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Sharing Memories Through Grandmom Stories
Explore a gallery of moments that bring cherished tales to life.
Stories That Bridge Generations
Explore pivotal stories that capture the essence of childhood, family, and the art of storytelling.
A golden memory
Grandma Bess
Grandma Bess was Chris’ paternal grandmother. His father was not often in the picture. I think he worked somewhere in Pennsylvania and did not come to Rock Hall very often. When he did, it was cause for celebration and I wouldn’t see much of Chris until he was gone again.
On the other hand, Grandma Bess was a fixture. She was short and round. When I was in primary school, Grandma Bess was not much taller than I. I held Grandma Bess in awe for the reason that she had survived the bite of a tarantula. I truly thought that she had miraculously dodged death. Only later in life did I learn that tarantula bites were not usually fatal.
Grandma Bess had golden white hair that she wore in a braid wrapped around her head like a crown. There were always fly-away bits that helped to create the image of her head’s being larger than it really was. That hair shimmered in the light, much like a halo. She laughed often. It was a deep chortle that welled up from within her and shook her whole body. She jiggled with mirth.
Although Grandma Bess seemed soft in her roundness, I suspect she had an iron backbone that was hidden from us children. My memories reveal no harshness about her, but I do remember her simple reprimands when we misbehaved.
Once when Grandma Bess was babysitting us children at our house, I remember standing on a chair outside the door of the room where she was. That gave me the advantage of being taller than she. When she emerged from the room, I said, “Boo” with the glee that only a child can harbor. But this was not okay with Grandma Bess. Even now, I can feel the pall of shame from scaring that wonderful human with my prank. I was chastised, but not punished in any way. The truth of the matter was that I had disappointed Grandma Bess, and that stung like nothing else could. I learned that causing disappointment in others was far, far worse than making them angry.
When we were children we loved to say that Chris’ pre-Revolutionary house was built when George Washington was a boy. The original part of that house had a great room in the downstairs with a cellar under it. The stairs to the second floor were in the front corner of that oldest part and made a 90 degree turn at the corner. The stairs down to the cellar were closed off by a door but directly under the upper stairs. There were three bedrooms on the second floor. Chris’ bedroom was the smallest. It was tucked over the stairs and barely big enough for his bed. Then came Grandma Bess’ room, with the largest room being Miss Sylvia’s. All of this was in the original part of the house situated over that great room below.
The next part of the house was lower and there were steps leading down to it from next to the massive fireplace at the end of the great room. That part of the house had a dining room at the lower level with an attic above it. There was a “secret” passage to that attic from Miss Sylvia’s bedroom. There was a little door in her wall with a few stairs leading into the attic. A strangely configured stairway lead down from the attic to the dining room below, too.
The last part of the house was a kitchen/bathroom addition. When the original home was built the kitchen was in a separate building. This was to preserve the home in case of fire in the kitchen. I loved that house. It was steeped in history and mystery.
As Grandma Bess became older and more frail, she spent more and more time in her room until it became the sole limits of her life. Her bed was piled with blankets that swallowed her diminishing frame in mountains of downy comfort. Chris and I would sit on the edge her bed and listen to tales of times so far in the past, they sounded like fiction. Grandma Bess was telling her own Grandmom Stories. I credit her with the inspiration to do the same.
The Bungalow
The House in Rock Hall
The house in Rock Hall was considered a bungalow, a small, square one story structure with four rooms. Each of those four rooms was one fourth of the square structure. There was also a porch that spanned the entire front of the house. My mother’s grandfather built the house in the early 1900’s. Long before my parents bought this house from my mother’s siblings, a kitchen and bathroom had been added on to the back of the house. The well for the house had originally been close to the back door, but this addition was built right over the well. Imagine how delightful it was to have a trap door in the kitchen floor that opened to reveal a brick-lined well. How convenient that was when the power went out. When water could not be pumped from the well, all we had to do was lift the trap door and lower a bucket on a rope to gather the water we needed. I knew of nobody else who had a well under their very kitchen floor.
The well was located over a natural spring, so the water was fresh, clear, and delicious. When lots of water had been pulled from the well, it was possible to see the spring water bubbling up from below. That water needed no added chemicals to make it safe for consumption. Perhaps my great-grandfather knew about that spring before building the house and the well, but I will never know.
The four main rooms of the house comprised a dining room, a living room and two bedrooms. Early on the living room had a hall sectioned off from it that connected the dining room with the front door. In the beginning, my brother and I shared one bedroom and my parents had the other. The only heat in the house was the fireplace along with a gas space heater in the dining room. Kendall and I often dressed in front of that gas heater on cold mornings, teeth chattering against the chill from the rest of the house.
Across the driveway and a little further back from the road was a long low building that served as a garage. And then some. There were two typical garage doors for access in the middle of the building. At the near end was a storage room and at the far end was a more finished room. At the back of the storage room was a two-seater outhouse that was used until the bathroom was added to the house. My parents eventually tore it out to increase the area of the storage room. Until then we children used to imagine what it was like to have to run out there when one needed to go!
My great-grandfather had used that house for bootlegging, or cooking illegal liquor. Even in my childhood that reputation still echoed among the long-time residents of the area. I remember riding my bike home from town once. It was not unusual for the friendly folks of the nearby neighborhood to stop and ask to give a lift home. When that happened on this ride, I told the couple in the car that I was almost home and didn’t need a ride. “Where do you live?” they asked. When I pointed in the direction of my home they chuckled. “You live in the old Phipps place? That was famous in the day.” Ah, yes. More likely infamous.
The Studebaker
When we first moved to Rock Hall we had a Studebaker car. To me it was the most amazing car possible. No one else had one like it to my knowledge, so it HAD to be very, very special. I loved the way it came to a point in the front like a jutting nose. Plus the grill underneath made it look like it was smiling. Ours was gray, which I thought was acceptable, but I would have preferred shiny black or red. Even so, it was a STUDEBAKER! The word simply flowed off the tongue with elegance.
The very best part about that car was that it had four doors. To sit in the back seat, you only had to open your door and not climb in from one of the front doors. Who would have thought that cars could be so luxurious? And all the windows rolled down. I wan’t quite strong enough to roll down my own window easily, but Kendall was usually in the back seat to help me. I could manage it I put my mind to it.
It even had child safety clips to keep the back doors from flying open. These clips were on the outside and clipped the top of the door to the roof of the car. My parents usually operated these, but they were easy enough to access by rolling down the window and reaching up to clip or unclip them.
I remember coming home once from some outing. I always sat on the driver’s side of the back seat so I could hear better. That placed my deaf left ear toward the window. My good ear was facing the car and any conversation that others might be having. On this day, when we got home everyone was in a hurry to get into the house. I remember that Dad even stopped the car right by the back door instead of pulling over in front of the garage. No one took time to unclip my child safety device.
I decided that this lack of attention deserved some pouting on my part. There is nothing like a bit of contrite behavior at being ignored to make others feel guilty. So I huddled by myself in the car, sinking down in the seat, trying to look forlorn.
Some time passed and I realized that pouting wouldn’t bring anyone back out to the car to “let me out.” So I started wailing and caterwauling as my mother called it. That didn’t get the desired result either. I figured that with the windows of the car closed, they couldn’t hear me, so I put my muscles into it and got the window rolled down. I picked up the volume of my despair a notch or two. Still, no one came back out to the car to rescue me (and to feel guilty about leaving me alone in my distress).
It became evident that my plan was not going to work. With the window rolled down, I reached up and unlatched the safety clip. There wasn’t any acknowledgement when I went inside, either. I took off my coat and busied myself as the others were. Were they colluding to teach me a lesson? I will never know.
I learned something about guilt-tripping others that day. First, an audience for the performance is absolutely required. Secondly, those who are the targets, must be willing to be manipulated into that guilt. If no one accepts the guilt, then the effort is useless.
My mother was a master of manipulating us into doing things we weren’t totally behind. It never felt good to participate in those guilt trips. It took a long time to learn how to deflect those designs to use guilting for a desired result. I hope along the way I also learned not to use that strategy the way I tried to on that day in the Studebaker.