My Journey Into My Past

March 24, 2019: Twelve                 My mother worked at a bomber plant!   Clara Wickenheiser was born 12/10/1918 to Gus and Lena Wickenheiser.   She was the second of 10 children, nine living. Her mother tended home and garden, her father worked a small farm, and supplemented his income by laying track for the railroad and working in the local grain elevator.    In 1937 my grandfather died of blood poisoning, leaving the older children to support their mother and younger siblings. The last years of the depression were hard on the family. Then on 12/7/1941 disaster struck the United States when Pearl Harbor was bombed, thrusting the country into the European war.   While the ships and planes were still crumpled and smoking in Hawaii, the recruitment offices were signing up young men at record numbers.   They were ready and willing to get into the fight.   This...

I don’t have much to say about large families. For me, it is the norm.   I have 83 first cousins, on my mom’s side of the family.   At our little country school the names Wickenheiser, Zochowski, and Joblinski were in all 8 grades for years….and that is not counting second and third cousins. All of my siblings had a least one or two cousins in their class. (my dad’s family seemed strange to me.   Only 9 aunts and uncles and 10 cousins.)   In all, I have had 28 aunts and uncles. 93 cousins. In our bunch a small family didn’t exist.

My paternal uncle, Edward F Joblinski (or Jablonski) was born 21 September 1904 and died on 17 April 1989.  My Dad was 13 years younger and really looked up to him.  Dad said he was very good to him.  But Uncle Eddie had a dark past.  As a young man he was a drunk.  This was in the 20’s and 30’s and there were no PC terms for his condition.  He woke up in the morning and hit the first fifth of whiskey for breakfast.  He made his mother cry.  He was a drunk. I heard about a few ladies he dated, but there was nothing serious, to my knowledge.  The whiskey was more important than the women.  Until the day he had to go to the doctor. I don’t know what drove him there, but the doctor laid down the law and said if he didn’t give up the bottle, he would be dead in very few years.  I am sure he was told to stop drinking many times before this, but this time hit home.  He went ...