41st Street
Stories set here
- Childhood Outings, Popcorn, and Sunday SandwichesBarbara recalls being told she got lost at Starved Rock Park when quite small. The family often walked to 41st Street to catch a bus downtown or to the library, and walked to the show in Highland. The Wizard of Oz frightened her, and she was told Virginia carried her out. Other pleasures included a huge pan of popcorn for the drive-in in Milan and Sunday nights making fried-egg sandwiches with ketchup and pickles with Diana while watching Lassie.
- The First Television and the Music That StayedThe parents returned from Diana’s 1949 leg operation in Chicago with the family’s first black-and-white television. Dee contrasts television with the radio programs that had fed her imagination. Bernie bought a record player after starting window-display work, and Dee repeatedly played Patty Page’s The Tennessee Waltz. Bob and Sue danced, Barb and Margie adored Pat Boone, and Barbie and Diana played instruments. Years later, Diana’s warped violin was discarded, rescued by Mr. Sajben, repaired, and played by his son; Dee regretted being unable to recover it.
- Ice Deliveries, Party Lines, and Summer in the BasementCarol describes well water pumped beside the sink, water heated on the stove, an icebox supplied by an iceman, and glass-bottled milk delivered during the war years. She contrasts her family's circumstances with school friends Juanita and Lavelle Nelson, who lived in a boxcar and cooled food in a hillside hole. She recalls distinctive party-line rings and secretly listening to conversations. In summer the family lived and ate in the cooler basement; her father eventually cut up their oak dining table to make a punching bag ceiling-mount.
- Carol’s Extra Basket of Back-Then MemoriesAfter the book was finished, Carol collected memories Bernie said there was not enough room to include. Her nostalgic list moves from Mom reading the funnies, homemade treats, and Dad's comparison of a Studebaker to a two-row corn picker to Bob's Davy Crockett hat, Bernie's stilts, school dances, fashions, childhood games, illnesses, street names, music, and remembered entertainment quotations.
- Long Winter Rides Through the Big WoodsBernard recalls eagerly awaiting Christmas and snow, and the transformed winter landscape of Ferry’s Woods. He describes approaching the woods by the Frys' farm and navigating a steep, winding sled run with Bob on their shared Christmas Flexible Flyer. They extended their rides onto a frozen creek until a log near a small pond stopped them; the long climb back in heavy winter clothing made this hard play.
- The House and Garden He Built in His MindDaddy's talk of buying a two-story house on 41st Street inspired Bernard to imagine its decorations and garden repeatedly, including geese to weed strawberry patches. Talk of moving to Walla Walla, Washington offered similar excitement, though he later understood these plans as only talk. The family did not have top sheets, and Bernard retained a preference for sleeping under just a blanket.
- A Bicycle Rack and Two Country RoutesAfter moving from River Drive to a new country house at about eleven or twelve, Iris delivered the Moline Daily Dispatch to eighty homes after school. Her father repaired a second-hand boy’s bicycle and built a wooden newspaper rack for it. She also used the rack for Saturday bread deliveries, collecting bread from Peter’s bakery at an old farmhouse and taking customers’ orders for the next week. She loved the work and saw it as an early sign of her interest in business.
Events here
other
Imagining a different family home
Daddy discussed buying a two-story house a few doors up from the Ferrys. Bernard imagined decorating and landscaping it. No purchase or move is reported.
Family corrections
Notes sent in by the family and approved on review. They sit alongside the original record — the book's wording is never changed.
No corrections on file for this record yet.
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