It's My Story - I'll Tell It My Way

By James M. Wahl

My Story is a refl ection on the events of my lifefrom my birth in 1926 until my
marriage in 1949, at the age of 23. My experiences in growing up on a poor, hilly farm
without electricity or inside plumbing during the depression years of the 1930s, then the
diffi cult war years of the early 1940s, followed by the growing prosperity after WW II
all helped to shape the kind of person that I wished to become. These events helped me
to progressively establish three main goals for my life: Build a meaningful relationship
with my Creator, get a worthwhile education, and fi nd a Special Girl to share my life.
In those 23 years, I accomplish two of my goals. The one remaining goalmy fi rst and
oldest objectivewas still a work in progress at the end of My Story. My efforts to
fi nd an acceptable way of worshipping my God would not be realized until a few more
years had passed. I had also determined that my Special Girl and I would reach this
goal together. If time allows, I will complete that account in Our StoryAll the Way
in the near future.
My initial purpose in writing this account has been to preserve that heritage for my two
sons, Steve and Jeff, and for their families . . . If My Story proves to be of any interest
to others, so much the better.
Jim Wahl - text should be Amazone BT for "Jim Wahl"

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 20, 2010
• ISBN: 9781456825065

James M. Wahl

James M. Wahl was born February 2, 1926 on the Wahl family farm near Logan, Ohio. He was the ninth of 13 children born to Bill and Bertha Wahl. After graduating from Logan, Ohio High School in 1943, he served overseas in the Army during World War II. Surviving a wartime injury, he returned to Ohio where he earned a Bachelor’s degree in Agricultural Education at Ohio State University under the GI Bill. Upon graduation from OSU, he taught Vocational Agriculture at Piketon, Ohio High School for two years, and then worked for International Harvester (now Navistar) for 31 years, retiring in 1982 at age 57. At age 31, he satisfi ed a growing desire to serve as an ordained minister. From that date forward, he has continued to serve in a voluntary ministry that centers on Bible study education. Since 1966, he and his wife, Betty, have lived together in Fort Wayne, Indiana, surrounded by a growing family, including 2 sons, 5 grandchildren and 9 great grandchildren . . . and counting!

Book preview

IT’S MY STORY-

I’LL TELL IT MY WAY

James M. Wahl

Copyright © 2010 by James M. Wahl.

Library of Congress Control Number:       2010917833

ISBN:         Hardcover                               978-1-4568-2505-8

                   Softcover                                 978-1-4568-2504-1

                   Ebook                                      978-1-4568-2506-5

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Contents

HOW IT ALL STARTED

ABOUT MY GRANDPARENTS

THE HISTORY AND LAYOUT OF THE WILLIAM AND BERTHA WAHL FAMILY HERITAGE FARM LANDS

ABOUT MY PARENTS

THE VERY EARLY YEARS

EARLY SCHOOL YEARS

MY LIFE ON THE FARM

THE HIGH SCHOOL YEARS

AFTER HIGH SCHOOL

YOU’RE IN THE ARMY NOW

CAMP BOWIE, TEXAS

FLASH BACK TO THE FARM

BACK TO CAMP BOWIE

MOVE OUT TO THE EAST COAST

OVERSEAS TO EUROPE

WE ARRIVE IN FRANCE

THE INJURY OR ACCIDENT

ON TO ENGLAND

BACK IN THE STATES

LIFE AT NICHOLS GENERAL HOSPITAL

RETURNING HOME

WHAT ABOUT GIRLS?

EARLY COLLEGE YEARS

HOLIDAY BREAK— DECEMBER 1946

TAKE THE SUMMER OFF FROM SCHOOL

A SPECIAL GIRL

SOME REFLECTIONS ON MY LIFE

FAMILY POINTS OF INTEREST

BACK TO COLLEGE

MY FIRST CAR

A REALLY GOOD DECISION

FINISH UP COLLEGE

TWO WEEKS IN JUNE

HOW IT ALL STARTED

It was a dark, cold, stormy night, with howling wind and blowing snow . . . that Monday evening of February 1st in the year 1926. But it was warm and cozy in the first floor bedroom where the small woman was struggling to give birth to her ninth child. Four of her other children were upstairs in bed. Dave, the oldest of her brood, who was going on 17 now, was off somewhere with some of his friends. Three of her children had died very young from the childhood disease called scarlet fever. She was determined not to lose another child that way. Nor would she lose one during childbirth . . . she had grit . . . and she had prayed.

So, childbirth was not a new experience to this hardy farmwoman. Six boys and two girls had preceded this one. But, Oh why, she thought, does it have to come on such a terrible night. Doctor Donaldson wouldn’t want to come out on a night like this, unless he knew it was a real emergency." But he didn’t know, because it wasn’t time yet. Doc had said that this baby wouldn’t be born until next week and he sounded like he was sure of it . . . but he had been wrong before. Besides, there was no way to contact the good doctor unless one would go to his home to tell him. (It would be several years before the telephone lines would be strung out from the county seat in Logan to this remote northeast corner of Hocking County.)

The only light in this room was from a small kerosene lamp (more commonly known as a coal oil lamp) sitting on the dresser. A Florence coal-burning stove provided the heat for this room. It sat in the innermost corner with its black stovepipe stuck into an opening into the chimney. The brick chimney was the very center of this square-built house. The chimney was seated in the floor of the basement, extended through the first and second floors then out through the roof. There were four rooms on the first floor, each with a corner against one of the sides of the chimney where a stove could be placed. The upstairs was one big, unfinished room with no heating provided. A bucket full of chunks of black coal sat on the floor beside the stove. Her husband, Bill, had filled it earlier in the evening as well as the bucket by the cook stove in the kitchen and the heating stove in the living room or front room as it was usually called. In cold weather, like tonight, the stoves were banked to hold some heat during the night and be ready to start up again in the morning. Banking a stove meant putting on some more coal but closing the damper so that it got very little air and would, therefore, burn very slowly during the night.

Bill sat there wondering what he should do. His previous experience hadn’t prepared him for anything like this. All of the other children had cooperated nicely and arrived during fairly decent weather; that is, except Johnny, who had been born on February 3rd just two years before. He recalled that had been a miserably cold night, too. Maybe he should hitch up old Tom to the buggy and drive the three miles to Old Gore and get Doc to come over . . . The Model-T Ford would never make it on a night like this. He would more than likely run it into a ditch somewhere and need help himself. No, she said, as if reading his mind, I think the pains are letting up. It is probably false labor this time. Lets wait awhile longer. Bill sighed with a sense of relief. OK, he said softly, knowing that she was the best judge of what was happening at this point. He got up to get a glass of water from the bucket in the kitchen. It was just past 10:30 now. So, it was going to be a long night.

James Melvin Wahl came into the world four hours later. It was 2:30 in the morning on February 2, 1926. Later that day, Doc Donaldson came by to see that everything was OK with mother and child and to fill out the necessary papers to file at the court house in Logan. Ground hog day it was called. For those who follow such old wives tales, the sun didn’t come out that day. It was cold and wet. Even the dumb groundhog knew enough to stay inside his warm burrow. So, just another tag to hang onto the squalling, little 8-pound infant that they first called Jimmy and sometimes James. Later it would be just Jim. This is his story; or rather, I should say that it is my story, for I am that ninth child of William and Bertha Wahl. There would be four more children born to this hard-working farm couple in the next eleven years.

Oh, by the way, there might be those who would question the accuracy of my account concerning the circumstances of my birth. Obviously, there is no way that I can claim to recall the events and conversations in exact detail. I won’t try. However, at the same time, neither can anyone else truthfully say that it happened in another way. And, since IT’S MY STORY-I’LL TELL IT MY WAY.

ABOUT MY GRANDPARENTS

My paternal grandparents were Lawrence and Mary Rinck (or Rink) Wahl who were both German immigrants. Lawrence was born in Jan 1853 and Mary in Jan 1860. They apparently came to the United States separately; Lawrence in 1870 and Mary in 1872. One story is that Lawrence’s parents cut down a tree in the front yard of their home in Germany to get lumber to make a chest for Lawrence before he came to America. This happens to be a true story, because the chest is now in the possession of his great grandson, Albert Wahl, who lives in Logan, Ohio.

It is unclear whether Lawrence and Mary knew each other in Germany or got acquainted after they arrived in America. She was just 10 years old when he, at 17, came to America in 1870. Whether other family members traveled with either of them is also unknown, but there is some evidence that two of his brothers may have come along. Another story intimates that seven brothers came to America by way of Prussia at the same time. In any event, there was an attraction between the two young people while they were both in New York City, but there was no commitment to marriage as yet.

At some point in the 1870’s, Lawrence traveled to the Midwest while Mary stayed in the big city. She got a job as a housekeeper and later worked in a bakery. She made as much as $12 to $15 a week. Good money for that kind of work at that time. Lawrence was able to take advantage of a US Land Grant program available to farming immigrants who would prove up on free land by farming it and building a house on the land. So, he established a homestead on a parcel of land in Perry County near Gore, Ohio. The initial plot was 80 acres of hilltop land with plenty of trees and brush and with about 25 acres of tillable land. Not really good farmland, but there was a nice amount of fine, white clay that he later found quite profitable. He also planted a nice apple and peach orchard.

Lawrence and Mary apparently wrote to each other during this period. He no doubt told her about his efforts to establish a home here in Southeast Ohio, planting his orchard, clearing the land and getting started in farming. The relationship seemed to have prospered, so in time, Lawrence traveled back to New York where he proposed to Mary. She had a nice job and a good income and was reluctant to leave the city for a farm in the wilderness. But, after his glowing description of the new country and the good farmland that he had settled on, she finally accepted his proposal. They were married in New York City in early 1883 and then traveled westward to Ohio. During their c.55 years of married life they had nine children. There were seven boys, Jake, Frank, Bill, Charles, Albert, Lewis and Robert and three girls, Mary, Clara and Mina.

There is some indication in family lore that Grandmother Mary Wahl was not exactly enthralled by her new hilly, woodsy surroundings. She had left a goot paying job in the big city for this poor, backwoods farmstead. Years later it was reported that she described her new home as having Nutting! Nutting! Nutting! She apparently made the best of it, because she stayed and made a loving home for her ten children. Later on, numerous grandchildren came to visit along with their parents to enjoy some of grandma’s goot German cooking.

Neither Lawrence nor Mary learned to speak English fluently, but grandma accomplished the most after they got a telephone because she could listen-in on the party line. During their lifetime, grandpa expanded the farm acreage. Records show that he had some building experience and that the chest that he brought to America from Germany contained carpenter tools. He apparently built two or three homes during his lifetime as well as several barns and other farm buildings. The house that I knew best was the one on the hill north of Gore on Howdyshell Road. This was part of the original homestead. Another one was located a couple of miles farther north along this same road on another farm that Uncle Albert bought or took over from grandpa after he married Aunt Myrtle.

I knew both of these grandparents during the first 10-12 years of my life. But because of the language barrier, I never got really close to them. They were strict, no-nonsense, hard-working farm people not given to a strong show of emotion or affection. However, they were kind and generous within their own family. I do not recall when either of them died, but grandpa passed away first. A couple of years later grandma followed. This must have been in the middle 1930s since both of them passed away before I started high school in 1939.

I can remember going there on a Sunday afternoon for a nice dinner and staying until about dark. There was a pear tree and a plum tree by the summer kitchen. Just north of the house was a nice apple, peach and cherry orchard. There was another small apple orchard across the road behind the machine shed. John and I liked to explore the barns and the old horse-drawn buggies and a couple of ancient cars that grandpa had tried to learn to drive.

NO 1- GRANDPARENTS.jpg

Anniversary picture of Lawrence and Mary Wahl. Taken about 1900

David and Nancy Johnson were my maternal grandparents. They were married in the early 1870s and lived part of their life in a log cabin near that frame farmhouse where I was born. That cabin may have been the same one where grandpa was born about 1848 or, more likely, another one in the same area. Family history indicates that grandpa Johnson was in the army for about four years after the Civil War before they were married. They had six children, four boys (Laige [?], Rindy, Joshua and John) and two girls (Bertha and Elizabeth).

Grandma died in 1902 when my mother was just 14 years old. With a younger brother and sister to take care of along with the household duties, she became the new mother of the family. Grandpa never remarried. He eventually came to live with us in his old age. I was very young, but I recall that one time he fell on the porch and tore the skin off the back of his hand. I can still see that in my mind. That had to hurt. I believe that he died about 1929 or 1930.

The 120 acre farm where I grew up was originally settled by my mother’s ancestors soon after the revolutionary war or at least by 1800. A Johnson received either a government land grant (presumably for war service) or he purchased cheap land that was readily available in the years before the Ohio territory became a state in 1803. By 1889, the 120 acres had been divided into six plots as shown on the following farmland layout. It also shows how the land passed through various hands until the present. The 40 acres on the northeast corner of the farm was not purchased until 1982 when Don, John, and I bought the land from Mr. Curt Kline in order to protect the original Wahl farm heritage.

NO 2 - FARM PICTURE.jpg

Arial view of the Wahl farmstead about 1970. Later, another dormer was added on north side roof

NO 2 - FARM PICTURE.jpg

Ground level view of the farm buildings from the field across the creek on the old Deacon place.

THE HISTORY AND LAYOUT OF THE WILLIAM AND BERTHA WAHL FAMILY HERITAGE FARM LANDS

NO 3 - THE HISTORY AND LAYOUT.jpg

ABOUT MY PARENTS

My father was born on the Lawrence and Mary Wahl family farm near Gore on January 1, 1888. Bill, Billy, Will or William, as he was variously called, had six brothers and three sisters. All members of this family were of slender build and medium height; i.e., about 5'8-5'9 and 160-170 pounds for males and 5'-5-5'6 and about 115-120 pounds for the females in adult life. The family religion was German Catholic. At age 20, Bill married Bertha Mae Johnson who lived on a farm about three miles west of Gore along route 75 toward Logan.

Bertha, Bert or Bertie, as some called her, was born on August 4, 1888 in the log cabin where her family lived. Her parents were David and Nancy Jane (Clarke) Johnson who were both of a mixed English-Dutch ancestry. There were six children in this family. The Johnson family members tended to be a little smaller in size and weight than the Wahl family. Bertha, in fact, was less than 5' tall and generally weighed under 100 pounds except for the 13 times that she was pregnant. Of course, this condition covered the first 27 years of her 61 years of married life. During the last 10-12 years of her life she weighed about 90 pounds. The Johnson family generally adhered to whatever Protestant church was available. This varied somewhat over the years, but seemed to be mostly United Brethren in the Gore area. This fact caused some concern in the Wahl clan for a few years.

Bill and Bertha met in grade school at Gore where they both completed the first four grades. Few farm children attended high school in those days in rural areas. They were married on October 16, 1908 at Gore, Ohio. Witnesses were the Justice of the Peace, D. K. Lappan and David Johnson, Bertha’s father. This marriage of mixed religion was what caused the members of the Wahl family to look down on this couple. It also resulted in Bill being kicked out of (I believe they call it excommunication) the Catholic Church in New Straitsville. He never tried to return and in time most of the family members accepted the marriage as legal even though it was not performed in their church. A couple of the older children never seemed to get around to accepting Bertha into the family. So, religion had an early effect of the family of Bill and Bertha.

They began married life together in a rented house in Gore. Pop had a job in the New Straitsville brickyard at the time. Later, in 1915, they purchased a 40-acre (actually 40.5 acre) plot of land from Jesse Linton and moved their small family of three sons, Dave, Harry and Josh (another son, Charles Edward had died at 6 months of age on 9-16-1911), into a frame house on a wooded hillside located along the Logan-Straitsville road about three miles west of Gore. This acreage butted up against land owned by the Johnson family on the north and east sides. (See the farm layout map on page 13). They gained ownership of the 40-acres to the north and the 20-acre homestead plot on the east in 1920. The 19.43 acre Harve King place was not purchase until 1945 and the 40-acre Deacon place in 1982.

The Logan-Straitsville road was mostly dirt and gravel at the time. Later it would be paved (in the early 30s) and assigned as State Route 75 (Now SR 93). The Bill Bolbee farm was due west of the house across the road and west of Monday crick (creek) that wandered alongside the road for over three miles in this area. The house, machine shed and barn were located in the northwest corner of the ten-acre plot where Randy and Paula Wahl built their home in 2003. (See layout map) Davey Johnson still lived in the old Johnson family homestead, a log cabin over the hill to the east. The cabin was located on the east side of the crick that ran down the middle of the 20-acre homestead.

I grew up on the 100-acre farm comprised of the 80 acres located on the western half of the farm layout plus the 20-acre farmstead on the eastern side where Grandpa Davy Johnson had lived. Harve King, who lived in Logan and was some distant relative of Grandpa Johnson, owned the 19.43-acre plot south of the 20-acre homestead. He had tried to dig coal out of the hillside on the eastern half of this property, but the vein (perhaps 14-20 inches thick) was too thin to make it worthwhile. Pop arranged to farm the two narrow strips of land on each side of the crick on some sort of a crop-share agreement. Pop had wanted to own this land for some time and finally was able to purchase it from Mr. King in 1945, thus increasing our farm to 120 acres.

In 1923, Pop completed building a two-story frame house, including a full basement, on higher ground about 50 feet behind the log cabin where Grandpa Johnson lived. After Grandpa moved into the new house in 1923, the log cabin was torn down and the logs used to build a log barn across the ditch to the north of the new house. It became a two-stall horse stable with a haymow overhead.

NO 4 - LOG BARN.jpg

This picture was taken sometime in the 1960’s showing the log barn with a new front section that was added in 1924. A 10-foot wide space between the new section and the log part allowed room to back in a hay wagon.

Shown behind the barn are the chicken house and a corner of the brooder house for the starting of baby chicks.

The new section of the barn had a floor about a foot above the ground made of poles and slab boards. Originally, the front side was boarded up to the top to protect the hay from rain.

In 1926, an 8-foot wide coal shed was added on the front of the new section. (It was removed before this picture was taken.) It had a window opening on the back side and the front for shoveling coal into the building. An open door was on the side toward the house where we could load up coal buckets for use in the house. About 1930, Pop added a 10-foot wide open shed along the north side of this structure to serve as a machine storage area. As a result, some of the upper boards of the newer section were removed so that hay could be pitched in from the south side. He also built up the land along this side so that the hay wagon could be pulled alongside for unloading. The middle area was then used as part of the hog pen with the feeding trough in front. That change was needed because the old hog house behind the barn was ready to collapse. This was about 1935.

When I was about 3 years old, Pop, with the help of Josh, cleaned out the ditch in front of the house and lay in about 20 feet of 20 inch tile. These came from the Logan brickyard. This was covered over with gravel from the crick, then topped with a layer of dirt. Now we had a wide walkway with easy access to the log barn and other buildings that made up the farm lot. In time, this included a tool shed with a corn crib attached, smoke house, hog house, another corn crib, wheat shed, chicken coop and brooder house for baby chicks.

A log footbridge was built across the crick to get to the farm buildings and garage on the west side. The first building here was the hay barn and horse stable. The two-vehicle garage was added in 1928 when Pop bought a Chevrolet Touring car and a flatbed truck. Next a cow shed was added to the west side of the barn. There was a small corncrib at the front of this addition and stalls for six milk cows. Then when Josh got his first car (about 1934), a side shed was added to the west side of the garage. In time, side additions were added to the back end (north side) of the barn and on both sides for various uses.

Pop was raised on a farm and knew how to work with horses, but he tried several other areas of employment before coming back to general farming. In his younger years he worked at the Straitsville brickyard, on the railroad, in the oil fields, hauled coal from the coalmines in the New Straitsville area and did some road building and maintenance work for the state highway department. Since he had a truck, he was hired to haul gravel, cinders, dirt and such for WPA road building crews during the depression years in the 30’s.

As I mentioned, his farming efforts were referred to as general farming; that is, he did not depend on just one type of farming to make a living. It was hard work and not greatly profitable in hard, cash money, but it was enough to care for the basic needs of a growing family. Crops were mostly corn, wheat and hay, although he tried soybeans and rye at different times. This produce was used mostly to feed livestock. A small portion of the better corn and wheat was processed at the Logan Feed Mill into flour and cornmeal. In the early 30s, we used a horse drawn grinder to make cornmeal as well as coarser feed for the milk cows. Before he started buying hybrid seed, the best looking ears of corn and some of the wheat was set aside as seed for planting the following year.

The livestock included the workhorses, dairy cows, beef cattle (steers), pigs, chickens, and a variety of dogs and cats. Although various other critters were experimented with over the years (turkeys, ducks, geese, guinea hens and western horses), the cattle, hogs and chickens were the main source of cash income. Excess garden produce also provided some extra money and bartering power during the summer months.

During the hard times of the 30's when they came close to losing the farm for taxes, Pop did some of the off-farm work mentioned earlier. In addition, he started using his car as a small school bus to pick up neighboring children for the grade school at Gore. He had to hang a hand-painted SCHOOL BUS sign on the back bumper so other drivers would know why he stopped along the road. Because most of us were so small, he put a board across the back seat on the side arm rests to provide more seating places. There were up to 10 of us at times.

I remember my mother as a rather small woman of less than 100 pounds. But she seemed to have lots of energy to do her house work, including cooking, canning and cleaning as well as taking care of the two large gardens, her large flower garden and the flock of 100 to 200 chickens. These were considered to be her responsibilities. Pop did the farming and took care of the other livestock. This work included milking and feeding the cows, feeding and caring for the hogs, horses and any beef animals. This also included care and maintenance of the farm equipment and buildings. The children were worked into these various tasks as they became able to help out.

Mom was the fierce, self-appointed defender of the family. There was no question but that she loved her husband and every one of the 13 children that she bore. Many years later, she still grieved the loss of three of her early offspring. And she was always proud of each of her other children no matter what they accomplished in life. She worried about each one and longed to hear from them and always welcomed them home when they