This is a fun story! Dad’s memories of his youth are revealing and show a small glimpse of how children felt during the Great Depression. It shows how our (my) parents learned how to survive and prosper during times of adversity. There’s some history, some humor, tragedy . . . This could be a Shakespeare play!!!
Let’s start a dialogue; You can post comments on each of these posts. How about if you, the reader, recount some of your memories from your youth and post them in the comments section at the bottom of the article. I may publish these stories, complete with mine and other comments in book form, someday.
I always thought there was something missing in dad’s unpublished book. Not enough pages for a full-length book for one thing. Dad’s own comments would be perfect! Perhaps reader comments would be the addition that brings the book into focus as publishable and marketable in my (and probably most publishers) mind.
Seriously. I would love to see comments, critiques and even complaints, if you have them. I have editing capabilities on these web pages but will not edit out any complaints. Only inappropriate content will be deleted or not published. So, please . . . Comment, comment, comment . . . I, and others, I’m sure, would love to hear from you!
p.s. Dad was born in Windsor, Ontario and lived there until he was 11, when he moved to and became an American citizen.
Thanks for reading,
David T
Good, Bad Times Remembered
By Don Tschirhart
Excerpted from the unpublished book “It’s a Wonderful World: A Retired Reporter Looks At Life”
Turning on television the other night Margie and I caught the start of a 1938 musical starring Jeanette McDonald and Nelson Eddy. It brought back memories for anyone who lived through the Great Depression.
“Do you realize my mom was 38 years old when that movie came out,” my wife, Margie said. “She just loved those two.”
I looked at her and thought, “Gee whiz! As young as we are Margie and I have lived through so much. I wonder if the present generation wonders if they will some day look back at today and say, “I remember that,” and, “Those were the good old days.”
Young folks seem to think older people are always living in their memories. It’s true. We, who have lived beyond the 50 percent of our lifetime have experienced much.
Of course, there are many good things we’d like to remember and pass on to our offspring, if they’ll listen. We’d just as soon forget the bad.
I reach back a few years. Now, let me see. It was 1932 that the baby of aviation hero Charles Lindbergh was kidnapped from his New Jersey home. Six years before Lindbergh became the first person to fly the Atlantic Ocean to Paris.
I was only five years old and living in Windsor, Ontario. Even there, Boy Scouts and many others including me searched the area near our homes to see if we could locate [ed. find] the infant. Lindy’s babe was later found dead near his New Jersey home.
A couple of years later another flyer wanted to fly from New York to San Francisco. Missing for two days he was found in Ireland. He was known forever after as “Wrong Way” Corrigan and became my personal hero.
Few families had money to spare in the Depression Era. I loved movies — especially westerns with Tom Mix and Hopalong Cassidy.
I searched the neighborhood for old newspapers during the week stashing them in our garage. Saturday morning I’d wait to hear the familiar horn blown by the “Sheeny,” a man with a horse and trailer picking up metal, newspapers and other trash in alleys that he could resell.
He would weigh my newspapers and give me a smile and enough money to buy a ticket to the Annex Theater on Grand River . . . and a box of popcorn to boot.
To earn money to buy clothes and pay my way through Catholic Central High School I worked part-time at the Post Office. I delivered a half-route of mail after school and a whole route on Saturday. Regular post men were off fighting Hitler and Hirohito.
I learned many things delivering mail that school couldn’t teach. On occasion I’d deliver servicemen’s letters that had postage due, meaning they didn’t have enough postage and the homeowner owed me a couple of pennies.
My route covered a mostly Jewish neighborhood. On Saturdays I often had trouble collecting the postage due because Orthodox Jews wouldn’t touch money. Women would bring purses to the door. I’d reach in and take the coins. Men would ask me to reach into their pocket. Some I gave credit.
On a couple of occasions I delivered letters to people who had just been notified that the sender had been killed in action. It was then I learned compassion and diplomacy I later used as a news reporter.
Saturdays were dance nights during the school year. Dressed in Sunday-go-to-meeting suits we’d pick up dates and dance the evening away in the Grand Ballroom of the Book Cadillac, Statler or Fort Shelby hotels in downtown Detroit. The Delfoy was our dance of choice.
In the summer there was the Walled Lake, Eastland and Westland casinos where we danced to Glenn Miller, Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey and Benny Goodman. Admission cost less than $3 each and the Coke cost 50 cents.
I think all of us today look back at that era with nostalgia. Indeed, it was good times and I remember it with great affection.
But then I think that it wasn’t all good times. The world was at war and friends Jimmy Murphy, Jack Owens and George Henry would never return alive.
I wonder if those years were the “good-old days.”
In 60 years will young people look at today any different than I remember yesteryear’s ‘good old days?’
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