There was a time Bill and I considered adoption. We wanted a little boy to even out our family. We were asked to take classes for the adoption. During the classes we were to make a chart of our family tree. I became interested in looking back as far as I could. Working with mom and dad to fill in what they knew. I decided to bring Aunt Agnes and Aunt Theo, mom’s only living Aunts to her house for lunch. In the mean time I searched at the Tecumseh library for the article about the train accident that Mom’s dad and oldest sister were killed. It was the spring of 1930. Mom never talked about it and just got teary whenever it was mentioned, which was hardly ever.
We had arranged for dad to need a ride shortly after they got there so that we could talk with them alone. They told us how devastating it was for the family, the whole town really. Mom was only 5 and Uncle Raymond was only 2, Uncle Alfred, Aunt Frances and Helen were in elementary school when it happened. I am attatching the article from the paper.
TheytoldusthatGrandpaLidsterandMargie(thatwasmom’soldestsister,whowasabouttograduatehighschool)hadgottenaridehomefromafriend. On the way home the car stalled as it crossed the railroad tracks, about 2 miles North of where they lived. The friend and Margie were inside the car trying to get it started and grampa was trying to push it off the tracks. (In those days the trains didn’t use whistles unless they were in a town.) This was 1930 and there was no insurance, so if you lost your car it was a big loss. As the article says, it dragged the car a ways down the tracks and everyone was cut beyond recognition.
Grandmahad5childrentocareforand a 100 acre farm. They told us how all the farmers in the area helped get the crops in and gave the family clothes and other stuff they needed. Thank goodness Aunt Theo lived across the street.
They also told us stories about how their grandpa fought in the civil war. That would be my great, great, great, great grandpa. They remembered he talked about how cold they were in the winter and that they had to find their own food. Stealing eggs from chickens, stealing chickens, hunting and cooking for themselves. The Union (government of the north) only gave them a uniform, gun and bullets; and a canteen. Food rations were unreliable.
