Gramma Austin, Chapter 4

Gramma loved practical jokes and silly stuff. The Austins told and retold stories about the family and the funny things that happened to them. Some people have a knack for turning a setback into a funny story, and Gramma and Grampa Austin did just that.   The time the car broke down . . . the time it rained the whole time they were moving . . . the time the car got stuck in the mud and had to hire a team of horses to pull them out.  The time that Forrest had to serve time in the city jail for "excessive noise", driving his car around the Winterset streets.  The time that Mary locked Nancy in the closet under the stairs or the time Mary locked herself in the bathroom and they had to boost Nancy up (age 6?) up the ladder, in through the bathroom window and a hop down to the floor to turn the deadbolt lock and release Mary.

Sisters

Stella, Mattie and Laura

Stella Wilson Stradley, Mattie Wilson Austin and Laura Wilson Webb

My guess is that Gramma Mattie is expecting. 

And maybe Stella too, because of the dropped waists.

So they told about the time that Aunt Annie was accidently shot by the "boys" playing with a gun. She was shot in the buttock but the women wore so many petticoats then and Aunt Annie's skirt was bunched up behind her on the wagon seat that the bullet went through 26 layers of material before entering the cheek. The wagon train layed up for a couple of days and as that buried bullet didn't bother Aunt Annie and it didn't get infected, the doctor left it right where it landed and turned them loose to travel on.

Austins traveled across 3 states to visit brothers or father or cousins.  Here are at least 3 generations visiting near Tingley, I think it was.  My Great Grampa RB Austin is on the right. 


Nothing suited the Austin's more than to gather a bunch of grownups together into a room and start off telling stories. They'd laugh and guffaw and slap their knees.   They'd drag out every old story they could think of it retell them. 

Some nights, if there was a guitar player in the group or a fiddle player, they'd take to singing old-time cowboy songs.

The photograph above is mainly Wilson's but Mattie married Rob Austin so there's one Austin family in this picture.  It illustrates that even back then, the folks found time and made efforts to get all together for visits and reunions. 

When evening fell and the kids wore out, the folks would have gathered on the porch or in the house and talked into the wee hours . . . hating to give up and go home.  Young children sat on the floor, in the corner or lay on the bed in the next room and listened and felt warm and safe and content . . . until they couldn't stay awake another minute.    And would secretly hope they'd be carried to the car. 

This photo has Austin and Coe cousins all scooped up together for a family photo op. 

This would have been about 1954 or so.  Nana, age 5, I imagine.   2nd from Left, with hand up. 

Gramma Austin, Chapter 3

Mattie Jane Wilson grew to adulthood in the house she was born in.  She graduated 8th grade but the time and place wasn't right for my Grandmother to go on to high school or college.  Grandmother "wrote a beautiful hand" . . . meaning her penmanship was excellent!  She could draw little flourishes, feathers and arrows and showed her granddaughters how to practice their penmanship so as to improve their handwriting.  Mattie Jane was educated and informed, with just a country school 8th grade education.  (it is my understanding that the old 8th grade certificate was more the equivalent of today's high school diploma).  But believe me or not!  I can't prove that.  I know my mother had Latin in High School in the 1930s. 

My Gramma could play the piano.  I heard my Dad, Forrest, say that she "chorded" on the piano and I don't know about that because I just thought it was playing the piano.  She loved to sing.  I don't remember Gramma Mattie doing any handwork like embroidery or crocheting.  I know she would have sewed up little girl's dresses and little boys' shirts.  She would have made her aprons and her own clothes until really late in life.  I remember her good dresses as being store bought when I first can remember. 

Robert Briggs Austin, my Grampa is in this picture I think.  He helped his father build a log cabin at Allendale, Mo when he was 12 years old.  I'd better check my facts! but I know they were at Allendale just before they moved to Shannon City. 

In Mattie's 18th year, her father hired a bunch of ditch diggers to tile his fields. I'll let Mattie's son Forrest take over the story for a bit. He starts out with just a little about the Austins . . .

When my Dad was fourteen, they moved to a small place just west of Shannon City and, of course, the rest  followed. Some lived in Tingley. They (Nancy -- the Austin children) seemed to follow my Granddad around. I think because he had a small disability pension from the War. But the Austin boys were diggers. They would dig wells, caves, or tile ditches. Now, there weren't many backhoes around then and they dug with spades and shovels.

Well, my Granddad Wilson's farm south of Arispe was pretty flat and didn't drain too good so he hired the Austins to dig tile ditch.

I don't know if they stayed there nights or went home, but anyhow they got their dinner. That's where my Dad met up with my Mother, Martha Jane, nicknamed Mattie. They were married in 1908. I don't think my Grandparents were too happy with this union but I wonder if she didn't enjoy the life she had more than if she'd settled on a farm and went to Ladies Aid and quilting bees. She was easy going, took things in stride and made many friends along the way.

Well, Granddad Wilson had done well. He gave each of his boys 80 acres of land and the girls 40 acres . . .  I think he helped him start farming on 80 acres just north of the Shannon City corner on the west side of the road. They lived there two years and my oldest brother, Robert 3rd, was born there. Dad said it rained all the time both years, 1909-10, and they couldn't raise a crop.  

                                                                       Forrest Austin, 10/27/1994

Mattie and Robert, on the 2nd day of July 1908, harnassed up a horse and cart and rode on over to Creston, Iowa, the county seat, and got married.  Mattie's dad set them up on 80 acres just north of Shannon City.  They lived there a couple of years.

Mattie Wilson and R. B. Austin's wedding photograh

July 2, 1908

Creston, Iowa

When I was just a small girl, Gramma told some of us granddaughters that she "lost" her first baby when she was kicked by a cow.  Gramma said it was a little girl.  Her second baby, Robert,  the first to live, was born in 1010, Leonard was born in 1912 and Forrest, the 3rd, in 1914.  So now, besides carrying water and cook stove wood, doing laundry in a tub over a fire and scrubbing the whites on a wash board, hanging clothes on a clothes line or whereever she could find inside in the winter,  planting a garden, canning and drying fruits and vegetables, using an outhouse . . . now Gramma at age 24, was married and had 3 boys and another on the way.  And then went to homestead at Pine Island, Mn in 1913.  They lived in a log cabin. 

I swear tho, I bet my Gramma was still singing and smiling.  I hope I would have done the same.  Make the best of it.

I bet Mattie Jane was singing as they loaded up and moved to northern Minnesota to homestead.  They moved there with two young sons and some of RBs brothers and families but it wasn't long before Mattie was expecting again. 

Robert B Austin was a conversationist, my brother Marion told me.  Marion said Grampa could converse on a wide range of subjects and strike up a conversation with anyone.  I imagine that came in handy being a barber and a poker player.  Was it developed, being a barber? Or was it inhertant -- which helped him in the barber/poker trade.  I wish I had been one of the older grandchildren so I would have known my Grandfather Austin better.  My brother Gary, as a teenage, worked with Grampa at my dad's junkyard.  Gary worked along side Grampa junking cars and rebuilding car parts.  Gary had stories and knowledge of Grampa  -- I wish I could remember them all! 

Robert, Rob, Bob or RB as he was known lol!  when times got tough and the family poor, Rob had a habit of going off and staying away then coming back with enough money for whatever the latest or next endeavor was.  Stories when I was a kid said that Grampa went off to "barber".  It is true he had learned a trade, had trained to barber and we know he did support the family some that way. 

Later when I was older, when we children were all grown up, the stories took a different turn.  Now the stories hinted that Grampa went off to gamble.  Grampa Austin probably was a poker player.  Family stories reveal that Grampa would return to his family with a "pocket full of coins" or a bag of coins,  or a sock full of coins. 

Brother Gary gave me evidence (courthouse records) that Grampa won the Afton hotel back in the early 1900s;  records didn't say "won in poker game"  : )  Grampa turned around and sold it soon after; he had a need for cash -- not the building! 

well, I'm going to publish this chapter.  There's surely another chapter or two to be told . . . and about 40 Chapters to be conjectured about!  To imagine.  To wonder what the real story was.  I wish I knew it all! 

But still, not knowing, I love my Gramma for being happy, for carrying on, for playing practical jokes  -- for singing and loving and laughing.

Gramma Austin, Chapter 2

Gramma Austin, although not of wealthy parents, was always well fed and cared for.  She was raised rather genteelly by well-read and fairly educated parents.  George and Mary Washington's schooling would have been taken in the one-room Melrose Country School but they were progressive and made sure their children were educated.  The hard-working Wilson's were prospering, frugal and pretty much self-sustaining.  They lived off their land -- probably only having to buy flour, coffee and sugar.  The family was known as early pioneers of the county and well thought of in the community.  The Willis' and Wilson's had a large extended family and therefore, large, frequent family get togethers. 

There were occasions and motivation to have family portraits taken.

Shelby and Sarah Jane Bradley Willis were Mattie's maternal grandparents.  Mattie is the smaller child sitting on Grampa Shelby Willis' knee in this photo.  This is an early professional photo and the children, 5 boys mostly still in dresses and 2 girls, were out fitted in the latest Iowa fashions.  Imagine all the hand sewing that went into these little outfits.  I am pretty sure not a single one was "store bought".  Lyman Wilson, center back, was Gramma Mattie's oldest full brother, her oldest sister Laura is on Lyman's left.  Blond brother, Homer, is center front. Taken about 1891.   

These fine looking girls dressed in their Sunday best were granddaughters of James Blackburn and Martha Russum Wilson, first generation to come to Union County, Ia.  The photo was taken 1905.  I name them here lest they be forgotten:

Back:  Mattie Wilson and Madge Aikin

Middle:  Gladys Aikin, Alta Jackson and Lenora Jackson

Front:  Fern Bishop and Ruth Bishop 

A lot of the Wilson's were blonde and blue-eyed.  Gramma Mattie was too. 

Gramma would have been a typical girl of the late 1890s and 1900s.  She had chores at an early age, she was sent to country school, she attended Church with the family and learned to sew and darn.  She might even have been taught to card wool and to weave.  Gramma Mattie's grandmother had a "weasel" -- an appartus made to wind wool after it was carded and spun on a spinning wheel.  She had the spinning wheel too and probably a loom.  The little girls would have been taught to knit, maybe to crochet, to embroider and to hem.  The Weasel is in the Union County Historical museum out to McKinley Park.  My dad, Maddie's son Forrest repaired the weasel in the 1990s.  He and his cousin Merle Wilson donated it to the museum.  We'll have to go out sometime and see what all is there. 

I remember Gramma telling about having to gather eggs from the chicken house.  Her folks also kept geese.  The geese could be mean and would chase little girls across the yard.  Gramma said it hurt just awful if a goose nipped the back of your leg.  She might have carried a stick with her later, to rap that goose's head . . . but if she did, I'm not telling! 

Mary Willis Wilson and five of her seven children.  Her husband George W Wilson had seven children with his first wife Elizabeth Wright Wilson, then seven children with his second wife, Mary Willis Wilson.  Lyman, Laura, Homer, Mattie, Stella, (Harry and Clarence came later).  Again, a professional studio portrait taken about 1905. 

There is a lot of history in the Blackburn Genealogy Website if anyone gets the bug but just for something to think about, here is the lineage.

John Wilson, born 1763

  James Blackburn Wilson, born  1811

    Geroge Washington Wilson, born 1837

      Mattie Jane Wilson Austin, born 1890

        Forrest Marion Austin, born 1914

          Nancy Austin Hofmeister, born 1950

            Kristy, Erica, Craig and Johanna, born 1971-79

              Morghan, Jack, Gabby, Maddie, Joey, Audri, Bella, born 1999-2009

My Gramma Austin

This is my Gramma and Grampa Austin.  Rob and Mattie.  RB and Martha Jane Wilson Austin.  Mother and Pap, to my dad, Forrest.  Gramma and Grampa to me. 

By the time I came along, these good folks had 20 or 30 grandchildren.  They were getting elderly and wearing down but they still put up 3 little girls and once in awhile, Alan, too while our folks went off on vacation with the 5 or 6 older children.  It was special, those 3 or 4 times, we stayed.  We had some adventures!  and maybe I can tell you about those later but my Gramma Mattie had a life-time of adventure!  of travel!  of sorrow and happiness!  If I don't get it all told here, I'll write again.  Gramma's life is just so different from what I experienced, or you.  I really can't imagine it . . . so am pretty sure my children can't either.  My grandchildren will think it happened on another planet.  or that I made it all up. 

My Grandmother Austin was born Mattie Jane Wilson.  well, there, already I fibbed.  she was bequeathed the name Martha Jane Wilson upon her birth.  She was one of 14 children born to George W. Wilson.  Her father had 7 children with his first wife and after she died, he remarried to Mary Willis Wilson and had 7 more.  George Washington Wilson tried to name his children so that they couldn't be nick-named.  Out of 14 there were 2.  2 rogues.  2 with nicknames.  It wasn't until my dad was gone that I and Dad's cousin Irma discoverered that there were 2 of George's children that had nick names.  My Gramma Austin was always an obvious choice for the child with nickname.  She was christened Martha Jane but everyone . .  I mean everybody . . . called my Gramma Mattie.  Now that's a nickname. 

My grandfather as a boy, and my young grandmother.  Gramma stuck these to photos in this album, side by side.  I think she dislodged another Austin relative to to that! 

After Dad died and I was still visiting Granny in the nursing home, I got to know and love my dad's cousin Irma Stradley Miller.  Irma had suffered a broken back in the late 1960s and had survived a multitude of illness and health problems.  She was a tough bird.  Through Irma, I learned that her mother Stella Wilson Strandley's real name was Estella.  I will bet you a 1000 bucks that my Dad didn't know that because he always claimed that his mother, Martha.  Mattie.  was the only one nick-named.  Anyway . . . doesn't really matter.  What I want to tell you about is my easy going, fun-loving, boyant Gramma Austin.  Mattie Jane Wilson Austin. 

Gramma was married young (oh weren't we all?)  but she married an Austin and the Austin's wandered around.  They followed family here.  They followed family from Ohio to Iowa to Nebraska to Missouri to Minnesota.  And all before the automobile.  They traisped around in covered wagons or horse-drawn carts.  Without coolers or refrigerators or bathrooms.  and other, newer sanitary items.  or washers and dryers and laundromats.  OMGosh.  how did they women do it?  especially in the month of birth of a new baby . . .   I'm overwhelmed and stressed out just thinking about it all.  I have no idea how the women of that time coped. 

Whew.  I'm spent.  Not sure I am up to the next leg of this journey.  Check back.  I'll get the smelling salts and get revived for the next part of this tale. 

Family

Love this picture of Antonia Marie Novy Sychra taken with her chickens.

We had been meaning to go and visit for . . . oh, 10 or 12 years anyway.  Today, we finally climbed in the car and went and visited Himself's cousin Kathy and her husband, Joe Clinton.  These are good folks.  Himself and Kathy are posessed of family genes that never change -- they are recognized by people that haven't seen them in 40 years.

Himself's mother and Kathy's father, Harold Sychra were brother and sister.  What great hospitality and shared interests we enjoyed today.  We sat and talked across family photographs and scrapbooks (trading items and gifting others; looking and remembering) and then these hospitable cousins took us on an old houses tour. 

Joe and Antonia Sychra's 50th wedding anniversary

with their grandsons and only granddaughter, Kathy.

That bitty guy front and left,  is Kent Jay Hofmeister. 

The Sychra women had style and fashion sense. 

LaRene Lucille Sychra Hofmeister.

Kathy and Joe own 1000 acres of Cass County farm land.  (well, they own 960 . . . and I said Joe, how can you not go out and buy 40 more? and he agreed.)  They own 4 houses or five.  They live in a big "4 square" house where they raised their 6 children (and lost Jennifer, their oldest daughter to cancer), they own Joe's grandfather's "4 square" house that daughter Joni and SIL live in, they own "Billie's" house just south of their own that their daughter Ann lives in on the weekends with her 3 children . . .  and, oh yes, at least one more that son Mark and wife Missie live in.  It is small and Mark and Missie are moving soon to a 1970s home they bought. 

But for me, this lover of old houses and oak furniture and salvage, I had a hey day! 

These two cousins were born in the same year and graduated in 1965.

 Kathy and Lanny, are still recognized by school mates 50 years after their graduation! 

Photo taken September 2011. 

Himself turned 65 years last October.  I first met him when he was 23 and I was 20.

January 19, 1970.

It was Viet Nam era; he was just back from serving time in the Army.  He joined the National Guard while working at Zenith Corporation in Sioux City, then someone activated the National Guard unit and the whole until got sent to Colorado.  Himself was a "clerk".  Some of his fellow Guardsmen got called up and shipped out.  They got called to Viet Nam.

 

National Guard Called to Serve

During the Vietnam War era service in the National Guard was not looked upon with the same respect and appreciation it currently receives. Some considered National Guard service an alternative to the draft and a way to avoid going to Vietnam. But the services of National Guard units from the Sioux City area were called upon in the 1960s, and some members were sent to Vietnam. Other Iowa National Guard troops were sent to college campuses around the state to help keep things peaceful during times of campus unrest.

In January 1968, the 185th Tactical Fighter Group was mobilized. Approximately 860 men were in the group. Three hundred of the group left Sioux City in 23 planes headed for Vietnam. 1st Lt. Warren K. Brown became the group’s first casualty of the war when his F-100 fighter jet was hit by hostile ground fire. Brown was the only Iowa Air National Guardsman killed in action.

In May 1968 the 2nd Battalion, 133rd Infantry was mobilized. Men from Sioux City, LeMars, Sheldon, Mapleton and Ida Grove made up the 863 guardsmen infantry. The group was stationed at Ft. Carson, Colorado. Over 500 were deployed to Vietnam with regular Army units. Twelve members of this unit were killed in action with over 60 wounded in action. The battalion received over 2600 awards and decoration for their Vietnam service. They returned to Iowa in December 1969.

Himself was reaching the top of the list, to go to Nam when President Richard Nixon declared that the US was withdrawing troops.  Himself got to come home December 1969, for Christmas.  He still had monthly meetings but they would be in Sioux City.  He had a couple of months off and then had to go back to work at Zenith in Sioux City. 

We were getting used to seeing each other so when he had to move back to Sioux City to work and for National Guard weekends, it was hard on this girl.  I was working in Creston as a Telephone Operator.

This is almost the exact Board I sat at.  I liked this job except that I worked the "swing shift" and that meant I might work at 5 am or 3 pm or 5:30 pm.  It sure kept me off balance.  then I might work 7 days and have 4 off.  or work all weekend. 
 It might have been hard on Himself too as he drove back in his black 1969 Plymouth Fury many a weekend to come see me.  Soon we were talking about being together . . . and that meant getting married.  To me.  To Himself.  In those days.  So anyway, we started planning an elopement. 

And we did.  We planned it and eloped and went home to tell our folks. 

We were young.   

Lanny, 1970.  Taken somewhere near Prescott. 

    

July 1971 taken in Prescott

October

We have had a beautiful Fall,  The extraordinary dry months of summer set the wheels in motion for a most lovely, colorful fall.  Himself and I had two trips to Missouri and back in which we both exclaimed over all the colors in the hills and vales.  We both said we have not seen such a beautiful autumn in years -- if ever.  Now, we have had a little rain and some wind and most of the leaves are down.  There's a couple of exception tho.  Our big ol' Maple tree out front of the house.  It still has a quarter of it's leaves; it is always the last tree in the neighbor to let down and let go.  The other exception is any timber full of oak.  Oak trees don't let go of their dry, brown leaves until spring -- when the new green leaves finally force the old leaves to drop.  This was our experience, anyway, down to III. 

I guess this photo is from November but we aren't far from October and I'm going with it!  Himself and I took a ride today to run down the Bohemian National Cemetery.  I took my children here years ago on our cemetery tour but hadn't been back for so long, I didn't know how to get there and Himself claimed never to have been here.  We ended up having to call his cousin and get directions over the teleephone.  We found it!  I am truly surprised that Himself had never been here because he has great grandparent Novys and Sychras laid to rest here. 

Himself remembers this Great Grandmother, his Grandmother Tony's mother.  He remembers being bribed to call her Babička -- grandmother in her native Bohemian language.  If he wasn't too shy to say it, he would get a piece of candy.  All the others would end up with a piece of candy except for Himself -- he thought babička was a "cuss" word and wouldn't try to say it!  (I think he must have been in trouble already, with cuss words.  What do you say?)

Anyway, today we tracked down Gramma Sychra's "little mother", Babička, and himself's great grandparent Sychra's.  Someday, I'll make a book -- photos, relationships, cemeteries, maps!  And stories.  and more stories.  I'd better get busy! 

We celebrated a milestone birthday for this dear ol' guy. 

Shhh; he doesn't like to talk about it.  

And, we have had a little down time.  I think I have actually read three books this month.  I remember when I used to read three books a week.  I also have read at least three magazines, a daily paper and 2 weekly newspapers.  If I include what I read in the internet, I think I am reading as much as I always did.  I'm just reading different.  Anyway, glad you stopped in to visit.  Hurry back . . .