|
a.
|
Note: As young woman, Aunt Mary was very pretty with deep blue eyes and curly hair. When her brother, Arthur, left home for college and thereafter permanently, she stayed home and looked after her parents until their deaths in 1900 and 1901. Then the first year after Arthur's marriage to Emily Wycoff Berry, Mary lived with them in New York City (1902-03). In 1903 or 1904 Mary married George Van Kleck. The Van Kleecks were among the early settlers of the South Danby area. George had a farm in Dry Brook, a few miles from the Howland farm. As a farmer's wife, Aunt Mary worked very hard, helping with the chores as well as caring for the house, cooking, etc. She told me Uncle George was kind and gentle with his animals and helped them at birthing. They had no children which was sad because Aunt Mary loved children. They eventually sold the farm in Dry Brook and moved to a brick house on the outskirts of Candor. This was a smaller farm but the work was the same. Aunt Mary was a great story teller and delighted in telling the stories passed down in the family about the life in the rural community. Farm houses were all a mile or more apart, but everyone knew their neighbors and the kind of people they were. Social life centered in the church--that is all there was--no phones, no radios, no TV and a 12 mile drive with horse and wagon to Ithaca, the nearest city. One of the neighbors had a run down farm with nothing cared for or looked after. Aunt Mary told me that when one of the family died, she went over to help the family prepare for the funeral and for any visitors who might come in. The house was so dirty she had to scrape the floors with a hoe to get them clean. It was said of this place that the cockroaches were so big they came out of the house in the morning and sat on the fence and crowed. After Uncle George's death, Aunt Mary sold the Candor place and went to live with her sister, Elizabeth, and niece, Susan, in Trumansburg.
|
