1935 – Camp Dawson, & Making a Road Along Little Sandy Creek, Preston Cty. W.V.

The fourth of the July came on a Sunday that year. After church that day, uncle Ray took aunt Rhea, uncle Oak (as we called aunt Rhea’s brother), Dora and I, to camp Dawson, an army base thirty miles away.

The army was having an independence day celebration. Some of Uncle Ray’s old army buddies were going to be there. The celebration was really something to see, I never saw so many good looking guys in one place, it was the first time I ever saw a guy in uniform, the sight was breathtaking. They had a military parade, the governor of the state was there and made a speech. When the military band played the national anthem, everybody stood at attention with their hand across their heart. Uncle Ray cried, as he said it made him homesick. Remembering the time he had spent in the army. I’ll always remember the magnificent time we had that day with Uncle Ray and Aunt Rhea that day.

July and August is a busy time on a farm and our’s was no exception. The oats were ripe and had to be cut, raked, and tied into sheafes and shocked. The hay was also ready to be cut, raked, dried, and hauled into the barn. Father came home to do the cutting, but the rest was left to Dora and I; the hay got rained on before we could get it into the barn, and then had to be scattered and raked again. The wagon broke down and we couldn’t fix it, we had to use the sled to haul the hay to the barn, which was harder work.

Every Sunday, somebody was having a family reunion, as we knew everyone, we all went taking a picnic lunch. Mother would buy a loaf of bread and make peanut butter sandwiches. I seemed to live just for those sandwiches, they were so good.

I saw Tommy Harvey [Homer Thomas Harvey 1911-1979] once again at a picnic that summer, but before I could talk to him, father had him playing and singing he looked at me once in a while and winked but that was all. He didn’t stay very long, I never saw him again. 

September came and I was thirteen, [September 1934] I was five feet and seven inches tall, and weighed ninety seven pounds. I was all legs, I ran everywhere, very seldom walked. The barn was full of hay and the granary was full of grain, the corn had to be cut and shocked. School was out of the question. Dora and I started checking on the rabbit traps, repairing the ones that needed it. It wouldn’t be long until hunting season started.

Around the first of October, a gang of men came to the house. They were looking for the Forsye place, they told us they had been hired to cut timber and make a road along the little sandy creek. That a timber company from confluence, PA had bought the timber and were bringing in the sawmill. They asked where they might find a place to stay until they get a shanty built. Mother didn’t have any room, as she had deer hunters coming, but she got on the telephone and started calling her friends. Soon she had a place for everyone to stay. Big trucks started coming past the house two and three at a time loaded with the saw mill. The men on the trucks would wave and whistle. I would hide when I saw a truck coming, as I didn’t like men whistling at me.

In a couple weeks, the men had their shanty built and their own cook. As they needed food supplies, mother had plenty of milk, eggs, potatoes, ham, she also agreed to furnish them with bread, and once they tasted her pies, they bought them faster than she could bake them. At first two men would come every night after milk and (eat) then more of them came. Father learned some played music, soon all fourteen of them were coming, and night after night they would sit with father and play and sing. Finally staying up all night started to interfere with their work and they didn’t come as often. There were two, Teddy and Orie that still came every night. Teddy was real tall and heavy set and usually fell over his own feet. He wore glasses so thick the men called him Popeye. I think that’s the reason he blundered so much. He was excellent when it came to music. Dora learned alot from him. He liked me best and wanted to teach me to play his guitar, but I said no. As he kept wanting to touch me. I liked Orie better than Teddy. Orie was shorter and older, a good singer, but when playing music he followed better than lead. One night it was snowy and icy. Teddy slipped and fell on his guitar and mashed it. He had paid a hundred dollars for it, so he was heart broken. He only got fifty cents an hour for working, it would take him a long time to save enough money for a new one. Without his guitar Teddy and Orie stopped coming. 

Rhuie Lena Frankhouser 1891-1944, Oak Fuller Frankhouser 1877-1937, Dora Guthrie McNair 1916-1982, Homer Thomas “Tommy” Harvey 1911-1979, Ada Guthrie, “Teddy and Orie”, Uncle Ray Frankhouser.