Phase I - Part III
Teen-Age in City

• The climate in Texas did not agree with us after one year returning to Tennessee we stayed in Knoxville, rather than going back to Sevier County, due to better education facilities.
  
  
• The likelihood of getting hot cinders in one's eyes when a train window was raised for fresh air.  The constant crying of children on trains.  There was no airplane or bus transportation - only a few roads suitable for inter-state automobile travel.
  
  
• Enough round steak for a family of 6 could be purchased for 10 cents to $1.50 - we seldom had steak except for breakfast; frying size chickens selling for $1.00 each - fried for breakfast - cream gravy, too.
  
  
• Fresh beans or tomatoes 50 cents per gallon - eggs 15 cents per dozen - buttermilk or skim milk $1.00 per gallon - whole milk $1.50 per gallon - "Sour John" apples for making jelly 50 cents per gallon.  What ever happened to "Sour Johns"?
  
  
• We eagerly visited both our grandparents back in Sevier County at every opportunity.  Grandmother (paternal) always baked us an old fashioned many layered stack cake -- dried apples or peaches -- and a gallon bucket of cookies.  All the uncles and aunts made us feel wanted.
  
  
• Grandmother always setting table ready for breakfast after washing dishes at night.  She "rested" by patching clothes for a large family of 6 boys - 1 daughter - quite frequently smoking home grown tobacco in a clay pipe.
  
  
• Large twists of home grown tobacco, hanging in an outside closed room, for smoking in our paternal grandfather's and grandmother's clay or cob pipe.  Only two of a large family of boys ever smoked.  No ready rolled cigarettes available.  No snuff or chewing tobacco used.
  
  
• Our maternal grandfather reading the Bible daily and saying Grace at meal time.  He was a fine Christian gentleman, with two large families (7 and 8 children) -- my mother in first family.
  
  
• No dry cleaning plants, only pressing clubs, using heavy hand irons -- pressing the dirt into the garment.
  
  
• Shaving done only with a straight razor.  Individual shaving mugs on the barber shop's shelves.
  
  
• Trying to conjure doodle-bugs out of holes in the ground by repeating "doodle bug, doodle bug," etc., and inserting a wild onion stem in the hole hoping the doodle bug would attach itself to it - and quite often did.
  
  
• Some whys:  Why does one always mount a horse (or dismount) from the left side -- or why is a cow milked from her right side or why do cattle grazing always head in the same direction?
• The enjoyment from simple playthings, viz:  baseballs made by wrapping twine tightly around a ball of cloth (earlier, in the country, we would play "ante over" at school with homemade balls) -- walking on wooden stilts and tin cans with strong strings attached -- a shoe tongue for the "pocket" of a sling or sling-shot -- rolling iron hoops by fashioning a piece of stiff wire for a handle, the other end cupped for guiding -- kites made from any available paper, with strong weed stems as staves-- belly buster wooden snow sleds -- playing "hide and seek", mumble-ty-peg, jacks with small pebbles, marbles, spinning tops, one eyed cat, etc.
  
  
• The making of homemade ice cream in a hand-turned wooden freezer each Sunday.
  
  
• A boy calling on a girl friend -- out of his neighborhood, usually -- was "rocked" when leaving and had to run to the trolley car -- I ran fast.
  
  
• This one episode in my early life I regret, but it has a "box seat" in my memory.  There could have been dire consequences.  Going to The Knoxville Journal about 4 A.M. (this was later advanced to 2:30 A.M.) to secure papers for my paper route.  I had to cross a long bridge.  A street housing mostly saloons and bawdy houses (both were legal) ran under the bridge.  One of the bawdy house's chimney came almost even with the bridge, and only a few feet away.  This house had a tin roof.  Two other boys were usually with me -- mob psychology at work.  We conceived the idea of having some "fun" by dropping bricks on the tin roof, then running very fast to a safe distance where we could see "people" coming to the windows and doors.  One time we dropped a package of lighted firecrackers down this chimney.  Consternation below??  Yes:  We stopped this dangerous foolishness after about four or five times spread over a period of about two months.
  
  
• The necessity of wearing "dust coats" on all automobile trips outside the city.  All roads were macadamized or plain dirt and very dusty.
  
  
• For many years automobiles were open cars -- touring cars or roadsters (some with a rumble seat) -- curtains were available.  All with outside running boards -- no automatic shift -- and hand-cranked until about 1913 or 1914.
  
  
• Tires were improved to the point a 5000 mile guarantee was a sensation.  Tire patches, boots, and repair kits were a necessity and certainly a jack and tire pump.
  
  
• Some of the automobiles formerly sold in Knoxville not in production now:  Star - Dart - Jordon - Haynes - Winston 6 - Austin - Mormon - E. M. F. Page - Frazier - Chalmers - Auburn - Flanders - Cord - Crosley - Saxon Apperson - Moon - Pierce Arrow - Allen - Peerless - Stanley Steamer Franklin (air cooled) - Durant - Chandler - Overland - Stutz (bear cat) Hupmobile - Reo - Maxwell - Erskine - Hudson - Kaiser - Edsel - Packard Studebaker - an electric and a three-wheel auto.  This is from memory -- and wonder why they failed?  And is this peculiar only to the automobile business?
  
  
• While attending a revival one Sunday evening and choir softly singing, "Just as I am, Without One Plea," etc., going forward to accept Christ as my Saviour.  Some people say they cannot recall accepting Christ at a specified time.  I can.
  
  
• Two days before our mother died September 3, 1910, she called each child to her bedside, separately.  She said to me, "be a good boy, and be good to your sisters" and then in a weak voice said a short prayer in my behalf.  She was a sweet good mother.
  
  
• As we passed my former one-room school with my mother to a nearby cemetery, we were the recipients of the "bell tolling" -- as mentioned previously.  All students lined up standing quietly outside.
  
  
• I'm thankful for learning early in life, when there are no "boot straps," the "WILL to do," with action is effective and causes many problems to vanish.  A "dole" or "relief" to an able-bodied person was insulting.
  
  
• A phenomenon:  at age 18 I was the youngest member of a baseball team that won the Knoxville City League championship.  Here's the unusual occurrence:  forty (40) years later we held a reunion, and every member of that team was living and all present except two.
  
  
• Now the "will to do" tested.  Arising 2:30 each morning, walking 1-1/2 miles to newspaper office to work in mailing room -- $3.50 per week -- then carrying a long paper route -- price 10c weekly -- 15c with Sundays.  Walking from 8 to 14 miles daily, plus the two hours previous fast work before school at 8:00, and Sunday School by 10:00 each Sunday.  How happy and thankful I was for the opportunity to make enough money to buy my clothes, pay my school expenses, and partially repay my three sisters, De, Mae and Rae for the many things they did for me.  After our mother's death, they did the cooking and house work.  Our family was happy and full of hope.
  
  
• Have been thrilled lately seeing a friend's scrapbook listing my batting average at mid-season in the City League at 5.20.  I made the All-City team each year while at Central High School.  My high school years were enjoyed, making good grades and active in athletics.