Final thoughts

Tuesday would have been my father's 96th birthday. The other posts today are all the remaining stories from the recordings, and I've done multiple posts to conclude this week; it seems appropriate.

In the folder with the transcriptions was a letter from my father. It is undated, but reads: 

Dear Larry & Dovey,

It was good to hear your voice on the phone tonite, and I'm glad you have the happy prospects of parenthood. I take great delight in my grandchildren and the greater the number the greater the delight!

And here is the info about my grandparents:

Adam D. Hochstetler, born May 18, 1862 at Goshen, Indiana. Married Feb. 8, 1886 in Elkhart county, Indiana, to Catherine, daughter or Jephtha and Elizabeth (Yoder) Troyer. Catherine was born Jan. 29, 1860, died Sept. 23, 1896 in Fayett county, Illinois. Adam died Dec. 25, 1931, in Hutchinson, Kansas.

I was 11 years old when grampa died and I well remember him, and his huge Amish funeral. You may notice that Papa was 13 months old when his mother died. My grandfather was the eldest of 12 children and my father was the youngest of 8 children. I don't know of any description of my grandmother Hochstetler.

Papa's account of his childhood tells of his living with his grandparents. They were David J. Hochstetler, born April 3, 1839, and died Feb. 8, 1929. David J. Married Magdalene Eash, she was born Aug. 15, 1844, died May 4, 1920 (about a week after I was born!) My grandfather lifes to 69 years, my great grandfather lived to be 90 and his wife lived to be 76.

So much for the family history lesson!

Love, Dad.

With the letter undated I can only speculate that it was written when we found out Dovie was pregnant with "BAILEY ANNE, [born] May 29, 1983," as it's listed in Descendants of David J. and Magdalena Hochstetler, Third Edition 1995. Family listings of descendants of my great-great grandparents take 411 pages. Since the letter was written our listing (family #302) has grown to include "WILLIAM JOSEPH LEE, Mar. 25, 1985."

Joe and I had the opportunity to travel together to visit eastern Pennsylvania; we stopped by the historic marker in Shartlesville, Pennsylvania and even drove into property (marked "Do Not Enter") to see where the Hochstetler homestead was that merited the historical marker.

Later we were in Philadelphia and happened by an office of the National Archives, and stopped in. We were helped to find record of one of our ancestors, an experience that has spurred in Joe interest in the family he had not previously evinced.

Now there is another generation unlisted in "Descendants" books. And now there is at least a partial recounting of the life of David A. Hochstetler/Hostetler, family #297.


So much for the family history lesson.

 

 

 

 

 

 

`Going back to Brown County

In later years, after I was married, long after I'd left Colorado, we took a trip to Indiana to a family reunion. I also wanted the chance to go to Brown County to see some of the folks down there (this was about 1939.)

The first place was close to the school district neighborhood. We stopped in Edinburgh to meet schoolmates. One place we stopped to see a schoolmate, Love Snyder. She married a man named John Hamlin.

She hadn't seen me since I was wearing Amish clothes, at about age 15. Uncle Amos was with us. I told him not to come up (he was Amish), because I wanted to see if she would remember me.

Her husband came to the door and I asked him is he knew me. He said "no."

I said "have your wife come and see if she knows."

So she come to the door.

I said "Do you know me?"

She said "no."

Just then Uncle Amos got out of the car and came up to the house. When she saw Uncle Amos she thought right away who I was.

"Oh, it's Davey."

They used to call me Davey, you know.

We told them we were going to Brown County.

Love said "We'll meet you there. We'll get ready."

She had never met my wife, but it wasn't long until they were like two old cronies who hadn't met for a long time. She was glad she came to visit.

Later, we were again in Brown County. Some of us went to look up Virgil Condon, one of our school mates. We found out he wanted to get with us. We went to Nashville, the county seat, and saw the wooden jail. We had quite a time sightseeing.

Amish Church

Amish church services were in German. They were very devout. They believe in the born again experience, the Trinity (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost), and they believe that every day is a holy day. Baptism is practices, at maturity. Footwashing is practices once a year. Every member participates, women separate from men. Then they stand to their feet after the ceremony and greet each other with a holy kiss. Sometimes it's just the preachers who greet each other that way. The Amish lived their religion.

There would be two or three preachers each service. Children were well-behaved, and smaller children (grade-school age) were in every service, which are held in homes. Families have a clean-up day to get ready - sometimes neighbors help. The day before they'll bake a batch of cookies to use in keeping the restless children quiet. You don't hear noise.

One church had a nice building. They don't have musical instruments. They sing in German, and the song service always includes The Love Song. One man leads the singing, others follow.

Preachers are chosen by lot. They have a special meeting, like a conference. Other preachers come to help select and get ready to cast lots. They would take several Bibles. The preachers and an elder or two decide who they feel would have the qualifications to be a preacher. Then they get the names of three men, put them in the Bible. After preachers have been in the church for a while, they ordain them as Bishops. My Uncle Sam was a Bishop.

Amish think of non-Amish as being English people. Not worse, just English.

The Amish want to keep their family together. Barn-raising gets the community together. Most Amish are farmers. In some places Amish work in factories. They make their own clothes.

Every spring, the Amish gather in a large congregation. They have a lot of young people, and when the young reach the age of accountability and feel like they want to join the church, the preacher and the elders talk to them and let them know what is involved: staying free from worldly amusements.

More Childhood Reminiscences

The father makes the children's toys.

When I was young I found some discarded gears and played with them, imitating a wagon or traction engine [a steam engine] like they used on the farm.

When I was living with my grandparents I didn't have anyone to play with. Two of my uncles, Levi and Sam, had boys my age.

My cousin Elmer had a sharp pocket knife. We'd cut sticks into horses. Once we were playing and I felt my horse wasn't as good as his. He did good work with wood. When he got a little older he made his own play wagon. Later on he became a carpenter.

Girls help with the housework, boys with farm work. I remember working in the field when I was too small to ride behind the harrow. They'd put a box on the harrow so I could drive the team of horses. I was probably eight or nine years old. I was too young to plow.

Goodbye Mississippi

But the mail carrier didn't know which way father had gone.

We went down the road to another town. The first place we came to was a filling station. We stopped and asked if he'd seen an Amish man.

He said, "Yes, but not lately."

On the way back to father's house, the mail carrier said there were some Amish "down this road."

We went and there were several Amish families, all living close to each other and all related. We asked if they'd seen Adam Hostetler today.

The said "no."

I told them why we'd come and they said they were glad to hear that, because they didn't like to see him living all alone. If they could do anything to help, let them know. I was glad to hear that.

We went on back to father's house. He wasn't there yet. We were hungry and tired.

I took the mail carrier home.

I went to sleep as soon as I got back.

I was awakened by my father's voice. He said "I knew you was here."

I said "How did you know it was me?"

We told him what we had in mind.

He said he couldn't leave all the stuff here.

I suggested a sale.

He couldn't figure out how we could have a sale quickly enough.

I went and told the Amish we were having a sale. They came over and I auctioned off some of the stuff.

When we got back to Kansas, he stayed with me more than all the other children combined. He could have gone to live with one of his brothers in Indiana, but he was quite satisfied.

I give mama the credit for that; she was so congenial, she could get along with anyone.



In the Descendants of David J. and Magdalena Hochstetler, Third Edition 1995 listing for Adam D. ("Davey's" father) is an interview from July 1994:

Adam's granddaughter Lucille (#298) remembers attending with her family the Hochstetler Homecoming in Indiana in 1928, which Adam also attended. Adam also spent some time in Indiana during the final months of his father David's life, and was there when he died in 1929. some time after that Adam was living in southern Mississippi all alone on a peanut farm near Picayune. [There was a small Amish settlement in that county from 1929-1936 but it is not known if that was the attraction for Adam to move there. It is known that Adam's brother Samuel visited Hancock co. in Jan. 1930 and preached for that Amish group. See Luthy, p. 230ff.] Lucille remembers that between Christmas 1930 and New Years their family went to Picayune in their big Nash car to bring Adam to Hutchinson to live with them. On this trip they stopped in Popular (sic) Bluff, MO to visit her Aunt Lydia's family. Adam died of a stroke and was found dead along the canal in Hutchinson where he had gone walking near son David's home on Christmas Day 1931. 

1930s:

We were planning on visiting east Missouri to see Lydia (my sister) and her family. They were moving farther east and we realized it'd be even harder to see them after they moved. By this time Vernon was about 13.

We went through Hutchinson so loaded up in the car that a policeman pulled us over.

When we were in Sikeston, Missiouri, we decided we ought to go see dad. He had moved to Mississippi and still have [sister] Fanny with him. She had reached "the age," where the children leave home, but was still helping dad.

When we decided to go to Mississippi we tried to get Lydia to go with us to try to get papa to come back. She joined us in the crowded car. Her husband gave us $25 for expenses.

I got so sleepy I started to fall asleep and ended up in the ditch. Neither the car nor its inhabitants were hurt.

When we got within 8 or 10 miles of papa's place I was wondering how we'd find him.

We went past a few buildings where a man was standing. I hollered for him to come and answer some question. I asked him if he knew where the Amish community was.

He said, "Oh, yes. I was a mail carrier."

So I asked him if he knew where a man named Adam Hostetler lived.

He said "Oh, yeah." He started to try to tell me how to get there. I thought the way the lay of the land was I might get lost, so I asked if he'd come along and show us how to get there, then I'd take him back.

When we got there the house was just a small house, one room with a small attic overhead. It was locked with a padlock, and I said "Are you sure?"

He said "I am sure." I unlocked the trunk, got a hammer, and hit the padlock with one lick to get it open.

I told the ladies to go in and make themselves at home.

We had stopped and picked up some groceries for all of us. I told the ladies to make them a meal and the man and I took off.

The man said "sometimes he goes and tries to sell peanuts at the grocery store."

We went to the grocery store and I told them I was Adam's son and we were trying to persuade him to come up where some relatives are.

He said "Well, I'm glad to hear that. We don't like to see him over there all alone. Not long ago there was an elderly man not very far from here who lived alone, with no one to see after him. Someone went to check on him and he was dead. Every evening before I go to bed I look over to see if he's got a light, 'cause then I figured he'd be okay."

From Single Man to Married with a Child - the 1910s

Herbert Shaw, the Captain's son, was my age and took an interest in me. They wanted to go the "open air" street meetings, so I carried the American flag.

One night, after meeting, I asked one of the young ladies if I could walk her home. She said "I guess so."

They had a porch to sit on, and we sat there with our feet hanging down. I couldn't think of anything to say and she couldn't either. I remember that I asked her three times how far it was to Main Street. When I left I felt really good that I finally had a girlfriend.

I walked her home for several weeks before I could carry on a conversation with her. Her name was Bessie. I eventually married her.

I told her that sometime I had a question I wanted to ask her. I don't know whether she said "I guess so" or what. We were engaged for several months. [And that's the extent of what we know about their courtship.]

We were married in a house by the same preacher who married her sister Cloy.

When they were moving from Colorado they had to sell the belongings they couldn't move with them. Lucy went to help them sell and move. The first place they went to was Hutchinson, Kansas, to our home. We'd only been married a year or so. Lucy saw that someone would be there to help with our first load. Instead of going west to her place, she stayed to help.

Before the baby was born I got a job on a farm. World War I was going on. I got notice to come to the draft board in Langdon. I went and the farmer I worked for had gotten a notarized statement to say I was needed to work on the farm. They didn't pay much attention to the paper, but told me to step on the scale.

Since I weighed only about 110 pounds I was too small to be drafted, and since my chest was all caved in they said I could go back to farming. I was 21 [in 1917].

The first time I voted, I remember everyone said that Wilson had kept us out of war and that he'd keep us our of war again if he was elected for a second term. So I voted for him. The war started anyhow, soon after he was re-elected.