Those were the days!

Hello Folks: At outbreak of the Second World War my family moved from Kansas to the West Coast. We settled in Vallejo, California, where my Dad worked as a pipe fitter and my Mom worked as a storekeeper at the Mare Island U.S. Naval Shipyard. Soon after the war, our family moved lock, stock and barrel to Salem, Oregon, where my folks purchased a five-acre farm five miles outside of Salem. Before long we were moving in and unpacking all our meager belongings and settling in our cozy white two bedroom house… later my Dad would build an add-on room that was my bedroom. The kitchen had a big Franklin cast-iron stove, which my Mom cooked on. Until then I had never lived in the country so this was a new experience for me. As I now remember our farm had a large grove of walnut trees and two fields of hay. The sky was as blue as a new baby’s blue blanket and our farm had a deep well. If you can believe it the family well gave us sweet drinking water that tasted like a fresh honeydew melon. Oh, how the air smelled so sweet too. The land was made up of dark rich fertile soil that could grow almost anything a person wanted to plant. I have admit to you those memories are not lost and if I think hard enough I can still smell the sweet air and taste the water pleasurable. Papa Chuck