Saga of One Who Loved and Yearned to Be Loved: Memoirs of Mary Eichelberger Luther

Contents

The early years

Going Back Home to Mother

The Married Years

THE TRAVELINGG YEARS

EARLY YEARS IN AURORA

THE RETIREMENT YEARS

HER SECONDARY JOURNAL

MY CHILDREN

EPILOGUE

by Dale

The early years

I was born and raised on a farm in a small hamlet in Central Illinois, November 9, 1913. I was the seventh child of thirteen children, eight girls and five boys. Eight of us grew to adulthood. Five of the girls died in infancy. We were a very poor family. My father was a farm hand and was paid very little wages. My earliest memory was walking down a dirt road , barefooted, carrying two syrup pails of fresh water to my father and his boss working in a field nearby. I was about four years old. Dad never stayed in one place more than a couple of years. He would either be fired or quit because of something his boss would say or do. He believed children should be seen and not heard. He never paid any attention to the children and had a vile temper. My mother was a hard working, loving, quiet Christian woman. Her mother died when she was only nine years of age. From that time on my mother was on her own, a servant for others.

When I was about five years old my mother was taken ill and went to the hospital. My older sister was only ten years old at the time and in the meantime a baby brother was added to our family.

My mother’s younger sister took us in—my sister, a crawling baby brother, and me. She and her husband also lived on a farm with three daughters. The oldest one was around my sister’s age, 11 or12, the second girl was 10 or 11, and the youngest was a year older than I was. My aunt worked in the fields with her husband while the oldest girl took care of the house and her sisters. It was quite a problem to have three more children thrust upon her.

An uncle of moms took me in to raise me. He and his wife were getting along in years, in their sixties, but they were wonderful to me. Uncle Frank wanted to adopt me, but mom said no. She wouldn’t legally give up any of her children. If he wanted to take me to raise and educate she was agreeable. So, I became a part of Uncle Frank’s family for six years until he became sick and died. My uncle was not a rich man. He owned a 90 acre farm. In those days farming was done by hand and horses. There was very little machinery.

I was the only child in the household but my aunt and uncle did not spoil me. Those six years were the happiest years of my life. Unless we had overnight visitors my bed was a leather couch with a raised end at the head. It was in the sitting room just outside Uncle Frank’s and Aunt Mary’s bedroom. Many a night I would wake up crying because my legs hurt so much. Aunt Mary would get up and come and sit on the side of my bed and rub my legs until the pain eased and I would fall asleep. Back then they called them growing pains.

They loved me very much. One of my fondest memories is of the evenings we spent after the evening meal—Uncle Frank in his rocking chair with the back to the dining room table under the light and Aunt Mary at one end of the table doing crossword puzzles or sewing and me at the other end doing homework.

I never went to bed or left the house for school or church or anywhere without giving them a hug or a kiss. Sometimes, at noon, I came home from school (½ mile away) for lunch. Often times Uncle Frank would go out to the barn to ready his team for work before I headed back to school. I would go out to kiss him goodbye and often ask him for a nickel to get an ice cream cone on my way back to school. He always gave it to me. Sometimes it was more than a nickel , but that was all I could spend. I had to bring back the change to him.

When I was eight or nine we would go to Streator on Saturdays to sell eggs and butter and to grocery shop, etc. I was given 25 cents to go to the dime store. I could only spend 10 cents, the rest was for church the next day and my piggy bank. It never dawned on me to do otherwise.

My uncle was financially well off that I wanted for nothing that was essential. I didn’t have an abundance of clothes, but enough. I was taught to save, share, work, and given a good religious training. They were very good Christians.

If I displeased my uncle he never punished me, but the tongue lashing he would give was worse than punishment.

I remember one time of hiding a book under my coat to read in church one Sunday evening. How he knew I had it I never did find out. All he said to me was, Give me that book. One’s conscience would bother when one displeased him.

I was with my aunt and uncle for six years. During that time I wanted a bicycle so bad but didn’t get it as they were afraid I would be killed on the highway that ran past the front of our farm. Also, I wanted to take piano lessons, but my aunt said it would be too hard on her to make me practice. As I said, she was getting up in years.

Three motherless girls spent nearly every holiday with us. The youngest one was a year older than I so we were kind of buddies. Our farmhouse was a big two story house with three bedrooms upstairs. Several times my older sister was there at the same time. One time I remember was when all four of them was spending the time with us. The three older girls shared the bed in one bedroom while Lucy and I had the other one. As girls will do after going to bed we would lay there and talk and giggle. My uncle would rap on the ceiling with the broom handle to quiet us. This time we covered our heads and kept on until Lucy’s older sister came and took us each by an arm and marched us into their bedroom. She put Lucy on one side and me on the other. Imagine five girls in a double bed with three of them grown. When one turned to the other side all had to turn.

One day when the three motherless children were visiting for the weekend during cherry time the girls and I were out breaking small branches of cherries to eat. One particular branch was just out of my reach. I hung on a lower branch off the chair. Fred came along and pulled the chair away from me. It hurt my ankle if I dropped to the ground, so I was yelling at him to put it back. One rule Aunt Mary had was no loud noises on Sundays. Aunt Mary had come out to see what all the noise was about. I had a handful of cherries when she marched me up the back porch steps. I must have dropped one as she stepped on it and fell and broke her wrist. At that time I thought good enough for you. Many years later we brought up the subject when I told her what I had thought. We had a good laugh over it.

I never asked for toys and such. I had certain chores to do every day both before and after school. One day when I came home from school I walked into the kitchen where Aunt Mary was. A package was lying on the egg crate. Aunt Mary told me to go and change into my old clothes (a rule every school day) and come back down to the kitchen. I did and then she told me the package was for me. Imagine my surprise when I opened it to find a brand new pair of ball bearing roller skates. That evening I didn’t have to do my chores. I was allowed to go out to skate with my new roller skates.

I was so thrilled with them. I had learned to skate on an old rusty pair of skates, so I thought I could put on the new ones and take off. ‘Wow’ did I find out differently. I had to learn all over again. For quite some time I could only use them at home. We had a grand place to skate at school. Sidewalks in front at the street– leading to the school house from each corner – from one side around the front to the other and straight out from the front door. Also, when the weather was bad we skated in the basement until we started cracking the whip and one of the kids got hurt. That ended that.

Route 23 ran past our house from Streator to Ottawa. Five or six of us walked to school together. Half way to school I met the neighbor kids (Rinkers) and one day we decided to skate on the road to school. The school found out about it and put a stop to it. Aunt Mary never did find out.

The Rinker family was very nice. Mrs. Rinker had an adopted son, a son, and two daughters of her own. Her husband had died several years before. Lois, the youngest one became my closest and dearest girlfriend. Their place was the only place that Aunt Mary would let me go and play.

Mrs. Rinker was such a kind, dear and compassionate person. If anyone was ill or in need she would fix up a basket to send to them by her daughters. I went with them sometimes. She wasn’t able to get out herself as she was a semi-invalid in a wheelchair.

Rinkers barn had a high domed roof. Hay was stored on the second landing. A ladder was built on one side so one could reach the top part of the barn. Someone had hung a one inch manila rope to the rafter at the top of the barn. A gunny sack was tied at the end. We kids climbed the ladder while someone else tossed us the rope and we would jump off the ladder to the rope and swing almost the width of the barn. In the center was an open space above the hay. We would drop down about ten feet into the hay. Lots of fun!

The snow storms today are no worse than when I was a little girl. It would pile up as high as the fences and usually last all winter. It would be so cold a crust formed on the top and how we loved to walk on top. One time when two of my friends and I were delivering a food basket their mother had fixed for someone sick we were walking atop the snow and hit an air pocket. We sank, basket and all, in the snow to our armpits. We had quite a time getting out of that hole.

One summer my brother, Frank, who is two years older than I came to visit. It was during hay season. It had rained a few days before this event. Uncle Frank had harnessed his team to go to the field to see how the hay was. One of the horses had been broke to ride , but not double. Frank decided to ride to the field. I couldn’t let him get ahead of me so I said I’d ride the other one. So, uncle Frank wrapped the reins around his wrist and set me on the horse. Everything went fine until we got to the field. Evidently the mare began to feel my weight. She reared up and I went flying up in the air. I came back down on her and scared her more. She reared again and side stepped and I came down on the stubbles along side the hay mound. The horse turned and ran back toward the barn dragging uncle Frank. He soon loosened the reins and the horse continued to the barn. Uncle Frank went after her and it is the only time I ever knew him to abuse