JUNE • 2008 • NEWSLETTER

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Dear $$firstname$$,

Summer is nearly upon us, so this month’s newsletter is decidedly summery with stories about baseball, June brides and home building. We’ve also thrown in a bit of romantic, nostalgic art from some early-1900s postcards and a poem that’s sure to give you a warm look back on your own childhood.

If you’ve been enjoying our monthly dose of bonus nostalgia, consider forwarding this newsletter to a friend or family member. If this newsletter was forwarded to you and you’d like a monthly copy of your own, just use this link to sign up yourself. For now, welcome to the good old days.

—The Folks at Reminisce

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In this issue:

• The Day I Met the Mighty Babe Ruth
• Construction Wizards Teetered on Trouble
• Fancy Preparations? Not for These June Brides
• My First Job: Hawker for the Wolves
• Postcards: Romantic Interludes
• Poem: Gone Forever
• Over the Back Fence
• Time Capsule Trivia
• A Thought to Remember

The Day I Met the Mighty Babe Ruth

View large image

View large image Harry Melvin, Then and Now

By Harry Melvin
as told to neighbor Dare Freeman Ford
Hendersonville, North Carolina

I’m in sixth grade, in 1932 Atlanta, Georgia, when my hero, Babe Ruth, comes to town.

On their way back to New York from Florida spring training, the New York Yankees are to play an exhibition game with the Atlanta Crackers. Each school gets one free pass to the game. Lucky me—I win at my school!

When the big day arrives, my mother gives me a dime for the streetcar fare to Ponce de Leon Park and back. I run to the trolley stop.

When I finally get to the ball field, Babe Ruth is sitting a few rows up in the stands, signing autographs, with kids hanging all over him. I go through the gate, find a scrap of paper and run over. My heart races, as I breathlessly thrust the paper in front of the “home-run king” to get his signature.

Then Babe Ruth says, “Well, guys, I’m going to have to play a ballgame in a few minutes, so you’d better get going.” Everybody scampers away so they can get front-row seats, but Babe reaches out and grabs me by the back of my belt.

“Whoa, fella,” he says. “Wait just a minute. Can you tell me where the concession stand is?”

I turn and look straight at the big man with the spindly legs. “Yes, sir, it’s right over there.”

He smiles. “Well, if I give you the money, will you run over there and buy me a couple of hot dogs and a Coke?”

“Yes, sir, I’d be happy to.”

He turns to the reporter who travels with the team and asks, “How about lending me a couple of bucks, pal? Thanks.”

Babe Ruth gives the $2 to me and says, “Two hot dogs and a Coke, please. Hurry if you can, kid. I’ve got a ballgame to play.”

“Yes, sir.” I run as fast as I can to the concession stand, get his food, and hurry back.

I start to give Babe Ruth his change, but he says, “You keep it, kid.”

“But it’s a whole dollar seventy-five!” I exclaim. “It only cost a quarter for everything.”

“That’s okay kid. Keep the change,” he says.

I thank him and turn to leave, but the Babe says, “Not so fast, kid. You’re in too big of a hurry. What’s your name?”

“Harry, sir. Harry Melvin,” I reply, to which he says, “Well, Harry, sit down ’til I finish eating, and we’ll play a little ball.”

Before long, I’m sitting on Babe Ruth’s shoulders as he runs to first base. I get to meet some of the other players from the famous “Murderers' Row,” guys like Lou Gehrig, “Lefty” Gomez, Tony Lazzeri and Bill Dickey.

As the Atlanta Crackers take the field, I decide to find a seat, so I head toward the stands. Babe Ruth stops me. “Harry, hang on a minute. Come over here. Harry, do you have a bat?”

“No, sir.”

“Well, go over there and get yourself one of mine,” the Babe says as he points to a row of bats. My eyes must have grown as big as golf balls.

“Go ahead,” he says. “Take any one you want.”

I look them all over and choose one. “Gee, thanks a lot, Mr. Ruth. Thanks!” I say with a big smile as I turn to leave.

Babe Ruth snatches me back by my belt, saying, “Whoa there, Harry. You’re in too big of a hurry. Let’s let the whole team autograph your bat.”

When I finally sit down in the bleachers, I’ve got Babe Ruth’s autograph, his bat signed by the whole team, and lots of money in my pocket.

After watching the first couple of innings, I leave the ballgame and head to my neighborhood corner store, McCrory’s, where I spend all of the money in my pocket. When I arrive home, I have a grocery bag full of treats.

My friends and I eat candy and play ball the rest of the day. Our “ball” is gravel wrapped in black tire tape. Our “bat” has always been a broom handle, but today we’re stepping into the street with something much more.

Eventually, my autographed bat was destroyed. Somebody told me that it would be worth $4 million today. I told my wife that if she ever wakes up in the middle of the night and catches a grown man crying, she’ll know why.

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Construction Wizards Teetered on Trouble

View large image The author posed with brother George Jr. around the time of the story.

View large image George and Laura Seel

By Mary Jenkins
North Augusta, South Carolina

In 1938, my mother and father, Laura Mae and George Seel, purchased three huge lots in the country around Charleston, South Carolina on which to build their home. I was only 4 years old and my brother, George Jr., was 3.

Mother had her white house with a white picket fence pictured in her mind, and the main design in her house would be an archway between the living room and the dining room. She was set on this. My father was an excellent carpenter, so he began to build our home.

Every weekend was spent working out in the country. I’m not sure my brother and I were much help as my father was building, but one day, we turned out to be essential!

You have to understand the way Dad was constructing the arch for the living and dining rooms. As I’ve been told, Dad would wrap the board with hot towels, which I believe he dipped into hot water, and then would bend the board and let it set.

The first two boards were much too tight and the third was too loose. Becoming very frustrated, he went into the house for a cup of coffee to ponder the situation.

While Dad was in the house, my brother and I were left alone with the pieces of wood. We began to seesaw on one of the tight boards.

We were having a great deal of fun until we saw Daddy coming back out. He was very upset with us. That is, until he picked up the board and tried it in the arch. A perfect fit! We became the big-time heroes of the day.

The arch is still standing in the old house. It’s funny, but if they ever tear that old house down, I’d love to have that arch.

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Fancy Preparations? Not for These June Brides

By Shirley Baum
Waxhaw, North Carolina

George had proposed to me, and I’d said, “Yes,” but we had not set a date.

George and Shirley Baum, in 1944

On Friday, June 20, 1941, I was given a 4-day weekend off from my job at the telephone company in Pekin, Illinois. When I told George, he said, “Let’s get married now.”

He borrowed $25 from his brother-in-law for the trip to Hannibal, Missouri, where we could obtain a license on the spot. When we told Steve and Ora Ellen, a couple we ran around with, that we were going to get married, they decided to go with us.

We arrived in Hannibal around 9 p.m. and stopped at a gas station. George asked the attendant if he knew a place where we could sleep. The man directed us to a rooming house, which turned out to be Becky Thatcher’s house, one of the places Mark Twain wrote about in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.

The Becky Thatcher House

The house was unusual in another way, too; the upstairs was divided. The boys stayed on one side and the girls stayed on the other side. It was fun to hear George and Steve’s voices, faintly through the wall. Although we strained our ears to hear, we couldn’t make out what they were saying.

Ora Ellen and I woke up early the next morning and walked down to the Mississippi River. On the way back, we stopped at a small diner, and I had two doughnuts and a cup of coffee.  Those doughnuts hit my stomach like a lead balloon and eventually made me sick. Back at the room, I kept telling Ora Ellen, “I can’t get married; I’m sick.”

By 9 a.m., I was feeling better when the boys pounded on the wall and hollered, “We’re ready, let’s get going.”

We drove to Palmyra, the Marion County seat, and found the license bureau. George purchased our license for $2. Down the street was a Baptist church. We went in and found the preacher, and at 11 a.m. that June morning, George Baum and I were married. George gave the preacher $5 for his services.

We all went up to Keokuk, Iowa for lunch, and while we were eating, Steve asked Ora Ellen, “Why didn’t we get married, too?”

“I don’t know why we didn’t,” she answered, “but we should have.”

So we drove back to Palmyra. By that time, the license bureau had closed and its clerk had left, but a man sitting on the steps said, “I know where he lives.”

We followed his directions and found the clerk, who kindly said, “Sure, I’ll open up for you.”

When Steve and Ora Ellen had their license, we returned with them to the church, around 3 p.m., finding the preacher still working on his sermon. “Did you forget something?” he asked.

“Yes, you forgot to marry us,” Steve answered jovially.

As George and I signed their marriage license, the preacher said to me, “Don’t forget; you have a new name.” That’s when I signed “Shirley Baum” for the first time.

Not only did our names change that day; the season changed, too—at noon. George and I were married in the spring, and Steve and Ora Ellen were married in the summer.

George and I had a wonderful life together. We had our ups and downs, of course, but with love and a ready sense of humor, we enjoyed a 41-year marriage until George passed away in 1982.

My First Job: Hawker for the Wolves

By Neal Murphy
San Augustine, Texas

Every time I go into our high school football stadium here in the piney woods of east Texas, I always take a glance to the northeast and let my memory take a short stroll.

Though torn down many years ago, there once stood a rather large baseball grandstand—rustic, yet functional. During the 1940s and early 1950s many a baseball game was played on that diamond. The proud San Augustine Wolves fought “tooth and toenail” with teams from neighboring towns.

The Wolves were a semiprofessional club, Class D at that time. They played in the Red River Valley League with Louisiana teams like the Leesville Indians and the Natchitoches Indians and such Texas teams as the Center Lions and the Diboll Merchants, along with other teams from the area. The San Augustine Wolves won the pennant in 1948.

In the early days of the team, all games were played in the afternoon, usually Saturday and Sunday. Most of the players were in their late 20s and early 30s and had other jobs. The stadium was usually full of enthusiastic fans who eagerly followed the team to the out-of-town games as well.

A red-letter day was Tuesday, June 1, 1948, as the Wolves played their first baseball game under the lights. It was a red-letter day for me, too, because I started my first job that night. I was all of 12 years old and a big fan of the team. My father somehow managed to convince the manager to give me a job selling ice-cold soda to the crowd.

Spectators at these games were a thirsty bunch. They had a need and I had the solution. The gentleman who manned the snack bar had a large, metal, kidney-shaped container that he filled with bottled drinks surrounded by crushed ice. With the container’s strap around my neck, I’d walk through the stadium yelling, “Soft drinks! Get your soft drinks here!” When a customer beckoned, I would uncap the bottle and send it his way. I made 1¢ per drink sold.

When business was slow, I enjoyed watching the Wolves play baseball. At my young age, I thought they were real professionals. G.W. Woods handled third base very well. Hugh Sparks was a good “lefty” pitcher, and when his brother, Leroy, was the catcher, I would hear the crowd yell to the batter, “You don’t stand a chance! You’re between two sparks!”

Joe Bickley was a good late-inning pitcher, as was A.J. Luqwette. The manager was an older brother to Hugh and Leroy Sparks, Mr. Beeman Sparks, who always did a fine job, in my book. Wilhite scooped up grounders at shortstop, while Williamson did the same at second base, both throwing runners out to the first baseman, Baxter Cartwright, who was an in-law of the Sparks brothers.

I particularly enjoyed one of the local umpires. He had lost half of his right index finger in an accident. This made for some interesting-looking signs as he held up the “ball-and-strike” count on the batters.

Young boys would almost fight each other to get the job of controlling the scoreboard lights for strikes, balls and outs. Others would fight over the responsibility for putting numbers up on the scoreboard in right field.

You may wonder how I could make any money with my take of 1¢ per drink. Actually, I did quite well. I usually went home with $3.50 to $5 per game. Needless to say, I was quite tired at the end of the game. In 1948, that was a pretty good night’s work for a 12-year-old boy.

As I look around the football stadium today, I realize most of those players from the 1940s are gone. And the old baseball stadium to the northeast isn’t standing anymore. No one looking out would even know it ever stood there.

But I still can look out and recall those distant memories of days long past, and my first real job.

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Romantic Interludes

These postcards belonged to my husband’s mother’s oldest sister, Elsie. At 17 years of age, she left home and worked as a housekeeper in various cities, but mostly in the Merrill, Wisconsin area.

View large image	View large image

As she received postcards from family and friends, she filed them in a postcard album, which we received after her death, in 1975. The cards were written to her spanning the years of 1907 to 1919. We greatly treasure these mementos of her life back then.

—Shirley Zuelsdorff
Merrill, Wisconsin

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Gone Forever

By Erik Braum
Lafayette, Louisiana

If I could just relive one day
And have a choice in that short stay,
I’d do it the old-fashioned way,
In times now gone forever.

I’d ride Dad’s knee as just a tyke,
I’d have a dog and fly a kite,
I’d do the things that children like,
In times now gone forever.

I’d play a game, like hide-and-seek,
I’d learn to swim in Turner’s Creek,
I’d get so tired I couldn’t sleep,
In times now gone forever.

I’d watch while Ma fixed gingerbread,
I’d eat it ’til I felt like lead,
I’d “get sick sure” just like she said,
In times now gone forever.

I’d go to where I sometimes hid,
I’d do more good deeds than I did,
I’d be a friend to some shy kid,
In times now gone forever.

I’d take and hug my mother’s neck,
I’d change her from a nervous wreck,
I’d be good for her, by heck,
In times now gone forever.

I’d hike and hunt through fields and wood,
I’d shoot—but miss now, if I could,
I’d not harm things that made it good,
In times now gone forever.

I’d wish and dream as I do now,
I’d do all that hours allow,
I’d share it all with you somehow,
In times now gone forever.

Over the Back Fence

When our son Walt was 4 years old, we took him and his sister to the Cave of the Mounds in Wisconsin. It is a lovely cave, and our guide gave us a wonderful, descriptive tour.

We were part of a large group. At the end of the tour, as we headed toward the exit of the cave in silent awe, our son spoke up in a loud voice, asking, “When are we getting out of this basement?”

—Lillemor Horngren
Bishop Hill, Illinois

Time Capsule Trivia

From the decades spanning the 1920s to the 1960s, try to guess what year these historic events took place. The answer is given below, but no peeking!

1. The summer’s record heat causes drought, failing crops and dust storms that ravage the center of the country, underscoring the need for the Soil Conservation Act passed in March.
2. It takes just 6 months to sell a million copies of Margaret Mitchell’s new novel, Gone with the Wind.
3. At the Summer Olympics, in Berlin, Germany, the 18 African-American athletes from the U.S. win a total of 14 medals, putting a crimp in Adolf Hitler’s theory concerning the natural supremacy of the “Aryan race.”
4. At the movies, 15-year-old Deanna Durbin makes her feature-length-film debut  in Three Smart Girls, one of the year’s hits, and Carole Lombard teams up with William Powell in the screwball comedy My Man Godfrey.
5. Although it’s not in a championship fight, boxer Max Schmeling knocks out Joe Louis for a sensational upset.

For the answer to Time Capsule Trivia, click here.

A Thought to Remember

You can’t change the past, but you can ruin the present by worrying about the future.