in the basement of the Dallas Police Headquarters by Jack Ruby. I was watching the whole thing on TV. I along with millions of other Americans saw it happen right before our eyes. It was surreal, as if in a dream.

Ruby was immediately taken into custody. What was going on? This stuff happens in fictional movies and TV shows, but this was real life. Two murders in two days! I don't remember watching any more TV that day. I may have, but that scene from the basement of the Dallas Police Headquarters remains etched forever in my memory.

Monday November 25, was President John F. Kennedy's funeral. In our part of Michigan, it was another sunny day with mostly clear skies. I may have watched bits and pieces of the funeral on TV, but I remember very little. A few years in the future, in 1969, my college roommate and I would visit Washington, DC. While there, we would cross the Potomac River to the Arlington National Cemetery and visit the grave site where the eternal flame was burning. But that is another story for another time.

After the President's funeral, at some point school resumed. The Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays came and went. A new year began. We would go on with our lives, but for each of us who lived through that tragic historical time, our lives would never ever be the same after that one tragic fatal November day in 1963.

(Written by J. William Newcomer. Copyright © April 2010. All rights reserved.)

Remembering Mickey Mantle's Big Hit

(This is being reposted from one of my other blogs. I think it is a story that fits well with the intent of "The Neukomment Files".)

Late August 1961, it was the summer between 6th and 7th grade, and my last summer of Little League Baseball. That day all us Little League ball players from our small rural Southern Michigan town packed into the school bus and were off to Tiger Stadium in Detroit to watch our favorite Detroit Tigers take on those NY Yankees.

That small rural town was several hours from Detroit, and as such, it was a rare treat for any of us to see a Major league baseball game first hand. We listened to the Tiger games over the radio with George Kell and Ernie Harwell calling the games. Those were the years when Al Kaline, Rocky Colavito, Norm Cash, Jake Wood, and Jim Bunning, among others were our heros.

That summer of 1961 was also the time when Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris were chasing Babe Ruth's home run record.

When we got to the stadium we were seated out in the center field section of the stands. The Yankees were out warming up, and there he was right in front of us; Mickey Mantle! And over in right field was Roger Maris! The two guys who all season long had been hitting all those home runs!

We started yelling "Hey Mickey!"... He turned and waved. He caught a ball, (it must have come from Yogi Berra in left?). We called out to him to throw the ball up to us. He made a motion like he was going to do just that but that ball returned to his glove and Mickey returned to his warmup. We were in awe. What a guy!

The game started. In the course of the game both Mantle and Maris hit home runs. I don't rememeber what inning it was when Mickey was at bat and hit that 2nd (as I rememeber) home run. I can still hear in my mind the crack of his bat hitting that pitch. We heard that crack all the way out in the center field stands. We watched the ball rise as it headed out towards right field. It keep going up and up and up. It was over the outfield fence and still going up. It cleared the stands and even then was still going up.

Was it going to hit the wall? No!!!

It cleared the wall and was out of the stadium! Mickey Mantle had just hit a home run out of Tiger Stadium, and from our center field seats we had the perfect view of it all the way up and out!

As I recall, the Yankees won the game and afterwards we climbed into the school bus and headed back to our small rural Michigan community. The memory of Mickey interacting with us during the warmups; the memory of that "out of the stadium" home run remain in my memory to this day. We had seen someone who was to us, one of baseball's larger then life heros. And even though most of us remained loyal Tiger fans, Mickey Mantle had a special place in our hearts and memories.

I am well aware that in latter years, after his retirement from baseball, Mantle had some struggles and failures in his personal life. For myself, those things do not take away from who he was as a major league baseball player, nor from what his presence met for the game. For us who as youngsters saw him play the game, Mickey Mantle was and remains a great baseball player and hero.

RIP

Official Mickey Mantle Website

(Up to 1961, the Detroit stadium had been known as Brigg's Stadium. 1961 was the first year it went by the new name of Tiger Stadium.)

Guy Vernon Newcomer (1879 - 1940)

OBITUARY

Guy Vernon Newcomer was born August 17, 1879 near Wauseon, Ohio, the son of George D. and Melinda Newcomer.

In 1901 he was married to Miss Sadie Gray of Fayette, O. To this union were born five children. The first ten years they made their home near Wauseon. In December 1910 they moved to the present home near Waldron, Mich.

He was an active member in the Masonic lodge and for four years was worshipful master of Leonard lodge No. 266, F. & A. M. At the time of his death he was a member of the school board of the White district.

After an illness of several months, he passed away Tuesday, May 7, 1940, age 60 years.

Survivng him are his widow, five children, Mrs. Clare Merrifield, Montpelier, Ohio; Mrs. Nathan McCully of Midland, Mich.; Mrs. Lawerence Ruffer of Waldron and Rex and June at home; two sisters, Mrs. E. C. Lee of Waldron and Mrs. Clare Tedrow of Delta, O., and nine grand children and many friends.

_______________

CARD OF THANKS

Words fail to convey our appreciation of the many beautiful things done for us by our friends in this our last sorrow.

Mrs. Guy Newcomer and family.
_________________

This obituary of my Grandfather was transcribed from a copy my sister Carol sent me. There is no indication on that copy of which newspaper the obituary was originally published in. The Card of Thanks did appear under the obituary. Grandpa's mother was Melinda (Mikesell) Newcomer. It is through Melinda that our line of Newcomer is connected to the Mikesell and Bayes families.

Guy Vernon Newcomer Remembered

My Grandfather, Guy Vernon Newcomer, died about nine years before I was born. My mother’s father had died from complications while recovering from a farm accident when my mom was only seven years old. Thus it was in God’s providence I never got to know either of my Grandfathers. Back in 1988 I asked my Aunt Florence (Newcomer) Ruffer to write about what she remembered of her father, my Grandfather. The following is what she wrote in December 1988:

Guy Newcomer 1880 - 1940

“No one can tell me much about our father so what I write is my remembrances of Guy Vernon Newcomer.

Our mother was the dominant figure in our home so I remember Dad as a quite, gentle man. He had many friends and was a good neighbor. Dad did not attend church. Would he have if Mother would have gone to the Methodist church? We’ll never know.

I can see Dad, at 6 P.M., sitting beside the Atwatter Kent (radio) listening to Lowell Thomas’ newscast. He never failed to listen to his favorite newsman. I also can picture him with the cigar in his mouth as he drove the horses or car. Also, driving the horses attached to the bobsled as he picked us up from school on snowy days. Often he took all the kids home around the square mile. No, he didn’t smoke the cigar at that time.

He loved his Masonic lodge and was a loyal member of the Waldron lodge. He had a wry sense of humor for instance; mother’s W.C.T.U. (Women’s Christian Temperance Union) was, to him, the “Women’s Continual Talking Union” and lodge members who only came for the “eats” were the “belly members”.

Ruth Merrifield Suffel (his grand-daughter), says he always took them with him to the mill and he always bought them candy. I recall the ice cream cones he always bought us on the Saturday night town trip.

Dad always rested his horses at noon - he also rested on the couch on the back porch. He always fed milk to many barn cats. that feeding always came first.

Dad graduated from the eighth grade and I believe he should have gone to college but destiny said “he a farmer”. He could have been a surveyor or some trade similar.

Dad was a good man, as I recall him. I remember going to the Fulton County fair with him and the many friends he also had in Wauseon.”

[Florence (Newcomer) Ruffer, December 1988]

The school Aunt Florence mentioned was the old White School on Hartley Road just west of Tuttle Road. A house now sits where the school building once was. My grandparents moved to Waldron, Michigan about 1911 from the Wauseon, Ohio area.

My father says that in the late 1920’s Grandpa had to take off-farm work to make ends meet. He got a job in Toledo, Ohio. Toledo is about 50 miles east of Waldron. He would stay in Toledo during the week, then come home for the weekend. At that time one could catch the train in Fayette and ride in to Toledo and back.

Letters from Aunt Gladys (Newcomer) McCully

In February 1995, my Aunt Gladys (Newcomer) McCully sent me a letter with some memories of her father and her early years. This letter of Aunt Gladys’s helped me much better understand some of the things I’d observed about my Grandmother when I was a child. She writes (italics are my own notes):

“........I remember my father as being a quit man - a hard worker - kind. I never saw him abuse his animals. We girls never had to work in the fields or do heavy chores as many farm girls did. As I look back I think we should have. He was interested in knowing what was going on in the world by both the Toledo Blade (Toledo, Ohio newspaper) and radio, that wonderful exotic invention that brought Lowell Thomas and Amos and Andy. I also remember the sleigh rides.

My mother was not a farm girl and I think missed many of the amenities that might have been hers elsewhere. I thought of this when I was volunteering at the Historical Museum (in Saginaw, Michigan). I was working on an exhibit portraying life in the early 20th century. There was a difference between the farm home and the town or city home! I have to describe my mother as being “straight laced” which was not unusual at that time. On the lighter side - she enjoyed music and had some training. Her alto voice was often used in the church choir and as a soloist. She was excellent as a reader of prose - not poetry.

Dad was a Mason and both parents were Eastern Stars. These organizations (and the Gleaners) provided the social life for them. Dad did not go to church, but mother was very active in the aid Society and the Temperance Union.

On Saturday night we went to town in the surrey. I don’t remember fringe on the top! This was quite an occasion - the band played in the village square - later there were free movies (we took our own seats). Of course we had an ice cream cone too. 5 cents each! Dad often bought some peanuts which we sprinkled on our oatmeal Sunday morning.

By the way, my dad enjoyed the threshing time. It was long hard work but the companionship was important.

My parents moved to Michigan a few years later then you said. (I had originally thought it was in 1908.) My birth certificate shows that I was born in Ohio Feb. 26, 1908. I have always understood that they moved to Michigan when I was about 3 years old.

I recall so many things about W.W I. At first I had no idea what a war was. My parents explained it. It was so far away across the ocean but by the time the United States was involved I was old enough to appreciate the bond sales - Red Cross Days - etc., etc. Then dad received a questionnaire from the draft board, but fortunately the Armistice was signed. It was celebrated with great jubilation. Waldron really shook that day!!

It was a big decision when my parents decided to build the new house. First they built the new granary. This would serve as our sleeping quarters. Then the kitchen from the old house was moved next to the granary. It continued as the kitchen. Many meals that summer were served on a table under the two maple trees in the yard. Wonder of wonders - the new house had a furnace to supply central heat AND we had a bathroom with a flush toilet!......................”

In another letter from Aunt Gladys, received in February 1997, she relates some more memories of the Tuttle Road farm near Waldron, Michigan..

“..This farm of 80 acres was bisected by a fairly wide lane which gave my father easy access to any of the fields or the woods., which was at the far end of the lane. Near the woods was a wooden bridge over a ditch which went the width of the farm.

About a third of the way back on the left side of the lane was an area of wetland called a swale. Dad wanted to drain this. This would call for hand labor- no equipment available such as we have today. Sam Flowers and son (or sons) were experts in the tiling business. They lived about a mile North of us. To lay the tile the ditch had to be a precise depth and evenness. I used the term ditch, but really it was a long narrow channel as a trough for the tile. Sam Flowers was the best! Hard work? You bet!

Across the lane and a little further back, the land was a little higher. I remember Dad removing some stumps from this area. In my mind is a remark dad made one time when my older sister Martha and I were helping(?) dad chop down thistles in this area. He said that at one time there had been a log cabin there. Some years latter I asked my sister Florence if she knew anything about it. She said no. I don’t know the early history of the area or the farm, but I believe the story could be true. Michigan was part of the Northwest Territory and was slow to be settled, partly because of swampy land, and was not easily accessible until after the completion of the Erie Canal in 1825. Then settlers began to arrive in Detroit, and fan out into the southern part of what is now Michigan state.

Bernice Chappel has written several excellent novels about this part of our history. In my opinion one of the best was “Reap the Whirlwind”. Other titles were “In the Palm of the Mitten”, “Bittersweet Trail”, and “Blowing in the Wind”. We used to sell them in the Museum Store. [The local history museum in Saginaw, MI.]

All or most of the lumber for the new house came from the woods on the farm. I don’t remember the kinds of trees, but I do remember going nutting with mother. We gathered hickory and butternuts. Closer to the house was a huge black walnut tree. There were some fruit trees near the buildings - apples, sour cherries and plums. One lazy summer day we children were lying on the ground under the trees when my brother, then a small lad, quietly and seriously asked, “Is there an engine that pulls the sun across the sky?”

Our black and white cows were all named (Mary, Daisy) as were the horses (Mutt, Bill, Dan, Jack, etc.). Babe, a grey mare, was the mother of Jack. when Jack was full grown, he was kicked by another horse. Lockjaw resulted. Lacking modern medicine, Dad had to put Jack away. I can still see him leading Jack down the lane.

There were many small animals. Lots of cats. We were always excited when dad came in to announce a new calf, pigs, or kittens. One year I had a pet lamb. I think that was the only year we raised sheep. We had to take the runt pigs into the house to be babied and give them a good start and then out they went.

In Robert Schuler’s biography he tells about being sent out into the pig lot to gather corn cobs, (This was Iowa), to be used for fuel in the house. We never had to do that, but there was a pig lot west of the barn. We always had a swill pail by the back door!

I didn’t intend to write so much - just got carried away! I will celebrate my 89th birthday next week. I have had time this past year to think about what happened years ago. I am thankful for good health, a wonderful family and that we enjoy each other...

[At the end of this letter Aunt Gladys adds this PS.]

During W.W.I my sister Martha and I drove a horse and spring wagon to town to deliver the milk for dad and neighbors, Mr. Bradley and Mr. Moyer. We were paid a small sum for doing this. We used the money to buy war savings stamps. We also drove Bill about the area to sell tickets for the benefit of the Red Cross. I must have been about ten years old. G-

Aunt Gladys grew up and went on to become a teacher. She married Uncle Nathen and they lived in Saginaw, Michigan where they raised a family. Aunt Gladys passed away in 2003.

My Sultana Connections

The Compiling of the Sultana Passenger List.

The compiling of the last passenger list of the steamship Sultana began immediately after the tragic explosion of April 27, 1865. One of the primary sources of the list are the Memphis and St. Louis newspapers of the time (The Sultana Tragedy, Jerry O. Potter, pg 195).

In 1892, Chester D. Berry, a survivor of the Sultana, wrote Loss of the Sultana and Reminiscences of Survivors which in Potter's words, "..contained an incomplete list." Gene Salecker is to be credited for his years of research in compiling the names of the soldiers on the Sultana. That list was included in Disaster on the Mississippi : The Sultana Explosion, April 27, 1865, written by Salecker and published in 1996. Potter clearly acknowledges his debt to Salecker, and combined his own research with Gene's to produce the list that appears in the Appendix of The Sultana Tragedy published in 1997.

My Connection to the Sultana History.
My interest in the Sultana is two fold, involving family history and the history of the area of Hillsdale Co., Michigan where I grew up, Wright Twp. near the town of Waldron.

Wesley Lee, my great-great-great uncle on my father's mother's side, enlisted Aug. 19, 1862 in Co. A of the 102nd Ohio Vol. Infantry. Uncle Wesley was captured by the Confederates at Athens, Alabama on Sept. 24, 1864. He was held at Andersonville until the end of the war. He was on the Sultana when it blew up on April 27, 1865 just north of Memphis. Uncle Wesley was one of the first survivors to make it to shore that terrible night. His account of that tragic experience is told in Chester Berry's 1892 book, Loss of the Sultana, and Reminiscences of Survivors. Wesley Lee finally made it home to Holmes Co., Ohio. He did marry and he and his bride settled in Davisess County, Missouri.

Zebulon Gray, my Great-Great Uncle on my Father's mother's side, enlisted August 1884, in the 18th Michigan V.I. and was in Co. G. The Michigan 18th Reg't was recruited primarily from Hillsdale, Lenawee, and Monroe Counties. Family records indicate Zebulon was with that part of the 18th Reg't captured by the Confederates at Athens, Alabama. According to the family story, Uncle Zeb was detained at Macon, and then at Andersonville until the end of the war. His Andersonville imprisonment is confirmed by his pension records. After their release at the end of the war, a number of the 18th Reg't POW's were on the Sultana when it blew up near Memphis, TN on April 27, 1865. Don Harvey has identified 60 men from the MI 18th Reg't that were killed in that explosion. Uncle Zeb's pension records indicate he was not on the Sultana, but he would have known comrades who were. He came home and raised a family.

Phyllis Rickard, an old neighbor of mine from the Waldron, Michigan area, found in her research references to three men of the 18th MI Reg't. from what was then known as South Wright, but is now Waldron, who were on the Sultana and survived; Christian W. Abbaduska, Nathaniel Fogelsong, and Samuel Stubberfield.

At the time Phyllis and I were growing up, there were still families in that area with those last names. All three of these men came back home, and all three are buried in the Waldron Cemetery. A perusal of the rosters of the 18th MI Reg't will turn up a number of familiar last names for those whose roots go back that corner of Hillsdale Co., MI.

A memorial to the men from Michigan who died on the Sultana was dedicated on Veterans Day, November 11, 2001. The memorial is located on the Northeast corner of the County Courthouse square in Hillsdale, Michigan. I hope to have pictures of the memorial up loaded to this page in the near future.


Grave of Christian Abbaduska, MI 18th Inf, Co. F; Waldron Cemetery, Waldron, Michigan



Grave of Samuel Stubberfield, 18th MI Inf, Co. F; Waldron Cemetery, Waldron, Michigan



Grave of Nathaniel Foglesong, MI 18th Inf, Co. A; Waldron Cemetery, Waldron, Michigan