The Hicks Place

Summer Time

Summer time is usually my favorite time because I feel best when the sun is shinning and when it is warm, but this year it has been really too hot to enjoy being out of doors.  Of course it was hot when i was young and we had no air conditioning and haymaking and thrashing on the farm were hard, sweaty work.  I wonder now how the older men endured it, but they were used to it and knew the work had to be done.

Last Sunday was our family reunion, and my cousins and I are now the oldest living generation.  I am fortunate to remember well all of my grandparents who were still living when I graduated from college.  They were farming families who came from farming backgrounds, and all of my aunts and uncles lived on the farm except Ada Mae, and her husband Landon worked mostly on a farm.  We all lived within a 30 mile radius so we saw each other often, and had large family reunions almost every summer.  Now our families are spread out, particularly the next generation, so it is likely that when we cousins are gone, the annual reunion will probably become a thing of the past.  We used to have our reunions at parks or at someones farm house, but now we have it in an air conditioned VFW hall, and that was a good thing this year!  

Attendance by the younger generations was sparse, although I was very pleased that my grandson and great granddaughters were there.  Of course we older ones remenisce with each other about fond memories and probe each others minds for answers to questions we now wish we had asked our parents while they were living.  There are a lot of experiences we could share with our children about what it was like growing up in rural Indiana during the 1940's, but our lifestyle then does not much interest most of them until they reach 50, and then our times together are occupied mostly with entertaining grand children and we want to know what is happening in their lives.  Our mortality really doesn't sink in until we near retirement, and it is not particulary healthy to look back too much.  Whatever the purpose of life is, it is to be lived, and the more active we are the fuller and happier our life experience will be.

So, yesterday Marcia and I went to the Indianapolis International Film Festival at the Indianapolis Museum of Art which is not far from where we live.  We saw Summer Pasture , a documentary about nomadic life in the highlands of Tibet.  At least there they are not concerned with the heat, but their livelihood depends upon the milk from their Yak herds, and the dung from them is their source of heat.  At 15,000 ft. it is a harsh environment except in summer.  Recently these nomads have found a new source of income, Caterpillar Fungus , which is in great demand for use in medicines.  This is a poignant film, depicting the nomadic life and the particular hardships of the female who is expected to do most of the work.  It is no wonder that these nomadic groups are disintegrating as more and more of the younger ones leave for life in the remote towns.  I was touched by the young mother's experience and her endurance, and I strongly recommend seeing this film.  It will make you appreciate that life is difficult around the world, but more difficult in some places than others. 

I continue to read, having recently finished F. Scot Fitzgerald's Tender is the Night, and currently slogging through W. Somerset Maugham's Of Human Bondage.  Fitgerald's book is interesting both for its description of affluent life in France in the 1920's and the treatment of mental disorders by the self-centered psychiatrist who is the main character.  His wife is a patient, and he himself is flawed, as of course we all are.  Maugham's book is about the life of a physically handicapped man, his search for love and an occupation, and struggles to overcome his feelings of inadequacy.  Thrown into both books are passages regarding the author's views on life, religion and politics of the day.  Just the stuff I love to read for its historical insight.

I find myself now taking little time with the newspaper and television news reports.  Most of the news is not encouraging.  Sure I care about what life may hold for my children and grand children, but most of the people who are in a position to influence the future of our country are really more concerned about the next election than they are about doing what is best for the U. S. of A., and the World!  I vote; I abhor the money spent on elections.  Just think what good could be accomplished if that money were spent "for the good of the people"!  There isn't much I can do at my age to influence the future.  All I can do really is to encourage young people to seek knowledge, beware of slogans and sound bites, be tolerant but do not abide fools!  Read!       

 

 

Historic Information and Opinions

While visiting my son Greg last fall, our discussion consisted of his asking some things about his great grandparents and their lives which had been prompted in part by his reading this blog.  I of course was full of information for him, sprinkled with facts and my impressions.  At last, he chuckled and said I should set myself up as an authority and charge people for information in response to their questions.  Well, for Christmas I received from him a large plaque en-scribed "Historic Information and Opinions,  The Hopkins".  That was a gift I cherish, and it made me and Marcia really laugh.  So, Greg, here goes!   

In February, 1941 the unemployment rate in the US finally dropped below 10% after it hit a high of 25% in 1932.  This country was still trying to stay out of the war in Europe, but finally had approved the lend-lease program allowing needed war materials to be sent to England.  In spite of all of the programs which had been tried to end the great depression, it lingered on until we began to gear up for war.  The period we are in now and have been in since 2007 is without question the greatest recession since then, and just because Wall Street is back up and running doesn't mean we are out of the woods yet.

Seventy years ago I was 5, and would start to school in the Fall.  My father was tending a 100 acre farm, two thirds of it tillable, with a team of horses.  We had a car, a 1933 chevrolet two door sedan with no trunk, but no electricity or indoor plumbing.  The house, a large 7 room two story, had 3 bedrooms, but in the winter we lived in just 3 of the rooms because it was heated by a pot belly wood/coal stove in the living room. That was the Hicks Place, for which this blog is named.

We were never hungry because we had dairy cows, chickens, hogs, and a big garden.  I and my brothers went barefoot much of the time in the Summer, except for Sundays when we went to church, where we saw our grandparents and families of cousins, often having Sunday dinner at one of their houses. 

In the summer, my dad would work with relatives and neighbors to help each other at haymaking and wheat or oats harvesting times. One of my grandfathers had a larger farm and had tractors, a threshing machine, a hay rake and loader, so my dad and others gave their physical labor and my grandfather provided equipment.  But in the fall and winter my dad shucked all of the corn he raised, at least 20 acres, by hand.  That means he walked along each row in the field, took each ear of corn in his two hands pealed back the shucks, broke it off of the stalk, and threw it into the farm wagon beside him which was pulled by our team of horses,"Dick and Gale".  He was fast at it and could shuck two wagon loads a day when the weather was good.  Some winters he wouldn't finish until after Christmas.

I am currently reading "Citizens of London" by Lynne Olson.  It relates the situation in London, the bombings and shortages affecting normal people there, but also the lives of US newsmen, Averell Harriman, and particularly the US Ambassador John Gilbert Winnant as they reported the situation to the American public and conducted relations between our administration and the Churchill government.  It portrays the shakey relations between Churchill and Roosevelt as well as the conflicts between the Allied military leaders, Eisenhower's strengths and weaknesses and troubles controling his generals.  That is a war we should have entered sooner.

But now I am cautious about the power struggle in Egypt. Out of a population of about 80 million, perhaps several hundred thousand are reported demonstrating for Mubarak to resign and leave the country.  We have seen large demonstrations in our country which do not necessarily represent the position of the majority.  Once such demonstrations gain media coverage they can appear to represent a larger segment of the population than they really do.  I am old enough to remember when the media (particularly the NY Times) were instrumental in convincing us that Castro was a Savior for Cuba.

I am just saying that the US should be very careful not to take sides in this situation.  We cannot become involved to the extent that we appear responsible for the outcome.  We have enemies, to a very great extent, because we have made it our business to get involved in supporting foreign governments (we think in our best interest) which the people there find unacceptable.  That's my opinion.

 

Where Did July Go?

Well July got by me without a post.  Of course we did have the Hopkins/Page reunion on the 18th, in Roachdale at the VFW as usual, and had 37 attending by my count.  We lose some occasionally of course as we get older, this year my brother Charles and cousin Jean Ann's husband, Bob Wolfenbarger.  Attendees included guests Dale and Muriel White, Dale being a descendant of William Hopkins, brother of Cornelius who the rest of us go back to.  There of course was plenty of food and reminiscing.

It has been a hot and rainy Summer in Indy, continuing from a rainy Spring, so everything is green but it has been too warm to enjoy the outdoors much.  If you check my reading list you will see additions, the Scotland related items of course occurred mostly in June.  I have downloaded some other Pulitzer Prize winners to my Kindle which remain unfinished.  American Pastoral by Phillip Roth I'll likely never finish because I don't like his style.  Main Street by Sinclair Lewis because the heroine is so bored in small town Minnesota and never should have married the old doctor anyway.

We spent the last two weeks of the month at the condo in Roanoke.  Drove out this time because Amtrak doubled their rates for the summer.  It's almost exactly 500 miles and without major cities except Dayton and Charleston, so not a bad days drive.  

I've been under medication for an impinged nerve causing pain in my left arm and shoulder for much of the month.  For that reason Marcia did most of the driving and many days I was forced to go without my usual late afternoon martini.  I am now off the strong pain medicine and so think it is time to go back to my old habit.  

The Holiday Season

Seventy Five years ago today, December 26, 1934, my older brother then age 1 year, 3 months and 28 days, died of pneumonia at 1 o'clock in the afternoon.  He had only been sick for four days, so what my parents and grandparents had been planning for, Lovell's second but really his first Christmas when they could witness his joy at the Christmas ritual of gifts and family gatherings, turned unexpectedly into one of tragedy and almost unbearable sorrow.  Just a few months before, my parents had held his hands as he stood between them and took his first steps.  Now he lay stricken with an illness which was then often fatal, especially for small children. 

Lovell was described as being a happy little fellow with sparkling brown eyes, and I now have a box kept all through the years by my mother containing some of his little clothes and likely his first pair of shoes.  In that box with all of the memorabilia is the register of attendees at his funeral, his obituary, and the following poem, its author unidentified (though my father loved and wrote several poems over the years):

A flower once bloomed in a garden, it was cared for with tenderest care,

An Angel passed in by the warden, and plucked the bright flower so fair.

That Angel was death, and the warden was a father's and mother's pure love,

That flower was baby Lovell- Now transplanted in Heaven above.

Lovell was buried December 28, 1934.  On New Years's Eve, three days later, my parents celebrated their third wedding anniversary.  Ten months after that on October 3, 1935 I was born, and two years later another son, Charles was born on December 1, 1937.  My parents spoke often of course of Lovell over the years.  I'm sure they never recovered from that loss, what parent could.  I have only very happy memories of my childhood Christmases, but how mixed must have been the emotions of my parents each year at this joyous season.  They were rewarded, six years after that sorrowful Christmas, by the birth of another son, Ernest, born December 25, 1940.  

This year, we brothers and our wives were together Christmas afternoon and we shared happy stories of years gone by, our present aches and pains, sweets and other food not necessarily recommended for our health, and plenty of laughter at our jokes as a warm fire burned in the fireplace.  Then we dug into the boxes of letters, postcards, old grade cards from school, ribbons won at Farmer's Institute's, announcements of weddings and births, and memorial books listing names of attendees at funerals of relatives and friends, all thoughtfully saved and cherished by our mother.  Tonight my emotions too are mixed.  There is joy and there is sorrow.  But somehow, if we are lucky, or maybe because we believe, we have mostly joy. 

 

 

My "Page" Ancestors

Yesterday we attended a re-dedication ceremony for a private cemetery where my maternal great, great, great grandfather, Williamson Page is buried.   It is located in a woods overlooking a stream in Hendricks County, Indiana southwest of the town of North Salem. 

   It is on the land which Williamson and his wife Elizabeth originally settled in 1833-34 when they moved there from Lee County, Virginia.  Williamson was the son of Peter Page and Elizabeth the daughter of John McCloud.   They built a log cabin, cleared some of their land and had children: Nellie, Nancy, Elizabeth, Stephen, Andrew J. Jeremiah J., Chesley, Robert, Williamson and Demerius. 

Jeremiah Jasper Page at age 20 married Ann Elizabeth Hypes on June 15, 1854.  Ann Elizabeth, born in Botetourt County, Virginia on Aug. 18, 1838, was the daughter of Jacob and Mary (Pfeffly) Hypes.   They had 11 children, one of whom was Samuel R. who married Rebecca Morphew on April 4,1881.  Rebecca  was born in Hendricks Co., Indiana on March 19,1864 to Joseph Morphew and Margaret Cox.   Samuel and Rebecca were the parents of Lona Estas, Bertha Ellen, Jesse Elza, Lillian Ann, Glenn, and Carrol Paul. 

Jesse Elza Page, my grandfather, was born November 14, 1888.  He married Vela V. Dodds on Nov. 15, 1908.  Their children were James Jewell, Hazel Alberta, Geraline Alvena, and Walter Harold Page. 

Hazel Alberta Page was born April 12, 1913.  She married my father, Carlos Hopkins, on December 31, 1931.  Carlos was born October 23, 1906 in Douglas Co., Illinois near the town of Newman.  Their children are Lovell Hopkins (born Aug. 28, 1933, died Dec. 26, 1934),  Donald W. (born Oct. 3, 1935), Charles L. (born Dec. 1, 1937) and E. Ernest (born Dec. 25, 1940).

My cousin James Robert Page, his wife Ann and daughter Martha, and cousin Lloyd Hopkins began clearing off the cemetery area and locating the burial sites early this summer with the advice and help of Jessica Felix who is a volunteer expert in gravestone restoration.  They were joined later by Jonell Page Klay, Duane Leach, myself and others in locating and replacing the bases and pieces of the original stones.  Jessica fabricated new bases and pieced together the original head and foot stones which were put back in place as they appear in the top photo.   Williamson's stone was broken into several pieces but was restored as it appears here. 

There were about 55 of us at the re-dedication yesterday.  Ed Britton, current owner of the surrounding land has given the cemetery site to the Page heirs which will have right of access to it and responsibility for its maintenance.  I believe the Page heirs present were all grandchildren and their descendants of either Lona Page or Elza Page.  We are mostly descendants of farmers who now live in cities or small towns.  After the very appropriately reverent dedication ceremony at the cemetery, all present returned to the nearby home of Bob and Ann Page for a pitch-in dinner where we renewed acquaintance with cousins we had not seen in a long time.  It was a beautiful fall day in Indiana and we all experienced a very special occasion.

 

 

 

Reunions

The young lady seated on the right is my grandmother, Hattie Ogdon Hopkins.  The other seated lady is her sister Mae.  Standing are Minnie Liston and Bird King, neither of whom I ever knew or have heard of.  I don't know where this photo was taken or what might have been the occasion.  The photo was one in the collection of Ada Mae Hopkins Stewart, my father's sister, which was brought to the Hopkins reunion by Ada Mae's daughter, Rose.  The reunion was yesterday, July 16Th, in Roachdale, Indiana where it has been held annually for many years.

Grandma was a very pretty young lady, but of course I remember her with wrinkles and glasses.  She was always slim, but strong and hardy because she often walked a mile to the store or to church. 

This is Grandma Hattie Ogdon Hopkins and Grandad Ernest Hopkins on their 50th wedding anniversary in 1951.  She died in 1958 at age 82.  I seldom saw Granddad in anything but overalls.  He never liked to have his picture taken, as may be obvious here.

My father, Carlos, died in 1993 and the last of his sisters died in 2004.  Now as we,  their children  go back  through  their old photos  we often find pictures of people we cannot positively identify.  Sometimes names are on the back, but often not. 

I have have been tracing the Hopkins family tree and have gotten back 6 generations, including mine,   to James and Lydia Hopkins who died in 1859 and 1845 respectively.  It would be great to have their photos, but I likely never will.  However, I have just found someone who has a photo showing the wife of my great, great, great grandfather's brother  (and they married sisters).  It is interesting to see these old photos, even the ones of people whom you don't know.

It is doubtful that our Hopkins reunion will survive another generation.  I have a lot of pleasant memories of many Hopkins and Ogdon reunions, and the photos we have help bring those memories back.  But such multi-generation family reunions are becoming rare.  Too bad.