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Everybody has a story: Hard-working, literary mom made up for lack of dad

The Columbian
Published: January 20, 2010, 12:00am

I grew up without a father. Of course there was the biological necessity. Other than that I was fatherless. But it’s OK, I had a superb mother.

It was about May 1917. I was 6 months old — with whooping cough. Maybe he got tired of the nights of whooping. At any rate, he absconded for parts unknown.

My mother was left stranded — no money and three children. Earle was 6 and Bob was 5. This was in Chicago.

Many years later, going through my mother’s papers, I came across a letter written by Earle and Bob to their father asking him to come home; they were hungry. The envelope was stamped “address unknown.”

Mom got a job in an orphan asylum — the “Home for the Friendless.” Later, we moved to Oshkosh, Wis., and Mom enrolled at the Oshkosh Normal School. Mom graduated in June 1920 with a teaching degree.

Eventually, we moved to Madison, Wis., so Mom could enroll at the university there. She often told us, “Get all the education you are capable of getting.”

She got a job in the linen room at the Hotel Loraine. She worked nights, went to classes during the daytime and slept whenever, wherever. I never remember her studying. It may have been in the linen room at night, perhaps between classes at the university. We were carefully trained to be quiet and never awaken her when she was sleeping.

Mom graduated from the University of Wisconsin, with a major in history, in June 1926. She wanted to take one of the boys with her to the reception for the graduating seniors. Earle was nowhere to be found. Bob had a bad tear in his only good pants. So I accompanied her.

During the reception it seemed like I was the only child among hundreds of people. During a trip to the ladies’ room I was struck by a lady’s gown — white clinging material with a burst of diamonds (rhinestones, I suspect) radiating from her belly button. I gasped: “Mom, look. How pretty!”

It was the wife of the new president of the university. She took me by the hand and escorted us to meet the president. He bent down, shook my hand and said, “And are you going to the university when you grow up?”

“Yes, I am,” I said. Six years later I enrolled there.

Mom still found it difficult to get a job even with a degree in hand — because she was “not the sole support” of her three children. So she got a divorce. From suffering the stigma of being fatherless, we graduated into the greater stigma of being the children of a divorce.

Meanwhile, we tried to help. The boys became paperboys. I loved to get up at 4 a.m. and help pull the wagon with the papers through the dark and silent streets. (There were no streetlights then.)

At age 12, I got my first job — washing dishes at the restaurant at the railroad depot, being paid the magnificent sum of 50 cents an hour. I gave Mom part of the money. With what I had left, I saved up to take her to the circus. I proudly bought cotton candy and ice cream. She seemed to like the acrobats and clowns especially.

We have a treasured book in my family, a copy of “Pride and Prejudice” with Mom’s initials and date, my initials and date, my daughter Sue’s initials and date, and her daughter Tiffany’s initials and date. Someday her daughter will read it and record her initials and date.

Mom always urged us to learn poems and other pieces of literature. When we were young, she gave us 10 cents to learn a poem. It may not sound like much, but 10 cents would buy a lot of candy and I had a sweet tooth. So it began: “Under the spreading chestnut tree …,” “Loveliest of trees the cherry now …,” “This is the forest primeval …,” “Friends, Romans, Countrymen …,” “To be or not to be …” and so on and on. My brothers in their 90s could recite all of “The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere.”

Once when I was directing some college students in a performance called “You Know I Don’t Dig Shakespeare,” I took the group over to perform at the retirement home where my mother was living. I took the girl who was giving Portia’s speech from “The Merchant of Venice” to meet Mom.

Mom said, “Oh, yes, I remember that,” and proceeded to give Portia’s entire speech — to the amazement of the student who had had so much difficulty learning it.

So, I never missed a father. I had a magnificent, hard-working, educated mother.

EVERYBODY HAS A STORY welcomes nonfiction contributions of 1,000 words maximum and relevant photographs. E-mail is the best way to submit materials so we don’t have to retype your words or borrow original photos. Send to neighbors@columbian.com or P.O. Box 180, Vancouver WA 98666.

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