D.A.L.E.: Devoted, Accomplished, Loyal, Ethical

By Don Swinford

This book tells us that we dont have to look that far to find heroes and inspirations. Just because some make headlines and serve in high places doesnt necessarily make them good people. Look around, as I have, to see why you are as you are. Im proud to be from the grass roots of America. From people who worked in the dirt in an effort not only to make the world a better place but also to make better lives for their children. Struggle was part of life and affected most families, but it also built character and produced individuals who are worthy of remembering and celebrating with a written remembrance.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 4, 2017
• ISBN: 9781546219651

Don Swinford

Don writes from inspirations experienced in his 80 years of life. As a retired Certified Public Accountant, he has found time to reflect on paths he has crossed and remembers best. All of his books are family related and are fictional in nature. One book on short stories is true experiences. Don has been married to Marilyn for over 59 years and they have three children. They were childhood sweethearts and both graduated from the University of Illinois. Both trust strongly in their Lord Jesus Christ. Don also served three years in the United States Army.

Book preview

© 2017 Don Swinford. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse  12/01/2017

ISBN: 978-1-5462-1966-8 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-1967-5 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5462-1965-1 (e)

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

NIV

Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV® Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.® Used by permission. All rights reserved worldwide.

PREFACE

In my eighty years I have experienced many people who have influenced my life. Jesus’s teachings would be number one. There are other people, some of whom have crossed my path, and others that I’ve read about or have become national or international icons. Many of these people have disappointed me when real truths were revealed, but some remain. One person, who did not let me down, didn’t have a publicity team or public relations advisors on the payroll. He lived much closer to home. My intent is to recognize such a person.

First and foremost, this is not a biography. I do not want to imply to anyone that I knew the heart and soul of the man who is my inspiration for this novel, my brother Dale. I am only portraying a person who could pull himself up by the bootstraps. A fictional person, like the real one I have long admired and respected. This is not a ‘rags to riches’ theme, but a story of a boy who started life during hard times and became a success story, in my opinion. The reason my brother is my inspiration is because of what he has meant to me. Our personalities and beliefs differed, but he had more influence in my life than he ever really knew. He was six years my senior, and in our early years I could make a pretty good case that he didn’t even like me or want me around. That changed as he matured and married the love of his life Barbara. This marriage changed his outlook on life forever.

Barb and Dale were married over sixty years in an honest and caring partnership. A marriage that family and friends alike truly envied. Dale’s siblings learned to love Barb as a true family member. They raised four children together. I cannot write their life’s story, no one can. I can only write about the trials and tribulations of a loving young man and woman. They may resemble my brother and sister-in-law in many ways. They were a couple who also grew old together, and I have used my loved ones names in tribute in this novel. Some of the reflections in the story may touch a truth, but most are fictional accounts of what might have been. It’s a story that many people would not define as a success story in today’s world, but in my world I’d label it as a beautiful success, like that of Barb and Dales.

CONTENTS

Chapter 1     The Lost Of The Greatest Generation

Chapter 2     Growing Up Is Hard To Do

Chapter 3     The Rebellious Years Begin

Chapter 4     Time To Grow Up

Chapter 5     Loss, Pain, And Tears

Chapter 6     Time To Go Home

Chapter 7     Now Is The Time

Chapter 8     Reaching For The Future

Chapter 9     Things Would Never Be The Same

Chapter 10   Pulling Up Stakes For Greener Pastures

Chapter 11   Hopefully, A Brand New Start

Chapter 12   Building For The Future

Chapter 13   It’s Harvest Time

CHAPTER 1

THE LOST OF THE GREATEST GENERATION

The term, Greatest Generation, defines those who were born around 1920, faced a great depression in the 1930’s, and went to war for their nation in 1940. President Franklin D. Roosevelt was to say, they were the ones who ‘had a rendezvous with destiny.’ We know of this generation, that many men and women struggled getting through the depression years and not all made it. Many had their lives interrupted when the war that tore families and sweethearts apart, some forever. To these people we do owe a tremendous debt of gratitude and all have earned a badge of courage.

Then there were the ones of that generation that got lost in the times. These boys and girls were born between about 1927 and 1933. They didn’t understand it when they got up from the table, in the thirties, still feeling hungry. They watched their older siblings go off to work and then to the war, some forever. When the world around them was crushing the joy from their parent’s lives and there was no light at the end of the tunnel, anger could build up in a ten or fifteen year old who had never really known a happy life.

If you had been riding or driving down a dirt road in rural America in the thirties you might have seen one of the lost decade. A sunburned boy in bib overalls tossing rocks at a tree for entertainment might be Dale. He would have been very thin and carrying a scowl on his face. This boy would make it through the depression, was too young for the military and faced life largely on his own. Like many of the farm boys of that era, he wouldn’t finish school. They didn’t run school buses in the war years, and getting to town to the high school was not easy, even if he did have an incentive. What would his story be? Would the D in his name stand for devoted or devilish? Would the A stand for accomplished or angry? Would the L stand for loyal or lazy? Would the E stand for efficient, ethical, or evil? This young guy could and would take many turns, some good, some bad. Let’s see where he came from and where he is going.

His clan migrated to Illinois in the middle of the eighteen hundreds. Matthew, his grandfather was born in Putnam County, Indiana which is about one hundred miles east and a little north of Charleston, Illinois. When he was less than a year old, in 1850, the family moved to Illinois and started farming at the very spot Dale was born. Matthew married, had eleven children, and with his wife Rachael farmed eighty acres on the bank of the Embarrass River. There they stayed until time took its toll. Matthew had lingered for several days before releasing his hold on life the 9th day of July. He was at peace because he had lived a good life, and worked at instilling his values into his children and relatives. He treated all men with dignity and always gave God the glory. His last two years had been lonely in the sense that he could not share them with his beloved wife Rachael of 49 years. Of their eleven children, nine lived to maturity and they were proud of each one of them. Unfortunately Rachael had fallen ill to the point that he was unable to care for her, and she went to live in one of their daughter’s homes where she could be attended to properly. To fulfill his personal needs, his youngest son Adren, and wife Ruby and children moved in with him to take care of him. This had its blessings, because even though he had forty-four grandchildren, they were almost strangers. Times together were mostly for family dinners and holidays and that did not give him time to get to know them properly. With Adren’s family, he had the opportunity to get to know the older ones for nearly two years. He was saddened that Rachael could not have experienced that.

The oldest of Adren and Ruby’s children was a seven year old boy named Owen. He was a strapping lad with dark hair and dark eyes and intelligent for his age. He and his grandad hit it off immediately and it enriched Grandad Matthew to have that time with him. Adren’s four children were spaced about two years apart in age. Of course they were all special, but only one was a boy. Owen was so special to his grandad that he told his son that he best take care of him. He felt certain that Owen would be the only boy his son would ever have. Adren already had that impression of his son, and his dad’s comment made a true impact on him. The three of them spent many an hour together working and playing, and music was always a center piece for entertainment. Adren in the years to come was known to repeat stories of that time together in glowing terms. Perhaps he did it too much to the detriment of his next son, who never got that type of one on one attention. The same could be said of the third daughter. Perhaps it was just what happens when your first is the highlight of your life, and then there are more. Many things come into play. All are loved, but the time and energy to enjoy a growing family sometimes just isn’t there.

After two years of loving care from this family, and before Ruby his daughter-in-law had another baby, Grandad Matthew died on a hot July day. Just six days later Albert Dale was born. After three daughters in a row, Adren and Ruby now had a second son born on July 15, 1930. The name Albert was after his dad, Albert Adren, and like his dad no one ever called him by his first name. He became Dale from the very beginning. Little did anyone know what would lie ahead for this family and little Dale, but the country’s economic condition that was in the process of making a catastrophic turn was to affect their lives deeply. In fact, every man, woman and child in the United States of America would look back and wonder, What if? The previous fall had seen the biggest failure in the financial capital of the world, Wall Street in New York City, and that affected all the nation’s banks. That would feed on down to all businesses and farms until no man or family was left untouched. Even in good times, the eighty acre farm that Adren and his siblings inherited would have had a difficult time supporting a large family, let alone one with nine owners. The family decided that Adren should stay on and operate the farm and live off the proceeds. None of them were farmers anymore. For the small farmer it could not have come at a worse time.

When the depression hit the family farms early on; Adren saw the demand for his crops plummet, the credit at the bank dry up, and therefore no seed money for the next year. After struggling for two years, Adren moved to town in order to try and work on construction in addition to farming in an effort to feed his family. While living in Oakland, another son, James Cleo, was born in 1933, but they were once again forced to return to the farm to try and salvage something. There in 1935 a fourth son, Aaron Adren, was born and just a year later the family was forced into bankruptcy and the bank claimed the land. For the next five years Adren worked as a tenant farmer with part time construction in the off season to feed his family. It was just fortunate that new road projects were being built and Adren had enough skill to help lay forms and pour concrete. He also sharpened his other carpentry skills wherever he could. It was in a four room tenant shack that Ruby and Adren had their last child. Ruby had a great deal of difficulty with delivery and when it was over they knew that Donald would be their eighth and last child. Ruby was thirty-seven and Adren thirty-four at the time.

As it turned out, both Edna and Dale started school under difficult circumstances in a one room country schoolhouse and that only heightened their disdain for education in future years. They both suffered from ‘middle child syndrome’ before the problem was named by the psychiatrists of the world. The good times were when the family would go down to the branch in the Embarrass River and play in the water and wash his dad’s old jalopy. Other times Dale had a thing for fire and would sneak matches whenever he could. He and his sister Edna spent a lot of time exploring the woods for lack of anything else to do for seven and eight year olds. One day Dale decided to start a fire for a nice bonfire with some matches he had found. Due to dry conditions and winds, the fire soon began to spread and got out of hand before the two of them could stop it and the woods were catching on fire. Only on the swift action of his sister did people arrive in time to put the fire out. It did burn several acres and made a lasting impact on Dale. He was old enough to know that it was a bad thing, but the punishment he received only made him more resentful. In later years the professionals would probably think he was looking for attention. As an adult he would laughingly explain that the thinning of the trees made for a more beautiful woods, and that he might check to see if it needed some more attention after all these years. Another lasting memory was seeing his mom chase a fox that had a laying hen in his mouth. The fox had to drop the chicken to escape her with club in hand. Both mom and son had a certain flair to their personalities.

That first one room school was about a half mile from his home in Canaan, the name given to the school district, but not to be confused with the land of milk and honey of the Bible. Because of the fear of Tornadoes in that part of Illinois, schools were furnished with storm cellars normally consisting of a hole in the ground in the yard. It looked like a large cylinder half buried under the surface of the ground and when storms approached the students were quickly herded into it. Its normal use by the kids was as a mountain that held the king that the other students tried to knock off. This particular school did not do much to help Dale and Edna advance in the world of education. For one thing, when his sister Edna passed from third to fourth grade, there were no other students entering the fourth grade the following fall so the teacher put her in with the third graders again and she took it once again. Fortunately that only happened once or she might still be there. As for Dale, when it came time for him to start school there was no teacher. The solution was that he and two other boys were taken to the nearby town to enter first grade. Now Oakland, Illinois was a small town of a thousand people and they were nice human beings, but their children just dressed a little nicer than the children from the country and appeared to be a little brighter. They had grown up around other children and seemed to have a different way about them than the boys from the country with their bib overalls; high top shoes, and relatively long hair. These three boys stood out and soon became the target for some ugly discrimination, in return for which they gave out some substantial beatings. The teacher appeared to side with the town children and at the end of the school year she flunked all three boys. No amount of protest by the parents seemed to make any difference with the Oakland School Board and the teacher would not reconsider. The following fall the one room country school was back in action with a new teacher who thought it odd that all the boys had flunked, so he decided to test them himself. They definitely lacked some skills but none of them were dumb. They had just not been taught. With the approval of his school board, he reversed the decisions made by the first grade