VELMA:

I think I'll start with my first memories of Dad. Mother was working at the Utah State Hospital in Provo, coming home for weekend visits with us, and Jess and I were living with Grandmother and Grandfather Bigelow in Wallsburg. When Mother brought Dad with her to meet us, I must have been about seven years old. She had met him through Aunt Rita Carter. He was her brother-in-law. I can remember Jess and I sitting up in the back behind Mother and Dad in the old Model T Ford, and as we drove along in the car, Jess and I would sing, "Clyde's falling in love with Elva." There was a popular song like that at the time, and we used to tease them. This romance blossomed and Mother decided to marry Dad. Their wedding reception was in Wallsburg, and Dad made all the pie crust for the wedding reception. Were they ever good! He made the best dewberry pie you have ever eaten.

Before the wedding, Dad used to bring Mother up on weekends to visit us. When I was about seven years old, I had been sewing some doll clothes and I left the needle from my sewing on my doll bed. We did not know it but Jess knelt down on the bed and the needle went into his knee and broke off A week later his body was so sore all over that he just cried when Grandmother tried to give him a bath. That's when she found out that the needle was in his knee. Grandfather took him to Heber to the hospital and they operated on Jess. They couldn't find the needle. Grandfather came home so upset because he said the Doctors would slice Jesses knee just like you would slice a piece of beef and they couldn't find this needle. Jess had three operations before they found it. The third time they operated, Grandfather had taken him to Heber for the operation, and Grandmother said, all of a sudden, "They have found the needle." When Grandfather came home about one O'clock he came in with Jess and said, "They found the needle." Grandmother said, "Yes, I know." Grandfather said, "How do you know?" and she said, "At eleven o'clock I knew."

My memory about Dad was that Jess had been given a really neat wheelbarrow for a Christmas gift. It was wooden, and a good size. We used to put a pillow in it for Jess, and push him around. He couldn't walk on his leg after the operations. I remember Dad wheeling him around in this wheelbarrow, and carrying him around in his arms. Then after the wedding, we went to live with Mom and Dad in Provo.

Dad and Mother were married on January 30, 1929. The next important thing I remember was in March. Mom and Dad took Jess and me to the courthouse. I remember the judge asking us if we wanted to be adopted. It really meant a lot to me that Dad thought so much of us that he wanted to make us his own. Dad used to come home from work and we would stand out on the lawn and watch for him. We used to have so much fun with him. He would come home and play with us on the lawn, and of course our dear little Myrna was born the next Novem ber. The thing that is so import ant is that I can never remem ber Dad making any differe nce in his love for us and the childre n that were born naturall y to him.

CAROL:
I remember Dads sense of humor. I don't know how old I was, but I remember that they had a party at our house one time, and Dad got this pillow that was kind of like a flat balloon that made a noise, and they put it under the sofa pillow. Someone came in and sat on it, and I remember Dad laughing. He loved to play jokes.

VELMA:
Mom and Dad went to California on their honeymoon to Catalina Island. I can't remember whether it was family or friends that you had over when you came back, but there was a plate on the table that had something that looked like long sausages on it, and people tried to cut through it, and it was a fake.

MOM:
Dad was president of the MIA one winter and they put on some plays. I remember one skit that Dad was in charge of, ani he put on this black face, and they had two men on the ends. They called them "end men" and they told jokes.

VELMA.
Anyway, Dad was one of those, and I remember going up to see that. Dad took us, and after the performance that night they had a party for all the cast. The lady in charge served black olives, and I'd never seen them in my whole life. That's the first time I ever ate olives.

MOM:
You weren't so different. It's the first time I'd ever eaten them too.

MYRNA:
When I think of Dad laughing, I think of how his nose would wrinkly up, and how hard he would laugh. I remember being outside one time helping Mother in the garden, and I called Mother, "Ma". Dad corrected me. I never called her anything but Mother after that. He used words to correct us, but rarely used physical force. In growing up I only remember one time in my life when I really got a spanking. One time Mother told me to go get a bucket of coal and I told her I didn't have to if I didn't want to. I got the razor strap because I sassed Mother. More than anything else, he wouldn't tolerate any kind of disrespect, particularly of Mother. He seemed to be able to control us with words more than any other way.

I remember on Fathers Day when I was in my teens. Don, Carol and I had gone downtown and purchased a special gift that we were giving Dad. He just sat there for the longest time and didn't open his present. Finally, I asked him why he didn't open it, and he said that he was just waiting for us to come put our arms around him and tell him that we loved him. Until that time I did not realize that Dad needed and wanted this kind of affection. Mother has always been very affectionate, but Dad was more reserved. We all knew how much he loved us. There was never any doubt about that. This experience really hurt me, and I think it did Carol and Don, but it opened some doors at the same time. It made us feel badly that we hadn't been thoughtful and kind enough, and sensitive enough to go to Dad and tell him how much we loved him. After that, from then on the rest of his life, it was very easy to put my arms around Dad and give him affection because I knew he wanted it.

VELMA:
I think I always sensed that. Of course I didn't know Dad until I was six or seven years old, but I sensed that from the start, and I always went up and hugged him and I could tell how pleased he was.

CAROL:
I think that when we were younger Dad was able to show more affection to us, but when we got into our teens, I think that it wasn't Dad, it was us. I know that with my own boys, that when they get a certain age then they don't want you to come up and kiss them. They do want affection but not in front of anyone. I remember when I was a little girl of going up and sitting on his lap, and I remember as I was older he didn't come out and say "I love you," and come put his arms around me like I could remember as a child. But I think that the failure was my own.

Even with this kind of thing, though, we could depend on Dad for anything that we ever needed. If we ever had any thing that we really wanted he would do anything that he could for any of us. I remember one year telling him that I wanted a desk for Christmas, but I knew that we didn't have the money. I remember that Dad wouldn't let me go into the furnace room for a long time. I guess it was at least a month that he wouldn't let me go in there.

I was so curious. I knew he was doing something for me and I didn't know what it was. I remember thinking, "Well, I'll just go in," but I didn't. Dad had made that desk for me.

MYRNA:
You know when our children were little, Dad did just as much for them as he did for his own children. He made a stove for our children. He made the oven open, and he painted the burners on top. I don't know how he ever designed that, and drew those burners so perfectly, but it was just beautiful.

CAROL:
He made a table and chairs for our children for Christmas. When we were up in Pullman, he and Steve would go to the shop and work until midnight on that project.

STEVE:
We've done many projects together. The way to keep he and Elva longer was to put them to work. He loved to do things with his hands. I think our relation ship was strengthened by working together.

DON:
I can remember when Jeff was first born. We had a rocking horse that had been Judy's brother's. It was just about dilapidated but we got that and put it back together, and it looked like it had just come from the store when he got through painting that. Jeff used it, and Lori used it. I don't know what finally happened to it, but he sure fixed that up nice.

MYRNA:
He made rocking horses for our kids too. They loved them.

DON:
Speaking of Dad talking to us, and not spanking. I recall when we were living up in Wallsburg, and wanted to go over the mountain with Dad to the farm. I told him, "If you won't take me I'll drive the car." After he left, I went out to the garage, opened the doors, and backed that Model A out to the gate. I don't know how far it was.

MYRNA:
You have to add, Don, that you weren't big enough to see out the windshield when you got your feet on the pedals either.

DON:
I don't remember. I don't know how I did it, but when I got to that gate, I was afraid. Boy, I was only four years old, and I didn't know how to get it back in. I can remember being afraid, but when Dad came home, he didn't spank me. And from then on, it was being afraid of the talking that I knew that I was going to get.

VELMA:
When I was a teenager we had a Hudson. It had what they called an electric shift or something. It was just a little teeny thing by the steering wheel and Dad would let me take that car. I hadn't had any lessons in driving, and I came home one night after dark, and I still don't know how I did it, but I got the garage door caught somehow in the bumper. Boy, I went in the house and I tiptoed up the stairs and I was afraid to let Dad know. But he was like you said Don, he handled it with words. He didn't even really scold me, but I remember him saying, "I don't know how she ever did it!"

DON:
Was that the car that Jess rolled over?

VELMA.
Yes.

DON:
Going back to the time I backed the car out, it seems like you two (speaking to Myrna and Carol) were involved in some way.

CAROL:
After you did that, Dad decided to lock the car doors so that we couldn't get into the car, and Myrna bet him that she could get in. He said, "No, you can't. I locked the door." She went out and showed him. I remember saying, "Dad, I can get in that car too." and he said, "No, the doors are locked. I found a door that he hadn't locked and I got the nickel. Myrna got the first one, but I remember getting one too.

DON:
You know when you get to the age when you know how to drive, and you can't wait to? (I guess I'm telling on myself now.) I used to get in the car and take it, when my parents didn't know about it and, I'd drive around a bit and pull it back in the garage. I never knew if they ever knew about it until this one night. We wanted to go down to the Teen Canteen. Mother and Dad were going to a party, and I'd been quizzing them about it. A bunch of us got together and went where the car was parked, and we took it and went down to the Teen Canteen. We went in and I told Carol that the car was there, and we were having a good time when here comes Mother down.

MOTHER:
John Roylance was in the car with a girl, and he went in when he saw us.

DON:
They came in and told me that Mother was out there, and I tried to get Carol to take the key out and she wouldn't go.

MOTHER:
I was on the committee for refreshments that night, and I told them that I had the car and I would go get the ice cream. When I went out there was no car. We called the police, and the car was listed all over the state as a stolen vehicle. One of the ladies asked me if we had an extra set of keys. We did, and she said that their son had taken their set of keys one time and had taken their car. That's all I needed. I knew right where that car was.

DON:
In that instance, I can't remember when Dad was working, but I remember that I avoided seeing him for about three days and nights. He would go to work and I would wait to come home until he had left, and I wouldn't get out of bed until I knew he had gone, so I missed seeing him for about three days. I was really afraid to see him. Finally Mother came up to me and said, "Well son. I think you had better go see your Dad." Do you know what? Rather than Dad being ornery, he said, "You know son, I think you have learned your lesson." I had. Never again did I take the car without permission.

Another thing I'll always remember about Mom and Dad is that they were always generous with anything that they had, and especially with their car. I know that they had walked downtown to go to a movie so that I could take the car, not just once but many times. I could always go to Dad for anything I wanted, and if he felt that it was all right he would never turn me down.

VELMA:
One thing about Mom and Dad is that they were willing to listen to your side of the story, and I think that was really a good thing.

DON:
There was one time that Dad wasn't too willing to listen. I kept wanting to get a dog, and he kept saying, "You can't have a dog in the city. You'd want to bring him in the house, and you can't bring a dog in the house." I don't know how long I had been after him, but my friends and I had been up hunting in the foothills and we stopped by the dog pound. I saw this dog in there that I really liked, and so I brought it home. Everyone liked it. I guess Dad came home from work.

MOM:
Let me add a little bit to that. You kept begging for a dog. I believe your Dad said you could have one but you couldn't bring it in the house. It was about three weeks after that when you brought Shep home. That day I told everyone what time we were going to have dinner, and I had made hot biscuits, and I expected everyone to be on time. When dinner time came, we sat down at the table when a knock came at the door. When I went to the door I couldn't see anybody. I looked farther out, and there stood Don with this dog, and he had the biggest smile on his face. I've never seen anybody love a dog like he did. He was the most beautiful dog. Everyone in the family loved that dog. He must have been treated really badly because when you would go to pet him at first, he would just cringe like he expected to be beaten.

MYRNA:
I remember when we would give that dog a bath, how white and pretty he would be and how he would prance around. Don didn't keep him out of the house either. Don would lay on the floor with the telephone for hours and the dog would lay there with him, with his head on Dons shoulder. You could go out on the back porch all summer long and here Don would be with the dog on the bed with him, and Dad would say "Don't let that dog on the bed," and the next morning the dog would be on the bed again.

I remember when I was a little girl when we would go places and get home late at night, and Dad would carry me into the house. It was such a comforting feeling to be so sleepy and to be cuddled and carried into bed. I hated go be so grown up that I had to walk, and he still carried the others.

When we were talking about cars, it reminded me about a time when I was a little girl up in Wallsburg.. It must have been the same car you all were talking about. It had running boards along the sides. Dad was going somewhere, and I wanted to go too, and I wanted to ride on the running board. Dad said, "No, its too dangerous." I begged, and he finally told me alright. So I stood on the running board, and he started off; going very slowly. I did fine for a little ways, but then I got scared, and tried to jump off Dad stopped that car so fast and ran over and picked me up, and how frightened he was that I had been injured. I didn't even have a mark on me. Dad was going so slow that I wasn't hurt at all. I had just tried to jump off and fell.

Do you remember that time just after we had moved from Wallsburg to Provo, and we lived in that house with the big window? Mother kept telling us not to jump on that bed, that we were going to break the window.

CAROL:
I remember after we broke that window, Myrna kept telling us that we had to go because we had broken that window. It was a Monday, because Mother was washing. I remember Myrna decided that we were going to go to Wallsburg, to Grandma.

MYRNA:
We started off; but Mother wouldn't let you or Don go, but I left, and when I got about two blocks up the street to the railroad tracks, I could smell fried potatoes, and bacon and onions cooking. It made me so hungry that I came back home. I was going to get some food to take, so that I would have something to eat on the way, but Mother would not let me go the second time. I expected Dad to be really angry, and I was scared to death to face him because he had told us so many times not to jump on that bed, but it was just like it was with Don. He didn't have to say a lot of words. He really knew we had been punished. We punished ourselves and he didn't have to.

DON:
The only time we didn't really learn our lesson was when we kept running after each other, and knocking over that lamp.

VELMA:
I remember the days of the depression when there were so many men laid off Dad would get called back intermittently for short periods of time for about three years.

MOM:
He was laid off he year Carol was born. He got called back that winter, and we had to borrow money to get feed for the cattle. He got back on for about two months, just barely long enough to pay for that feed.

VELMA.
Then I remember it got worse and worse. I was in the fifth and sixth when we lived in Orem. We lived in a house that had an orchard around it, and we grew tomatoes. We had apricots, and other fruit. I remember Dad loading bushels of fruit on that truck, and driving up to Wasatch county to try to sell the fruit door to door. One trip he came back and hadn't been able to sell any, and I remember the look on his face. He actually gave it away. Then we moved down to Provo, and he and Mother took turns trying to make any kind of money they could. They were selling cosmetics, and Zanol products (spices, makeup, etc.) door to door.

They would go out all morning and Mother would come back in time to fix our lunch. Nobody had any money. Nearly everybody was out of work, and nobody had any spare money to buy these things, but Dad and Mom kept struggling. Then we went back to Wallsburg. We lived up around the hill on an old dry wheat farm. I hated it. The wind blew so much, and that house was just a frame. The foundation was just a pile of rock on the corners, some in the middle, and when the wind would blow, it would shake that cabin, and that's all it really was. There was a loft where we had mattresses on the floor to sleep. Jess would go down and swim in that spring where we got our drinking water.

MYRNA:
I liked it up there. I remember that there was the big spring where we got our drinking water, but there was a little one not far away and there were buttercups, and other flowers, and there were little animals. I was little enough then that these were the things that a little kid would enjoy.

VELMA:
There was a stream up there, Mom, that we used to go get watercress from. I think of how hard Dad worked trying to make a living for us. I was old enough to realize it but I don't think that Mother and Dad said anything about not being able to do this or that for lack of money. They would go without in order to give things to us. When I think of my high school years and the time you took me to Provo to get a dress because all the girls wore formals, and you bought me that beautiful white, lace dress that I think cost $12. In those days that was almost more than Mom had in grocery money for a whole month. I think Mom used to spend about five dollars a week for groceries. Then. Dad had to go to Nevada.. He got called back on the railroad while we were up there and he had to go down to Las Vegas to work. He was gone the whole summer.

MOTHER:
He would usually work the days during the week and every thirty days he would get time off and come home. Then he got back on the railroad in Provo a few days a week, and commute from Provo to Wallsburg. Then he was called back to Provo to work in November, and we moved back to Provo. He was supposed to get a check just before Christmas. It didn't come. We had gone to the stores, and laid away some things for Christmas. That day he was supposed to get his check, and when he left for work I told him we needed some coal. He said to call the coal company and have a ton sent out and he would pay for it when he got home with his check. When I called the coal company they would not send any out unless we paid cash for it. We only had one scuttle of coal to last that day. When your Dad came home that night, and I looked at his face, I knew something was wrong. He said, "The checks didn't come." So we went down to the stores, and they let us have the gifts that we had arranged for, and your Dad said, "We're not going to be without coal for Christmas, and he went down to the railroad and went along the tracks where he picked enough pieces that had fallen from the cars, to fill a sack so that we had coal for Christmas.

VELMA:
Remember, Mother, there was one time too, when you were out of flour. We had no money at all, and a guy owed you some money for a pasture.

MOTHER:
Yes, we rented out pasture. That's when we were living up on the hill where that orchard was, and Clyde said, "I'll go and see if I can't get some of this pasture money." He went down and asked this man but he said he couldn't pay it. Your Dad must have shown in his face how he felt, and the man said to wait a 'minute and he'd talk to his wife. She gave him three dollars. We put enough gas in the car to get us down to the grocery store and we got a sack of flour.

VELMA:
I remember that one time when we lived in Springville, I was just eleven. Mother sent me to the store with fifteen cents and told me to buy hamburger. That was a pound of hamburger to feed all of us.. Mother made gravy, and that meat tasted so good to me. I don't know what mother managed to feed us but we never went hungry, but we sure didn't have meat and fancy foods.

CAROL:
I didn't feel like we didn't have money, or that we were poor. In all the time I was growing up I heard of these hard times, but I really don't remember ever feeling that we were not as rich as anyone else in town.

MOTHER:
When you younger children got old enough to remember your Dad had a job.

DON:
I never remember having to go without something. I can't ever remember Dad or you ever saying no because we didn't have the money.

MYRNA:
We knew we had to be careful, because we didn't have enough money to be extravagant but at the same time we knew that if we needed something Mother and Dad would find a way.

BOB [Anderson]:
We have spoken about Dad Carters affection for his grandchildren, and this became evident in our own situation. Granddad always showed great affection for Bob. We were always able to farm the grand children off on Grandma and Grandpa Carter. Velma went down to stay with them while I went hunting, and I was gone for four or five days. I remember coming back to Provo, and my own son wouldn't even come to me. He was Granddad's boy. I also remember his barbering ability. It was impossible to get our kids to go to the barber, unless it was Granddad Carter. He refused to cut anyone else's hair. He said that when he gave up barbering that he gave it up for good. We finagled him into cutting Bobs hair and he did this as long as we were in this area.

MYRNA:
The memories I have of Dad with children were not just with his grandchildren. It seemed that every little kid that ever came around would go right to Dad. 1The rest of us would take a while to get them to come to us but with Dad, he could build up a relationship almost immediately with any child that was there.

BOB:
It seemed that kids were just drawn to him. Then there was the time Velma and I had gone to the Parks in southern Utah, and we left Bob with the grandparents. When we came back from our stay in the Parks, he wouldn't come to either of us.

VELMA:
It wasn't that long either. We had intended to stay a week and I was having nightmares so, after about three days we packed up and came home. I couldn't stand to be away.

MOTHER:
When you came home Bobbie called Clyde "Daddy" and you turned and said "Who's been teaching him that?"

CAROL:
We had a similar experience with our children. When Steve was finishing up his graduate work, he had to stop his project because they didn't get the equipment that he needed, and he had to start a whole new project. We had already moved out of our house at Pullman, and the children and I were living with his parents. He asked me to see if Mother and Dad would come and get our children and take them to Utah so that I could go back and help him finish his project. They came up in October, or the last of September. John was born on Dads birthday, and he was ten months old when they took him. It was the 16th of December when we got down there. John had completely forgotten us. He would not come to us at all. We had to leave before we really got reacquainted with him. The others remembered us but John didn't. That trip back to Connecticut was something. We stopped at a service station, and there was a man there who was gray haired and wore glasses similar to Dads, and John just sobbed and tried to get out of the car to that man. He pawed at the car window, and that night he woke up in the night at the motel, and neither Steve nor I could comfort or do anything with him. He just missed Mother and Dad, especially Dad. I guess Dad really took care of him.

MOTHER:
The children got really sick, and I went and stayed with the one that was sick and needed me most. We had John's bed in our bedroom next to the bed, and your Dad really took care of him. We had them down for about two months, and John learned to walk, and he said his first words while he was with us. His first word was stocking.

CAROL:
That was really hard to have to renew your acquaintance with your own children. To them we were not their parents.

DON:
Not only children liked Dad. I don't of a person that knew Dad that wasn't his friend.

MYRNA.
That was shown when he died. You know we only expected a small crowd at the viewing and funeral because he died so near Christmas. The night we went down to the viewing, we went an hour early so that we'd have some time alone as a family. There were people waiting for us, and we never did have any time as just the family. The viewing started an hour before it was supposed to and lasted an hour or an hour and a half after it was supposed to be over because there were so many people. The next day it was the very same way. Here it was, two days before Christmas and they had to bring in extra chairs because there wasn't room for everyone who came.

STEVE:
I think that John took Dad's death harder that any of our other children. That's affected John even today. He is never around when goodbyes are said because he had such an emotional experience.

CAROL:
After Dad died and we came home from the funeral I remember trying to talk to John, who was about eight, but he wouldn't talk much about it. One day I went into his room because he was just sobbing. When I asked him what was wrong he said, "Mother, I'll never see Grandpa again."

MOTHER:
One of the things that was said at his funeral by the bishop was, "He was small in stature, but in spirit he was a giant of a man." There never was anybody that needed help that he could help that he didn't do it.

VELMA:
You know I felt so terrible because when Dad died I was very ill with Hong Kong flu, and Tom had come down with it too, and he was so sick I couldn't leave go home. I was just torn that weekend. Here I had a child with a fever of 104, and I was so weak myself that I could hardly stand up and this Sunday, the day before the funeral, I had fallen asleep on the couch. I didn't know how long I slept, but I woke to what felt like a touch on my shoulder. I was awake instantly. I had this feeling come into my mind that everything was all right, that Dad understood. It was a very comforting experience to me.

MYRNA.
Another thing I remember were the vacations we took. Dad took us on the train down to California. There was one vacation I remember especially. We went to San Francisco and Grass Valley. There were some experiences that I had on that trip that I will never forget. I've never been so frightened in my whole life. We went into an ice cave. It was a tunnel that had formed from an earthquake, and there were huge, I mean really huge, boulders that were held in place above us by these little tiny pebbles. It just frightened me to death. I remember Dad taking my hand as we went into that cave, and holding it until we were back out again. I had confidence in Dad. I just knew that if anything happened he would take care of me. Then we went to a water cave that was really deep. It had ladders zig- zagging back and forth from one side to the other until they got down to the water. Mother went first and the ladder broke with her. She managed to get back up, and then we went up to an observation tower that was manned by the forest service as a fire lookout. I've always been afraid of heights, and there were about 150 steps going up to that lookout. Besides that, the steps were not solid. They were circles with holes in, and there was no back to them. I got up all right, because I could look up, but when it was time to go down, I just couldn't. Dad must have known how frightened I was because he came back up and helped me to go down those steps.

That time the man came to the house and scared me so bad as a teenager I knew Dad would take care of things. I don't know if Dad had ever had to whether he could have handled physical force. He wasn't a very big man, and he wasn't trained in any kind of marshal arts that I know of, but I thought Dad could take care of any kind of situation.

VELMA.
I know that one time I came home from a dance with a boy when I was a teenager and he tried to get fresh. When we got home I told him "You go home right now. My Dad is upstairs and he's got a gun and he'll come down here and use it on you if you try to get fresh with me." I don't think Dad ever had a gun in the house in his life, but I knew that Dad would come down and beat the daylights out of this kid if I yelled or anything.

I don't remember how old I was when Dad took us on a trip to California. It was so exciting. I think it was when he was working in Las Vegas. We stayed in a hotel, and we went out to Venice Beach. He took me on that roller coaster which at that time was one of the scariest ones in the country. I remember him holding on to me. I don't think I would have live through it otherwise. Then we went to Woolworth's shopping. He said to me "Which way do we go, and I said "This way." He said "No, we don' t." I was so sure that was the way we came into that store. "No, you come with me and you'll see, We go this way." Sure enough, when we went his way we went out the door, and it wasn't until we already had gone out the door that he told me that there were two entrances to Woolworth's, and that I had been right all the time. He loved to play tricks.

CAROL:
On this trip Myrna and Don mentioned, we stayed at a hotel, and I remember how Mother could never keep her directions straight. We'd go in one door and out another, and Mother would be completely lost. But Dad always had a good sense of direction and he always knew where he was going. Mother would say,"We're going the wrong way," and Dad would answer, "That's all right. You just come along and we'll be all right." I always knew Dad would get where we were going.

DON:
I remember that vacation when we went on a ferry, and he took us to Flyshacker Zoo.

MYRNA:
Another thing I remember about Mother and Dad was the way they worked together. I don't remember Dad coming home and seeing Mother working at putting up fruit, or anything else that he didn't pitch in and help. It doesn't seem like he was ever just sitting when Mother was working. He was always helping in some way.

VELMA:
That's true. I always remember how much Dad loved Mother, and how much he thought of her.

DON:
It was always interesting to hear one of them start a story. They could never get through it, without the other helping. Another thing I remember about Dad was the way he painted our house. He painted it, then went back and striped between the bricks.

MOTHER:
He was really meticulous. I remember him painting, and I was helping paint the window. He wouldn't let me finish, because I couldn't do it good enough.

VELMA:
That's interesting about Dad because I remember when I was younger he always insisted that he couldn't do anything like that. Then we moved into that one house and he kept lowering the ceilings.

DON:
I can remember in that same home when I was about sixteen, John, Phil, and I bought a Model A Ford for $33 It cost each of us $11. We broke an axle on it so it was parked in our garage. We had a heavy storm that year and the roof caved in. I remember Dad said that he couldn't build a new garage. Then all of a sudden, he decided he was going to do it, and I remember helping him. He built a real nice garage there, and he had no problems at all on it.

CAROL:
Dad always kept the yard and garden so nice. Do you remember the roses along the fence and the peonies that he grew, and the good vegetable garden?

VELMA:
Do you remember that he used to tease Mother because she planted flowers among the vegetables, and vegetables among the flowers.

MOTHER:
He said one time that we should be growing flowers on the roof.

DON:
One thing I remember and cherish is one vacation that Mother and Dad took, and they came down to visit us in Orangeville. I had bought a chain saw, and I had purchased a lot up in the Lake of the Pines. We were clearing all this oak. I had permission to go in and cut the oak. Dad would get up early in the morning and go up and help me cut that. I was worried that Dad was going to overdo himself but he just loved to help, and he didn't like to set back and watch anybody else work. I think he really enjoyed that vacation where he worked that summer.

CAROL:
He enjoyed his grandchildren even when his asthma got so bad that he couldn't pick them up and play with them the way he used to.

VELMA:
I think we all agree that we were lucky to have him as our father.

DON:
I have always been thankful that I had a father that gave me the training that he did. I think a lot of things that Dad did with us as children have been carried over into my family. I married into a family that didn't have the type of affection that we had within our family. We had a real close association with one another. I don't recall putting my arms around Dad so much, but I always did around Mother, and a man to man relationship is a little different. I always had that love for Dad, but if it hadn't been for the atmosphere I had to grow up in, we probably wouldn't have it in our home. I've always been grateful to Mother and Dad that I did have such a loving home to grow up in.

VELMA:
I think that we all feel that way.
Diane and David added that they remember the love, the tenderness, and the patience that Dad always had.