Christmas 1956

In sorting the many hundreds of photos for the albums, I found a few pictures of Christmas Day 1956. In one of the photos I can see our raggedy Christmas tree (I think Dad went out back into the woods and cut it down), Raggedy it was, with wide spaces between the branches , not too many Christmas decorations because it didn't have that many branches. There was David, still in diapers with a head full of soft little curls. Gene growing very handsome at 14, Bob, sturdy and sweet faced at 12, Vic, with a solemn almost sad little face one minute and the next lit up with an impish smile at 4-1/2. I'm there of course. Just turned 17. I'm sitting on the floor holding out a little white dog with dark ears and a short tail. David has his little hands around its neck as he gives it a big thorough kiss! There are toys of course, a baseball bat, large and small footballs, a basketball, a plush elephant, what looks like a small plastic pull toy dog, some shirts and boxed games, and a small metal bulldozer. There aren't many store bought toys and as cute as they might have been, they are not the toys that made this such a special Christmas. 1956 wasn't a good year for Mom and Dad and they were worried. Money was short, Dad's building business wasn't doing well. When Dad started his business the economy was better than good, and it wasn't unreasonable to expect his business to grow and with it the promise of a better life. I remember how excited and enthusiastic they both were as the very small ranchers Dad was building began to sell. Unfortunately, somewhere around mid 1956, a downturn in the economy that was to prove sharp but short and last into 57 and 58 made it impossible for Dad's fledgling business to survive. The effects on Dad's business were felt long before that Christmas Day. There simply wasn't much money to spend on Christmas presents or anything else for that matter. I don't know whether my brothers knew something was wrong, but I did. I just didn't know what. Dad would come home at night and then disappear and we wouldn't see him again until supper time the following evening. This went on for weeks and weeks. When I asked Mom where Dad was, she refused to tell me. I remember wondering if they were having trouble with each other and it was just too scary to think about. The answer to my disappearing Dad is in one small black and white photo. In it are two cranes, two trucks, a bulldozer and a wooden rocking horse with a hand painted face and a yarn tail. Each night, Dad went into his shop and carefully cut, carved, sanded and painted those two cranes, two dump trucks, a bulldozer and a wooden rocking horse with a hand painted face and a yarn tail. The bulldozer, trucks and cranes are long gone. But the rocking horse was ridden by his grandchildren and great grandchildren. Despite their worries and difficult circumstances, once again Mom and Dad did everything they could to make sure that we had Christmas that year. And it was a good Christmas, maybe one of the best we ever had. Mom made her famous mile high chocolate cake and we had good food to eat. Forty years later my Dad made wooden toys again. This time he would take them to flea markets to sell. When he died in November 2005, there were still a few sitting on the table in the patio. Brandon Blanchard has one, Rob Klein, Jr. has another. I have a comical elephant puzzle Dad made and gave me as a gift. I'm not sure who else has a wooden toy and I think Brother Bob Klein has the rocking horse. (Bob tells me that years ago he took the rocking horse home. By that time it was in bad shape and he restored it. His children Lisa, Robby and Michelle all rode that little horse. Later, Bob made copies of that horse for his grandchildren and gave the original rocking horse with a yarn tail to David, the child now grown up with children of his own.)

Dad's Wild Punch

Some of you younger folks may not know that your Grandfather (and Great Grandfather)Robert Samuel Klein was a boxer and a wrestler while in the Army way back in the 1930's. (Mom made him give up wrestling when he was thrown out of the ring and practically landed in her lap!) His personal experience naturally created real fondness for watching wrestling on television until it changed into "entertainment" but he absolutely loved boxing. When we were kids, boxing was televised frequently and you could always count on Dad being glued to the TV screen. There was one memorable bout sometime in the 1950's that I will never forget. I don't know who the opponents were, but I do remember how involved and excited Dad became while he watched. Dad had added on to the house in Millville to give him space for an office area where he could work on blueprints for new houses. This room more or less doubled as an additional living room. Well, this one evening I was sitting with Dad watching the "fights" and tried to imagine Dad in the ring slugging away at his opponent. Since I was only 15 or so and Dad was an old man of about 40 (LOL), I just couldn't picture it. As the fight progressed Dad got more and more agitated and started to tell the boxers what to do. Some of what he said was not polite to say the least, but he was in another world. As the fight heated up, so did he and he began to throw half punches, yelling at the fighters. Then, he was swearing and sitting on the edge of his seat, throwing punches at the TV screen. He threw a terrific right cross and the next thing I knew he flew out of the chair and landed on the floor.

Dad's Creamed Spinach

I was thinking about brother Gene today. I don't know why the infamous creamed spinach came to mind except that it is irrevocably linked with Gene in my mind. Ha ha! I can see our dining room in the house in Millville and Mom bringing in bowls and platters of food. What was in all but one of those bowls I can't recall. Now, some of you may not know this but Dad was a really good cook. Not as good as Mom, but then again, Dad knew better than to spend much time in the kitchen. For one thing he made a mess and for another he generally left that mess for Mom to clean up. Mom much preferred to clean her own mess and not his, so you can imagine what she had to say to him. But every now and again he would get in the kitchen and "experiment" with a recipe. Why in the world he chose to make something called "creamed spinach" none of us will ever know. I'm not sure of the ingredients but considering that Mom always kept a tight rein on her grocery budget I'm pretty sure it didn't contain real cream and probably didn't contain fresh spinach. Maybe milk, butter, flour, or cream cheese. Most of us liked spinach more or less. When Mom put the bowl on the table it was whitish with dark streaks of green. Kinda thick too as I recall. Gene looked at it and you could just tell by the expression on his face that he wasn't the least impressed. Mom passed the bowl around and we all took some (it actually didn't taste bad at all, but it was thick and sort of slick if you know what I mean). Out of the corner of his eye Gene watched to see what every one's expression was and then the bowl was passed to him. He looked down, then up and then turned as green as the spinach. He put the bowl down and said he didn't want any. Well, that was enough for Dad. He just couldn't understand why Gene wouldn't taste it. So he told him to........Gene said No, he didn't want to taste it. Dad asked him why. Gene said he would get sick if he did. Dad told him that if he didn't, he would make him sick. I'll give this to Gene, he stuck by his guns but Dad wasn't having any of it and before we knew it Gene was sent to his room without any dinner. Good thing we didn't have asparagras the following night or Gene would have lost 5 lbs.

Grandfather Vic's Driving

Bob, your story reminded me that when Grandpop Vic was past 80 yrs old and lived at 1134 Wynbrook he used to hit the cedar tree at least half the time he pulled into the driveway. Of course that could have had something to do with those martini's for lunch he liked so much. Or maybe hitting the cedar tree was the signal for him to apply the brake, turn off the ignition and get out of the car.

Grandfather Victor's driving

My grandfather Victor was over visiting my parents, Bob & Tess when we lived in Glen Burnie. It was probably around 1967. I made the mistake of parking my car behind him. Grandpop was about 75 years old at this time and didn't like to turn around when he backed up. We all said good by to him and watched him as he got into his car, started the engine and preceded to back up, without turning around. You see my grandfather figured out that it wasn't necessary to turn around because the jolt of backing into the car behind him was enough to tell him he could not go any further. After he hit my car, he pulled up, but didn't seem to have enough room to maneuver around the car in front of him. So, now he needs to back up again, sure enough he banged into my car a second time. Lucky for me he had enough room to pull out in the road and he preceded on his way like nothing ever happened. There wasn't any real visible damaged but a very small scrap.

Bob, Tess and the Sausage Maker

Sunday, December 3, 2006 This morning, while I mixed fennel into sausage meat, I suddenly remembered the time that Mom and Dad made Italian sausage in the kitchen of our Millville house. While I don't remember where Mom got the sausage or even why she and Dad got this project going, I do remember her chopping up the pork and pork fat while Dad clamped the grinder on the kitchen counter. Dad filled the hopper with the cut up pork and began to crank the handle while mom pushed the meat down into the hopper. In their usual "cooperative" way this simple action was accompanied by instructions from Mom and counter instruction from Dad. Dad cranked too fast and Mom pushed too slow; Dad cranked too slow and Mom pushed too fast and each of them kept up a running commentary on the obvious failure of one or the other to do the job "the right way". Finally, all the sausage was ground and while Mom mixed the seasonings and herbs into the meat Dad attempted to get the casings on the machine. The casings were hog intestines that were very delicate, transparent and slippery! While Dad tried to get the casing opening over the protrusion on the machine, Mom kept an eagle eye on him and soon began to get panicky. It didn't take long before she was yelling at him not to rip the casing. In the meantime, he was getting exasperated because as soon as he got one side on and moved to the other side, the first side fell off. His fingers, which were nimble and talented enough if he was building something turned stubby and awkward at this job and he began to curse under his breath. In his concentration to get the casing on, his tongue would flicker in and out at the corner of his mouth to help his fingers along. Just as Mom was threatening to take over the job, the casing slipped right on! I gave a sigh of relief and was surprised to realize that I had been holding my breath as if I had been watching a car chase. Mom grinned at Dad and he grinned back. I sat there and watched as Dad cranked the machine and Mom pushed the seasoned meat into the hopper and out came the sausage until it coiled on the kitchen counter. We had some of that sausage for dinner with fried peppers and onions and crunchy crusted Italian Bread. It was delicious!