Good Sandwiches

One of my favorite lunch sandwiches was make from Campbell's bean soup. Mother would spoon the cold beans right on the bread. I thought they were much better than a peanut butter sandwich. I still make them once in a while.

Another sandwich I loved was made with fried spam and mustard with a slice of tomato on it. No amount of money could buy anything better.

The Feed Store

The feed store was right on the main street in Bristol. That was always a fun trip to get feed for the animals. They had so many interesting things in there like boxes of rat poison with a picture of a really ugly rat on them.

After Dad paid for the feed, we had to back down a very steep driveway that used to scare Mother, she never liked steep hills. That old 36 Plymouth was a workhorse, we still had it several years after we moved to NJ. It carried everything from feed, animals, people, and even scrap iron.

The Food Market

I always liked going to this little market where Dad used to buy lunch meat and cheese. I would get close to where they were slicing the cold cuts just to smell the American cheese. It was really strong smelling compared to what it is today.

We would almost always get an ice cream sandwich to eat on the way home. They seemed so big, but I guess it was because I was so small.

Fleetwings

Aunt Wilda sent me this website. It's about the airport we lived next to in the lockhouse where Dad worked in the fleetwings factory.

The airport

Calling a Dr.

Things have really changed since I was a kid. I remember when I was in the 3rd grade I was running around the Lower Township grammar school and bumped into someone. I glanced off them and hit the brick school head first. This was on the lunch break and the next thing I remembered, the teacher was asking me if I was feeling better. I looked around and here I was at my desk and the clock said 3:15, time for school to end for the day. I had a terrible headache and when I moved my head, everything would spin.

Here I had sat in class all afternoon with a concussion and the teacher didn't call a doctor. Some of the other students said I was talking crazy, but I don't remember.

Dr's by Aunt Wilda

Back in the 40's, Doctors use to come to your house. Our family Dr. was Dr.Webb. When I was going to start School, Dr. Webb came to the lockhouse to give me my vaccination.( I liked him until then.) Our family was so use to him, because he delivered about half of the family back then. His name was James Doyle Webb, so now you know where Jim got his name. Back at that time we borrowed names, now we make them up.

Ice Skaters

One cold day a group of ice skaters were coming down the canal from Bristol. I thought it was the neatest thing the way they just glided along so smoothly and fast.

I couldn't skate, but I had a lot of fun just sliding from one bank to the other. I used to fall a lot and I still remember how my hands used to sting from the cold hard ice. We used to hear the ice cracking from our weight, good thing it held.

It was always great to go in and stand in front of the stove after a time in the cold. I liked to stand there until my clothes started steaming.

The Fire by Aunt Wilda

One night the woods next to the house was on fire? The dogs were barking, and it woke me up. I saw flickering light in my room and I got up and looked out the window and the woods was on fire. I yelled for everyone to get up,there was a fire. We all got up and jumped into our clothes and Grandmom was grabbing anything that would hold water and told us to get water out of the canal and throw it onto the house. Someone that lived near by called the Fire Co; but while they were working on the wood fire, we kept throwing the water on the house. It was coming closer and closer to the house,but they finally got it under control. They told us later that because of our hard work, we saved the house. I remember that I didn't sleep the rest of the night. For many years I had to check everything that could cause fire before I went to bed. If a car went by the house and the headlights cast a light, I would get up to check for fire. I finally got over that,but it took a long time.

My Swimming Root

The part of the canal where we did our swimming was in front of the barn. There was a large flat rock at the edge of the bank and it was a good step into the water. There also was a tree root that was under water and about tree feet long right next to the rock. I spent a lot of time hanging on to it and just floating, knowing I was not going to float away.

The canal seemed a lot bigger in those days. It actually was pretty narrow where the locks were.

The Farmers Market

We used to go to this market, I'll call it a farmers market because I don't remember the name of it. It had a big plaster foot at the entrance, I remember that. It was like the cowtown market in NJ. I loved going there because of all the shops and animal auctions they had going on all the time.

We met Grandpop Demusz and Uncle Emil there one night. It was always crowded and one night I looked around and couldn't see anyone I knew, talk about panic, finally one of the store owners recognized me and took me to the rest of the group. That night I had a dream that I got lost and couldn't find my family until I was an old man.

The Goats Went Swimming

I remember one day all the goats were out in the middle of the canal. It was very strange looking because they didn't seem to be doing anything, just staring back at us. Mother was wondering what to do and finally decided to go in and pull them out.

She got all of them out, but we never found out why they went in for a swim in the first place. I always liked to think that a wolf chased them in, but it probably was a dog.

The Bull Again.

Jim reminded me of this story. One day the bull got loose when Jim and I were outside and we had no place to run except in the old outhouse behind the lockhouse. We got in there and pushed the old rusty bolt shut and waited until the bull was gone. The problem then was we couldn't get the bolt to move and we were stuck.

We were in there for quite a while thinking all kind of fates to come about because of this, I was thinking they would have to push the thing over to get us out. Finally Mother came out and found us and reached in the little window at the top of the door and pulled the old rusty bolt open. What a relief that was, we were saved.

Fun loving John by Aunt Wilda

I remember watching John milk the cows every so often. He seemed to always have a lot of patience. One day some of us "kids" went into the barn to watch the milking, and let one of the cats in with us. The cat was going closer and closer to the bucket, and just as he got there, John squirted the milk right in the cat's face. That cat took off yelling, and we all had a big laugh.

Fresh Milk

Dad used to bring the milk from the barn in a large cooking pot. He would then filter it and something had to be done with it pretty quick, because it was not pasteurized and would go sour.
Sometimes it was made into cottage cheese.

When it would set for a while the cream would float to the top and I liked to dip my finger in it and taste it. It was very heavy cream and pretty good.

On Sunday's we always had pancakes and I remember dad would get the milk and start them, he always made them for some reason. I don't remember Mother ever making them, maybe because it was always on a Sunday when Dad was off and he loved making them.

He used to go through the same steps each time he cooked them and explain what he was doing and why. He would have one of us kids stir the sugar in the hot water to make the syrup. They were good.

I always liked mine with butter and cottage cheese, I still eat them that way.

A Special Lady by Aunt Wilda

I asked Grandmom one time how she knew so much if she only had a third grade education, and this is what she told me. "Every time you see a word,read it,spell it, say it to someone. read it again." after that, if we were walking or riding, she would say" See that word? read it, what is it? say it again and spell it."She said ," If there is a loaf of bread on the table, don't just look at it, look at the word and read it." That is how she got her education. She said "If someone says a word you don't understand, look it up." That was Grandmom. She was a special lady.

Aunt Wilda Watching Over Aunt Lois

One day Lois was out on the Ice, skating around and enjoying the new skates and red velvet skirt and jacket she got for Christmas. She was doing a beautiful job at it,and tried to make a figure eight,then down she fell. I went running to her,"Are you ok?" She looked at me and said,"Yes, that is what I was trying to do." I JUST LET HER THINK I BELIEVED HER.

The old fallen tree

There was this big tree laying in back of the lockshouse that probably was blown over in a storm and was soft and pithy. It was like cooked chicken breast. We used to pretend it was food.

One day our cousin Brenda was over and I told her it was good to eat and she took a piece and started chewing on it. I chewed on a piece of it plenty of times and it never bothered me. Well she suddenly got this funny look on her face and let a scream that they probably heard all the way down in Bristol. They heard it in the house and I was in trouble.

I was told that boys aren't supposed to treat girls like that, which I couldn't understand because she was as bad as any boy I knew.

Grandmom Miles

Here is some family history from Aunt Wilda.

I remember Grandmom Miles telling me this about when she was a little girl: When Grandmom was little, they had no way of getting help like we do now. When she was eight years old someone told whoever took care of Child Care then,that her mother had several children in the house, and they were hungry, with no father to take care of them. One day a lady came to the house and took some of the children and put them out on farms to work, and the farmers housed them. Grandmom's Dad was away a lot because he was a traveling Insurance Man, but they didn't have that information. While she was on the farm she would get up about 4:AM to start breakfast for the farmer and the hands. Breakfast was The big meal of the day, so they had things like Chicken, Mashed Potatoes, Vegetables, Home baked Bread,etc.to start the day, and all of the hands were fed. For lunch they had a regular lunch, and the last meal of the day was like our Breakfast. She said that was because the farmers worked hard all day and worked off the food and in the evening they didn't have to have all that energy. After she finished with the cleaning up, she went to school, but after a while they put more work on her, so they took her out of school. She only had a third grade education. She said she would run away every so often, because she missed her Mother, and they would come get her and take her back to the farm and give her a hard beating,and give her more work. she said she was always so tired, but they piled more and more on her and told her she wasn't tired, but lazy. She ran away one day and got lost. She said she felt the life going out of her,but she kept going.She saw a little white house with a picket fence and some flowers in the yard. She said she was thinking (this is heaven) and she hurried to the fence and passed out. The next thing she knew was she was in a clean bed and there was an old man setting on a chair next to the bed, and an old lady standing next to him. They asked her where she came from, and she told them her story. They kept her with them for a couple of days and then somehow they sent her back.

5 & 10 Store

One time we walked down to Bristol and it was the first time I remember being inside a dept. store. The little metal airplanes, cars, and trucks were the neatest things I'd ever seen and I was surprised to find out you could buy them. We of course had no money, but it was a thrilling day for me anyway.

Autumn on the canal.

The Lost Boar

One day our boar got out of it's pen and we found out later that a farmer had it. Dad took us with him in the car to go get the boar. It was pretty big and white as I remember. I remember the farmer saying he wanted $2.00 for keeping it, that was like $40.00 in today's money.

They hog tied it and started to lift it to put it in the car trunk and the thing turned and crunched down on Dad's hand. That looked pretty bad to me, but Dad laughed about it and the farmer gave him some iodine and bandages and off we went.

This is added by Aunt Wilda.
I would like to add a little to The Hog. I didn't go to pick up the hog, but I was in the yard when it came back. John had taken out the back seat of the car to make it a truck. That old hog was so heavy that the front of the car was up, and the back was down. We couldn't let that hog get lost, he was our pal. LAZY as could be. Every time he saw anyone coming toward him, he would lay on his side so we could scratch his side. We left a board outside his fence just for that reason.

Canal South of Levittown

This how the canal looked when we lived there.

This is the part of the canal that the lockhouse was on. Aunt Lois and Aunt Wilda used this path to go to school.

A Mothers Love by Aunt Wilda

A Mother's Love....One day while we were playing near the barn, Jim saw a duck egg in the water,so he reached in the Canal edge, and in he went head first. We all started yelling,"Jimmy,Jimmy, Help, Jimmy" Margaret was on the porch talking to Grandmom, and she came running with Mike in her arms, and without realizing it, she jumped in the water. For some reason, Jim was going out to the center of the Canal. Margaret swam out and grabbed him. She came up with Jim under one Arm, and Mike still in the other. Jim was crying, and Mile with a look like(What happened?) and Margaret yelling to all of us,"Get up to the house, don't ever ask to come out again,You are just lucky I was near by. Don't even ask again." Well guess what? WE WERE OUT THE NEXT DAY.

Lock Area

This is something like the locks that were at the number 2 locks. The wooden doors are missing that were under the little bridge. Our house would be on this side of where you see the little red house in the picture. The barn would be behind the tree on the left of the picture. At our place the tree was a black mulberry.

Preserved Lockhouse

Here is a picture of a lockhouse that was preserved further up the canal near New Hope, PA.

I haven't found a picture yet of the one we lived in at the number 2 locks.

Where Lockhouse Used To Be

This is what is left of the canal locks and canal. We lived in the lockhouse that housed the lock keeper that controlled these number 2 locks. It's all filled in now.
Click the link below to see how it is now. Aunt Wilda sent this to me.


http://www.americancanals.org/dc_lock_2.htm

Uncle Bill at the Lockhouse.

Uncle Bill was taking pictures and movies of us kids sliding down the little hill beside the lockhouse. The snow was packed and as hard as ice. This was the first time I can remember seeing him and I was taken by his laugh. He laughed more than anyone I ever knew and I thought it was neat.

We went out on the ice in the canal and I remember he got a big kick out of the round depressions where the ducks spent the night and melted the ice. He was joking about the ducks having cold feet and all that and we all were laughing until our lungs hurt from the cold air.

Winter Memories by Aunt Wilda.

These cold days we have been having takes me back to Winter at the Lockhouse. No electric heat, no furnace heat, no heat at all, so we put in that old Wood Stove. Some times it would heat so well, and other times we would set around that stove and be nice and warm in the front and our backs were freezing. At night, Mother use to warm up the blankets and tell us to jump in bed, then she would throw those warm covers over us and put a brick on the stove. When it got hot, she would wrap it in a towel and place it at our feet to keep the bed warm.
We didn't have electric, so we had no radio, no television, (No one else did either) no refrigerator,(We had an Ice box). What we did have was a lot of time to be a family. We played board games, read, sewed, games outside, Ice games, fun with the animals, and Swimming.
We have lived in other places, but none has been remembered and loved as much as that place.It is a part of history.

Scare in the night told by Aunt Wilda

One night about 11:PM; Grandmom was setting by the lantern reading her Bible when she heard a scream, "MOTHER." Grandmom said, " That's Judy." She jumped up and started to run out the door. We heard her and jumped out of bed, running behind Grandmom. When the moon was shining bright, it would reflect on the Canal, and make it quite light, but this night it was very dark. As Judy walked the path, she bumped into something, and it went EE haw, and turned and hit her with it's head right in her ribs.

There was the mule that belonged to the Dewsnap family. It broke loose and pulled his chain along with him. The chain got caught on the bushes and he couldn't go anywhere. Grandpop followed behind us with his flashlight and got the mule loose. We took him home with us and tied him up. The next day he was taken home, but Judy didn't forget him in any hurry.

The Horse Fly

We were eating lunch and Dad looked out the window at the cow that was out in the pasture and said "wow, look at the size of that horse fly on the cow, I'm going to go out and kill it." We all looked out and sure enough there was a black spot on the side of the cow.

We watched as Dad walked out with the fly swatter and wacked the thing. He brought the dead horse fly in and I was amazed that a fly could get that big.

Mr. Mean

Here is a story from Aunt Wilda.

We had a rooster we called Mr. Mean. He wasn't afraid of anything, And he hated to see the Milk Man come. Every time he came, that old rooster would go after him. One day that Mr. Mean was in wait for that Milk Man, and the Milk Man saw him. The house had a hill on both sides of it, and on one side there were steps, and the other was just the hill. The Milk Man thought he would trick that rooster, so he went around the other side, and when he did, that Mr.Mean came running behind him. There was snow on the hill, and where the water was dripping off the roof, it made ice.That milk Man went running up the hill and the rooster behind him. The Milk Man slid on the ice and down he came with Mr.Mean picking at him all the way down the hill. The Milk Man said he will never come back unless Grandpop locked THAT THING up. Grandpop thought that was really funny. Mr.Mean never bothered any of us, just the Milk Man, but one day I was running, and Mr, Mean came running after me, and bit me on the leg. Grandpop saw him, and guess what we had for dinner that evening? MR. MEAN

Grandpop Demusz's farm

We finally got to visit Grandpop's farm and it was great. He had a huge barn with cows chickens and ducks. There was huge pastures with glumps of blackberries that were big and ripe, more then anyone could pick. A nice stream was going through the pastures and went close to the house.

There was a lot of people there and they had long tables set up on the lawn with all kinds of food. Dad and his brothers and cousins were in one field playing baseball. Us kids had a ball exploring the barn and all the other buildings. There was even a rusting old Model T Ford behind the barn that we could play in.

We even got to ride in the back of Uncle Emil's truck while he took the days milk down to the creamery to sell. He gave us a tour of the mountains and river in that area.

Uncles Mike and Emil

Uncle Emil brought Uncle Mike to visit us one day. He was still in the army air corp at this time and he was in uniform. It was the first time I remember seeing him and I thought the uniform was the neatest thing. He gave both Jim and I a harmonica and said "the next time I see you guys, I want to hear a song."

He came again not long after that, the war in Europe was over and he wasn't in uniform this time. We all went into Bristol to see the people celebrate. People were dancing in the streets and I never saw so many flags. There hasn't been a celebration like that since then.

Uncle Furm's Boat

One day Uncle Furm brought a row boat over and it was strange looking because it had wheels attached to it. You could push it right into the water. It was neat and we had something new to do in the canal. I can still see Uncle Furm and Aunt Edith in that boat with all the white ducks swimming around them.

Mike Joined Us

Mike was born a few months before we moved to NJ. That made 4 of us kids and we used to walk to Grandmom's house with 2 in the coach and Jim and I on each side. Grandmom had moved down the canal a ways.

One time when we were heading that way, Mother said here comes a wild horse. I looked back and sure enough, a horse was running up behind us. Mother started running and I think Jim and I only touched ground about every ten feet or so. You know Mother was on the Bristol High School track team and she could really run in those days.

Well we made it ok, I can't remember which way the horse went.

Mercury Candy

My cousin Georgie and I were looking through some junk in back of the house one day and we found something that we never saw before. After looking it over for a time, we decided it was hard stick candy. I pulled on it and it broke into 5 pieces. I decided to suck on a piece and see what it tasted like. It looked like it was filled with cherry juice.

So, I started to suck real hard on a 4 inch piece and my tongue turned cold and numb right away. I ran to the water pump and tried to wash the taste out of my mouth, but it stayed with me all that day.

I know now that it was a thermometer that the drug store used to give out that was about 2 feet long. I often wonder how that mercury played a part in my health through the years.

My Book House

We got a wonderful 12 volume set of books one day, called "My Book House". They were filled with mostly fairy tales and short stories. We loved them as much as kids do their tv's and games nowdays. We didn't have radio or tv so this was our connection to the world.

Grandpop's fish

Ice fishing was popular

The water in the canal was really clear one day, you could see the bottom. Someone spotted a large fish and Grandpop got his fishing pole. The lure was near the fish but it wouldn't bite. Grandpop slowly started pulling the lure along the bank and the fish followed about a foot behind it. I'll never forget this, us kids were following along and he kept waving us back so we wouldn't scare the fish. We of course didn't listen and stayed right with him and the big fish. Finally after quite some distance, the fish bit and he caught it. I was glad he did catch it, he was so happy with that fish that he forgot all about yelling at us for almost scaring the thing off.

Fishing, but catching turtles

Dad bought us a tin of fishing hooks so we could catch the little sunfish in the canal. We used either bread or worms for bait. It was great fun except when the little snapper turtles were biting. They were very hard to get off the hook and took a lot of the pleasure out of fishing.

The young bull

Jim and I were out on the far side of the barn where the young bull was tied to the barn with a long rope. We heard a very loud crack, looked up and saw that the bull pulled a large hunk of the barn off and was loose. We ran up to the house and Dad came out and grabbed hold of the rope. Dad was in very good condition in those days, but that bull still pulled him down the canal tow path and out of sight around the bend.

Later on we saw that the bull tired out first and was being pulled home. I was disappointed because I thought that we were finally rid of that monster.

Walking Aunt Judy Home

This is from Aunt Wilda.
Aunt Judy,(MY sister) was eighteen years old and worked at the tomato plant. She was getting off from work, and Grandmom always liked to walk, so she said we were going to meet Judy half way. We did, and on the way up the Tow path was something or someone laying near the water. It was starting to get dark so seeing was a little hard. Judy grabbed mother's arm and said,"That's a man laying there". Grandmom said,"Let go of my arm. I can't do anything with you holding my arm." "Just keep walking, he is probably drunk." We kept walking, and just as we got pretty close, a breeze blew the Newspaper, and a frog let out his RRRRRIIBBETT,at the same time. WE all screamed and then laughed, telling each other how silly they looked.