Wednesday, September 7, 2016

Quilt Projects Update

I finished my Edgar Allan Poe quilt, complete with a feather pen and his manuscript of Annabell Lee. I made this as the second in my series of poet quilts featuring love poems. 

As I did on William Shakespeare, I hand drew the quilt pattern and made the sections as separate quilts using fusible applique, machine, embroidery and quilting. The purple curtain is pleated and partially loose.

Next I want to do Emily Dickenson! 


 I have all the Bee-autiful Quilt blocks completed and I ordered some fabric for setting it together.



The bunny needs a pom pom tail still.

The bicycle block has been hugely popular. I found bicycle fabric at Hawthrone Threads that had to be in this quilt:
Also from Hawthorne is this honeycomb fabric:

The scale is larger on this honeycomb fabric also from Hawthrone Threads but it will be a great backing fabric.

I am still hand quilting my Austen Album quilt from Barbara Brackman and working on the 1857 Album from Sentimental Stiches. This will take all winter!

I am thrilled to have received a sweet box of review books from Schiffer Publishing!
Sue Reich's World War II Quilts, Don Beld's American Heroes Quilts, and Anne Hermes' Patchwork Pillows.
PLUS Mary Kerr's newest book Twisted and her previous book A Quilted Memory, which already has been inspired to tear into my stash of vintage textiles.

I have also been sorting and organizing my embroidery floss, for some crazy reason, which is taking much longer than I had ever expected!


Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Opening Doors: Dark Matter by Blake Crouch

When I open a book and see a quote from T. S. Eliot's Burnt Norton from his Four Quartets I am predisposed to like what comes after. Dark Matters by Blake Crouch begins with this quote:

"What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present.
Footfalls echo in the memory
Down the passage which we did not take
Towards the door we never opened."

I sped through Dark Matters in a few sittings. I had read the beginning on Read it Forward and liked it enough to request it for my Blogging for Books choice. I was not disappointed. I do enjoy a book that is a nice plot-driven read.

Jason is a happily married man with a son and a nice job. He could have been remarkable--so could his wife--but they 'settled' for good enough and a happy family life, no regrets.

"You could have won that prize," Damiela says.
"You could have owned this city's art scene."
"But we did this." She gestures at the high-ceilinged expanse of our brownstone..."And we did that," she says, pointing to Charlie..."

Then Jason is kidnapped and shunted into an alternate reality where he achieved great things while some other man got his wife and kid. All Jason wants is to get back home to the reality he loved.

The science behind Jason's dilemna is 'dark matter', the theoritical mystery thought to hold the universe together, and the concept that every possible occurance exists simultaneously, although we are aware only of the reality we exist in. Jason must open the doors into alternate realities until he finds the one he knows as 'real'; then he must displace the interloper who has become Jason, as well as the other Jasons who have been created by his visitations into other realities during his quest.

"My understanding of identity has been shattered--I am one facet of an infinitely facted being called Jason Dessen who has made every possible choice and lived every life imaginable. I can't help thinking that we're more than the sum total of our choices, that all the paths we might have taken factor somehow into the math of our identity."

I appreiate that Jason's love for his wife and son motivate him to endure suffering and death threats to return to them. It is ordinary life that is held beyond value, and which the various Jasons struggle to gain. It's almost like a Greek Myth, the hero's journey to come home.

Dark Matter movie is already in the works, and it will be awesome.

I received a free book through Blogging for Books in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

"Time past and time future
What might have been and what has been
Point to one end, which is always present." - Burnt Norton

Dark Matter
Blake Crouch
Crown $26.99 hard cover
ISBN: 978-1-101-90422-0

Sunday, September 4, 2016

Mad Enchantment: Claude Monet and the Painting of the Water Lilies by Ross King

As a girl I scoured the public library for art books. My love of the Impressionists, especially Monet, came early. I requested Ross King's new book on Claude Monet as soon as I saw it on NetGalley. 

Although I was very familiar with Monet's paintings, especially those in the Philadelphia Museum of Art, I knew very little about his life.

King focuses on Monet's later years as he struggled to realize his Grande Decoration during WWI while dealing with failing eyesight. The trials of the artistic life, how genius copes with human limitations, and the horrendous impact of WWI on France is vividly portrayed.



Nympheas, Japanese Bridge,
1918-1926, Claude Monet, Philadelphia Museum of Art
Although it took me a few chapters to get into the book I became swept up in Monet's story. I recall complaining, "I can't stop now, Monet's undergoing eye surgery!" 
Claude Monet Water Garden in Giverny, photo Ariane Cauderlier
The book begins in April, 1914 with Monet's dear friend Prime Minister Clemenceau coming to Giverny, the rustic hamlet where Monet built an 'earthly paradise'--the gardens now famously preserved in his paintings.  
L'Agapanthe, Monet 1920-22
The concept of Monet's Grande Decoration was born after the death of his son Jean in 1914. His water lily pond would be recreated through a series of massive paintings to be displayed in an oval room. He spent years obsessed with capturing ephemeral beauty. Monet promised Clemenceau he would give the water lily paintings to France. 

"Many people think I paint easily, but it is not an easy things to be an artist. I often suffer tortures when I paint. it is a great joy and a great suffering." Claude Monet

Cataracts and blindness plagued Monet and compromised his belief in himself. He knew what he wanted to achieve but felt his limitations. 

Monet was a passionate man who would rave at life's limitations. He was his own worse critic, destroying canvases that he considered failures. He stalled handing over the paintings. As long as he had his great work he had a reason to live. The delay strained his friendship with Clemenceau. 

At his death in 1926 the paintings were put on display in the Orangerie at Tuileries. Go on a virtual visit to here.

Monet the man and the artist was brought to life in King's book and I have a better appreciation of the impact of WWI on France.  

I received a free ebook from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

Mad Enchantment
Ross King
Bloomsbury
Publication Date: Sept 6, 2016
$30 hard cover
ISBN:9781632860125


Saturday, September 3, 2016

Memories of Eugene Gochenour: Scouting, School, and Accidents

Today I am sharing selections from my father's memoirs about growing up in the 1940s in Tonawanda, NY. These stories are about accidents, Boy Scouts, and school days at Philip Sheridan Elementary School and Kenmore High School.

Accident Prone 
Ray Grace and Gene Gochenour
Boy Scout Troop 146
"I was a very hyper kid so I was always getting cuts and bruises, unlike my sisters who never got hurt.


"One winter day my father and I went to a Boy Scout camp at Holland, New York, about forty miles away. It was called Camp Ta-wi-e, probably an Indian name. When we arrived there we met the rest of the troop in the parking lot and unloaded our clothes and equipment. There was snow on the ground and we had to hike about a quarter of a mile to get to our campsite. The troop consisted of about twenty scouts, with Stan Grace and my father as leaders. We were all excited when we arrived at our campsite, and set about preparing for our weekend stay.

"I had a new hatchet I was waiting to use, so I started to chop wood so we could get a campfire going. I was not chopping for very long when the hatchet glanced off of a log and struck my foot. Well it was sharp all right, because it went through my overshoe, my shoe, my sock, and into my foot. My foot was bleeding quite bad and I could not walk on it, so they all took turns hauling me back to the car. No one noticed how deep the snow was on the way in, but they sure did on the way out!

"Somehow Dad found a doctor at East Aurora, a town not far from the camp. The cut on my left foot was near my big toe, and it took three stitches to close it. That was the shortest camping trip we ever had! Dad never hollered at me when I got hurt."

Troop 146 at Summer Camp

Troop 146 at Summer Camp. Gene is at the end of the middle row on the right.



Gene Gohenour on the left, Ray Grace on right, 

Gene Gochenour holding turtle. Harry Summerville, Louie Grace,
unknown, Keith Rhodes, Roger Schneckenberger, unknonw, Ray Grace.

Swim race at camp

1940s, Troop 146 in parade.

Alger Gochenour was part of the Sheridan Parkside Men's Club sponsoring Troop 146

Alger Gochenour listed as part of the Sheridan Park Men's Blub for Troop 146


"As a youngster, I went to the Philip Sheridan Elementary School. It was about a half mile away and I walked through the fields to and from there. It had five classrooms and a fenced playground. Once when I was in the lavatory I started running to get to class and a kid tripped me. My head hit the wall and when I put my hand to my head, because it hurt, I found my hands were covered with blood. It must have been quite a sight when I came screaming out in the hall with blood running down my face, and bloody hands from holding my head. The kid who tripped me was probably scared for what he had done. Someone from the school took me to the doctor, and he put in three stitches, after calling my parents.
The "old" Philip Sheridan Elementary School
"Keith Rhodes was a friend who lived two houses away. One winter day we decided to go over to the hill by the railroad track and do some skiing. On my first trip down the hill, I fell at the bottom. When I fell, my knee struck a clinker, a large rough stone that had fallen from a train. It cut a hole in my pants, and when I looked into that hole, I saw blood. The wound hurt bad, and I started hollering. This probably scared the “H” out of Keith, but he helped me up the hill. We had a sled with us, and I sat on it, and Keith hauled me to John Kuhn’s house, a couple of blocks away. So here we come, me hollering, and holding my bloody knee, and Keith pounding on their rear door to get their attention. Lucille and Alma came to the door, and looked shocked, but then wrapped a towel around my knee. One of them went to Keith’s house next door, and brought back Keith’s uncle Jim Turk, who was visiting there. My parents were not home, so he took me to the De Graff Hospital in North Tonawanda, about five miles away. When I arrived they put me into a room, but they could not do anything until they got my parents’ permission. My Uncle Abbey came to stay with me till my parents came. Then the doctor fixed me up with twelve stitches. Eighteen stitches, and still counting!

"It was my job to cut the lawn, usually once a week, and one day I decided to adjust the lawnmower blades because it was not cutting right. I had watched Dad do it, and thought I could. To check to see if the blades are set right, you take a piece of newspaper, set it between the blade and the cutter, and rotate it. If it cuts the paper clean, it is good, if not, then you turn the adjustments until it is set right. Well I rotated them all right, except the palm of my hand, by the wrist, was also between the blades. So I cut my hand, and off to the doctor we went to get two more stitches.

"We kids were not supposed to go into the [Sheridan Park] creek at the golf course but sometimes the temptation was too great and we would sneak in to look for golf balls. An old man, who we called the Geezer, patrolled the course, and would holler at us, and kick us off when he caught us. We were terrified of him. Well, we were finding a lot of balls that day in the creek, and everything was fine until I stepped on a piece of glass, and cut my foot. I think it was a broken bottle. So I had to ride home on my bike with my bleeding foot. It was about a mile to our house and when we got there I showed it to my mother. She probably thought “Good Lord here we go again!” So off to the doctor we go again for three more stitches. Now were up to twenty three stitches!

"At least I never broke any bones as a child. Even after I grew up, I occasionally needed to get stitched up. While working at the station one day I was loading up the pickup truck with used batteries to take to the scrap yard to sell. The truck was parked in the front driveway, and when I bent over to set a battery down, it slipped, and I dropped it. When it fell into the bed of the truck, battery acid squirted straight up into my left eye. I was terrified, and jumped off the truck, and ran for the station. It was winter, and when I got to the front door, I skidded on the ice, and when I put out my hand to stop, it went through the front door window, and I cut my arm. But then I opened the door and ran to the lavatory to wash out my eye. I wasn’t worried about my arm, just my eye. Flushing
out my eye quickly saved my eye from serious damage.

"Bad things always seemed to happen to my left eye. When I was in school, I took up a course of Machine Shop. When working on a grinding machine I got a tiny piece of steel in my left eye. Then working at the garage, at various times, I had brake fluid, anti-freeze, motor oil, and dust in my eyes. Luckily, the eyes have survived all the abuse!


School Days

"The year was 1935 and the first school I attended was the Philip Sheridan Elementary School. It was located on Elmwood and School Streets near Sheridan Drive. That was about a half mile from our home on Military Road. I remember crying when mother left me after enrolling me for the kindergarten. I was not happy, but I soon became distracted by all the toys and the sandbox they had there to play in.

"Since the school was not too far from our house, I had to walk to and from there. Sometimes I would take a shortcut and walk through the fields. On the way I would pick and eat strawberries when they were in season, or I'd kick up a pheasant, or see a muskrat, or other animal, so I liked doing that.

"I think the school had five classrooms. It had an auditorium with a stage and a large fenced playground. One day during recess, while playing at the playground, I found a chain with a metal pendant on it. I threw it into the air a few times to see how high it would go. But then I threw it and it went over the fence and landed in the deep grass in the field. So it was gone. I later decided it was a religious medal I had thrown there. So much for trial and error!

"This was the school where the kid tripped me in the lavatory and my head hit the wall. When I came screaming out of the lavatory with bloody hands holding my head, it must have been quite a sight to see! That episode cost me three stitches.

"One of our teachers decided we should all get harmonicas and learn to play them. Well the day came when we all had them, and at the teachers instructions we started to play the designated song. I did not know how to make music with it so I just blew into it and faked it. I think many of the other kids did the same, because the song was a disaster. After a few sessions like that the teacher gave up trying, and that was the end of our harmonica lessons. My harmonica was a Honer, and I did eventually did teach myself to play a little.

"Not long after I left and went on to the Washington Middle School, the little Philip Sheridan School was closed, and a new, large, and modern school was built two blocks north of it on Coventry Road during 1947. My first real job was working as a waterboy for the John W. Cowper Construction Company that built the new school. Years later my daughter Nancy went to that Philip Sheridan School.

"The next school I attended was the Washington Middle School. It was located on Old Delaware Road in the city of Kenmore, about five miles from our home. The kids in the area where I lived were bussed to and from that school. At the Philip Sheridan School I was the fastest runner, but not when I got to the Washington School. That school had many more students and I was no longer top dog at running.

"Behind the school was a ball field, and one day while playing baseball there, a ball was hit over the fence, and I climbed over it to get it. When I climbed back over it my hand snagged the sharp wire at the top and I was momentarily hanging from it. When I got it loose and dropped to the ground it was bleeding quite bad. The school nurse put a bandage on it, but I don’t remember if I had a tetanus shot.

"The school was located near the center of the town and there were many stores nearby. One of my favorite things to do on the lunch hour was to go to Galagher’s Bakery and get what was called a fruit doughnut. At that time they cost five cents, and I loved them.

"The Second World War was going on when I went to that school, and kids would take money to school to buy war saving stamps. The stamps pasted in a booklet and when it was filled, exchanged it for a war bond. The bonds were in $25, $50, $100, and larger dollar denominatons. The money was used by the U. S. government to help pay for the war effort.

"Then came Kenmore Junior High School. It was located on Old Delaware Road, about a few blocks north of the Washington School. During the Second World War there were scrap drives to collect metal to be used for the war effort. Everyone was patriotic and wanted to do their part to help. We would scrounge around home to see what we could find, and haul it to school on the school bus. When we arrived at school, we threw it on a huge pile at the rear of the school building. It grew to be a small mountain. The bus dropped us off and picked us up at the back of the school, and when the scrap metal pile was removed, we would play handball at that wall while we waited for the bus to take us home. During the winter we would sit in the hallway and play Pinochle until the bus came for us.

"I worked at the teacher’s cafeteria for a while. When I worked there I got free lunch meals, eating what the teachers ate, and the food was better than at the student cafeteria.

"The school had a print shop and the teachers name was Walter Faxlanger. I went to that class for a semester and enjoyed it. We learned how to set type, how to run the printing press, and did some bookbinding. Walter would sometimes give us a lecture on the evils of smoking and how much money it would cost to smoke for a year. Years later when I operated the service station that my father built, Walter had also gone into the same business, and he was the head of the Gasoline Retailers Association of Buffalo. He talked me into joining, and I served on the board of directors for a few years.

"The next school I went to was the Kenmore Senior High School. It was also located on old Delaware Road, about 8 blocks north of the junior high school. It was a very beautiful school with three floors, very wide hallways, and a locker for each student. There was an Olympic size swimming pool, and a large gymnasium that had a huge doorwall that could divide the gym in half so the girls were out sight from the boys when in use. The auditorium was like a movie theater with a huge stage, floor to ceiling curtains, carpeted aisles, and upholstered seats. There was a typing room where each student had a typewriter, and at the chemistry class each student had a stool and a granite work table with a Bunsen burner, water faucet, test tubes, beakers, etc.
Gene Gochenour, Sophmore year at Kenmore HS

Gene Gochenour, Freshman at Kenmore HS

Mary Gochenour yearbook photo, Kenmore HS

Mary Gochenour, yearbook photo Kenmore HS
"The machine shop metal brake, and individual benches with vises. The wood shop was equally equipped with everything including a workbench for each student. There was an electrical shop, and a home economics room with stoves and ovens where students made cakes and meals. At the wood shop I made a darning egg, a baseball bat, and a small table that I had designed. At the metal shop I made a hammer with a screw driver inside the handle. I also made a V block, a device used in metal working to hold objects as they were machined. Each project involved using all the machinery at the shop to build.

"The swimming pool had bleachers where people could sit and watch swim meets and swim shows put on by the students. Behind the school was a football field and running track and bleachers for many people when there were football games or track meets. I think the school was as modern as any in the country.

"My grades were never outstanding except for Earth Science and the shop courses. I rode the school bus to and from school until the last year when I drove the motorcycle.

"Archie Henderson and Joe McAuliff were two of my school buddies. They were in many of my classes and they were both bigger than I. One day when they were picking on me in fun, a teacher saw us, and gave them a scolding for ganging up on me, not knowing they were not serious. After he left we all got a big laugh out of that! Those two big bullies picking on poor little me! Joe and Archie lived at the housing project, and we played baseball and basketball together, and Archie sold me my first car.

"Every year the school would put on a sport competition day. We would all gather out by the football field where we would compete in various events. The events were running, long jump, ball throwing, etc. I entered the basketball throw and won one year. Maybe nobody wanted to compete in such a dumb event!

"At the time when I graduated in New York State two certificates could be earned. One was a High School certificate, the other was from the State of New York. The reason this happened is that at the end of the year when the students were given their final exams, one of them was a test for the state that was comprehensive, covering all of the students’ past education. The high school test covered only the past year. Each year we would spend some time studying past Regent tests to prepare for the next. Earning the State certificate was more important than the school one.

"My graduation class had 466 students. When I graduated I had a major in shop, and also had taken the classes for college entrance. Little did I know that many of the courses would be helpful even though I decided not to go to college. I took business courses that came in handy when we opened the station. And the chemistry and shop courses were invaluable when I went to work at Chrysler. I never took any classes to be an auto mechanic, I learned them on the job, and from reading repair manuals."
Gene Gochenour's Senior Photo, 1948

Thursday, September 1, 2016

The Unseen World by Liz Moore

As I read the last paragraphs my breath caught in a sob, something between tears and amazement, surprise and the regret of ending. A visceral and wholly unexpected reaction. I had come to inhabit this world and know the Sibelius family, experienced Ada's journey, and now it was over and wrapped up in an ending I had not expected, told by a narrator who knows the Sibelius family as ancestors to be remembered and respected.

The Unseen World is a deeply layered and satisfying novel, a coming-of-age story involving the search for the father, a quest for identity, and a revelation of American society's penchant to fearfully target those who are perceived as different.

Dr. David Sibelius and his daughter Ada have an unusual relationship. David is Ada's entire world: mother, father, and teacher; the employees of his lab at Boston Institute of Technology is their extended family.

David's work is in artificial intelligence and his passion is cryptology. Ada participates in his work by talking to ELIXIR, a 'chatbot' program designed to learn human language through conversation. She pours out her daily life to ELIXIR.

One day David gives her a floppy disk with a cryptographic puzzle to solve in her spare time.

Ada adores her father but at age 12 is curious about the lives of  'normal' families and school children. She spys on the family of David's coworker Diana Liston and her beautiful older son William, while younger son Greg in turn watches Ada.

When Ada turns 13 she learns that her father has Alzheimer's syndrome. She endeavors to manage their life and hide his lapses but within a year his condition becomes obvious. Ada is required to attend public school, and when David is placed in a home she moves in with Liston.

As Liston deals with legal issues pertaining to David's care, his estate, and guardenship of Ada, it is discovered that David Sibelius is not who he said he was. Ada becomes obsessed with finding out her father's true identity and solving the cryptographic puzzle which may hold answers.

But discovering David's real identity still leaves the mystery of 'why'. Years pass until Gregory Liston returns with an insight that may solve the puzzle.

Moore captures adolescent society pitch-perfect, Ada's inner world and her apprisal of teenage machinations are spot on, moving and evocative. Ada is a sympathetic and beautifully drawn character.

The writing is wonderful. With subtle inference the reader is allowed to make connections that are later revealed in full. The backstory is told through jumps in time between the 1980s and 2009 with a few chapters dating to David's early life.

The book is rich with multiple themes: identity, the development of artificial intelligence, societal alienation, the father-daughter relationship, and societal prejudices and pograms against people who are different.

I loved reading this novel.

I received an ARC through Shelf Awareness in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.

The Unseen World
W. W. Norton
$26.95 hard cover
ISBN: 978-0-393-24168-6


Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Eugene Gochenour's Memoirs Part 4

Today I continue to share my father's memories of growing up in Tonawanda, NY in the 1930s and 1940s. Here Dad writes about making a tractor, hay farming, tragic deaths, camping along the Niagara River, about the local airport and even the town dump! I remember going to 'the dock' at Grand Island as a girl and wading in the Niagara River. I was told not to go far out as the current could carry one over the Falls!
Eugene Gochenour
"Father decided to get a real tractor and found one in the country and somehow hauled it home. It was a Fordson tractor with a four-cylinder engine and was built sometime around the late '20s, or early '30s. Once home, he found it needed some spark coils, so we had to drive to Holland, New York, to a tractor parts store to buy them. Holland was about thirty miles away. When we got back, he installed the coils, made sure it had gas and oil, and cranked it up. After he got it running well he painted it red, and it looked and ran great!
John Kuhn on a tractor built by Al Gochenour from a 1928 Buick.
1937 Eugene Gochenour and with sister Mary on tractor at Kuhn's farm.
The house in the right background was on Waverly St and belonged to Phil and Edna Kuhn.

Gene Gochenour age 14
"During the summer, I would drive the tractor and John Kuhn would ride behind operating the sickle machine, the hay rake, or pitch hay onto the hay wagon. The tractor had huge rear wheels and small steel wheels in the front. I was probably thirteen years old when I started to drive it.

"The fields we mowed were Timothy grass, alfalfa, and clover. The first cutting was usually during the middle of June. When it was time, I would drive the tractor, and John would control the sickle bar, which was like a large lawnmower.

"After a few days, when the hay was dry, I would tow John as he operated the hay rake. We raked the hay into long lines so that when we brought the hay wagon out, we could drive along the line and pitch the hay onto it. Then we hauled it to the barn where it would be stored in the hayloft. Salt was added at that time. The salt helped keep the hay dry by absorbing moisture from the hay, and the salt was a good addition to the cattle’s diet when they ate it.

"When John no longer had any animals, he baled the hay and sold it to the riding stables that were near by. Each bale weighed around 100 pounds. John sold them for about a dollar each.

John Kuhn bringing in the hay, 1930s
"There were always many cats around the farm, and some of them were half wild. They would go into the fields to catch mice. The mowing machine had a long sickle bar that cut the hay and sometimes a cat would be in the field and lose a leg to the machine. There were a few three-legged cats on the farm. Occasionally a pheasant would also get caught and lose its life. Dogs, rabbits, and other animals seemed to be smart enough to move away.

"John also had a cider press and father borrowed it one fall to make some apple cider. Dad had made a box trailer and one fall day we went to the orchards by Lake Ontario and brought back a load of apples. The press was wooden with a hand crank. After the apples were washed they were dumped into the top of the press. Turning the handle chopped the apples up. Then the apples were crushed by a press that was on the machine. The press had a large wooden dowel attached to a screw, and as you turned it, the juice flowed out of the bottom into a trough. The trough drained the juice to where you could fill either jugs or barrels. When the juice first flows it tastes like apple juice, but before long, it tastes like cider. Some of the cider father gave away, some he sold, and some he made into Applejack, a high alcohol drink.

"We were very good friends with the Kuhns and one evening we invited them to a corn roast. When John ate the corn he remarked how good it was. We said it should be, because it had come from his field! We all got a big laugh from that!

"The end of the airport landing field was two blocks west of our house, and about a half mile past that was the Sheridan Park Golf Course. The airport hangers were about a half mile north, and east of them was the town dump.

"Almost every evening during the summer, a man named Peewee would parachute from a plane. One evening he jumped from the plane, and the chute did not open. He landed in the dump and was killed. The oldest Morrow boy was called Buster, and he had always helped Peewee pack his chute, and he felt bad when Peewee was killed.

"There was always something going on at the airport. There were midair shows, and they gave flying lessons, and plane rides to customers. Once during the Second World War, a P-38 warplane made a forced landing and had to be towed up Military Road past our house because the field was too short for it to take off. Another time a Grumman Wildcat fighter plane crash-landed. I went over to see it and was surprised how big it was. It had belly flopped and the propeller blades were all bent back. That plane also had to be towed past our house. During the war I knew every war plane there was.

"Whenever there was something going on at the airport it drew huge crowds. Then a neighbor friend, Ridgely Ware, and I would put a sign on the lot behind his house and charge 25 cents to let people park their cars there. I don’t know who owned the lot, but people were glad to park.

"Levant (Lee) Becker was my mother’s brother and my uncle. He was about two years older than I and we hung around together a lot. He and I had many adventures together. He lived with my grandmother and grandfather on Morgan Street in the City of Tonawanda, about four miles away. Sometimes I would walk through the fields to his house.
Lee Becker at the family camp on the Niagara River
"They had a rowboat they left on the shore of the Niagara River about four blocks from their house. Sometimes Lee and I would row out onto the river and hook onto a barge that was that was being towed up the river. We would tie the rowboat to the last barge, then run up to the front of it and jump into the river, let the barge steam by, then grab the rowboat as it passed by. The only person on the tug was the captain, and he was so many barges away that he could not holler at us. After we left the barge, we drifted back down the river and rowed over to Grand Island. The river at that point is about a half mile across, and on the Grand Island side was a spot called Elephant Rock. It had that name because of a huge boulder that sat out in deep water, about a foot under the surface. It was in deep water, but we could swim to it, and stand on it. We also called the spot “bare ass beach” for obvious reasons. The bank of the river was about twenty feet high there, and a road went along at the top of the bank. I am sure people saw us at our nude beach.

"Sometimes when we were at Lee’s house we would walk to the Erie Canal where it went through the City of Tonawanda. There was a swing bridge that went over the canal that we dove and swam from. The water was not exactly clean but that did not bother us. The Robert Gair Paper Mill was next to the bridge and we found many comic books in the bales of paper. The top of the cover page was cut off because they had been returned from stores when they were not sold. We eventually had a huge pile of comic books.

"Lee spent a lot of time at our house and one night when he was there he and I crawled out the front upstairs window onto the roof. From there we could watch the cars drive by on Military Road. Dad worked at the Buffalo Bolt Company and he brought us home some of the scrap slugs that we used with our slingshots. Well, we had our slingshots, and we decided to shoot at the cars as they passed by. We had done this before, and never hit one, but on this night when we shot, we both hit a car. The car stopped, and a man got out, walked around the car, and when he could not see what had happened, got back in, and drove away. We were so scared we never did that again!
Al Gochenour in front of  the 'chicken coop'
"There was an old chicken coop in our backyard and Lee and I would sometimes climb onto the roof and sunbathe. My father suspected we were climbing on it and told us he would kick us in the butt if he ever caught us on it. We did not listen very good and one day he did catch us on it, and he did kick us both in the butt! We never did climb that roof again!

"Lee and I fished together a lot. Sometimes we would go at night and fish for suckers or bullheads at Spicy Creek on Grand Island, or at Burnt Ship Creek Bay which was over by the North Grand Island Bridge. We fished for Northern Pike both there and at Jackie Senn’s boat livery on the East Niagara River.

"Lee got a car before I got my wheels and occasionally we would drive to a rink in North Tonawanda to roller skate.

"We spent one winter each building our own sailboat. The boat was called a sailfish and we built it from a plan we found in a magazine. It was a one-person boat and you wore a bathing suit when you sailed it 'cause you sure got wet sailing. Sailing on the river was a challenge because of the strong current.

"Nineteen Forty-Six was a great year for me. I had a motorcycle for wheels, a girlfriend, and when summer came my parents allowed me to stay at the family campground on Grand Island. The camp was a beach on the Niagara River that was leased by the year. All our relatives paid toward the lease. Lee and I stayed there all summer.
The dock at the family campground on Grand Island along the Niagara River.


"My future brother-in-law Clyde Guenther worked at the International Paper Mill but stayed when he was not working. At the camp was my father’s large Army tent, a twelve-foot trailer that he and I had built, a raft, dock, rowboat, and a sixteen-foot sailboat. We had a friend whose father owned a brewery across the river. We let him have parties at our camp as long as he supplied the beer. He also had an eighteen-foot sailboat and occasionally we would sail the river with him. The boat could hold seven or eight people, and sailing on a warm summer was beautiful. 
Clyde Guenther. Getting ready to target shoot at the camp.
"At night we would have a campfire on the shore. Crayfish (crabs) would come near the shore at night and we would catch them using a flashlight. We would throw the largest ones on the fire, and cook them in their shells. They would turn orange in color, and when they were cooked and cool, we would peel the claws and tail and feast on them. They were like lobster. 
Camping along the Niagara River

'Moose', Lee Becker, Abbey Becker, Clyde Guenther, and Gene Gochernour at the camp
"On weekends many of the relatives would come to the camp. It was like a family reunion.
Emma Gochenour along the Niagara River in 1956
Lee Becker at 'the dock' on the Niagara River in 1956
Alice Gochenour at 'the dock' on the Niagara River
"Crayfish would come near the shore at night and we would catch them using a flashlight. We would throw the largest ones on the fire and cook them in their shells. They would turn orange in color, and when they were cooked and cool we would peel the claws and tail and feast on them. They were like lobster.

"Crayfish were the best bait for catching bass. The bait shops charged $1.25 for a dozen so Lee and I would catch our own. We knew a certain weed that the soft-shelled crabs liked to hide in. Crabs shed their shells as they grow, so they hide till their new shells harden. They are the best bait for bass.
We would row to the certain weed bed, and with a net haul the mass of weeds onto the deck of the boat, and pick out the crabs. We saved them in a minnow bucket till we used them.

"Grand Island split the Niagara River into the west and east rivers. Our first camp was across from the City of Tonawanda on the east river. It was just upriver from Elephant Rock, a huge boulder in the river that we could swim to, and was knee deep under the surface. To get drinking water we had to row across the river to a park. The river had a strong current and it was probably a half mile across so it took a while to row over there and back. But we had always rowed the river and were used to it. We had a nickname for the camp. We called it Gismo Beach. Lee had been in the army and had served in Korea, and he came up with the name. Back then everything was a Gismo.

"There was a lady who walked her dog by our camp every day early in the morning. One day she knocked on our trailer door while we were sleeping, and excitedly told us about someone lying in the bushes by Elephant Rock. We were all only half awake and went back to sleep and forgot about it. Late in the day we saw a Sheriff car by Elephant Rock and walked there to see what was going on. There was a young man lying in the bushes and he was dead. Someone had turned him on his back because you could see the imprint of grass on his face. Later in the week, we read an article in the newspaper that he had been in the U. S. Navy, but they did not say what he had died from. Where he was lying was only about one hundred feet from our camp."

Clyde Guenther at the Niagara River Camp. Elephant Rock is in the background.
Where the white posts meet the trees a dead body was found.

Clyde Guenther's sailboat on shore near Franklin Street
"East, and across Military Road from the airport, was a very large field that was used for the town dump. It extended from Military Road to Delaware Road, and from Knoche Road to Waverly Road. This was where Pee Wee died when his parachute failed to open, and where we kids would junk pick.

"Many ferocious wild cats lived there. They were probably farm cats that had gone wild. They lived in the piles of trash, and if we chanced upon one, they would hiss and snarl like demons. One small pond was left back in the field, and a muskrat lived there. The dump was used for many years but finally became full.

"When they stopped dumping there they dumped in the gully next to our house. So for a while, we lived next to a dump. Living next to the dump was not too nice because of the noise, dust, smell, and flies. This was during the war, and a man told us kids he would pay us a nickel a bushel for broken bottles if we broke them up. Well, it seemed like fun at first, breaking bottles and putting them in bushel baskets, but we soon decided it was too much work and told him so. So that enterprise was short lived.

"It did not take long to fill the gully so they then started to dump at an abandoned gravel pit on the other side of the airport. Before it was made a dump we fished and swam there. We called it the Pit. Many rats lived at the dump and we would take our 22 rifles an shoot them for target practice. The original dump east of the airport changed from a dump to a cemetery. I often wonder what they run into when they dig for a grave? The gully next to our house was eventually the site of a Texaco gas station, and a bicycle repair shop."

[Ed.note: Reader Bud Reid informs that the airport Dad referenced was the Consolidated Bell Airport at Military and Ensminger Roads.]

Sunday, August 28, 2016

Washington's Spys by Alexander Rose

We have been watching the AMC series Turn about General Washington's Culper spy ring and so dear hubby bought me the book that inspired it, Washington's Spys: The Story of America's First Spy Ring by Alexander Rose.

As Nathaniel Philbrick notes in Valient Ambition, the Revolutionary War was also a Civil War, dividing families and communities according to allegiences as Loyalists or Patriots.

Then there were those oppotunists who preyed on anyone and allied with whatever side was most profitable, the "vultures, vultures everywhere" always found during war time, coyboys and skinners and piratical whaleboatmen.

I like how the series Turn portrays Setauket as under seige from all these angles.

Long Island was a British military base and under matial law. Corruption and looting was rampant. Colonel Simcoe of the Queen's Rangers was brutal. Consquently, the British served to increase citizens' Patriot leanings.

Washington's Setauket based spy Abraham Woodall, AKA Samuel Culper, resorted to setting up citizens to cover his tracks, even burning down the barn of the father of Robert Townsend, AKA Samuel Culper Jr.

Of course there is a lot of fiction in the AMC series and romances and interpersonal conflict to keep things interesting. Rose's book offers the facts, just the facts, which is mighty interesting without embellishment.

The book begins with failed spy Nathaniel Hal; it ends with war hero General Benedict Arnold's defection and ignomous end, and the hanging of British spy John Andre'--who earned the respect of countrymen and enemy alike for doing his duty. In between we learn the intricacies of how the Culper ring developed, how it worked, and the impact it had on the war.

The main ring was comprised of Setauket friends who trusted each other: Ben Talmadge, Washington's head of  intelligence; the Setauket based spy Samual Culper, in real life Abraham Woodall; Quaker Townsend, who had gone to New York to practise business and provided observations on the British; and whaleboatman Caleb Brewster, fearless and bold.

We encounter a new side of General Washington as he forged a new kind of spycraft, utilizing advanced methods and emplying flawed, couraegeous, and colorful civilians.

In a letter from Rose found at the AMC website,
"Instead of remaining faceless names or nameless faces...through their letters the personalities of the spies themselves emerge and we perceive them not as invincible superheros like James Bond or Jason Bourne, but as ordinary individuals coping the best they can in an extraordinary time. These secret agents--because they're frail, because they're flawed, because they're sometimes fearful--come across...as recognizable, symatetic, real people having to make unenviable, hard choices while facing potential lethal challenges. 
"What I've found most remarkable about TURN is that eveyone involved is willing to throw out the conventional goodies vs baddies narrative of the War of Independence in order to explore these very human factors lying at the heart of that titanic clah of nations and ideologies."
Here is an interview with Rose about the AMC series based on his book:
http://www.amc.com/shows/turn/talk/2014/03/turn-qa-alexander-rose-author-of-washingtons-spies

Washington's Spies
Alexander Rose
Bantam
$17 paperback
ISBN 9780553392593