Life at Skelly Number 2

By Jim Eaton, grandson

I spent a substantial amount of time at their house over the years, so I have many, many memories of them [Andy and Flora Lehr] and my aunts and uncles that still lived at home. My mother worked with my father in their stores for many years when they were getting started, so I got to stay with my grandparents, overnight frequently at my request. This was a great environment. My mother was the eldest of the eight. She, her brother Dick, and sister Pat had married and moved to their own homes when I started staying at my grandparents. That left the twins, Ruth and Joan, Judy, Jim and Bill at home when my memories start.

The house was a story and one half with one bathroom downstairs and one with a shower upstairs. My earliest memory was when Judy had a small bedroom upstairs, the twins, Ruth and Joan, had the other upstairs bedroom with a double size bed. Downstairs, my grandparents’ bedroom was in the front of the house and opened into the bathroom. There was another room adjoining the bathroom that was often used for guests, and the back bedroom for Jim and Bill. At one point there was a large living room separated from the dining room. The wall was eventually removed, and a very large living area created. This was very functional because many of the holidays were celebrated here.

There was a screened-in back porch that eventually was completed with a section converted to a dark room for developing and printing photos. The other part of the porch was a great place to make homemade ice cream – hand cranked. There was a very large single garage with a well-equipped workshop. It seemed like it had every tool and machine any woodworker would need.

There was no air conditioning initially. When window air conditioning units were installed, everyone thought they were in heaven. The house was heated by two large gas stoves in the combined living-dining room and a large gas stove in the room off the bath. There was a small space heater upstairs. It seemed like a mansion to me. In later years when I revisited the site, I was amazed how small it actually was.

There was also a lot of land behind the house with a “stream” running at the end of the property. It was a drainage stream for overflows from the refinery. Such streams would not be allowed now, but were of no concern then. There was a large front porch that faced east and overlooked a greenway between the frontage road in front of the house and the main street into the refinery. This greenway ran from the edge of the refinery offices on the south (essentially two lots down) to the end of the development on the north (four lots away).

There was a regime to life at the Skelly house. I assume it was necessary to manage all the children. Each night in the winter, my grandfather would turn back the gas stoves that heated the house. That was the last “hint” to go to bed. After everyone was settled in bed, my grandfather would walk through the house sprinkling holy water on everyone. In case you didn’t get the hint, religion was the foundation for this family. There were prayers before each meal, and Mass on Sunday. The Lehrs always sat in the same pew. I remember times when someone else dared to sit in my grandmother’s place. She just stood there until they moved.

There was a pump at the refinery that ran twenty-four hours a day. It had a very unique rhythm to it—chug, chug, chug, chew, chew, chew. Instead of an annoyance at night, it became soothing and put me to sleep. That sound has stayed with me for more than half a century. Every morning, my grandfather would arise before everyone to prepare the house for the day. He flew the flag each morning and lowered it each night when he returned from work. In the winter, the first thing he did was to turn up the gas on the stoves to warm the house for everyone else. The milk arrived at the front doorstep in glass bottles. It was my duty to bring it in when I was there. It was not homogenized—the cream was always at the top of the bottle. It was great on cereal.

Then there would be breakfast prepared by my grandmother, and the fresh milk always tasted great. After breakfast, my grandfather would walk to work, no matter what the weather. He walked home every day for lunch. At that time, there was a whistle at the refinery that blew at 8:00 am, 12:00 pm, and 4:00 pm to signal the start of the workday, lunch, and the end of the workday. This practice eventually stopped, probably as watches and clocks became more cost effective and prevalent. In his forty plus years with the company, he missed only three days for sickness. He was bitten by a brown recluse spider and became very ill. I remember the size of the abscess in his toe caused by the poison from the bite. It was very nasty.

While my grandfather was at work, there were chores to be done before play. One of the chores assigned to me, in addition to getting the milk, was to vacuum the carpets every day. Of course, all the beds had to be made. Everything had to be dusted each day. Then it was time to enjoy the day. This was a time when there was no TV, and we survived. We played lots of games including Canasta that my grandmother taught me at a very early age. Scrabble came later along with many other games. Often the neighbor kids were around, and we played outside most of the time. My aunt Judy played golf. She allowed me to use a couple of her clubs to practice. As I described above, there was a large greenway in front of the house. I was able to hit the golf ball from one end to the other. I even added a hole in the ground on each end and planted my own flag to mark each. During my professional career, I never allotted the time to enjoy the sport.

My grandmother kept a bottle of Jergens hand lotion in the living room. I still remember the aroma from it. She kept a very well-run household. All her children knew their chores, and just performed them automatically. My aunts and uncles were in school during the day during my early days staying there, however, they included me in many of their activities. I have no memory of major discord or disagreements among my aunts and uncles—maybe I was naïve. Nor can I remember a time when either my grandfather or grandmother really raised their voices to reprimand anyone. Everyone just respected their elders. This was in part due to the examples my grandparents provided. Their mood was always calm and positive. Their religion guided them, and they passed this on to their children. I never, never heard my grandfather use profanity in any way.

When adversity struck, and has in every person’s life, it did, they handled it in a calm manner. One specific event I remember was the time my uncle Bill was out driving the family car with my future aunt Beverly, at that time there was only one car in the family, when it rolled totaling the car. I was at the house when the call came from Bill. Bill was devastated, but A.J. put it all in perspective—no one was hurt, the car could be replaced—and never raised his voice. He knew how badly Bill felt about destroying the car, and did everything he could to alleviate his anxiety. I am sure that later he had a discussion about speeding around curves, but that was a private learning event. Another event involved their new car. They had to use bottled water for drinking for a period of time. They bought it in 5-gallon bottles. On one trip to replenish the water supply, someone left the full bottle of water in the back seat of my grandfather’s new green Dodge while they went shopping. It was summer and the sun was shining brightly, too brightly. The water functioned as a magnifying glass and concentrated the sunrays to start a fire in the upholstery of the side door in the back. The result was a large hole in the door.

My grandparents’ card game was Pinochle—I never figured out why there were so many face cards. They had a group of friends with whom they played the game for many, many years, and were never interrupted by TV. Speaking of TV, they also had a friend, Leo Call, who had one of the early TVs. They would take me with them when they went to Mr. Call’s house to watch The Friday Night Fights on Fridays and Bishop Sheen during the week. I was not surprised at them watching Bishop Sheen, but often wonder why this mild manner man had such an interest in the fights. I never asked that question. The TV screen was a rather small, black and white model, so Mr. Call installed a large, circular magnifying glass in front of it—the magnifying glass was almost two feet in diameter. It distorted the images but made them much more visible from a distance.

  I liked to get dressed in his bathroom because he had a wide selection of hair tonics of various colors and aromas. It was also interesting to see what he kept in the medicine cabinet. Health care was significantly different than it is today. Most medical issues were handled at home, so he had a number of tonics and salves and ointments and elixirs.

For many years, celebration of most of our holidays were at the Lehr Skelly house. All their children and grandchildren who were in town at the time gathered there. My grandmother was a great cook, and we feasted all day. I especially enjoyed the home baked pies, and homemade cloverleaf rolls. The meal was usually topped off with homemade ice cream. In addition to the usual fare, I distinctly remember each year someone brought an orange Jell-O salad with shredded carrots in it and a lime Jell-O salad with some type of bitter green grapes in it—I did not like either! One year, my father provided the lumber and a couple of my uncles made three or four large picnic tables to relieve space pressure in the house. We wound up with one of the tables at our house. During the day, my uncles orchestrated games outside. Remember that vacant lot next door I told you about. Well, that was the site for many of our games. In retrospect, it was amazing that the older uncles would encourage and incorporate we younger kids in their activities. These gathering continued after Andy retired and they moved into town. Eventually, families moved out of the area, families grew and had their own gatherings.

Please share your memories of Skelly Number 2.