Given the opportunity to sit with your favorite person, what would you want to know?

- What kind of trouble did you get into in grade school?

- What did you want to be when you grew up?

- What were you afraid of when you were small?

- How did you pick on your siblings?

- Who was your favorite relative and why?

- When did you first experience awe?

 

A million more questions are floating around out there somewhere.  What would you ask?

 

Check out my new website at www.1stPersonHistory.com

Alright, so Auntie Diane got Grandma for Thanksgving, but I learned a few things anyway.

My parents both went to country schools -- you know, one room with multiple grades and one teacher.  In fact, my mother was the only one in her class.

Anyway - on to the dads. 

It was common practice at my dad's schoolhouse to bring a potato to school for lunch.  That's it.  A potato.  When the students got to school in the morning, they would put their potato in the stove and it would be ready for lunch time.

Forget your to put your potato in the stove?  Well then, forget having lunch.

My father-in-law went to school in Alby, SD.  Population is around 10-ish these days. (I don't really know, really).  Every day, 2 students were selected to walk down to the post office and retrieve the hot lunches for everyone -- which was about 10 students.  Good stuff.

Finally, things are starting to fall in to place for 1stPersonHistory.com. 

Finally.

I'm really hoping (and praying and wishing) to be up by Dec 15. 

All of that aside, I was wondering the other day what kind of trouble my Grandma T got into when she was a kid.  She's this sweet little lady who is always so gentle, I can't imagine her ever getting in to trouble.  Lucky for me I'm headed up he way on Wednesday to pick her up and bring her to Mom and Dad's for the Thanksgiving weekend and we'll have a good hour and a half to talk.  Two if I drive slowly.

More and more questions about her life come up as I think about it.  She has these tremendous stories about her dad (my great-grandpa) from when he worked on the homestead.  He didn't have shoes, so he would be plowing as snow was falling.  His footprints would have spots of blood from his feet as he walked behind the plow.  It makes me so sad to think that he had to go through that.  At the same time, we as a nation seem to have lost something in what we are willing to do and go through to create a better life.  Laziness has become the norm and "good enough" the mantra.

I think I have a pretty interesting family.  My paternal grandpa fought for four years in WWII.  My paternal grandmother owned only a model-T Ford and taught country school.  My Dad built roads to earn enough money to go to college.

My maternal grandpa was one of the most successful cattle ranchers in NE South Dakota.  My maternal grandma ironed even handkerchiefs.  My mother became frustrated with a bullying superintendent when she was a teacher, so she quit her job, ran for the school board, and got rid of the superintendent.

There are some great stories about these times in their lives.  I've heard a couple of them.  But I'm going to use this blog to snuff out the details and even more stories of their lives.