Barbara
Disclaimer: I am writing this story about my wonderful sister from seventy years of great memories. Cousin Gloria helped some, as did friends from across highway 71, Delbert and Frances. Old photos also helped jog my memory. And finally, my June remembered things about Barbara that I never knew or had forgotten. I believe that the events are accurate but the dates may be a little mixed up. Unfortunately, family who could have helped fill in the gaps, like Aunt Minnie and Aunt Ethyl, are no longer with us. I am writing about Barbara’s childhood, but for some real insight into the adult Barbara, you will enjoy reading Debbie’s “Memories of Mama” at the end.
In The Beginning
Barbara Joan Quick was born at the family home south of Hugo, Colorado, on Flag Day, June 14, 1939. An osteopathic doctor from Hugo attended the happy and uneventful arrival of Barbara, with the assistance of Mom’s older sister, Ruth Ball, who then stayed with us for a short time. Doctors made house calls in those days! That home was located on what is now Lincoln County Road 109 next to Branch Creek about 10 miles south of Hugo.
Barbara was the second child born to Joseph Francis Quick and Gladys Marjorie Samuelson Quick. She was actually the third because Mother suffered a miscarriage of a little boy before I was born. Barbara’s dad was born December 10, 1910, in Dodge City Kansas. He was half German, at least 1/8 Irish, and who knows what the rest was. Currently the best guess is English and a little more German. Barbara’s mother was born May 25, 1914, or possible 1913 as there was a question about the year of her birth. She was born in Des Moines, Iowa and was 100% Swedish.
In March of 1942, our family moved to the Matheson place west of Kutch, Colorado. That place is on the road that runs from highway 194 to the town of Matheson on highway 24. It was on the east side of the road about a mile or maybe a mile and a half north of North Rush Creek.
We went to a church that was held in the Kanza School located about a mile north of Rush, Colorado, and about a half mile east. I started to school at the Kanza School in the fall of 1942. About 10 kids were in a one room, one teacher, school house.
The Matheson house had bed bugs in it, so before we moved in our parents set off sulfur bombs. I remember the smell, and for some reason I remember that our chickens, which ran loose in the yard, pecked at the smell under the doors. Not sure what effect it had on them- probably gave them a good high. That procedure was a yearly practice for many people at that time. Maybe that is how we started hearing the saying: “sleep tight and don’t let the bedbugs bite.”
I remember playing some games with Barbara at this place including an attempt to teach her to play ball, but she was too young. We had a good relationship and she went along with any game I tried to teach her. Unfortunately, one of those games involved a brick on the edge of a shed which fell, hit her and left a small scar on her forehead. She was hurt, but I don’t remember her being mad at me. In fact I don’t remember any time that she was mad at me during our entire childhood.
I remember her crying when I fell off the barn when I was about eight. We were trying to see if Dad was coming home, and I kept backing up on the roof of the barn to get a better view and fell off of the back side. I wasn’t hurt but she ran crying for Mother to come and rescue me.
Our dad dug a pond in a little draw about a quarter of a mile east of the house. He used a Fresno (a scoop) to pull behind the tractor. Apparently it dug in too deeply and the tractor tipped over backyards. Dad wasn’t hurt and a neighbor came with his tractor and pulled Dad’s tractor back upright. The cattle drank from this pond and we had a big garden next to it. Barbara and I played in that pond often. I remembered it as a good sized pond, but when I took June and the kids to see it years later they all laughed at my “lake” that you could spit across.
Raymond and Nellie lived not far away and we visited them a lot. They lived on Horse Creek south of Hall Station, which is on highway 194 straight south of Kutch. Nothing left at Hall Station but there is still a sign. In about 1947, (Barbara was 8) Dad and Mom bought a kerosene refrigerator from Mr. Stephenson who ran that store. We had no electricity at our house as that time.
Nellie was related to Mom as Mom’s oldest sister Elveria had married Charlie Aery who had Nellie by his first marriage. Nellie’s husband Raymond died in a car wreck in about 1947 on “Dead Man’s Hill” which is on the north side of Long Branch creek between Punkin Center and Limon. The highway originally curved around the hill because it was too steep for early day cars to climb.
We also visited with the Schmiezer family who lived less than a mile south of our home. Then there was the family on the east side of the Matheson place who raised sheep. We got our first taste of mutton with them and we were not impressed. Fortunately, Barbara was probably too young to have eaten it, or at least she was too young to remember eating it.
There were not many girls near Barbara’s age in our neighborhood or in the family, so Barbara had only me and some other boys to play with during these years at Kutch.
We took a vacation every summer after the crops were planted-always to visit family and always arriving without specific notice. As I remember, we either went to Iowa to see the Olsons (Mom’s cousins), or to Minnesota to visit the Aery relatives. They might have known we were coming, but not when and with no phones we had to just show up. But, in those days everyone just showed up without notice, included home visits with neighbors in the evening. Friends just dropped in, and Mother always had a spice cake ready for who ever came by.
Two new neighbors who dropped in one evening in about 1948 were Charles and Bonnie who came from Iowa as I recall. Bonnie was a rather large woman and in the excitement of our first visit by them, Bonnie sat on Mom’s spice cake, which for some reason Mom had left on a chair. We still ate the cake and the two couples joked about the flat cake every time we were together after that. Her spice cake recipe posted later.
We also went to Colorado Springs almost every Saturday to shop and spend the day or perhaps the night with Grandma and Grandpa Quick. On one of those trips to Colorado Springs, probably about 1943, the right front wheel of our car came off at the top of hill and it rolled forever. Every time I travel over that hill on old highway 194 just east of Petersen Field, I recall the experience of watching Dad chase after that tire.
Aunt Minnie, Jack and Gloria lived at Eastonville north of Peyton Colorado. We visited with them often. Minnie was one of the cooks at the school. The three of them lived with us a few years later. Barbara and Gloria had a great relationship, but Barbara got along with everyone.
The Move to Ranch at Punkin Center
In May of 1944 our parents purchased their first property from Tony Girard, an elderly Italian hermit who had homesteaded the place. We must have visited with Tony several times before buying because I remember him well and I especially remember the ginger snap cookies that he always had. “You wont snops” he would ask Barbara and me in his broken English.
Tony took back a note and mortgage from Mom and Dad so we all went to Larimer Street in Denver once a year to take him his payment. The folks seem to think he spent it all on wine. Barbara was scared of the street car that came up behind us and had to stop because we were on its track, probably illegally, as the very close driver seemed annoyed at us and sounded his bell.
This property now belongs to Dick and Sheila, and they are generous in sharing it with family and friends. At that time the tiny house was on the top of the hill just east of its present location. There was a little room on the east side of the two rooms that was my private bedroom. Dirt floor and large cracks in the roof, but it served the purpose. The next summer Dad put the house, without my room, on skids and moved it down the hill near the well. Then the next summer he added a living room and a bedroom on the west side. Grandpa Albert Samuelson gave a lot of advice and probably helped some as did Bud and neighbors. Mother and Dad got the new bedroom, Barbara got the old bedroom, which is the north room of what remains of the old house. My room was the unfinished attic and I loved it.
Mom had a good summer in 1946. Dick was born and Mom’s brother, Bud, came home safely from the war. From my attic room, I saw him coming from Highway 71 and started to ride my bike to meet him. But Barbara wanted to go too, so she and I ran to meet him as he came from the highway after getting a ride with the mail carrier. He came to our house because he didn’t want to shock his Dad by just showing up. I don’t remember how we broke the news to Grandpa or what the concern was. Barbara didn’t remember Uncle Bud, but she was as happy to see him as any of the rest of us. We all got caught up in the excitement.
Until we got that kerosene refrigerator in 1947, canning was the only way to preserve vegetables, fruit and even meat. We did have a box high on the north side of the house where meat could be kept during colder weather.
Along with the arrival of the refrigerator, other good things happened in 1947. The bean crop was good; Dick was a healthy and happy baby and the only baby in the immediate family; Bud was home; and I was able to buy Mom a gasoline washing machine for about $50 from my little egg business. With no running water she had to fill and empty the washer, and it had to set outside on the back porch. The trees-which are still there- benefited from that waste water.
Even before Mom got the washing machine, Monday was laundry day; but it was also the day that mother cooked a pot of beans and made her delicious bread. Along with that bread come the best cinnamon rolls you could image. Monday evening meals were the best.
Sadly, about this time Mother’s health began to fail. Her heart had always been weak from the rheumatic fever she had suffered years before. Somewhere about this time she was told that she had a “leaky valve” of the heart. Almost an out-patient procedure to correct now; but at that time there was nothing they could do. A lot of the household work started falling on Barbara even though she was only about eight years old. Here she is at that age in a dress Mother made.
In 1948, with the help of the Rural Electrification Association (REA), we got electricity in the house. One bulb and one plug in each room. Ed Wiemer from Ordway wired the house for $52.00. Before the electricity arrived we did have a wind charger that produced enough power for one or two twelve volt, probably twenty five watt, bulbs.
July 4th was always a big holiday in the area. A picnic was held on Horse Creek about five miles west of Punkin Center. Elmer or Cecil Stone had an ice house where they stored ice in gunny sacks and sawdust taken from a pond near Karval during the winter. Barbara loved eating ice cream and wading in the creek.
Sometime during the war and after we moved to Punkin Center, a fighter plane crashed on the hillside south of South Rush Creek, which is north of Punkin Center about two miles. It must have been an important plane because the military cleaned it all up very quickly. We stopped there often and examined the hole it left but I don’t remember ever finding anything there.
In the Punkin Center community there were several girls about Barbara’s age. Frances Johnson who lived across highway 71 and who is now married to Delbert (she moved a half mile north) and Janet Lou Rutledge were both in Barbara’s class. Janet is no longer living. Rosemary Gibbs was also about Barbara’s age and lived close by, but Janet, Frances and Barbara were the closest friends at that time.
Aunt Minnie, Jack and Gloria lived with us some. I remember that they lived with us part of 1946 because Mother was having problems with her pregnancy with Dick, so Minnie came to help Mother. Dick was born June 7, 1946. Jack, Gloria, Barbara and I dug a tunnel connecting two holes we had dug on the north side of the house. Our parents made us fill them in fearing a cave-in of the tunnel. When they moved from living with us, they moved southwest about eight miles near Russell and Ruby Miller. At some point, Aunt Minnie bought what was known as the Ewing Place five miles west and a half mile south of Karval. Uncle Wilfred and Aunt Jerry were somehow connected to that place but I have forgotten the details, and Cousin Gloria was equally fuzzy about the dates. I do remember that neither Minnie nor Wilfred had a tractor, so it was my job to drive Dad’s tractor the six or eight miles between our home and the Ewing place.
One year, Uncle Wilfred had a beautiful bean crop going, so I drove the tractor and the harvesting equipment from our house to their field one evening in preparation for the bean harvest the next day. But it was not to be as a bad hail storm came through that night and Wilfred’s beautiful dry beans were all lying in the dirt. That ruined or at least discouraged Wilfred and Jerry, so they sold the property and moved to Colorado Springs where he started a roofing business.
Somewhere during these years Aunt Minnie took a job as house keeper for Grandpa Samuelson. In those days that was a common job for a woman alone with children. Grandpa and Bud enjoyed having someone to cook for them; but apparently Bud and Minnie enjoyed a little more than just eating as a romance developed between them. At least Mother, Aunt Ethyl and Aunt Lillian objected, but Bud and Minnie married in March of 1952. About that time Grandpa Samuelson hired Ada, from Mexico, Missouri, to keep house for him. Minnie, and at least Gloria, went to California for a short time before coming back to marry Bud. Grandpa and Ada’s relationship turned into a marriage a few years later and he then sold his homestead to Bud when Bud and Minnie married.
Gloria reminded me of the time that Jack, Gloria, Barbara and I found a dead chicken and decided to dissect it. We had a bloody mess when the parents stepped in and stopped our studies, preventing one of us from going on to be a doctor, no doubt?
Gloria also told me that she was jealous that Barbara could have beautiful curly hair while Gloria had to wear her hair in braids. One night while they were sleeping together Gloria took the curlers out of Barbara’s hair so that she would not have those curls.
All of that was to tell you that Barbara and Gloria had many good times together and were good friends as well as cousins. Gloria loved Barbara dearly as we all did.
There were, and still are, lots of good smooth trails and cow paths at the ranch so it was a good place to ride a bike. I taught Barbara to ride my bike here, but I don’t recall her having a bike of her own. Finally she was ready to play ball with Jack, Gloria and me; and we played a lot of monopoly.
On Thanksgiving Day in 1946 it started to snow and it kept right on snowing for weeks. We had no school the rest of 1946 and there was no mail service. We were all stranded. The National Guard dropped hay for the stranded livestock. Fortunately it was not extremely cold so not many animals died. The snow was above the fence posts and after it crusted over I could ride my bike on the snow. Around Christmas, Dad was able to ride a horse over to Aunt Minnie’s home to check on her, and also check on some of our cattle which were with her cattle. Jack had been able to ride their horse, Dolly, north about six miles to the Hall Station Store and bought some groceries. He was gone all day and did not get home until after dark, tired, cold and hungry, but had a successful trip.
As late as March, when the roads were plowed there were snow drifts as high as windmills including one big drift on highway 194 about two miles west of Punkin Center. From the top of a snow drift at Punkin Center Store, where the Haddock family lived, Dad was able to touch the blades of the wind mill.
Speaking of that windmill at Punkin Center, the talk was that one local man climbed up that windmill to avoid being arrested for evading the draft. They got him down and took him away but I don’t know what happened to him. The family stayed at least into the 1949-50 school year as three of his kids were in our school that year.
School Days at Pride of the Prairie
Barbara started to school at Pride of the Prairie (POP) in the fall of 1945. No kindergarten in those days. Just the “little room” (1st to 5th grade) and the “big room” (sixth through eighth grade). There was only one teacher in each room, sometimes husband and wife.
POP was located two miles west of the Samuelson home and about a half mile south. Aunt Ethyl named the school in a contest when it was established in about 1925.
The “school bus” picked us up for school. Dad tried to get the school board to come in on the trail along the south side of our property since it was a section line but they refused and we walked to highway 71 for the bus. Probably as a compromise the school board gave Dad the contract to drive the “school bus” for the kids in our area. He bought a new 1947 Jeep station wagon for that bus.
I believe that he drove that bus route for two years. That Jeep had a problem with the fuel system. On our way home from Colorado Springs where he bought it, the Jeep died. Dad noticed that the sediment bulb (a glass bubble in the gas line between the fuel tank and the carburetor) had no gas in it. He disconnected the line from the tank and blew into it and gas started flowing. Something must have been floating in the gas tank and every now and then it floated over the gas line intake. Warranties were unknown in those days so Dad made a split in the line with a plug on the extra line for him to remove and blow into when it was needed. He got so he could do that almost before the car stopped.
1949 was an interesting year for our little family. The crops were good and Dad was able to get everything planted early. So Dad bought a small trailer house and off we went to Minnesota to visit family. I fell in love there, but that’s another story. We were in Minnesota several weeks. The wild blueberries were ripe so we enjoyed picking and eating them. Mother canned some as I recall. Northern Minnesota has now been drained a lot, but at that time there were lots of bogs and muskeg. The blueberries thrived on those conditions. Barbara and I laughed about Uncle Charlie putting blueberries on his pancakes and almost everything else that he ate. That sounds pretty good now.
After a Minnesota visit, we headed west to South Dakota where my cousin Lois Ball Swan was living with her new husband, Keith Swan. The hitch on the trailer house broke in Fargo, North Dakota so we were delayed a day there.
We arrived in South Dakota in August and it was boiling hot and dry. Bill Swan, Keith’s Dad, offered Dad some work helping build a fence to contain his sheep. I went with them most days and helped a little. The ground was so dry that they had to find a crack to drive the steel post into, so the fence was a little crooked. When we returned home, Dad told family and friends that in South Dakota “It was 118 in the shade and there was no shade.”
After we moved to Punkin Center we attended church at Amy, northeast of Punkin Center. Amy had been a Post Office until about 1930 and was then a school for a while. It was more like a community building in the 1940’s. It is now a residence. The church was actually a Sunday school conducted by the American Sunday School Union. A man from Colorado Springs kept the program going for us and became a family friend. We visited with them in Colorado Springs several times.
Bible school was held during the summer for the kids in the neighborhood. The parents carpooled and took turns picking up some of us. I remember one of the two teachers was Yvonne Flanders. Both were from Norfolk, Nebraska.
We took the teachers home to Norfolk one summer on our way to either Iowa or Minnesota.
Sometime around 1947 two ministers, Harry Brownlee and Dale Spencer, came to our community. They were part of a non-denominational church that meets only in homes. The ministers traveled in pairs around the country so some people called them the Two-By-Two Church, but that was not official. Barbara and I were baptized by these ministers and Dale came back to conduct the services for Mother in 1952.
Aunt Minnie was a strong believer in the Nazarene Church so she disagreed with the teaching of our church and she and our Dad argued a lot about religion. Those arguments taught Barbara and me a lot about religion, so in a way those arguments were a good experience for us.
Willie Stone took over the bus driving obligations after Dad’s time. How did nine of us kids fit into his Buick Roadmaster?
As she started to grow up, Barbara was shocked when one girl in her room, Anna May, ate a worm and a little dirt during recess.
Barbara was ten years old in 1949 and I think she started to discover boys. This young man liked her and probably was her first “boyfriend”:
When school started in 1949, Aunt Minnie, Jack and Gloria were living southwest of us close to Russell and Ruby Miller’s home about three miles west of where highway 71 crosses Horse Creek in the curve south of the Samuelson home.
Cousin Gloria reminded me that our Mom was an excellent seamstress. She loved to make beautiful dresses for Barbara and made them by just looking at dresses in a catalog. Barbara learned her mother’s sewing skills and got Mom’s sewing machine. June tells me that Barbara made Debbie’s wedding dress and it was perfect and beautiful. Photos of that dress are at the end.
There was talk of school consolidation for rural school that fall. Melvin Savage led the opposition with stories that maybe the state was trying to bus all of us rural kids to Denver. A little extreme I think, but it scared Barbara and me.
Leaving Punkin Center Ranch
Pride of the Prairie School only offered classes through the eighth grade, so when I graduated from the eighth grade in May 1950, I followed many of the POP boys and moved to Rocky Ford. Like other of the local boys, I took a room with the O.C. Frantz family near the cemetery in Rocky Ford.
I was not alone in Rocky Ford for long. Dad got a job at the sugar factory in Rocky Ford that fall, and the family moved into a trailer house parked on the Frantz property. Dad cut and trimmed trees for Mr. Frantz, perhaps as rent. Barbara went to a school on Washington Street in Rocky Ford, across the street from the cabins where she and Roger would live a few years later.
In January of 1951, after the Sugar Factory run was complete, Dad, Mom, Barbara and Dick moved back to the ranch at Punkin Center. Barbara went back to Pride of the Prairie School. I transferred to Ordway High School.
I moved into a tiny camper on the property of an elderly couple on Arkansas Street. Dad had helped them build their house using his cinder block building skills which he had learned adding onto our house at Punkin Center. He probably did that work for them in the summer of 1950 but I am not certain.
I am not sure what happened to the Rocky Ford trailer house when we moved to Ordway, but it did reappear as a wedding present from Dad to June and me in July of 1953. Twenty-eight foot long and with no bath; but it, and a path, served its purpose.
When school was out in May of 1951, all five of us moved to a house about fifteen miles north of Ordway. This house was a former school house and had an excellent well on it from which we and many other Punkin Center residents took home drinking water. Dad worked that summer for Bryan Carter, who owned our house.
In the fall of 1951 our family moved back to Ordway, living in a little house on the south end of Arkansas Street behind where Lyle’s Dairy had been before.
I would guess that the milk house was converted into our little house. Dad worked the sugar campaign in Sugar City that year.
June and I started going together late in 1951, and we were going steady by Valentine’s Day in 1952. Barbara very much approved of June and wrote her a very touching note in early 1952. A copy of that note is on the next page.
Mother’s health continued to fail that winter and on April 19, 1952, she died in the hospital in Rocky Ford. Her funeral was at Karval and she is buried there.
When school was out Dad, Barbara and Dick moved back to the ranch at Punkin Center. Dad took Mom’s death badly and was lost without her. Then in July of 1952, Dad’s mother, Lizzie Quick, died. That upset Dad further, so in August Dad took Barbara and Dick to Corvallis, Oregon. A former area resident, Sylvia Clay, lived there and somehow she and Dad were thinking of marriage. However, after they arrived in Oregon Dad could see that it would not work. She insisted that Dad, Barbara, and Dick all join her church. Dad didn’t mind joining her church; but he felt that forcing the kids to join was too much.
The three of them came back to Ordway in September of 1952 and Dad worked the sugar factory campaign again but in Sugar City this time. They lived in a little house at the SW corner of 5th and Colorado in Ordway.
Sometime after that, probably in 1953, they moved to a house on highway 196 about a quarter mile west of highway 71. As I recall, they never returned to the ranch at Punkin Center and Dad leased the ranch to some people. Dad took a full time job as a ditch rider for the Twin Lakes Ditch Company.
In May of 1955, June and I went to Toledo, Ohio, where I attended an eight week meat cutting school. Barbara went with us, but Dad and Dick came to see us in July and Barbara rode back home with them.
After they returned from Toledo, the three of them moved into a nicer home on West First Street in Ordway across from the former alfalfa pellet mill.
In September of 1955, Dad married Martha who was only a few years older than Barbara. Probably as a consequence, Barbara and Martha did not get along well. Once Martha told her “I never got to do those things when I was your age.” Martha was just not mature enough to be married to Dad and certainly not prepared to be a step-mother to Barbara and Dick. However, Barbara had been doing the family cooking and running the household; Martha was still living at home so she had little experience. Ironically, the situation, in some ways, would be reversed for Barbara a few years later when she married Jim and became a step-mother to Jim’s teenage children, Jimmy and Debbie.
They were living in this house when Dad died in an accident on August 27, 1957. Dick went with Dad almost every day that summer but had a ball game that day and did not go. Barbara had graduated from Ordway High School in May of 1957. She was dating Lloyd Day when Dad died. Her best friend was Shirley Mann and they double dated some. Here is Barbara at graduation time:
Immediately after Dad died, Barbara moved in with Aunt Ethyl and Uncle Joe in La Junta. Aunt Ethyl had an amazing relationship with her many nephews and nieces; but Barbara was special to her after Mother died and even more special after Dad died. Ethyl often commented that Barbara reminded her so much of her sister, our mother, Gladys. I am not sure about that, but see the photos I will try to post later.
Aunt Ethyl helped Barbara enroll in Brown’s Business College and she started working part time at the health department where Aunt Ethyl worked. Unfortunately she came down with diphtheria which forced her to drop out of the business college.
Barbara had broken up with Lloyd Day soon after Dad died. She told June that she was not ready for the more serious relationship that Lloyd wanted. As it turned out, that probably was unfortunate for Barbara. Lloyd was a lot more mature than Roger Albrecht with whom she started going with in September of 1957 and married less than two months later. My June knew the Day family because she had dated Lloyd’s brother, Bob; and she felt that the Days were good solid people, as was Roger’s family for that matter. Maybe they spoiled Roger too much.
Barbara and Roger were married in his parent’s home on Washington Street in Rocky Ford. They lived in a cabin court across the street east of the elementary school on Washington Street in Rocky Ford. June and I had lived in that court a year or so before. It was in a lot better shape in those days than it is in 2010.
After Randy was born, Barbara used the little bit of money she inherited from our Dad to buy a little house in that same area of Rocky Ford. They lost that house about the time that she and Roger separated.
Ethyl and June encouraged Barbara to not get pregnant until she fully recovered from the diphtheria, but that was not to be and Randy was soon on his way. Not long after that, Roger left or Barbara asked him to leave while she was expecting Rodney. After Rodney was born, Barbara and the boys moved into a little house at fourth and Raton in La Junta and she went to work for Sears. She lived there for several years and continued to work for Sears.
Aunt Ethyl continued to be close to Barbara and probably helped her more than we will ever know. Some years later, Barbara and I worked together to trick Aunt Ethyl into seeing a doctor in Colorado Springs where cancer was found and treated, giving her to all of us for another five years.
While Barbara was working at Sears, she met Jim and they married in 1963. Barbara gained another son, Jimmy, and her first daughter, Debbie, when she married Jim . After a rather scratchy start Barbara and Debbie enjoyed an ideal mother-daughter relationship. Unfortunately, I do not have a photo of Jimmy to include in this story.
I asked Barbara’s special daughter, Debbie, to tell us about our Barbara. She did an excellent job of telling us what a great woman and mother Barbara was. If you can read her attached story without tears, you are stronger than I am.
They lived in La Junta Gardens when they first married; then they lived on the Old Trail across from Bent’s Old Fort; and finally they lived near the hospital in town. Barbara loved that home in town and the extended family enjoyed many gatherings there. Christmas was especially dear to her. She often commented on her pride of being able to have all of the clan in her lovely home.
It was a tragic loss to all of us when we lost Barbara in August of 1993. Seventeen years later I still miss her, but have been pleased to have this opportunity to recall all of these little parts of her precious life.
By Jerry Quick, December 15, 2010.
Debbie’s “Memories of Mama”
Barbara came into my life when I was approximately 8 years old. She married my Dad, Jim.. I don’t have clear recollection of first meeting her and the details except I thought she was so pretty, had a soft voice, a pleasant smile and was very nice. She had two boys, Randy; I’m guessing Randy was about 4 - 5 years old, very quiet and kept to himself; Rodney (who was called ‘Roddy’) was one of the cutest little boys I had ever seen, he must have been 2 or 3 years old and was quiet, friendly but not stand offish at all. Rod and I became closer as the years went by and he was my ‘pal’.
Early summer after Dad and Barbara married they came to Denver to pick up my brother, Jimmy, and myself and we went to Boulder where we met Barbara’s two brothers and their families. Jimmy and I were welcomed with open arms and my new Uncle Jerry said that I was just as much a part as the family as anyone else. For a little girl who didn’t know her own family too well, those were musical words to my heart! I have always been treated the same as blood relations and thrived on the love extended to me through the years.
In August of that year, I received a phone call from my Dad announcing that I had a new little brother, Michael Joseph Engle (later I would call him Mikey Joe, which he hates, but too bad!). My Dad was clearly excited about this new addition and I was excited to meet him in person. However, I didn’t get the opportunity until Christmas a few months later. He was stinking cute and a joy. Barbara glowed at being the proud mother of three sweet boys.
In 1966, I went to live with my Dad and Barbara just before school started for my 7th grade year. My birth mother said that I could choose who to live with when I turned 11 (one of the few and decent things she did) and I thought since I had lived the first 11 years with her and thought it only fair to live with my Dad the next eleven. Wow, was that a life changing experience for me!!!! I went from a ‘home’ (the term is loosely used in this instance) of having no family values, dirty, no clean laundry, not much food, little parent involvement, etc. and even now when I try to conjure up memories of life before, it is a black void! For the first time in my life, I lived in a family, a Christ-centered home, with rules, clean house, clean clothes, home cooked food, manners, discipline and proper expectations. I not only got a new family and home, but friends, school, and every single thing had changed for me, except for my name! Undoubtedly, it was a difficult transition for me, and, of course, Barbara. Seventh grade is not the ideal time to make such drastic changes. I appreciated the new life, but rebelled as I didn’t know who I was any more. My life had changed so drastically and to my chagrin now, I did not give Barbara the appreciation and respect she deserved. Barbara had a lot of the responsibility of the everyday life of all the children, including two undisciplined step-children, but not really the authority for the two step children. Dad worked for the railroad, so he would be gone a majority of the time and when he was home, he was working out in the fields of the small farm he owned. Often times, Dad would overrule Barbara’s decision when it came to Jimmy and me.
During Dad’s absences, Barbara was responsible for the milking of the cow, feeding the livestock (Dad’s Dad, my grandfather, would often come out to help when possible and the boys helped in feeding the livestock), caring for the garden all done in a skirt (Winter, Spring, Summer and Fall) as she did not ever wear pants until several years later. I don’t know how she did it all. She took care of the livestock and then would be in the house to feed us a hot breakfast and have our lunches prepared. Mom was insistent that we have a hot breakfast every morning, except on Saturdays and only then did we get to eat cold cereal, which became a real treat.
Mom had definite ideas about meals. Breakfast was always a hot breakfast, needed for clear thinking and plenty of necessary vitamins and ‘brain’ food required for our school work. Dinner always consisted of a meat, starch, and vegetable, some type of fruit (Jello, canned fruit, etc), bread and dessert. It was extremely important that a balanced meal was served, not too many starches and there was a variety of color. (It is funny, but I continued this tradition and even my girls have an appreciation for the balanced meal and the colors displayed on the plate, watching the number of starches!!). We were required to drink milk unless the milk cow was dry and then we had to drink powdered milk (yuk~!!) The only time we did not get desserts was the month following Thanksgiving and then Mom was busy making all of the goodies for Christmas. All of the family, except for Jimmy and me, loved liver – just the thought of it to this day gags me, but it was prepared several times throughout the year and always served with homemade Macaroni and Cheese. There was NOT enough Mac N’ Cheese or ketchup to cover the taste as far as Jimmy and I were concerned!!! The placement of food on the table was most important also. The meat was always placed in front of my Dad, and if it was a roast or something similar, Dad also carved it. The table was always set correctly, dinner fork on the left of the dinner plate, knife and spoon to the right of the plate. The napkin (although paper) was always folded and place under the dinner fork. The milk, tea glass was placed above the knife. The food was passed from right to left and no one was allowed to take the first spoonful until after prayers were said and Dad had put the first serving of meat on his plate and then the remaining food was served and passed. All of the serving dishes were placed on the table and never served buffet style unless we had a large number of guests. Dishes were cleaned after every meal, never, ever left until later. We had a full dinner every night, except on Sundays, when we “fended for ourselves” and she would make popcorn and we got to have a can of pop (Safeway brand) and it was a great treat we all looked forward to every week. Every once in a while, my Dad would get this wild hair and decide that the boys would have to help me clean up, letting Mom off of that duty. I know I hated the ‘help’ and I am sure that Mom would have much rather done the work herself as it was a BIG fight who was going to do what. I liked it much better when it was just Barbara and I!!
Barbara, of course, had to teach me about cleaning. I cannot tell you how many times I had to re-clean the bathroom or re-sweep the floor! She told me over and over, that a job should be done correctly and it would save a lot of grief for me. Also, I had to use short sweeps and not long ones for sweeping the floor. We had wood floors, and she would get on her knees to use the paste wax. Then, she would have all the kids put on old socks and we would get to slide around, polishing the floors for her. We had a blast and she got the job of polishing done. Barbara tried to make things fun for us children. When we traveled, she would make a list for each child to find 10 specific things (like a green barn, worth 50 points, a painted windmill, a certain color truck, etc). She didn’t have a typewriter available, so she hand printed each one. The one with the highest score got a prize.
She had to teach me to brush my teeth every morning and evening and I had to fix my hair every day. It was never allowed to hang. I curled my hair every day of my life for that point on! She also was insistent on my washing my face. Again, this was a new requirement for me! She was strict about the length of my dresses (which was worn every day to school. We didn’t get to wear pants until my Jr. year of high school). She made many of my Sunday dresses, but I must have complained a couple of times as she stopped sewing for me when I was a freshman. I remember several of the dresses – my mint green lace dress for my Jr. High graduation, a white with pink dotted Swiss for an Easter dress, an apricot colored dress. I wished I hadn’t complained and she would have continued to sew for me, however, that probably wasn’t “cool’ to wear homemade dresses in high school. The only other dress she made for me after that was my wedding dress. Ada Beth Finkner assisted in making that, but Barbara did most of the sewing and Ada Beth helped in the tailoring.
Barbara was very active in our church, The First Church of God. She taught Sunday School for the little ones, served on the Hospitality committee, helped with numerous dinners, showers and other events. She had a strong and committed faith. She was very active in the annual Ground Hog’s Dinner fundraiser put on every year at the church. Everyone loved her cooking and anything she made was gone immediately at any given Pot Luck dinner or function. She was also very involved with the community on the Bent’s Fort road and other associations.
Barbara had a compassion for the elderly and often visited and took them treats. She gave a lot of time and attention to her dear Aunts and Uncles, caring for them in their later years. She was especially close to Uncle Joe and Aunt Ethyl, although all of her relatives were dear to her. She was most definitely in her element when there was a family gathering. As we all know, Christmas was especially dear to her. She would start buying gifts, stocking stuffers soon after the first of the year, storing away the goodies for the following Christmas. She put a lot of thought into each gift. She had a great sense of humor, which was often reflected in the gifts she gave. I know her brothers received several humorous gifts! She wanted Christmas to be relatively the same year after year for those who could not come that particular year and they would have in their memory the activities and food that took place. She knew as the children grew, there would be changes and many would have to go to other families or start their own traditions, but she wanted the memory of the family Christmas to always to be a part of them. One of the hardest times in my life was my first Christmas without the extended family. We had just moved to Midland, Texas and were not able to travel to Colorado. I tried to make our Christmas very similar to what Mama had done and carried on the same traditions. It was as hard as there was only the four of us that first Christmas in Midland, TX and the girls were 3 and 6. I made so much food and no one to share with. But, I had it all, just like my Mama did. Mom gave me a simple gold music box that Christmas with the following note inside:
“Debbie - When you get lonely, close your eyes and open the box carefully. You will the laughter and remember the tears we’ve shared over the years. You will remember the breakfasts, coffees and the dinners we’ve shared. In your mind’s eye, you will see us together. After you re-experience our past joys, close the box. When I see you again, we’ll open it together and fill it with more happy memories. I love you, Mom “.
It remains by my bedside to this day and is one of my most treasured gifts! Mom wanted family gatherings to be fun and of course, with heaps of food. I have memories of playing games like “Call My Bluff”, “Spoons”, etc. Adults and children alike played and there was abundance of laughter.
My relationship with Barbara changed when we were preparing for my marriage to John. Barbara rarely gave me advice by this stage in my life, however, she was impressed with John from the very beginning (not to mention they shared the same birth date, June 14, Flag Day, when the flags were put out for them!) and she did say that he was a great guy and I should nab him. Fortunately, I took her advice, and John proposed to me on Christmas 1974. He had asked my Dad and Barbara for my hand in marriage and bought my engagement ring which Mom wrapped in several boxes, one inside another. I was so surprised to find a ring in this big box and I could not wait to show my extended family that would arrive for Christmas dinner. Mom said that she would help me with the wedding preparations, but she was not going to do all of the work and my birth mother come (she lived in New York by this time) and get all the glory. Fortunately, I didn’t have to worry about that as my birth mother was unable to attend the wedding. This was the turning point in Barbara’s and mine relationship. I finally grew up (thanks to the many, many talks I had with Sheila the year I loved with her and Dick in Boulder and I attended CU) and matured. Naturally, I turned to Barbara for advice, recipes, relationship with a husband, etc. We shared many times and experiences together. Shortly after John and I married, Barbara bought Shull’s Fabric store. I worked a day or so each week for her and when there was a sale, I worked more. I went with her to Denver to market and we had wonderful times. Those times were some of my very favorite. We would go to really nice restaurants, I would help her choose materials, and we talked and talked, and laughed a lot. We shared coffees, lunches and shopping. Our relationship was bonded and I asked if I could call her “Mom”. With tears in her eyes and firm hugs, we became Mother and Daughter. It was not a relationship that came easily or quickly, but one many obstacles were overcome and made us strong. I would hold our relationship up to any natural mother/daughter bond as we did work so hard to get to this point. From this point forward Barbara is no longer just a woman in my life but my Mama!!! I humbly apologized for the ugly words and attitudes, not to mention the disrespect and all the other horrid things I did as a child/teenager many, many times. Of course, she was gracious and accepted my apologies (which were given many, many times in the days to come) and said that it most definitely wasn’t one sided and that she begged Dad to get counseling for all of us and especially for Jimmy and me. Of course, that did not happen.
After three years of marriage, I had Staci Erin, our first child and my parent’s first grandchild. Of course, in those days, especially in La Junta, we didn’t have ultrasound available to us, so we had no way of knowing if we were having a girl or a boy. I wanted a little girl so badly for Mom, as I knew she always wanted a little girl and instead she got “me” and I was no treasure for many, many years, if ever! I had a fast and easy delivery and although Mom wasn’t in delivery with me, she was just outside the door and since I delivered so quickly, the nurses didn’t have time to close the door so Mom was standing there when Dr. J. Alan Shand announced that she was a grandmother to a granddaughter! What a joyous time for all of us. However, eight hours later I started hemorrhaging and during the night it was decided that I needed a D & C. Before they could take me to surgery, my parents brought my youngest brother, Michael, in and it was decided that he had a ‘hot’ appendix and it needed to be removed immediately. So Michael had his surgery and then I had mine. The staff had hoped that we would not be in recovery at the same time as they didn’t want me to get upset about my baby brother having surgery, but we ended up both being in there together. One of my best friends, Pat Finkner, was the recovery nurse and still hasn’t forgiven me for the trauma I caused her. I didn’t really know that Michael had had surgery, but I do remember that I was in Recovery and Michael was beside me, holding my hand and telling me he was glad that he was now an uncle and that baby Staci was beautiful. I told Michael that he had to leave Recovery because if Miss Grieser (an older, Mennonite nurse, who was a formitable person to answer to) found him in there, he would get thrown out and they would have to re-sterilize the Recovery room. I guess I had some complications and they called a Code Blue to Recovery and poor John and my parents who were in the waiting room and almost had nervous breakdowns. Michael recovered nicely, but I continued to hemorrhage throughout the next couple of weeks. It was evident that they were going to lose me and John asked Dr. Robert Smith, his boss, a Pathologist, and current Chief-of-Staff to send me to Denver. Dr. Smith made the necessary phone calls. The medic plane was out of service for repairs so John prepared a bed for me in the back of our car and Dr. Smith (and his son, Jim, who was one of my good friends from high school, who has since become a Dr. himself) followed with blood and plasma. The state patrol in each county had been informed of the situation and I driven to the major hospital in Denver. Before leaving the hospital in LJ, I was informed that I could not take my baby daughter. I also knew that I might not make it as I had already been give 16 units of blood. I remember handing over my sweet baby girl to my mother and told her to tell Staci how much I loved her and to please give her as much mother’s love as possible. I knew Mama would love Staci and give her good care. I knew Mama would be there to support John and assist in the raising of Staci, if need be. Once in Denver (it was Easter weekend) I went quickly into surgery and a small piece of placenta was discovered and removed and seemed stop the hemorrhaging. Of course it took me a long time to regain my strength and as expected, Mama was a great help. She thrived at being a grandmother, but didn’t think she was old enough to be one. She was in her later 30’s.
A couple of years later, Staci was to be in her first dance recital. I explained to Staci what a recital was and that her Daddy and Mommy and Grandpa and Grandma were going to attend to watch her dance. It was a very special program. Staci stopped and thought a moment, and said, “Well, my Grandma is very special, so she must be a “Program”’. So from that time forward Staci and later, Erica, would call their Grandma “Program”. Mama loved it as there was not another “Program” in the whole world. Mama signed all of her cards “Program’ and we even had the signage on her funeral flowers with ‘Program’ on it. Program relished her position as grandmother and loved, loved, loved spending time with the girls. Unfortunately, Erica was only 16 months old when we moved from LJ, but whenever possible, she did special things with them we were together.
On Mama’s 40th birthday, I took her to buy her first pair of jeans. Mom had always worn skirts, every day of the year, previous to this. She was a little hesitant at first, but soon learned to love her jeans and slacks and wore them a lot after that. This was such a fun and memorable time for the two of us.
My parents separated a few months after we moved and eventually divorced. Mom came to Roswell, NM, where we moved to from La Junta, and told me that she had left Dad but mostly she wanted to assure me that her love for me would not diminish and she would remain my mother, if I wanted to continue our relationship. Of course, I wanted and needed her to remain my Mama! She remained gracious and never said one negative word against my father. Her philosophy that had been repeated time after time in my growing up years was, “if you cannot say anything nice, then don’t say anything at all” and she most definitely practiced what she preached! Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for my Dad. He was very bitter and made hateful, awful remarks, eventually leading to Dad and me not speaking for a couple of years. I warned him time after time, however, when he started saying awful things about my mother and the grandmother to the girls, I had to put my foot down which lead to our estrangement. He got the message and learned not to say anything about Mama.
Mom started dating Bob , a retired conductor with the Santa Fe. Bob had lost his wife to cancer a couple years before they started dating. Mom was very cautious about marriage, had she had had 2 previous marriages, both that ended in divorce and she didn’t want to go through that again. They dated several years before marrying. Although we children liked Bob well enough, or at least tolerated him, we all knew that Mom loved him with all her heart and that he made her very, very happy. Bob and Mom enjoyed many doing things together. They traveled (as Bob was very involved with the Shriners, the little cars), going on a couple of cruises to Ireland and Alaska, shopping, getting together with friends and family. Bob enjoyed jewelry and bought Mom several diamond pieces. They were very happy in their life together. They would do whatever chores or running around that needed to be done and then around 3:00 each afternoon, they would take their showers and then dress for the remaining part of the day. It was funny to me they had this routine, but it worked for them. I believe Bob and Mom were married about 10 years before her untimely death.
In June 1993, a month prior to the accident, I had gone to La Junta for my 20th Class Reunion. John had to go on a business trip, but the girls and I spent two weeks in La Junta. We had a great visit and Bob’s daughter, Judy, and her children came up from Syracuse, KS and we all had fun being together, playing games and just being a family. Mom was still recovering from her hysterectomy surgery in May, but was starting feel so much better and well on the road to recovery. Mom and I made a pact after I moved from LJ and several visits home, it was decided that we would not cry when we said our goodbyes; it was just too hard on both of us. We could cry as we drove down the highway, but we would refrain from crying when saying our goodbyes, which worked for us. However, the last goodbye, Mom broke our pact. As I was getting ready to leave, Mom held me close and gave me a tight hug and said how proud she was of me, the wife and mother I had become and a wonderful daughter! She said she loved me so much and she had tears streaming down her face. I told her that she was breaking our pact but she said she just wanted to tell me how she felt. After, one last hug, I drove down the road with tears streaming down my face. That was to be the last time I saw my mother. God was so gracious in giving me those two weeks and those wonderfully sweet words that are treasurers in my heart. I have no doubt that it was her ‘time’ to go be with our Lord. I think it would not have mattered if Mama would have been in that car on that fateful day or sitting in her family room, her time had come and whatever her mission on this earth had been fulfilled and the Lord called her Home.
I’ll never forget the phone call, however, I can’t recall much after the call as we traveled to La Junta. I was not surprised to see the outpouring of disbelief and love that so many had for my Mama. The United Methodist church was filled to capacity for her funeral. My Dad really took Mom’s death hard and hopefully he regretted so many, many things. However, my Dad is not allowed to discuss my Mama in any form in my presence! I am so relieved that Mama did not have to experience her eldest son’s death. Randy and Mom had a really special bond and I think that going through that experience would have been too devastating for her. Mama had experienced many, many hard deaths in her life, but I don’t know that she would have gotten through Randy’s. I have thanked God for allowing her to escape that sadness.
It has been over 17 years and I still miss Mama. We used to call one another every Sunday night and I think of her often on those evenings. When I look at my daughters and their children, I think how much she would enjoy each one of them. When we have family gatherings I think of her as she reveled in those events. Of course, during the Christmas season I especially miss her! When I hear the Christmas music, when I look at the Christmas decorations she gave me, when I see the collection of angels on my mantel (she gave the girls and me an angel every year) and then when I do my baking. I still make the Sandbakkels and many of the things she made with the recipes passed on. Mama may not be with me in a physical way, but as she wanted, she gave memories, precious memories and a joy of a Mother’s Love! I haven’t even mentioned the extended family she blessed me with. I don’t have any natural family that I know well. Carol is my cousin/sister and I have a family filled with Aunts, Uncles and cousins.
Thank you Mama! Missed but not forgotten. I love you!!!!
