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Note: y memories of the Hutchinson family. The following is some of those childhood memories as told by Dick.
My first clear recollection of Hutchinson activities, other than a couple good spankings at home, was that of arriving in our Model T, late one night, at Camp Nirvana. Next day there were feverish preparations for the wedding of Aunt Ella Hutchinson and Frank Stone. The morning was spent gathering white water lillies, with Aunts Grace and Jean handling the one-cylinder, exposed-fly-wheel Evinrude. A treacherous machine, that. Ann Hutchinson Wilson was the flower girl and yours truly, the ring barer--the ring being balanced precariously on top of a water lilly. As you might guess, the water lilly tilted, the ring fell down in the middle of the ceremony and I had suffered my most embarrassing moment. I do recall having been upset and the fact that no one seemed interested in the fact the date - July 15, 1917 - was also my fifth birthday.
Early in 1918, or perhaps late 1917, Daddy enlisted in the Medical Corps of the U.S. Army and I recall quite vividly the thrill of traveling in a sleeping car with Mother and Bruce on our way to Kansas City to see him off for France. He had been in training at Ft. Riley. During the following summer we spent more than the usual time at the lake. Then we went to South Range, Wisconsin, where we visited Uncle Frank and Aunt Ella Stone on their farm just a mile or so from town. Two events stand out in memory - - the time I was butted over by a calf I had gotten too friendly with and the time Byron Stone, Jr. (Uncle Nibs) took me to town in his horse and wagon. He was probably 17 or 18 at that time and a real hero figure, since then, even as now, he had a real "way" with kids. On that particular day I pestered him to let me try a pinch of his snuff - - probably Bull Durum. He also treated me to a bottle of grape pop while in town. You can imagine the rest.
Our next stop that year was La Moure. We stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Hutchinson in the "big House" which was just across the street from Uncle Will and Aunt Mabel's neat little bungalow. Their daughter, Ann, although a year or so younger that I, was in the same class as i started first grade in La Moure. Jimmie Stone, Uncle Frank's and Nibs' nephew, was also in the class. Oddly enough, I don't recall ever having seen Jimmie during all the following years until Aunt Ella's funeral several years ago.
As you might guess, Ann and I were quite the playmates, except that she still had to have her nap in the afternoon and I used to get pretty impatient waiting for her mother to hand-set her red curls every day after her nap. Harold and Jean were both in high school, although Harold soon left to volunteer for the Army. He had to lie about his age by a year as I recall. He was quite a tease and had me turning around from the dinner table to see a rabbit running across the lawn while he pilfered some of my dessert. He also plied me with questions such as "how long is a string" and "how high is up?"
Holidays were very exciting that year as several of the older aunts and uncles showed up, especially for Christmas. The feature of Thanksgiving was that Grandpa let me have a whole turkey drumstick. That may not seem very unusual unless you realize that I had several childhood health problems - - the "winkums," a constant blinking of the eyelids, plus ecxema and warts. A total lack of meat protein seemed to take care of the winking, so you can imagine the consternation when Grandpa said "Now Eva, Thanksgiving comes only once a year and this poor boy hasn't had any meat for months." Back came the winking. A couple years later the problem went away as mysteriously as it had come, as did the warts and eczema eventually.
Grandpa had been successively a farmer, La Moure Postmaster and finally the owner of Hutchinson Hardware. One of my favorite pastimes that year wsa browsing through the store, admiring in particular a toy tool chest. Either to indulge his first grandchild, or perhaps, to get some "disciplinary leverage," he let me have the chest but had made it clear that there was a string on it. Misbehavior would pull it right back to the store. That Christmas the highlight for me was the note on the tool box which said "break the string!" Grandpa was a strong, outspoken, ruler-of-the-roost type, but with all that a real softie at heart. He let Grandma pretty much run things, day to day, but when they occasionally got into a good argument, it was easy to see who was boss.
Back on November 11 the Armistice had been signed, so there was considerable excitement when Daddy returned the next February. Everyone bundled up to go to the railroad station, with Ann, Bruce and myself giving him as rousing a welcome as we could with a drum, toy bugle and a so-called "bazoo", the thing you sing into thru a thin paper membrane.
For the next few years things seemed fairly routine - - school most of the time, plus our eagerly awaited summer sojourn at the lake. Once while visiting La Moure, Grandpa came home with a letter from Aunt Grace who was teaching school at Chinnok, Montana, She told of having two fairly serious boy-friends - - one a banker she referred to as an "old man of 35" and another who was a young up-and-coming garage mechanic, one Tommy Dowen. Interestingly enough, we met the "old man of 35" while attending the Dowen's 50the anniversary a few years ago. Or was it his son?
The next event which stands out was Mother's first trip to the hospital (Minneapolis or Rochester, I don't recall which). She came home after having one breast removed and seemed quite sure that the problem was licked. It couldn't have been many months later that a second trip revealed that she had cancer of the liver, then as now a sure death sentence. During the several months between then and her passing in May, 1923, we had a steady stream of family visitors, mostly Hutchinson, but also Aunt Anna, Daddy's youngest sister, who spent the last several weeks keeping the household and us three lively kids (Kent 3, Bruce 8, and me 11) in some kind of order. During that whole time, Mother was the most cheerful person around. She even wrote her favorite minister, who had left a couple of years before, to come and officiate at her services. As luck would have it, she didn't seem to suffer unduly until just the last few days, or if she did, she didn't show it.
Aunt Anna agreed to stay on for awhile until Daddy could find a housekeeper. She had grown up in Cooperstown, so she knew of number of people was well as our numerous Westley relatives in the area. Her mother, "Bestamoor", lived with another aunt on a farm nearby and incidentally attained the ripe old age of 94, thus pre-dating Anna's similar long life (97) before she passed away in 1980.
After a year or so, it became apparent, even to us kids, that a romance was developing between Daddy and Aunt Margaret Hutchinson. Of particular note was a picnic in Chataqua Park, Valley city, when she and Daddy disappeared to take a long walk along the river. It was no great surprise, then, when Daddy announced that he and Aunt Margaret were planning to be married. Sure enough, come New Year's Day they said their vows in Jackson, Mississippi, and shortly cam home to cold, snowy, North Dakota. Margaret had been most recently working in Public Health in Athens, Georgia, so it was quite a change for her even though she's grown up in North Dakota. Perhaps an even bigger change was the every-day task of keeping house and managing three boys of 5, 10 and 13. I've always greatly admired both Aunts, particularly Margaret, for what must have been some very trying times for them.
During the year before the wedding, Daddy decided at the last minute to take us to Grand Forks to hear Paderewski - - my first opportunity to hear such an international celebrity - - he came to Grand Forks in his private railroad car complete with his own Steinway. Almost as memorable as the concert itself was the fact I got to stay overnight with Aunt Jean at the Theta house on the University of North Dakota Campus! I took quite a bit of pleasure years later in reminding the boys at the Beta house that I was most likely the only one among them who could make that claim.
Sometime in the winter of 1926 I was visiting a friend about a block away when the volunteer fire department went clanging past. We naturally followed the two-wheeled chemical wagon and shortly saw flames shooting out of our kitchen window. The damage from fire wasn't too extensive, but the water they poured all through the house necessitated out living upstairs in the Charles Cooper house for several months while the whole place was done over. In fact, the folks took advantage of the opportunity to make several good structural changes while they were at it.
Our next "big event" was the arrival of Ruth Ann on the Scene, December 31, 1916, back when the fact she was an instant income tax deduction probably wasn't as important as it would be now. She easily became the center of attraction and we all did our best to spoil her - - not that it was all that difficult. She seems to have survived it OK.
Dick graduated from high school in 1930 and later from the University of North Dakota. I went to work for Cargill, Inc., now the world's largest grain firm, and subsequently was a vice-president of both the Glidden Company (soybean division) and Central Soya Co. of Ft. Wayne, Indiana. Back in 1963 one of my old Cargill buddies and I set up our own grain future firm in the Chicago Board of Trade and it continues to the present, although both he and I are now partially retired, spending our winters in places like Arizona and Florida and summers back at the old stand at the board of Trade.
The following two stories told by Grace Dowen provide insight into Dick's boyhood life. One is her version of a story Dick told.
"Richard was a boy who was somewhat mischievous. As a quite young boy, he saw a tool set (smaller version used to promote its larger counterpart) which he wanted very much. His grandfather, C.I. Hutchinson, said he could use it as long as he used it properly and that it was not his. That Christmas C.I. put string all over the house which Richard was to follow and ended up at the tool set. The note said that now he could cut the string. Many of C.I.'s family told him that Richard would not understand the note. They were all amazed because Richard did understand that the tool set was now his with no strings attached."
"Richard was given a sailor's suit which was not the type of clothing being worn at that time. He never complained, though, and wore it anyway. Some of the boys in school were giving him a rough time on his way home from school but he never said a word. Someone else told the family about it."
Dick graduated from the University of North Dakota on Tuesday June 12, 1934, which a Bachelor of Science in Commerce Degree. He was very successful in his chosen profession and at one time was listed in Who's Who in America.
Note: Dick is the oldest grandchild of C.I. and Sarah Hutchinson and has man
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