My Book ...................LILAGCS (17)

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November 10, 2010

 Beginning of My High School Days

Moving to Sac City was not too difficult. Mom and dad came to Spencer to pick me up at Aunt Imajeans and Uncle Swede’s place where I had been living for a coupe of months until school was finished for that year.

editor’s note:

I had actually driven through Sac City a few years before the decision was made to more there. My dad had an uncle in Carroll, Iowa that was a very famous eye doctor. and my parents had decided to have him examine my eyes. We drove from Spencer to Carroll and passed through Sac City to get there. My dad’s hat had blown out the car window just west of Sac City on highway 20. We had to stop and go back to get it. That is why I remembered Sac City from my past experience with “Dad’s Hat”

I can remember arriving at our new home on north 12th street in Sac City. It was a duplex and the one thing I will never forget is the comment that my mother made about being able to pound hooks and nails in the walls to hang pictures. (We could not do that in the fire station)

 

Shortly after I got unpacked a young boy from across the street came over and introduced himself as Jimmy Joe. Then the first thing he did was warn me about 3 "bullys" that lived just down their street from where I lived so I managed to avoid them from May until the beginning of our 8th grade year.(just about 3 months)

It was on my way home after my first day of 8th grade that I encountered the 3 Bully's" It was Terry, Mike and another Terry.

                       

                         My Murray Bicycle I bought for $50

I was riding my bicycle home from school down 12th street when about 3 blocks from my house I heard this person yell "Hey kid!" It turned out to be Terry and I soon recognized he and Mike as being in my 8th grade class from school that day.

Well to make a long story longer......I started playing with them soon after that first encounter on the corner.

I remember one thing about Terry and Mike that I have never forgotten. They had me convinced that they had this secret club and boy I wanted to become a member so bad. So as gullible as I was (and still am) I allowed them to put me through all sorts of initiation things to become a member.......this lasted all four years of high school and on beyond that. The last time I checked at our 45th reunion I still wasn't a member yet!!!! Ha ha ha!

Mom told me that the house where we lived was called a duplex. It had 2 families living there. We lived on the ground floor and another family named the Beaver’s lived on the second floor. There were stairs in back of the house that went up to their place. Directly behind the duplex was a stand alone garage that had been converted into a small apartment. A young couple with a baby lived there.

Attached to the garage apartment was a small shed that we were able to keep garden tools and lawn equipment. Then behind all that was a large garden spot that mom and dad had already planted by the time I got there at the end of May. On the north side of the garage was a raspberry patch that yielded lots on delicious red raspberries.

                                        

Our Duplex was located at the edge of the residential area in that part of town. Behind where our house and garden were located was a very large wooded area.

 

                      

We still had our 1940 or 41 Desoto that was dad’s pride and joy. I don’t think we had it too long after we moved to Sac City  because I remember a square black Plymouth when I was learning to drive .

                                   

 

My mother made friends with some ladies that lived in the neighborhood. Floris Miller, Dorothy Beaver , and Mrs. Green. Dorothy was the lady who lived in the apartment above us and a lady named Mrs. Green  lived across the street.

               

 

I don’t recall how many times they would get together for coffee in the mornings, but I know it was at least once a week and maybe more often.

Floris and Dorothy both had boys about the same age as my 5 year old brother Jim.

I do remember the smell of the sweet rolls and coffee cakes that they would serve at the coffee gatherings.

                                    

The boy upstairs from where we lived was named Fred. We call him Freddy. I would play with brother Jim and Freddy a lot. We played a made up game of football all the time.

There were just the three of us, but we would pretend to have opponents and play many hours each day running play after play.

Another thing I would do to occupy my time was take my BB gun and go walking through the wooded area behind our house shooting at tin cans as targets.

                           

Jimmy Joe, the friend from across the street also warned me about playing baseball. I had played a lot of Little League baseball in Spencer and was actually first team 3^rd base there. When Jimmy told me that the local Little League team was coached by a Catholic Priest and that he really yelled a lot. I decided to forgo my baseball career.

See you on my next Blog…..

 

 

 

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