The end of 1962: the Navy and all Aleene, all the time

I continued to think beyond graduation. There was always teaching, which I felt very comfortable with.  And with a great summer in Extension and 4-H work, I could go in that direction. Several of my peers from a year or two before had been lucky enough to get good assignments (i.e. agricultural counties) around the state. But I was still thinking Navy. I had tried the Army and Air Force ROTC, Navy was all that was left…right?  After the Cuban Missile Crisis, I was sure I wanted to do something in the military next. I was waxing very patriotic and was doing this, partly in remembrance of Dad.

I did not have a clue as to how to approach it, though. Brother Jim set me straight…”just go to the recruiting office at the (New Castle) Post Office and let them know you want information; they will be all over you,” is what he said.

Yep, he was right. When I got home at the end of the term in early December the first thing I did was to drive downtown and stick my head into the Navy recruiting office. A Chief Petty Officer was sitting there smiling. All I said was, “I want to talk to someone about the Navy.” Whew, you’d of thought I wanted to give him some serious money.

Before I knew it he had scheduled me to go with him to Pittsburgh in a few days, to take the Officer Qualifying Test, a physical, and to talk to a recruiter about officer programs. That is, of course, after I told him I was planning on graduating from Penn State in March 1963.

On a cold December morning the Chief Petty Officer (E-7 for you non Navy types) and I drove to Pittsburgh’s Old Post Office Building, as it was then known, arriving about 8:00 a.m. I recall looking at the numerical thermometer on a bank near there to see that it was  -10 degrees.

I strode right up the steps with the Chief and into a Lt(jg)s office and heard his pitch. I would take the test, and if I qualified they would send me for a physical that day which, conveniently was doable. If that was satisfactory they would swear me into the Naval Reserve that day. That way they could guarantee me a place in the OCS class in May contingent on my graduation in March. If I did not graduate for some reason, then I would be subject to the Reserve’s schedule for boot camp and all that might entail. I had until the end of the day to think about it.

Step one: pass the test; check. Step two: pass the physical; check. Let me add that that was the coldest physical I had ever had. The Old Post Office was just that, old. It was drafty and the docs (corpsmen and one flight surgeon) were dressed warmly. There were about 15 of us that stood around in our birthday suits shivering. Step three: raise your right hand; check. I did it. I bought into their logic. All I had to do was graduate from PSU and I was headed to the OCS class 64-1 which began on 20 May 1963 at Newport, R.I.

In retrospect, that was a smart move. It all worked out. In fact, my date of entry for pay and benefits began on that day, 10 December 1962. Had I missed the graduation date, they would have sent me to Great Lakes and I would have served as a “white hat” for two years with a 6 year obligation in the reserves. That never entered my mind. I was going to be a Naval Officer.

I went home to cool my heels for a few days. This time I did not cut down trees and burn brush and get poison ivy like I did the year before, but I was working up around the barn when I saw a blue Chevy pull into the driveway. Who was I expecting? It was Aleene. She returned home from school for Christmas break and since she hadn’t heard from me in a while, she decided to drive the ten miles to our house and see if I was still alive. When I saw her I was at once upset and embarrassed. She was showing some initiative. Her mission, I found out later, was to determine if we had a future. I did not know she was prepared to end it right there. If  I showed interest in keeping our relationship going, she wanted to be part of my life and support me through this funk I had been in since June 1.

Mother was not impressed. She was old school. Young women were not supposed to “throw themselves” at guys. She did come to understand that this unannounced meeting was not that. It is a good thing that I did not listen to her…this time. I do not remember what Aleene and I talked about; there was no ultimatum. In fact, I think I filled her in on my Navy decision, which surprised her. The last she knew, I was thinking Coast Guard. We had not been in touch very much during that fall.

Her arriving on our doorstep dressed up impressed me. Here was a young woman, while quiet in nature, was bold in action. She listened, as she does so well, and supported my every decision.  I did not ask for forgiveness for the past few months, I only committed to do better in the future. I could not believe the change her visit had on me. For the rest of the holiday we dated frequently, going to movies, hanging out at her house and at my house. She even came for a visit when Aunt Phyllis (Tottie) was there and modeled some Thai dresses that Auntie had brought along. Jim’s date/girl/future wife, Nancy Brookhart from Slippery Rock and Butler, was there too.  Here were those 19 and 21-year-old beauties parading around our old farmhouse in silks made in Thailand just to be near their guys. We have pictures (albeit black and white) of this fashion show revealing the two of them all dressed up.

The year 1962 ended on a happier note for me than it had been over the summer. That was the last “tense” time I recall Aleene and I ever had. From there on, our relationship grew and grew. I was now sure, she was the one for me.

1962…when I lost my father.

The Friday before finals, shortly after 2:00 p.m., on June 1^st, I got a long distance call at the Fraternity House. I was there with a group of guys watching TV. Classes were over, we were getting ready for finals and there was not a care in the world.

On the phone was our pastor from New Castle, Delbert Jolley. “Tom, this is Deb Jolley and I have some bad news. Your dad died of a heart attack at his office about an hour ago. A car has been sent to pick you up to come home for the funeral. Can you be ready in about four hours?”

I shook off the shock and went back to the TV room and simply said, “I hope you guys never receive a call like I just got…my dad is dead.”

Well, the mood in the room shifted and a couple of the guys jumped up ready to help with offers to drive me home to call Dr. Pasto and on and on. I realized for the first time what it means to be given support in a personal crisis. Jim Corselius, one of the older guys in my class, made the call to the Dean’s office for an appointment for me in an hour. He had a car and would drive me there to be sure I was back when my ride from New Castle arrived.

Doc Pasto, my former Ag Ec I prof and acting Dean welcomed me with open arms when I arrived at his office. “Tell me what courses you are taking and who your instructors are and we will have your finals deferred until you contact them to take exams,” he said. Bingo, I was free to go home.

Back at the house, the word had spread and one by one the young men with whom I had been so silly and so carefree came to me and expressed their condolences. I was beginning to learn a very valuable life lesson.

John McClure, a friend of Brother Jim’s whom I had known for years and, if I remember correctly, John Caventeur (another of Jim’s friends) arrived at the house to pick me up and we spent the next four hours driving home…back to Luacres. Not a lot was said during the trip. They were trying to be sensitive to my feelings and I was not sure what I was feeling.

The next week was a blurr. When I got home people were gathering around. Jim was home from Slippery Rock, Phyllis, who was living in Utah with her family would be flying in; Dave and his family were on their way from Washington D.C. area, and Shirley and Joe drove in from Gettysburg shortly after I arrived. Shirley and Jim were in tears and were commenting that Mother, who was stoic and seemingly “in charge” must be in a daze and did not know what was happening. Personally, I thought she was doing very well with the whole thing. Someone had to be strong and that was something she did very well. She was well accustomed to being under control.

Dad died in his office. His 1:00 p.m. patient found him lying on the floor of his office. His last patient left the office about 12:30. He had a massive heart attack with no warning signs that the family knew of. He was six days short of his 68^th birthday.

There are three memories of that week: (1) the long line of people coming through the visitation; (2) Aleene coming through the line, appearing out of nowhere, with her parents and hugging me; (4) Suzy Winter riding her horse down Valley Road to our house with her baby to pay her respects.

Dad was a fixture in the community. He had been a 32^nd degree Mason, he was a past commander of the American Legion, a Boy Scout leader for ten years, and practiced dentistry in New Castle for 44 years. He was more than a member of our church, he had been a leader and he was respected for living his life in an honest and fair manner. I do not remember the numbers, if there even were any, but the funeral director, John Hodge whom I knew from church, said that he had never seen so many people stand in line for so long being openly moved.

Deb Jolley did a good job with the service. After the public viewing, only the family was present for the funeral. The impact of all of this had not sunk in for me and it took a while to do so.

Aleene’s coming to the funeral home should not have been a shock, it is just that I had been meeting people, some of whom I knew and some I did not and all of a sudden, there she was looking up at me with a look of sadness on her face, as I recall. It was as if she did not want to be there, but felt that she should be there and simply reached out to hug me. I do not remember emotions, but there were feelings of surprise, thanks, and relief. If she had not been there, I would have missed her, but not blamed her. Funeral homes are strange places and to superimpose the death of a parent over the elation of finding a new love was hard…for both of us. I was glad she was there. There were neighbors there but no friends of mine…certainly none from Penn State…she was the only one. I was learning a lesson in how to be supportive of a friend who is grieving.

I do not recall the sequence exactly, but I had to go back to State College to take my finals. I remember Dave, Jim and me going to church that Sunday before I left and hearing the words of the Beatitudes being spoken as we went up for communion at the rail: Blessed are they that mourn; they shall be comforted. Deb was so good at saying the right thing at the right time. I shared this experience with his son Bob in 2007 via email when we got word that Deb died…well into his nineties. He had a gift for comforting people from the initial call informing me that Dad had died, through the service and finally at our attendance at church that next Sunday. I learned another lesson.

That afternoon, I was loading Jim’s car to take it back to State College. The sun was warm and I was moving fast when all of a sudden a horse and bareback rider appeared in the yard. She was dressed in shorts and had a small child in front of her. It was my schoolmate and neighbor, Suzy Winter…a single parent mother. I had heard that she got pregnant during her freshman year, but had not seen her since I had been in Chambersburg for the previous two summers. There she was. This is the girl whose bedroom I had been in when I was in sixth grade bringing her home work to her at her dad’s request. I was amazed that Suzy was coming to see me. I had not seen her in three years. I walked over to the horse and she leaned down and hugged me in one motion. I was overcome. She could have stayed away and I would never have thought a thing about it. But she chose to ride a half-mile down the road to express her sympathy. I learned another lesson.

I headed back to take finals with the view to stay in the frat house for a week and do what I had to do. It did not take me a week, but I was alone for all that time when I needed to be talking to someone. I did not realize it at the time, but this was not a good plan.

The big old house that had been teaming with 45 young guys when I left was now empty; everyone was gone. There was little food there and I was not sure how I was going to eat. But I stuck it out. The house was wide open when I got there and I left it wide open when I left. I thought that was fine, at the time, but today it seems strange.

My first mission when I got back on campus was to contact Dr. Pasto and see what I needed to do. He had arranged for me to have as long as it took, but I returned in a week and that was surprising to him. He gave me the phone numbers of my profs and I began calling them. There were four finals and I took only two. Doc Barr told me there was no way he was going to make me take a final. I had an “A” in the course going into the final and that would be fine with him. Yes!

Doc Boyle was nice. He was the insect guy. He wanted me to take the final because I could only help myself. I crammed (using the blue-book file the house had for his course) and struck pay dirt. He gave me the very same final I had been memorizing. Bingo.

The Personal Finance guy was leaving town and simply said that I didn’t need to take it if I would take the grade I was carrying in the class at the time. Good deal, except it was a “C”. Oh well.

The history instructor was also understanding and said that I could take it or not, but that he would only count it if it helped. I took it…I might as well… and ended doing quite well.

I stopped in to see Frank Gullo, Glee Club leader, since he had requested that I come in. There was no final, but he wanted to talk and give his sympathy. To a man, each was great, but of all the people I talked to that week, Dr. Pasto, the Acting Dean was the most helpful. I remembered that for years. Finally, in 2002, when the DTSers met for their annual picnic…this year at Penn State…we were at the Ag Museum and I ran into the curator emeritus, Dr. Jerome K. Pasto. I had a chance to retell my story and thank him for his understanding and support. While he did not remember me or the incident, (and who would after 40 years?) He had to have been well into his 80s, but I got to share my thanks with him.

It took me several days to get this all done, then I headed home through Indiana. I met my new boss. Ward Stover, the County Agricultural Agent, had a room rented for me…I was set to go the next week.

This was going to be a tricky arrangement. Jim was home and going to college, and he had a car, Mom had a car, and I needed a car. She gave up hers for the summer. Some how they worked out the logistics to allow me to make my internship work.

The summer of 1961 and how “we” met.

The following is an excerpt from “1958” on how I met Aleene the summer of 1961.

Finals came and went and I was on my way to Chambersburg for the second summer of work at Cumberland Valley Cooperative. I did not, however, realize the impact that this summer would have on me. The first summer with Joe, Shirley, Greg and Jane had gone by and while interesting and fun, it was not earth shaking. This one was different.

When I got to Kraiss Avenue, Chambersburg in mid-June, Shirley announced that her niece, who recently graduated from high school, would be visiting us for about ten days during the summer.

(This is how I met Aleene…beyond when we were seven and five at Joe’s and Shirley’s wedding. I will try to give my reactions accurately. She, obviously, has her own. I have checked some of the details with her verbally and frequently she says she cannot remember, so this is my story.)

My first reaction to Shirley’s announcement was to yawn. Her presence in the little house would be a nuisance, I thought. Where would she sleep? (Turns out she slept on the hide-a-bed in the living room.) I had the upstairs booked for the summer. And there was one tiny bathroom for four adults and two kids.  But that was someone else’s problem. What would we do on the weekends when I was used to kicking back, sleeping and maybe doing a picnic or something? As you can tell by my concerns, it was all about how this interloper would affect me. On the upside, it might be fun. I was two years into my college career and was wiser vis-à-vis girls than I had been. Would this be another handholding event like the previous summer or something else?

Let me put it this way: From the minute I saw her, I realized it was something else.

For some reason I accompanied Shirley and the kids to the bus station to pick Aleene up. My first glimpse of her, from my vantage point, were he legs from the knees down, which I thought were interesting…freckles and all.

Those were a whirlwind ten days. What Aleene’s mother, Mabel, and her Aunt, Shirley, had done was put a 17-year-old girl and a 19-year-old boy, both hormonal, together in close quarters in a moderately structured environment, ostensibly, to see what might happen. Let me say that it took me years to figure this conspiracy out, but I was able to interview the principles and I came away believing that there had been a plan. Mabel never admitted anything and Shirley grinned when I finally confronted her, but Aleene’s dad, Willis, told me that while there was not a plan as such, there was hope!

I do not remember how long it took (probably one or two days into her visit), but I do recall that we had all been outdoors in the back yard and when dusk fell, the rest of the family moved indoors we two teens stayed outside talking (flirting.) It didn’t take long after it got dark for me get close enough to kiss her. And that was it. She did not resist. I remember thinking and probably telling her that we were a bit foolish for beginning this relationship when she was headed to Indiana State to college while I would be at Penn State, eighty miles away. How would this work?

For the rest of her visit, we did not worry about future logistics, we just learned to enjoy each other’s company. There was swimming at Caledonia State Park and dreamy evenings outside talking under the stars.

When she left for home, she took a piece of my heart with her. We had our ups and downs for the next 18 months, to be sure, and I will comment on those times in due course of this introspective look at my life, but for the first time I was disarmed. I no longer felt trapped in a relationship. I was finally ready to be smitten. Don’t get me wrong it took a while for us to become an inseparable item, and by early 1963, we were just that.

That summer went by quickly. I took on more responsibility at the gristmill. While I was not a supervisor, I drove truck more frequently and delivered feed to those great dairy farms on both sides of town, both limestone to the north and shale to the south of Chambersburg. Joe and I talked openly about going into business together and buying 120 acres and milking a hundred Holstein-Friesians.  It was wishful thinking, of course, but we really did entertain the thoughts. What happened, however, was that the next year Joe changed jobs from CVCA to the Extension Service in neighboring Adams County: Gettysburg. I realized that with that our plans were nothing more than a dream, and I plotted my life accordingly. But I am getting ahead of myself.

The fall term (now) of my junior year was one of excitement and newness. There was every reason to be upbeat. I was beginning to focus on my major and, by golly: I had a new girl friend.

It seemed to be easy for me to accept this new relationship with Aleene as more than just “dating.” Even though we were 90 miles apart, and the principal way to communicate was by mail, I felt a soft spot in my heart/life for her. I was not positive she was the one, but I sure thought about it. I think we saw each other twice that fall…not much, right? But it gave us a chance to keep the spark glowing and to learn more about each other’s expectations. She was a freshman and I was a junior, so we were two years out of synch if this relationship was to develop. That had always been a concern of mine, but it became less and less of a factor. The other gnawing fact was the difference in our height. I was just self-conscious enough to think about how we looked as a couple. But just like the age difference, the height difference melted away in a few months. I don’t think Aleene was ever concerned about either.

Penn State, at last

When I got to Penn State my world changed forever. I virtually, never went back home. Yes, home was still Lawrence County, but once I left in the fall of 1959, I never lived there except for short periods. It was not that I did not like the place, rather it was due to a lack of opportunities. New Castle had been going down hill and continues to this day. My hat is off to those who stuck it out and found good careers there. I was in no mood to be in such a depressing economic place once I saw the larger world.

You can’t talk about Penn State without at least mentioning football. In the fall of 1959 the coach was Rip Engle. JoePa, which was not his nickname then, was the quarterback coach. We knew him. He was studious looking and since he had been around State for almost ten years, we were a bit taken aback when we learned that he was dating a sophomore who lived in Thompson Hall and ate with us in the commons, Waring Hall. We knew of Sue, and would see Joe hang around, but that was it.

As for football there are a couple of tales to tell. One was that Syracuse was a powerhouse that year (and why not, they had Ernie Davis in the backfield.) Since the Nittany Lion shrine was just across the street (more or less) from my dorm, we were charged with protecting it from any harm that the Orangemen might try that weekend. Well, we were not organized, nor did we understand how to organize and the Lion got lathered with orange paint.

If I recall correctly, PS narrowly missed beating the tougher Orangemen, but State played a great game. Richie Lucas was quarterback and Pat Batula was the fullback with Dick Hoak was the running back. They went to the first Liberty Bowl that year in Philly and beat Alabama 7-0.  That was Alabama just prior to Joe Namath (from Beaver Falls, PA…just down the road from New Castle.)

Two weeks after the last home game, they dismantled the steel stands and moved them one mile east to its present location. At the time Beaver Field held about 30K spectators. When the new Beaver Stadium was reassembled it had grown to about 45K.  Forty-five years later, it holds over 110,000.

During the fall semester I took English Composition 1, which was the great separator for freshman. Fortunately, I had an older prof, who had us read novels and write about them. He was the one who put the idea in my head that I might enjoy writing. I struggled at first, but soon I was cranking out 300 word themes with no problem. He used tennis as an avenue of instruction, which was very foreign to me. I hardly knew anything about tennis. He spoke with a slight lisp and when he talked about “foot faults” it still causes me to smile as I remember his delivery.

I recall reading Huxley’s Brave New World and Joyce’s Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man and a Dickens novel. He was a stickler for “comma faults” and would flunk you flat on that paper if he found any.

Fortunately, I had a great editor. One of the smartest kids I encountered that year was also from New Castle and he hung out in our room frequently. He was a real free spirit. He had been thrown out of Rensselaer (the engineering school in New York) the year before for throwing a kid out of the window of a dorm (or so he said), so he was a year older. Denny never did make it out of Penn State either. He just quit going to class. He joined the army and finally got a degree from Youngstown. I learned as much about proofing themes from him as anything I did at State.

I had Freshman Chemistry (inorganic), Animal Science, Botany (which I loved), phys ed, Air Force ROTC and two Ag survey courses; one in my major and one in general Ag. I got a lot of Cs that first semester. I will not make excuses, but my roomy, Bill, was a kid I graduated from high school with and he was hell bent on flunking out. He dragged me down. I did not do anything social with him, however, his poor habits did not help me in the least and I was adjusting to being away from home. That was my worst semester at Penn State.

Fall 1958 and why I don’t hunt deer

That fall I had physics, advanced algebra, English, Problems of Democracy, Concert Choir and some brownie deal worked out with the office. The principal was a patient of Dad’s and he gave me and a select few others privileges that most did not have. I was a junior Rotarian, got elected president of the Pep Club, and was president and student conductor of the Concert Choir. I sang in the boy’s quartet and did a bunch of solos.

I recall going deer hunting with Dave and JR that fall on the first day of deer season (the Monday following Thanksgiving). Mother wrote me an excuse, which said simply, that I was ill. Mr. Book, the principal, saw it and laughed out loud and asked me which big toe hurt? He knew where I was, but never interceded.

It was on this hunting experience that I got my first, truly shocking comeuppance with a gun. I was carrying Dad’s deer rifle, a .32 Winchester Special, lever action. The safety was a hammer. Normally, I did not carry the rifle with a round in the chamber. That meant that if you saw a dear, you had to “rack” a round into the chamber, which automatically pulled the hammer back. You were then ready to fire. We had hunted all day…someone driving, and some sitting. We were coming out of the woods and normal hunting discipline was not important. I was following Dave, which normally you would not do. We came to a rock outcropping on the side of a hill. Dave jumped down and was perhaps 15 feet ahead of me. I positioned myself on the rock and did a “stiff legged” jump.  I was carrying the rifle at my side in my right hand…pointing down as much as possible. When I hit the ground, the rifle discharged and the slug went into the ground not six feet behind Dave. I do not remember the reactions of the others around us, but I was shocked, stunned, frightened. I saw the place the slug went into the ground. I could not get the picture out of my mind and how if I had not been carrying the gun properly, it would have shot Dave.

I am not sure how the round got into the chamber and how the hammer got cocked back, nor for that matter how the rifle discharged without my finger on the trigger, but it did. That pretty much ended my hunting career. Hunting season was over in late November and the next year I was at State and did not hunt. I may have gone out once or twice with some of my friends in my junior year at State, but essentially, I never hunted again.

The next installment…or…what will he say this time?

The fall of ‘58 Brother Jim got back from Japan where he spent two years with the Air Force. He was reassigned to Langley AFB, Virginia and bought a car. Jim smoked then and we had a completely different relationship from when he left two years earlier. He was a man of the world…literally. We got a long famously. He still had two more years to serve so I was on schedule to go to college before he did and then graduate a year earlier. I thought that was cool. It was the great equalizer in our three-year age difference. He was wiser and more settled, but I would finally get to do something before he did.

Jim bought a 1956 Ford Victoria. It was a two-door hardtop with black and white leather seats. It was a real bomb with its T-bird interceptor engine. I do not remember the details of why or how he swung the deal, but it always seemed that when he was around I was allowed to drive his car. There was a time in about four years or so when that became my short-term transportation. He was great about sharing his car.

When Jim left for the Air Force two years before, then went to Japan, I was about an inch shorter than he. That fall, 1958, I was almost two inches taller. I had finally caught up. I was no longer the “runt” of the litter as I had been called for years. That was a big deal for me. Today, I realize the importance of self-image to adolescents. Brain development and self worth need to be considered by those around them. For me, I was lucky that I had been treated fairly and respected for my talents. I was maturing with few complexes.

That Christmas vacation was a treat for me. Aunt Ann (a smoker and mother’s friend and our piano teacher) and aunt Phyllis (a smoker) who was stationed in Thailand with the International YWCA  were there as were my grandma (Bonnie Beal), and Brother Jim. I was seventeen that fall and I finally had the courage to pick up the pack of cigarettes sitting on the table that the “grownups” were smoking, pulled one out and lit it up, right in front of the world. No one said a thing.

The discussion frequently turned to politics when Aunt Phyllis and my dad got together. She was liberally inclined (hailing from NYC) and Dad was an Eisenhower fan who truly disliked FDR. While he did not rail against Democrats, he told me frequently that much of the problems of the world were due to FDR. I was not opinionated about politics, but rather was open to the opinions of others whom I respected.  Dad told the story of his grandmother whom he described as having ears as big as his hand. She was definitely anti-Catholic and anti-Democrat. She compared them to rattlesnakes. We would laugh about the attitude, but it was never inferred to me that was a family position.

I liked Ike and was, at that time, ok with Nixon. He traveled to South America that year and encountered anti-American sentiment. A contingent of Marines was ordered into position off the coast of Venezuela in case there was serious trouble. I was proud of my country’s willingness to show strength, but was unaware as to why anybody would not embrace America. At the same time Castro was moving into position to take over the leadership of Cuba and that seemed ok. Fulgencio Batista was a dictator and we were told via the media that the Castro rebels were a good thing. A year later he came into power and two years after that was the Bay of Pigs…so go figure what happened there.

Alaska was granted statehood: yahoo! I was sort of bummed. Our flag, which had the stars in neat rows six by eight, now would be something else. It would not be the same, I thought. Of course, Hawaii became a state then too and there were fifty stars needed in our flag. That was more manageable than 49. The flags at school did not change right away, so the fifty star flag was not in usual display. We stood and pledged allegiance every day…after our homeroom teacher read some scripture and we said the Lord’s prayer. I was never aware of anyone being offended by that even my Jewish friends, but by 1963 Bible reading in school was outlawed. There was a big brouhaha about that, of course, but I can tell you I do not think that kids were any different before or after school prayer was outlawed. I was doing my student teaching when prayer went out…and where I was, there was no splash heard.

These were all things going through our minds the fall of 1958. But mostly, I was fixated on singing and taking care of heifers. I loved my cows. I would intentionally go places (when Mother did not catch me) smelling of “barn.” I was proud of that. The sixty or so of us country kids that went by bus to the city schools in 1954 had nearly doubled. Ours was the last class to make the trip into NeCaHi. The class of 1960 was the first at the newly established Neshannock High School. I was glad I got to finish in town. All my family had graduated from there, and I was a child of legacies.

Our community was becoming less rural and more sub-urban. It followed, then, that there were fewer and fewer of us who really were from farms even in the township. That made me unique in that regard and I loved the attention when it came to explaining combines or calving. I remember one of my city-girl buddies asking me in study-hall just how cows were artificially inseminated or bred. I do not recall what she thought it might mean, but I told her in as neutral terms as I could. She wrinkled up her nose and shook her head. Great stuff for a sixteen year old; I had information none of the rest of them had. It was too bad I was not milking cows at home (just at Dave’s) or I could have run a clinic. Lots of kids, wanted to know how to milk. I would give a verbal clinic on that, too. They would have preferred to actually see it and I was sad that I could not accommodate.

The guys at the lunch table called me Farmer Lutz or just Farmer, but I accepted the name as a compliment and did not think of it as a pejorative. My lunch group was a eclectic one: Barry Ralph, whom we called Decon or just Deke; John Bender, affectionately known as Ben; Bill Rhodenbaugh, whom we called Rhodie.  All these guys turned out to be successful, dudes in their chosen field. Deke did turn out to be a Lutheran minister, Ben a successful securities agent, and Rhodie a Hollywood film producer, no less. And Bill Snow, smoker and first chair baritone horn player in the band…someone whom I had to look to for assistance and aid since I didn’t have band for a class, but marched with the band…playing baritone.

They were sure, as was I, that I would turn out to be a farmer, but that did not happen, of course. We were spirited and fun loving and enjoyed off-colored stories like most teenage guys. The difference, of course, was that I came with earthy barn talk and stories that would frequently have them in stitches. The dichotomy was, of course, that for all the crude and earthy stories I told at lunch, I was singing operatic arias for the dowagers of the New Castle Music Club and great religious solos for churches or for Baccalaureate during the spring of my junior year. Who was I, really?

Life on the farm…summer – 1958

Farming during the summer of 1958 was the best. I could drive for the first time that I worked with Brother Dave and his in-laws, so I got to run for parts and occasionally drive the farm pick-up, a ¾ ton Ford. I also bought a 1951 Studebaker from a friend of Mother’s for seventy-five bucks. You can guess the shape it was in for $75. Granted, $75 then is like about $500 now, but it seemed a ridiculously low price, but it had a good battery. It did not have good brakes, however. Those had to be replaced.

The previous summer it had rained so much that we were constantly making hay in muddy fields and turning a lot of hay by hand trying to save it. Not this year. There were perfect growing conditions and harvesting conditions. Pap Green (is what his grand kids called him) would knock down 10 or 12 acres of hay in the morning and I would hop on either the IH Super C or our JD 40 and attach the hay conditioner or “crimper” as we called it, to squeeze the juice out of the hay. Later that afternoon on a good drying day it was ready to rake. Sometimes we could mow and crimp one day and rake and bale the next. I don’t think we lost a bale that summer due to weather.

One beautiful summer day I was crimping hay…third gear ½ open and as I was watching the swath of hay feed into the crimper, in went a live skunk. I quickly stopped the tractor, but the PTO continued to run and the crimper pulled the hay in, skunk and all. THUMP….went the skunk. I thought I had broken the crimper, but alas all I had done was squash the skunk. Needless to say, the odor was instant and awful. I pulled out of the field and drove to the barn to report the incident.Whew…did that stink. Each time I passed the spot where the poor pussy met its demise; I would be overcome by skunk smell. I learned my lesson: watch closely and be ready to react, not just stop the tractor, but also disengage the PTO immediately.

When I think back about this incident I realize how easy it could have been for a pet, or another animal to get crimped. In fact, I am in awe of the fact that through all the risk-taking I/we did, no one got hurt. Tractors are dangerous vehicles…tricycle in nature, easily turned over on the hillsides we farmed…I guess God was watching out for me/us. I use the plural, because all my siblings took part in these farming activities over the years and none of us was ever hurt. We rarely had adult supervision and knowing what I know now about adolescent brain development and the decision-making process…we were blessed.

I learned to milk using the DeLaval milkers. We used a couple of Surge units, but mostly it was the big buckets that were freestanding on the floor. The Surge milking units were suspended from a belt that went over the cow’s back. It was later that year that the Green farm installed a pipeline milker. The units attached to the cow the same way, by suction, but the milk went into a sterile glass tube about 1” in diameter. There was a vacuum on it so it sort of sucked the milk to the cooling tank. The glass tubing was elevated to the ceiling of the stable to keep it out of the way. I later learned that the stress put on milk by sucking it in that manner increased the bacteria count significantly. It wasn’t long after this that dairy barns were constructed with the cow elevated and operator and the equipment lower than the cow to reduce the amount of vacuum needed to transport the milk. I was getting a good, practical, education on how to milk and the science of milk production.

It was in this same barn that I witnessed cows artificially inseminated; helped cows be inseminated using a bull; watched as calves were born; helped a calf being born by literally pulling it out of its mother by tying binder twine around its little hooves and pulling; and watched as the vet delicately stitched  a cows udder that she had torn to pieces trying to get out of the pasture by jumping over the barbed wire fence. Many of my agricultural experiences took place in Green’s barn.

My involvement with the reproductive cycle of cows made me more interested in how that all manifested itself in humans. When I went to Penn State and took Dairy Science the first semester my professor, Dr. O’Dell, minced no words. He told us, showed us and discussed it with us. Our class of 20 probably had 5 women in it and we got their perspective, then, too. But more on that in 1960; we are still in 1958.

My summer, 1958, between my junior and senior year was a great learning experience. We cut corn in the milk stage and blew it into the silo for some of the best smelling cow feed you ever want to imagine. I hated grass silage because of the smell, but loved to fill the silos with corn. I also liked to unload corn from the silo versus grass, too. And I got a lot of practice. During the fall I would take turns milking on Sundays to allow one of the three adults some time off. I got to feed, wash, milk, dry cows off and all the rest of it. I was more reliable as a worker that summer and fall than I had been in prior years, I am sure.
I spent the summer living with Brother Dave and his family (he and his wife, Tillie, had two little girls, 5 & 2). I slept there most nights, ate with them, sometimes went to church with them. On Sunday evenings Dave, his brother in law (Harold Junior Green whom we called JR) JR’s wife (Janet) and I would travel to rural churches and do music for special services. Janet was a pianist and she had connections. She would book the trio of us. JR sang the lead, Dave sang bass and I harmonized somewhere in between. We were really quite good. So picture if you will, two guys in their late 20s and a gawky (6’3”, 165 # soaking wet) 16/17 year old “schuckin and jivin” the old gospel hymns. Janet would keep us on the straight and narrow, but we loved to jazz it up.

It was through song that I developed my spiritual side and my faith. The words of the songs we sang over and over took on new and deep meanings for me. I was sure that I wanted to be considered a Christian. I believed in the religion of my family and found it easy to become a part of the faith community. I took my feelings seriously…that stayed with me for decades and stood me in good stead. When asked, and you are often asked in the circles we ran in, when I became a Christian, I can easily say, 1958.

One of the pastors asked Tillie, Dave’s wife, if I came from a broken home because I was with them so much. She laughingly told him I was blessed with two wonderful (but older) parents, but I just hung out with them. We developed a deep bond that summer. It proved to be the last summer we spent together.

State solo and ensamble contests

This is an excerpt from my current project.

State Contests came up a few weeks later and were a fiasco. There were two station-wagon loads of kids going to Harrisburg, PA (Camp Curtain High School) from New Castle. I do not recall many of the participants, but it was a mixed group of instrumental and vocal talent; both male and female. The Boy’s Quartet and the Girl’s Trio from our choir both qualified and there was a clarinet, coronet, tenor sax soloists and a band ensemble of some type. Oh yes, one other fact: a third vehicle was required to carry luggage and instruments. Here in 1958 was a quirk that would never happen today. While the Band Director and the Concert Choir Director drove the two rented wagons loaded with kids, I was chosen to drive the third vehicle, which was the private vehicle owned by the band director.

Jerry Bonner (Mr. B.) sang in our church choir. He was married to the daughter of a church friend of our family and he trusted me. Remember, I was 16 and had my license for about six months. If anything had happened with me driving in that convoy, he would have had a heap of ‘splanin’ to do. He sent the bass from the Boy’s Quartet with me for company. George was African-American, which has more meaning later in the story.

We got to the venue without a hitch. I think that there had been some hanky-panky in one of the station wagons on the way there, but hey, we were all kids; what would you expect? By that I mean that on several occasions, gestures were made and a lot of frivolity was taking place in the far back seat of the car ahead of us in the caravan. Mr. B. did not take well to people not following his directions. He was quite stocky, a good musician, but fun to be around. Sometimes it was difficult to take him seriously, I guess, because he joked around with us. But when he laid down the law and somebody broke the rules, he got mad.

We all stayed in a motel not far from the school in the Harrisburg area.  District and State Chorus were festivals and we stayed there several days and we were housed in homes with other kids, but for State solo and ensemble contests (forensics), there was not time for that. We came, we performed, and we left. It was all business, so to speak.

The motel accommodations were two double beds per room, so it was four in a room. Of course, boys and girls were segregated, that is, until after lights out.

Our room was fine. We behaved ourselves. George and I shared a bed, but that is not the story.  In the other rooms, some of the boys and some of the girls got together…nothing bawdy as I recall, but they did get caught where they should not have been together playing cards in their pajamas. I would not have raised any eyebrows today, perhaps, but in 1958 it was a scandal.

Mr. B. awakened me at 5:30 a.m. gave me the keys to his personal car and $20 and said that he was on his way back to New Castle with a car load of boys and girls who had been busted. I do not recall exactly, but I think all of them were instrumentalists. George and I were to head right back with the luggage after we performed. Mr. Book would follow with those that remained. This is how I greeted the day I was to sing my two solos in front of state adjudicators.

Mr. Lewis, my voice teacher, traveled to Harrisburg in his own car to accompany me. He was aghast. How would I perform under these circumstances, he wondered? Well, I sang, as did Don Griffin the baritone, and we both got Superior ratings. Two juniors form NeCaHi had won state solo contests in 1958; one a baritone and one a bass. Our tenor did not place.

George rode shotgun and I drove the six hours back to New Castle. We pulled into our farm low on fuel and just to be on the safe side, I drew a 5-gallon can of gas out of our tanks and put it in Mr. B’s 1957 Plymouth Belvedere. That sounds generous by today’ standards, but we paid about  $.20 for gas, which probably was not taxed for farm use. So I probably anted up $1 of Dad’s money for the event.

I don’t recall the response of my parents to the story. In fact, after taking George home and delivering Mr. B’s car at his house on N. Jefferson adjacent to Mother’s future residence, I walked down town to Dad’s office on N. Mercer St. It must have been five o’clock in the afternoon. I was bursting with pride and he, between patients, smiled and said calmly, “Better call your mother to tell her the news and have her come and get us.”

There was “hell to pay” when we got back to school the next day. The word was out about the mid-night romp of the one group. But, ironically, nothing was said about George and me driving alone and unsupervised clear across the Pennsylvania Turnpike. Thus was the excitement near the end of my junior year…1958.

Tom, the cows are out…and other interesting things in 1958

I learned so much my junior year, both in and out of classes. In class, I took American Lit and Public Speaking, both of which became life-long interests. Frances Hayden was our literature teacher. She opened my eyes to the writings of the great American authors: Melville, Cooper, Irving, Poe and others. Why hadn’t we learned some of those poems and short stories earlier in our school careers?

Mildred Burleson was my speech teacher. She was a teacher first, but she was also a local actress (my mother’s age) who had really good ideas about public speaking. Not even my grad assistant instructor at Penn State matched her skills. Miss Burleson went to our church and knew my mother. I guess I didn’t realize how fortunate I was to have her training me. I recall one speech I gave on the subject: The words I most dislike to hear my mother say. My topic was: “Tom, the cows are out.” She loved it. I painted a word picture that included frustration, humor and accomplishment of getting my little herd back inside the barnyard.

What I liked more than anything else is that she accepted good attempts at fulfilling the speech requirement. No one refused to speak. Her first written comments were always: You filled the requirements of the assignment. Then the critique would begin. The way she managed her class gave me all kinds of ideas about when I could be a teacher.

During that spring, I was asked to speak at church (probably less than ten minutes) with several other youth. The Monday following the service she gave me a little slip of paper after class. On it was a stick figure standing at the podium with one foot on the floor and the other, leg bent, with only the toe touching. Her comment? “Good speech, bad posture. MB.” She waited until I read the note, then she smiled and said with a twinkle in her eye (maybe even a tear) “I was so proud of you.” I never forgot that critique.

My brother Jim did his student teaching with her years later. He has stories about her putting him in charge of the class while she would go off and rehearse her lines for a play she was doing working on.  Jim and I are not sure she took other student teachers; I don’t recall seeing any with her in my time at NeCaHi. She may have taken Jim on because he was Dorothy’s (our mother’s) son or because she knew us from church. Jim was a vet when he went to college, very stable (and a gifted teacher) and maybe she sensed that. He has praise for her, too.

I loved Miss Burleson. She was articulate, probably overly made-up, and she inflated my ego. She kept me coming back to school every day.