Entry 3

While living at 528 College Avenue (Grandma Handlin's house...upstairs) there were several happenings..these are not necessarily in order.

One day Dan and Danny had plans to go fishing. They purchased a little pole for Danny and I'm not sure what Dan used. However, with peanut butter sandwiches and cookies in tow, they drove out to the Lincoln Lakes. Not expecting them back for awhile, Jeanne and Patty were busy. Suddenly, up the long stairs we heard Danny with his Father behind him. They had only been gone about 30 minutes. From the scowl on Danny's face, it was obvious that something had happened. The first questioned asked was, of course, “Did you catch anything?”...the answer from a very unhappy Danny was, “Yeah, Dad caught my line in a tree trying to show me how to do it”. They couldn't get it out so the fishing was over.

Another Danny story: one day he was very upset about something and said he was going to run away. Jeanne suggested that we talk about it to see if we could work something out...don't remember what. Dan told me that when he was about 4 the same thing happened. His Dad helped him pack a little suitcase and he decided to stay for lunch and dinner and didn't go. I told Dan that that wouldn't work with Danny. He disagreed and helped him pack a little suitcase. Jeanne tried to talk Dan out of it as she knew Danny would leave. He did. We waited a few minutes and then Jeanne insisted that Dan go after him, which he did. Soon they were both coming up the stairs. Danny's only comment was, “I'd have gone further but I'm not allowed to cross streets.” We all learned quite a lesson that day.

While we were living at 528, one day a brown dog arrived. He wouldn't leave so, of course, we let him in for the night. When we left in th morning, he left. However that afternoon when we got home he was waiting at the bottom of the stairs. This happened for a long time so he was finally named “Ozzie” and became our dog, we thought.

I don't remember the details of Dan's meeting with this man but he told him the story of Ozzie. As the conversation continued, it was learned that our dog was also their dog. He had their home during the day and ours at night. They called him “Dutch”. We tried an experiment... we tried calling him Dutch and he didn't even turn his head. He was our Ozzie...a great dog.

One day while Patty and Danny were taking their naps, Dan made them a swing out of a board and rope and hung it from a tree in the backyard. They were so thrilled and Patty said it made her feel so loved.

As well as fishing, Dan would take Patty and Danny plinking. (They would throw cans from the bridge over Salt Creek and shoot at them, or anything in the Creek that was moving..nothing living. As I remember, Patty was the best shot...so I was told.)

Along with plinking, one COLD morning, (this was later from 1226) Dan and Danny got dressed to go hunting rabbits. The deal in Lincoln was get up and go to Pete Andrew's restaurant, The Gem Lunch, for breakfast before going hunting. Quite a tradition. They were gone about 2-3 hours and came home frozen. When asked about their hunt, they had seen tracks but not one rabbit. Our dog at that time was a Black Lab named Legba. After a short time as Dan and Danny were thawing out on the couch, there was a scratch at the front door. There was Legba with a rabbit; he was the hunter that day. Dan felt that his dog showed him up, but it was so great.

Patty and Danny stayed with Mrs. Seefeldt on Willard Avenue while Jeanne was teaching but their Dad always took them to school on their first day and also took the treats for their birthday parties at school. Billy stayed with Mrs. Stockbarger on Broadway and his Dad took him to school and the party treats also.

While still living on College Avenue, one day Dan, Patty, and Danny decided to plant a garden...radishes,lettuce, and carrots. Dan took clothespins, tied a string between them and they dug a little trench and put the seeds in there. For weeks they watered and waited. One day when Dan picked them up after school, Jeanne came home, thought the radishes looked big enough and pulled them up to surprise them at supper, realized they weren't big enough and replanted them. She found out that that didn't work as Dan thought the kids did it and she confessed that she did. With a concrete backyard and living in Chicago, she had no knowledge of any gardening. She was forgiven.