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Note: In a letter of 1986, Margaret Scholtz described her mother Ermil: She graduated from high school at Hastings, Nebraska, in 1912. That summer she and a girl friend rode herd on the cattle for the Forrester boys up near Logan where they were homesteading. That summer she met my Dad, and a year and a half later they were married. My Mom was a homemaker and mother. She loved her home and family. They were farmers, and not by today's standards of motor driven equipment but with horses and hard work and no conveniences such as electricity and running water in the home. They started on Dad's homestead claim, and with a two-room sod home.
Mom grew up in the Presbyterian church, but after her mother and husband passed on three years apart she suggested that we go to the Christian Science church in honor of her mother and that is where she, my sister, and I stayed for church growth.
Examples of her love as a mother are many. when Merle was overseas during the war she saved the money which he sent home. When he returned he was able to buy his own business, a garage, and he kept it as his work the remainder of his working years.
When Evalyn started college, Mom started too. We had a small college in our hometown. As soon as she could qualify for a teaching certificate she started teaching in the little country schools. This enabled her to put Evalyn through college and hold the home together for herself and Evalyn until Evalyn transferred to Oklahoma A&M and until Merle returned from the war. She attained 3 yrs of college and six yrs of teaching in the last 6 years of her life.
One year when i was in college and there didn't seem to be money enough in sight for even one semester, just enough for half a semester, she told me to go ahead and go because I could lose nothing. If funds came through I would b in a position to continue uninterrupted. If funds did not appear I could still come home and not have lost anything because no one could ever take from me what I had learned. One way or another i made it through.
She and great strength of character, and faced the years of raising her family alone with courage. Seh kept light-hearted and fun-loving through it all. She once said to a neighbor that one was no older than he felt. The neighbor replied, "Mrs. Schlotz, you should be in first grade then."
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