Written in 1983
I was the oldest girl in the family. I dressed the little kids and combed and braided their hair. We always wore ribbons in our hair and starched underskirts so our dresses would stick out. It took all day, usually on Tuesday, to get everything starched and ironed up so it would be all ready for Sunday. We wore button shoes and our leggins had buttons too. They got all iced up. I never had a pair of boots until after I was married.
We went to church and Sunday School at a Reformed Church in the morning, then to the Sunday School Mission at Porter School in the afternoon, then church at night at the Reformed Church. We had student preachers in the winter and usually the same one all summer. Trena and I cleaned the East Lawn Chapel for years. We each got 25 cents.
It was wild country near where we lived - there were no houses. (Where Mercy Hospital is now!) One time Lammert was walking across the creek with his hands in his pockets, he caught his toe in a root and fell right across the creek. (I still laugh when I think of it!) The creek had a fence going across it. Three of us girls thought we'd cross the creek holding onto the fence. The fence buckled and we all fell in! We had a lot of fun at that old creek.
One time Lammert and Clifford were pulling a wagon through the field to the green house on Roberts Street. They were going to play a trick on each other and let the other pull the wagon alone. So looking straight ahead first one let go of the handle then the other let go. They went a couple of blocks before they found out nobody was pulling the wagon!
We liked to play jacks and ball, annie, annie over and school. I liked to be the teacher. We always had a lot of fun trying to escape the housework that had to be done.
Grandpa Bush had a field of potatoes. They got about as big as marbles. Trena and I would each peel 50 potatoes. The first one that got done would read to the other until they got done!
Grandma Bush was sick for many years. Our mother took care of her and the others. It was up to me to help care for the younger ones. In the fifth grade I hardly went to school at all but passed anyhow because of the graces of the teacher, Grace Sovacool.
I stayed at Grandpa and Grandma Herlein's and slept in the front bedroom. The horse with the milk wagon would be going klippity klop down the street and always woke me up. (The sounds of the city!) One time I was staying overnight and got homesick and had to be carried home in the middle of the night!
I used to do housework for Aunt Anna (Uncle John's first wife). She wanted stuff from the store and she wrote a note of what to get. She wrote, don't get this or this because it's no good. I didn't know what she wrote. I just gave the note to the storekeeper.
I did housework for Uncle John after Aunt Anna died and his second wife, Florence, left. He had two kids, Harry and Jeannette. I decided to move the stove and hurt my back. I did the housework and the washing for $6.00 a week. I decorated the house with tissue paper and thought it looked real pretty. Some of the women from the church came over to give the house a good cleaning and took down all my trimmings. Hurt my feelings!
One time the men were helping to build the East Lawn parsonage. They were nailing the floor. Bill Boman was standing around talking instead of working. Clifford nailed the soles of his shoes to the floor. When they were ready to go, he couldn't move.
I'll never forget - Grandma Bush's house was behind the Doo Drip Inn. The train track ran behind her house. Uncle George had to take the train to go to the 1st World War. We were upstairs looking out of the window watching the train go by. She held my hand so tight it hurt. I think she had an inkling that she'd never see him again. He died of the flu at camp.
I still am amazed that anyone would leave the country where they were born to go to a new contry. Just think of what Grandpa and Grandma Herlein went through. The men were in a separate part of the ship from the women and children. He didn't know their baby had died on that three month trip until they got to America. Grandma had to take care of that all alone. The baby was buried at sea. They have a stone for him here in Muskegon. There are four stones for infants by Grandpa and Grandma Herlein's graves in Oakwood Cemetery in Muskegon.