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Note: NANA'S EARLY MEMORIES Alta Mae Marsh, (Lytle, Davenport, Beane) Nana's Mother, Hulda Marsh, left her husband and took her on a train to Colorado. THESE ARE NANA'S EARLIEST MEMORIES: "My earliest memory is of a lot of water. For years I had a picture of that water but I thought for a long time that it must have been a bad dream. One day when I was eight or ten years old I asked Mama if we crossed over a lot of water and were we in an upper birth of the train where I could look out of a little window. That was the way it seemed to me and Mama said that was the way it was. I was only fifteen months old and it was hard to believe I could remember back that far. " "My next memories are of living at Rocky Lake Park in Denver. I don't know if mama knew she was pregnant when my father put us on the train for Denver or not. Anyway l remember seeing the men dig a hole and bury a little box. I didn't know what was in that box until much later when I heard some women talking, must have been Grandma Davis or Aunt Becky. Anyway, they were talking about the long train ride causing Mama to lose her baby, a little girl. So somewhere in Rocky Mt. Lake Park my only sister is buried " "Rocky Mt Lake Park was owned by Uncle Alvin and Aunt Lollie Taylor. No real relation. Uncle Alvin was Uncle Isaac Taylor's brother and Uncle Isaac was married to Mama's sister Angelina, Aunt Linie we all called her. " "Rocky Mt. Lake was always frozen over in the winters. The men had a big ice shed there and cut ice and stored it in sawdust and in the summer Uncle Will drove the Ice Wagon all over Denver selling it. I should say he delivered ice to Hotels or any one who needed ice. No refrigeration in those days, just ice boxes. " "We left Denver and went to Kansas. I have no memory of that at all. All l know is what Mama told me earlier, anyway, we were in Kansas for a time, I don't know how long, but Mama met Joe Elliott and started dating, They became engaged but one day Mama said she heard that Joe had gone to the Pastor of the Church there and asked the Pastor if he (Joe) would be committing a sin if he married a divorced woman. When Mama heard about that she gave Joe the 'mitten' and we went back to Denver. Mama got a job in a boarding house and that is another little story. " "I will go back just a little. Joe Elliott later married Mama's sister Florence, so Joe became my Uncle instead of my step-daddy. " "Now back to the boarding house. Max Julian was a boarder there and it was not too long before he was going to the Livery Stable and getting the Nicest top-buggy and lovely brown horse to take Mama and me for a long Sunday afternoon ride. How l loved those rides. The stable man always put a little stool in front of the seat for me. The buggy seats in those days were barely wide enough for two adults. " "Then Mama and Max Julian became engaged and he (Max) taught me to call him 'Papa Julian. ' The trouble was I couldn't say Julian so it was 'Papa Dulen' I would watch for him to come from work and when I saw him I would run dawn the street shouting 'here come Papa Dulen, here come Papa Dulan 'much to Mama's embarrassment. " "Well - that summer Mama and Papa Dulen - were married I remember the night they were married Mama was so pretty. I don't remember anything more until Charlie was born. I remember Mama in bed with him and I had to back up to the bed so Mama could button my dress which buttoned in the back. " "Charlie was a big 11 LB, 12 oz. baby. The next I remember was the night Mabel was born. I woke up and heard a baby cry and some one said 'she only weighs 3 lbs. 8 oz. ' She was tiny all right. Always was. (Mable died at an early age) When Mabel was a few months old Denver was having a big celebration of some sort and a big parade and, of course, all horse drawn buggies and wagons. Uncle John Julian was living with us and he took us to see the parade. Suddenly Charlie was missing, a little over two years old and lost in the crowd A bout the time we missed him we heard him crying at the top of his voice for Mama. He was on the other side of the street. How he ever got through that parade of horses we never knew." "That was the first time Charlie got lost. One afternoon Charlie was missing from home. All the neighbors helped us look for him for a couple of hours and it looked like Charlie had fallen in the Mill Ditch. There was a mill and big water wheel down stream about a block as near as I can remember. Well Uncle John went back to the house for something and there was Charlie fast asleep on Uncle John's boots behind the bedroom door. " "There was a little footbridge to cross over the mill ditch, about a three foot bridge with no hand rail at all. Mama would often send me over the bridge to the grocery store for some little thing and Papa Dulan would give me a little bucket and a nickel to go over to the saloon to get a bucket of beer for him. I never went in the saloon, all I had to do was knock on the door and the big fat jolly saloon keeper would come and fill my bucket for me, take my nickel and I was on my way. One day Mama sent me to the store for something and on the way back I got an idea. There was just a little footpath leading to the bridge, no pavement or anything like that, I thought if I can walk on this path with my eyes shut, I can walk across the bridge with my eyes shut. Needless to say, I went into the water. I hit the water on my back. There was a curve in the ditch and I hit the bank before I got as far as the big waterwheel. I managed somehow to get up that bank and get home, wet and shivering, Mama took off my wet cloths and put me to bed I was fourteen years old before I ever told mama how I happened to fall in the ditch. She just laughed about it then, about all she could do I guess. " "When I was about seven years old Papa moved us out on the homestead thirty miles north-east of Denver. I think Papa took over Uncle John's relinquishment because the homestead was fenced and cross fenced and had a little two room homestead shack and I mean shack! It didn't have flooring. The floor was made of six inch boards and we didn't even have a well of water. Uncle Isaac hauled water to us in barrels. One night we had a terrible storm (called an equalnoctual storm) the wind blew so hard it shook that little shack. I'd wake up every little while and Mama was walking the floor, Id say, 'Mama, is the house going to blow over? and she would say, 'no, go back to sleep it's all right. ' When we went out there we couldn't see a house or building in any direction. We had one neighbor, the Blumenauers, but they were the other side of the sand hills and we couldn't see their house. Pa dug a well. Then Mama got a cow and a little horse and a buggy and I remember when we used to get in the little buggy and we would go over to see Aunt Lina, who lived about three and a half miles the other side of the sand hills. One day Mama went to Hudson, it was round-up time and the cattlemen had their cattle in the cattle yard and sorting out their own cattle. Well, I don't know how Mama happened to stop there but a cow had had a calf the night before, Mama bought that calf for one dollar, put it in the front of the buggy and held it down with her feet, she didn't have a rope to tie it down with. That little calf turned out to be the meanest animal we had on the place. " "One morning right after breakfast, Mama and Pa started out for Fort Lupton to buy some sheeting and cotton flannel for diapers as a baby was just about due. Charlie and I had been doing the milking, I think we were milking about three cows at that time. The next morning Pa came out and said, 'AIta, Ma wants you. ' When I went in, Pa was washing dishes, the only time in my life I saw him wash a dish. Mama said 'Alta, get the sewing machine out and start hemming diapers and sheets. ' I sewed until eleven o'clock. Mama told me to take the children and go dawn to Emmett's. Emmett's wife was in bed with a one week old baby and she had a colored mid-wife taking care of her, and this mid-wife knew what to do when I got there with all the children. She left her colored baby there for me to take care of. She came back about two o'clock and told me I could go home so I gathered up my brood and found Raymond that's when Raymond was born. (1894) 1 was fourteen in March of that year. I did all the cooking, baked all the bread took care of mama and the baby, did all the washing. Charlie and I did the milking, and I churned all the butter. Not bad for a fourteen year old. At that time we were milking that little red cow and Mama had never milked her without strapping her legs together because she kicked. So while I had to do the milking thought I would try milking her without strapping her legs. I had no trouble at all, she never kicked at all. So when Mama got well and took over the job of milking again she thought if I could milk without the straps, she would try it, the milk bucket went in one direction, the stool another and mama another. She never tried milking her again without strapping her legs. " (This was all that Nana and her daughter Ruth had written. The following are memories of stories we heard from Nana or Vera.) Nana was married October 15, 1900 to Samuel Adolph Lytle. July 26, 1901 Vera Vivian Lytle was born. They lived on a homestead and worked very hard. November 18, 1905 Verna Viola was born to Sam and Alta. February 27, 1910 Ruth Ellen was born. When she was about a week old Sam went to the barn to hitch up a buggy for Vera to go to school. There had been skunks in the feed so he took his gun with him Sam was a person who fainted easily. He could bump his elbow and over he would go. As near as anyone can determine, Sam bumped his elbow or something caused him to faint, the gun went off and he was accidentally shot. Vera went to the barn to see what was keeping him and found him there. She was ten years old at the time and never got over the experience. Alta was still in bed with the baby, the young Doctor had not stayed with her until the afterbirth was taken care of and she was very ill. With three young children and no husband it was a difficult time for all of them. When she was able, she moved into town and ran a boarding house. She sewed for people and kept her family together even though different families had offered to take one child. She would not separate her girls and she worked very bard to provide for them. She met Mr. Davenport who wanted to get married and move Alta and her girls to San Bernardino, California. During the years Nana ran a Boarding House, her oldest daughter Vera had many chores to do to help serve the boarders. One of the boarders loved to tease her and always asked her what kind of pie would be served for dinner. One night she had had enough of his question and she answered quite loudly "BEAN PIE"! After moving to San Bernardino the family moved to San Pedro where they lived for many years. Davenport wasn't in the picture for very long after he set fire to a doll house that was the pride and joy of the youngest daughter, Ruth. At this time Nana went to work in the fish cannery. Daughter Vera decided if her mother had to work to make a living, she would quit school and work also. She never went back to school after that. Somewhere Nana met Alton E. Beane who had come to California from Vermont in the early 1900s. He had a creamery and later he started a painting business (in the white wash days). The American Sanitary Painting Co. was one of the painters who painted the Sears store at Olympic and Boyle (14 floors) in the earlier years. Alton was a gentle person and trusted everyone which was not to his advantage. A man became a partner and wasn't honest, causing the paint business to close. After closing the paint business, Nana and Grandpa Beane moved to Baldwin Park in a two room house with no inside plumbing. They had an acre and a quarter that, after lots of work, became the "Ranch" with fruit trees, vegetables, chickens (1000 laying hens on wires) goats (for milk), rabbits, some times turkeys and pigs. Everyone loved to go there and Nana was such a wonderful cook that you could always depend on a wonderful dinner and delicious dessert. She was such a loving person and always very gracious. She loved to garden and could be seen in her garden at 6:00 a.m. on summer days to get the weeding done before it got hot. And it did get hot in Baldwin Park during the summer. One thing she always had on hand to cool you off was Hires Root beer, Yum, sometimes she would put ice cream in and make root beer floats. She always listened to her "stories" after lunch to rest a bit before starting to prepare for dinner. It was always so much fun to spend summer days there, there was so much to explore. The irrigation ditches offered hours of fun cooling off. The shed behind the garage was full of National Geographics and you could sit on a stack of magazines and read for hours. Those lazy, hazy days of summer. People were always around Nana. Vera and Doc and his Mother lived with Nana and Grandpa for some time. Doc's mother passed away and later he passed away and Vera stayed until she got a job in Long Beach and bought a house with a small apartment in the back of the house where she stayed during the week and came to Baldwin Park on the weekends. Ruth lived there with her two children, Colleen and Terry, after she hurt her back while working for Zazu Pitts. Later when she married Frank Floyd the four lived there until they moved to Summerland. Colleen moved to Nana's after graduating from high School, she got a job at Sears, Roebuck and Co. in Los Angeles, she and Vera shared a room on the weekends. Colleen lived with Nana until she and Jack were married and they moved to El Monte. They later moved back to the house Verna and Ernie made out of the egg barn. They stayed there with little Sharon until Ed was born and Jack got a job with the Carpinteria Fire Dept. and they moved to Summerland. Bill Julian lived with Nana until his death and then Charlie Julian came to live with her. This was about the time they decided to sell out and move to Carpinteria, Charlie came with them. Verna and Ernie, and Vera all moved to Carpinteria. Vera still worked in Long Beach for a time until she retired, she always enjoyed driving to Carpinteria for the weekend. They all lived there until Vera married Ray Kershaw and they decided to sell the house and Nana moved to Jackson with Verna and Ernie for awhile. She would travel and spend time with family. She would stay with Ruth and Frank in Oakhurst, Vera and Ray in Garden Grove, Colleen and Jack and family in Carpinteria, Terry and Anne and family in Carpinteria, then she would return to Jackson with Ernie and Verna. She continued these visits until she couldn't travel anymore due to poor health. While staying with Vera in Carpinteria, after Ray passed away, she fell and broke her hip. She recovered very nicely. When she was in Garden Grove with Vera and Ray she had Gall Bladder surgery. She came through it very well but the Doctor said that the shock to her system caused some old cancer cells to reactivate and it returned which finally caused her death at the age of 97. She made her 97th birthday and passed away in April. Nana was Nana to everyone, neighbors and friends of family. Everyone loved her and felt blessed to have known her. Individual Note: Alta Marsh was three years old when her mother Hulda (Davis) Marsh married Maximilian (Max) Julian in 1884. Alta told Ruth Myers that Max was very good to her and that he never made any difference between her and his natural children. Alta grew up in Colorado with her seven Julian half-brothers and sisters, since she was the oldest, she was a great help. This was a very close family and it was believed that Alta was everyone's favorite member. Alta married Samuel Adolph Lytle in 1900 and they were blessed with three daughters, all born in Colorado, they were Vera, Verna and Ruth. Sam Died when the youngest daughter, Ruth was only one week old, he was just one day short of his 30th birthday. Alta was left ot raise her three girls alone, she worked very hard at it. Vera was 9 years old at the time and was a big help. Alta worked in a cannery and also took in roomers and boarders. She also sewed for other people. In 1916 (exact date not yet known) Alta married George Davenport and the family shortly after moved to San Bernardino, California. A short time later they moved to San Pedro on the coast of California. The marriage to George Davenport ended in divorce in 1921. In 1927 Alta married Alton E. Beane, they had many happy years together before Al's Death in 1956. They owned a large chicken ranch ranch in Baldwin Park California. Alta's home was always open to all who needed her, and many of us did from time to time. Alta knew how to make anyone feel welcome. Many family members found refuge with her, her brothers Bill and Charlie mad their home with her after they lost their respective mates. Bill passed away while living with Alta and Al. I know she added many years of happiness to my father Charlie's life after my mom died. Alta had a full and interesting life, she had a wonderful memory, I wish I had started this work while she was still alive, She could have shared so much of the family history. Alta moved to Carpinteria, California and lived there with her daughter Vera and near her daughter Ruth and her husband Frank Floyd. She later moved to Pioneer to live with Verna where she passed away in April 1978. THE FOLLOWING ARE THE NOTES OF THE REVEREND JOHN IMBACH, JR. WHO SPOKE AT HER FUNERAL: We are here to witness the Reserrection and we are here to celebrate a beautiful life. 97 years of good living is worthy of celebration. There is always some sadness in death, but today there is mostly thanksgiving and joy because of Alta Mae Beane's living. She was born in 1881, but that is only a number. To say that she was born 17 years after the Cicil War palces her in a time of history and a culture of our common life. Most of her life she lived in the shadows of the mountains of Colorado and Southern California and more recently in these mountains. You think of the Psalmist's words: "I lift my eyes to the hills, from whence does my help come? My help comes from the Lord who made heaven and earth". There were many times when she looked to the hills and found strength in their strength, and their steadfastness in good weather and bad gave her confidence. But her help ultimately came from God the creator of our mountains and hills. Several words come to mind as I think of Nana. The first is HOME. Her home was the home for all of you related to her in the bonds of love. As I hear the stories most of you at one time or another lived with her. For each of us there is a place that seens more home to us than any other. Even after establishing your own homes when you went to Nana's you were still going home. In fact where ever Nana visited and stayed awhile was home to you. The New World Symphony speaks of death as: "Going home, going hone, I'm just going home". It is interesting how much home and family expression is in Jesus' sayings. "I and the Father are one..." "You are my mother and brothers and sisters". and yet at the end of His days He says: "I go to my Father's house. In my Father's house are many rooms. I go to prepare a place for you". Another word is "People". One of the family said Sunday evening, "People are her life". We live in a world of people and things. We have to decide which is more important. Ruell Howell wrote: "Things are made to be used, people are made to be loved. When you love things, you use people". Well, Nana loved people...her own family, their friends, and the neighborhood. All called her "Nana". She continued her "mother"ing all the way through life. She didn't aggressively go out and make friends, but she lived her quiet, open life, and friends came to her. The more we go after people, the more they close the doors. But the more we open the doors of our life, the more people come in. In her home and in her life the doors were open to people, and she helped many people open the doors of their own lives. Near the end of the Bible is a beautiful verse: "I set before you an open door which no one can shut". One of the best things you can be is to be an door opener. Nana was! "Roots" is another word. The quality of the roots depends on both the quality of the soil, and the quality and kind of plant or tree. Knowing Nana only these last few years I sensed a timelessness in her. Her roots went deep so she was not moved by every gust of wind or fad of thought. As well as having a very sharp mind, she had a steadiness of thought and confidence of life that comes with much living. Her physical life seemed frail, but her person, Mind -- Soul -- Spirit had great strength. "For all her quiet life flowed on As meadow streamlets flow, Where fresher green revels alone The noiseless ways they go. For still her holy living meant, No duty left undone; The heavenly and the human bent, Their kindred loves in one. She kept her line of rectitude, With love's unconscous ease; Her kindly instincts understood, All gentle courtesies. The dear Lord's best interpreters, Are humble human souls; The Gospel of a life like hers, Is more than books of scrolls. With roots go branches. Her life reached up and out. There was nothing flat about it. Edna St. Vincent Millay has some beautiful words. "The world stands out in either side, No wider than the heart is wide; Above the world is stretched the sky, No higher than the soul is high. The heart can push the sea and land, Further away on either hand; The soul can split the sky in two, And let the face of God shine through...." The bigness of our world is determined in part by the demensions of our own mind and spirit. The soul can split the sky in two and let the face of God shine through. "Humor" is a descriptive word. A good sense of humor is the result of a good perspective of life. When you see life whole, then you can see the things that are out of place or incongruous. In her nineties Nana could pick up on the humor faster than most people I know. When you laugh at life then life is cheap. When you laugh with life the life is deep and high and abiding. There is an interesting stanza in the youth hymnal of our church: "I would be friends of all the foe, the friendless; I would be giving and forget the gift; I would be humble for I know my weakness; I would look up and laugh and love and lift!" One more Word - -"Faith". Faith is many things. Basically faith is the direction and attitude of life. Faith is the kind of anchor that holds you steady in storms. Faith is tieing into the deep currents of life so that you accomplish good direction and goals. Paul has this statement about persons who used life rather than letting life use them: "We know that in everything God works for good with those who love him, who are called (directed) according to his purpose." Romans 8.28. We honor a person by thinking of the good things in their life. We celebrate the life that has breadth, strength, goodness and joy in it. This we do with Nana today. But our lives are brief against the background of eternity. We are nothing with Him who gives us life. "It is in God that we live and move and have our being." So we honor Nana today by reaffirming our belief in God who created us, who sustains us, and who eventually calls us to his eternal, and our eternal home. The death of one we love makes us aware of the shortness of life. But it also opens the door of Faith and Hope. "For life is eternal; and love is immortal, and death is only a horizon; and a horizon is nothin - - save the limit of our sight." So today, because of Nana, we affirm again our Faith in God who is eternal, in Jesus Christ, who came to give us life and life eternal. "All as God wills, who wisely heeds to give or to withold, and knoweth more of all my needs than all my prayers have ever told! That death seems but a covered way which opens into the light, wherin no blinded child can stray beyond the Father's sight, and so the shadows fall apart, and so the west winds play, and all the windows of my heart I open to the day. Amen. (John Greenleaf Whittier) Jesus said: "I am the Resurrection and the Life, he who believes in me shal never die..." "I set before you an open door which no one can shut..." "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you... let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid." LET US PRAY: Lord, Thou hast been our dwelling place in all generations. In this time of sorrow it comforts us to know that Thou art, and that nothing can seoarate us from Thy love. Thou knowest, O God, the agony of the spirit for which we have no words. Thou understandest our tears. Sustain us O God all the day long. In thee we would find our strength. Take to Thyself the Nana, the one we love, now separated from us for a season. Help us to rejoice and be glad in the years of rich fellowship Thou hast granted us through her. Help us to rejoice, even in our grief, that she lives with Thee. We thank Thee, Father, that Thou has prepared for Thy children a world in which there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain. In trust of Thee and of Thy care for Nana in her life after life, our spirits are made strong. "Grant us the joy that brightens earthly sorrow; Grant us the peace that calms all earthly strife; And to life's day the glorious Unknown morrow that dawns upon eternal love and life." Support us, our Father, all the day long of this life; until the shadows lengthen, and the fever of life is over; and our work is done. Then in Thy mercy grant us a safe lodging, a holy rest, and peace at last; through Jesus Christ, Our Lord. O Thou who art the Resurrection and the Life, grant us Thy peace. In Thee we rest. AMEN. BENEDICTION: May the Lord bless you and keep you; May the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you. May the Lord lift the light of his countenance upon you and give you peace - - This day and always. Amen. Scriptures used in the service: John 14; Psalm 23; Romans 8.18-39 and II Corinthians 4.13-5.7
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