The Lower Rio Grande Valley, to which we were moving, was billed as
“Texas’ fourth largest city” by
radio station KRGV, a claim Fort Worth
disputed (because the Valley was a collection of towns, not a single
city). The population of the Valley, was, I suppose, slightly
greater than that of Fort Worth. The
stated population of La Feria, our Valley destination, was 1594, about the same
as that of Granbury.
Ruth and Virgil transported Mother, Twila, and me, together with our
household belongings (with the exception of furniture), from Acton to La Feria using Goforth & Grammer’s Chevrolet pickup. We stretched a tarpaulin over the cab-height
sideboards to protect the load, which filled most of the truck bed; two of us
rode in the remaining space at the back (about two feet), with the tarp
flapping in our faces. I rode in back
the whole five hundred miles; Twila and Virgil alternated between cab and truck
bed.
We left Acton early one morning a few days before the 1937/38
school-year started; stopping only for food, gasoline, and restroom breaks, we
still didn’t reach La Feria until after dark.
La Feria is almost due south of Acton, so we traveled southward all day
until we hit the Valley’s “main drag” at the intersection of US highways 281
and 83, where we turned eastward, causing us to enter La Feria from the
west. Riding in the back of the pickup
bed in the early evening darkness, I wasn’t aware of the left turn at that
intersection, so I thought we entered La Feria from the north; as a consequence,
I was “turned around” all five years we lived
in the Valley; my internal compass was ninety degrees off.
[My first visit
to Little Rock many years later caused a similar problem. I flew into Adams Field and was taken to a
downtown hotel, during which drive I could see the state capitol building at
the west end of Capitol Avenue; I assumed, wrongly, that Capitol ran north and
south, as Congress Avenue does in Austin, so was again “turned around.” I soon learned the true directions, but my
internal compass had already been fouled up; several years passed (during whose
passage I had moved to Little Rock) before I became reasonably comfortable with
directions in that city.]
Ruth and Virgil stayed several days after “delivering” us to the Valley;
together we explored our “new world.”
We went to Brownsville, saw the Gulf of Mexico for the first time,
crossed the Rio Grande River to Matamoros (where outdoor markets with fresh meats hanging in open air amazed
us), and were awed by citrus orchards and truck farms stretching mile upon mile
along Valley highways. Oranges grew in
many yards, including that of the house into which we moved; that first fall we
ate all the oranges from a back-yard tree before they fully ripened.
Our first apartment was the lower west unit of a north-facing
“quadruplex” on Primrose, about a half-block west of Main Street. After a few months we moved to the east side
of a south-facing duplex about four blocks east of Main, just west of the
Hargrove Hotel. Our next-door neighbor
at both places was the Wohlford family (Gilbert/Freddie/Derrell), another
family from Acton. Mr. Wohlford, a plumber, plied his
trade in the Valley for less than a year, then returned to North Texas, where
he ultimately went to work for Convair-Fort Worth (I talked with him a time or
two years later, in the mid-‘50s, when I worked for Convair).
We vacated the second apartment soon after school was out, spent most
of the summer in Hood County, then went back to La Feria before the 1938/39
school-year started and rented yet another apartment, this time on Main Street,
right at downtown.
I don’t
recall the street addresses of any of the La Feria apartments in which we lived;
our mailing address was P.O. Box 594, so street addresses weren’t imprinted on
my memory.
We lived on Main Street the last four of our five “Valley”
years, in the upper south unit of a west-facing two-story structure in the
first block south of the business district; our landlords, Mr. and Mrs. R.E.
Anderson (Bob and Vivian), lived on the first floor, which also housed Mrs.
Anderson’s beauty shop. Two other
houses and a vacant lot occupied our side of the block; Post’s Grocery occupied
the building at the center of the west side of our block, with the Doctors Lamm
office/residence to the north and Coach C.E. Vail’s residence to the south.
Both Lamm parents
were physicians; she was the first lady doctor I’d known. We never utilized their services; Mother
used Doctor Schley when her appendix was removed at Valley Baptist Hospital in
Harlingen. Twila says the Lamms didn’t
have their licenses to practice medicine until later.
Our living quarters were sometimes invaded by mice, which my mother hated –
yea, feared – and couldn’t rest easy after seeing a mouse until my dad
successfully trapped and disposed of it.
One winter she sighted several in a relatively short period, and grew
quite edgy. I took advantage of that
edginess one Sunday evening after we returned home from church; I
surreptitiously rolled a gray jack ball across the living room floor and
exclaimed, “There’s a mouse!” Mother
yelped and both her feet came off the floor and went under her on the couch –
while the rest of us had a big laugh.
My dad’s reentry into his chosen vocation produced a weekly payday (as
contrasted to seasonal incomes from his share of sales of agricultural products
grown on Papa Grammer’s farm at Acton), and was more remunerative cumulatively
than farming.
As a consequence of greater family prosperity, Twila and I at some
point were granted allowances, which ultimately reached
fifty cents weekly. After putting aside
my nickel tithe for church, I had forty-five cents to handle as I chose. Still careful financially, I seldom spent my
entire allowance, but I regularly enjoyed things previously experienced only
sporadically, if at all:
·
I discovered hitherto unknown frozen delicacies (Eskimo
pies/fudgsicles/ice cream sandwiches/popsicles). My previous experience with frozen creamery products had been limited
to an occasional “plain” (i.e., vanilla) ice cream cone at a Granbury drug
store.
·
A candy table at school presented daily temptations. Two decisions were necessary – first, to
spend a nickel, then, which goody to choose.
My favorites were (1) Hershey milk chocolate and (2) Payday bars.
·
Chewing gum options included Gold Tip, which came in ten-stick
boxes, and cost a nickle per box, just as did Wrigley five-stick and Dentyne
six-stick packs; I liked Gold Tip as well as Wrigley and Dentyne, and
appreciated the lesser cost per chew.
The color of a Gold Tip box indicated the flavor of the gum inside
(e.g., brown boxes contained cinnamon-flavored gum).
·
Some bottled soft drinks (e.g., RC and Pepsi) came in
twelve ounce bottles. I learned to
enhance a cola’s “kick” by punching a hole in the bottle cap (with an ice
pick), shaking the bottle vigorously while holding a thumb over the hole, then
releasing the resultant “fizzy” into my mouth.
An option, if I happened to be in a free-spending mode and willing to
part with a dime instead of just a nickel, was to purchase a package of salted
peanuts to go with the drink, open the bottle, pour the peanuts in, then enjoy
the mixed tastes; salt also produced “fizzing,” an added bonus.
Soft drinks
were well-advertised on radio, often by musical jungles (e.g., “Pepsi Cola hits the spot/Twelve full ounces, that’s a lot/Twice as much for a
nickel, too/Pepsi Cola is the drink for you”).
That I lived in town, short blocks from commercial enterprises, was
vastly different from living on the farm at Acton, where stores were a mile
away. Temptations to spend were close
and plentiful in La Feria; my willpower was tested daily.
I could even see a movie any time I desired (subject, of course, to
parental permission); the Bijou Theater was only a few blocks from our
apartment. I didn’t go regularly, but
the option was always there, in contrast with our previous situation at Acton,
where the nearest theater was six miles from home.
◊◊◊
My allowance was supplemented, as I grew older and larger, by income
from mowing (1) the yard around our quadruplex on Main Street, (2) the yard
around the house just north of us, and (3) our pastor’s yard and its adjoining
vacant lot, using their push-type reel mowers.
I don’t remember what Mr. Anderson paid me for mowing the yard around
our apartment building, or what I received for doing the small yard next door;
Brother Amerine paid me fifty cents for mowing the parsonage yard and its
adjoining lot.
◊◊◊
My parents were careful financial stewards. Although they bought quality products, they
never splurged, and, to the best of my knowledge, paid cash for everything they
purchased. (In later years they bought
homes in Fort Worth and McAllen, signing mortgages and making monthly payments,
but, insofar as I know, paid cash for everything else.)
Their stewardship included the Lord’s work. Each Sunday they placed a tenth of my dad’s pay in the offering
at church. Their contributions went
beyond the tithe; they contributed
generously toward annual offerings for state, U.S., and foreign missions.
My dad was
asked to work on a rush job one Sunday some weeks after we moved to the Valley,
but because he felt uncomfortable having money earned on the Lord’s Day, he
sent his pay for that day ($10, for eight hours at $1.25/hour) to Brother
Leland Turner, who by then had moved from Acton to the pastorate of a Graham
church.
I
noticed my parents’ stewardship and careful financial management. I can’t claim to have never been in debt for
anything except home mortgages, but I’ve never been heavily in debt, and
subsequent to the 1964 purchase of my present home, have never incurred any
debt I couldn’t pay off on demand. I’m
also convinced that tithing one’s gross income is the best money one can
spend/invest; you can’t take it with you, but you can send it on
ahead.
[The
last check my dad wrote, shortly before his death in January, 1985, was a $500
contribution to the Southern Baptist Lottie Moon Christmas offering for foreign
missions. That action typified his
priorities.]
Most La Feria kids owned bicycles; many rode them to
school. None of my Acton friends had
owned a bicycle, so I hadn’t thought to want one for myself. That quickly changed; I was fascinated by
the very tracks of bikes on La Feria’s dusty trails.
My parents bought second-hand bicycles for Twila and me as our 1937
Christmas gifts; I thought I had arrived.
Those bikes took us all over La Feria and for miles around; some
Saturday mornings we rode eight or ten miles along back roads around citrus
orchards, usually accompanied by Delta Mae and Leonard Ray Shirley.
[My riding
ended when World War II rubber shortages made tire replacements impossible to
obtain; my bike’s rear tire developed a huge fissure as it grew old and worn; I
managed to keep wheels under me for a while by wrapping friction tape around
the tire and rim, but I was soon afoot.]
Flat tires, usually caused by goatheads, were common occurrences. Goatheads grew on runners from ground-hugging weeds that were easy to run
over; their points were as sharp as tacks, and had the same effects on tires
and tubes.
The
ubiquitous goatheads also threatened bare feet; one wanted to be careful where
he stepped. The pain from treading on a
goathead was much like that incurred by stepping on a roofing nail.
“Fixing” a flat front tire wasn’t difficult. The wheel was easy to remove and replace; one only had to make
sure the bearing cones weren’t too tight or too loose. Removing and replacing the rear wheel was
more of a pain; one had to release the coaster brake arm during dismantling, then after the flat was repaired, wheel
replacement involved proper tightening of the chain and brake arm reattachment.
My bike had a New Departure rear wheel coaster brake; others had Morrow
brakes. Leonard Ray Shirley’s
Schwinn bike had a drum-type front wheel brake in addition to the Morrow rear
wheel brake. I saw no three-, five-, or
ten-speed bicycles; even expensive bikes, such as the Schwinns ridden by
Leonard Ray and his sister, Delta Mae, were single-speed.
Delta Mae
often scraped the toes of her shoes on the pavement as she coasted along on her
bike. When I asked her why she drug her
toes; she said she was tired of that pair of shoes, and she could have new
shoes if she wore out the pair she was wearing.
I was happy to own a bicycle, but must admit I was impressed by (if not
envious of) Jim Noblett’s sleek Indian motorcycle as he sped along Main
Street several times each day. (Jim
still lives in La Feria, but I doubt if he rides motorcycles these days.)