Letters for Lewis

Postcards and letters from that era

When word went out from the Post Office about the letter, the town’s curiosity raised more than just an eyebrow.  

No one received actual letters in Lewis and Marie’s town.  Bills were natural and expected, but a true letter?  Postcards which were passed from hand to hand before reaching the addressed house were common.  

But a letter with a stamp and postmark?

The town women flocked to the post office, cackling all the way with speculation.

When Postman Harold Sims swung the bag over saddle back and then mounted, he turned to the brood.  “Y’all old hens go on about your business.  If’n I see one of yous, I’ll tattle to the preacher aboutcha.”  

Then Sims clicked to the horse who began the memorized mail route.

Grumbling and clucking, women dispersed to their own cozy coops.  We’ve never gotten a letter…Why’d they get a letter?...speculation lingered unanswered.

Marie swept dust off the porch, watched Minerva and Rosemary with a sense on contentment.  My children!  Our babies!  She placed a gentle hand on the rounding belly, anticipating a January birth.  It was a chilly November now with Lewis and other farmers bringing in the corn and bean crops.  A smile of joy lit her face.

Sims rode and stopped at her home, with Marie ambling to meet him. Her smile dropped like a bushel of rocks as he handed her the letter addressed to Lewis.  The postmark and two-cent stamp brought a shiver across her.  Minnesota?  October 30, 1927?  Lewis Cardiff?

Marie shushed the girls inside, with the letter in her deepest apron pocket.  What to do?  What to do?  Marie carried the letter and shoved it into an old shoe box way back in the closet.  I’ll think about it later.

Breakfasts, dinners, and supers passed over the kitchen table day after day.  January came, and with it a little girl.  Lewis attempted to hold back his disappointment about it not being a boy, but Marie knew with all her heart that the girl she held in her arms was another child who would not replace Bobbie.  They named her Irma after Marie’s best friend, loving the girl each day.

Marie Cardiff on the farm

In March during planting time, when Lewis would work sunrise to sunset, Hal Martin’s wagon from the train station drew up in front of the porch, with an unknown woman and her son descending.  Marie peered through her starched lace curtains as the two walked hand in hand to knock on the door.

Marie cautiously and slowly opened the door.

“Miz Cardiff?  My name is Norma Swenson and this here boy is my son Billy.  He’s only twelve, and a might shy.”  She shoved Billy forward where Marie could view him.  Brown hair…tall…and blue eyes just like Lewis…

Norma Swenson rambled on about Billy being Lewis Cardiff’s son and could Lewis take Billy for a bit as she was getting work down in St. Louis through the summer and---

Marie saw red, blood red as she grabbed her broom and batted the two off the porch, shouting words she didn’t think she knew.  “If you EVER come back, I will shoot you myself!  You and your bastard son.  You go to St. Louis and do what do best… lying on your back with your legs in the air!”

She hit them with all the force a strong woman could.  Hal Martin tipped his hat to Marie, whispering, “Them whores! They picked up soldiers like yer Lewis just as gold pieces back then. Don’t you worry about this’n.  You’re a good woman.  No one won’t hear a word about ‘er.”  Hal and his wagon of huffing lady and confused boy disappeared.

Lewis, on his way to The Front

Marie hurried to retrieve the shoe box and its hidden secret. And to read it, anger growing and creeping, until it reached her heart. 

When Lewis came in the kitchen the door, Marie shoved the letter into his face, shouting for him to read it, read it right now.  His face turned ashen white and then crimson as he read.  

All the stuttering excuses did not save him as Marie swatted him as if he were a blue bottle fly.  Lewis stumbled backwards, sprawling on the dusty ground.

Marie volleyed his dinner at his face.  Then she shut and locked the door.  Lewis would eat pig slop for the next week all the while wondering if there were any more bastards up north.  

What will I do?  What will Marie do? Those questions would linger for some time.

Going On, Going Forward

Marie and Lewis; Left to right Rose Mary, Irma (my mother), and Minerva
about 1928

Oh, Bobby!  My Bobby!

Those words were never spoken aloud, by Lewis and Marie Cardiff.  They knew if they did, they would never stop crying.  And all the parents in their small town, who had lost babies and children to diphtheria, would never stop either.  The streets would run with tears.

Minerva was a baby when Bobby died in 1922.  Marie hugged her tighter than a tick, afraid to let her go.  Lewis took her and rocked her through the late hours at night.

Another child was born in 1925, Rose Mary.  Marie and Lewis had silently prayed for a boy, but those words also were never spoken aloud.

Life on a farm is about life and living.  Crops were planted in spring, harvested in early fall.  Cows birthed calves, giving milk for them and the Cardiff family alike.  Horses, hogs, gardens:  all were life and living.  Going on, going forward.

Cars were now on the streets, “…dirty nasty things,” Marie Cardiff said some seventy years later.  Electric lines were appearing and some folks had phones.  Going on....

Lewis and Marie with last child,
Vada 1940

From his field south of the town, Lewis heard a sound, one that he prayed he would never hear again.  World War…bombs…planes…sounds that still froze his being.  

A plane wobbled from the south, its wings near to breaking off.  The nose dipped down and landed in Lewis Cardiff’s field.

Marie carried Rose and dragged Minerva to the field. What is that?  A plane? 

The entire town poured into the field and surrounded the plane.  They had never seen one, read about them, but now, here it was.  A plane in Lewis Cardiff’s field.

Robertson Aircraft Company lettered the side of the crumpled plane.  The nose was in the mud and the tail was up in the air.  One wing was punctured and the rudder was askew.

Next thing people knew, the pilot leaped out of the plane with Don Robertson, the owner’s son.  “I tol’ you this heap was a piece of shit, you knew it and I knew it.  You bastard!  Coulda killed us both!”  He stomped to the road and roared, “Where’s the goddam train!” 

In unison the silent townspeople pointed to the station a mile away, and the pilot stomped all the way there, raising his fist at the plane and shouting a variety of obscenities.  Some gasped, some roared with laughter, and the more holy ones smirked inwardly.

Mr. Robertson waited for a second train heading to St. Louis, Missouri, pulled into the station.  The tightly packed crowd moved with him, over one hundred souls.  Like yellow ducklings with their mama, they followed the poor man, who was wondering what the hell his pa would say when he heard about this.

A day later another plane circled the field, where the crumpled wreck sat.  The new plane chose to land in the Cardiff pasture next to the house.  A pale and defeated Don Robertson exited the plane, followed by the new pilot, Charles Lindbergh. 

His name whispered through the re-gathered town.  Daredevil Lindbergh? Air mail?  

early flying years

The town had foreseen that Don Robertson would drag his tail back to the damaged plane. En mass the ladies brought out boxes of fried chicken, pies, more fried chicken and more pies.  Tables were lugged by the men unwillingly straggling after them. The men also set a rusty table up around the crumpled plane. The tables would later be moved to the replacement plane.

Don Robertson and Chas. Lindbergh examined the plane wreck, determining that it was useless. 

Then Robertson shouted to Lewis Cardiff so that all could hear, “This here plane is simply broke.  But,” and he looked at the chicken-eating crowd, “We’re fixing it up.  And, there’d better be every last piece o’ metal and the like.”

Actually, a family reunion photo, but still
fried chicken and pie.

The silent pie eating group nodded in agreement.  Who would do such a thing?  Why, no one we know would do that.

It was determined that Robertson and Lindbergh would fly the plane from the pasture and head to St. Louis.  A mechanic from the company would join them, after Robertson had a meaningful talk with his pa.

When the three returned it was already dusk.  Marie hustled the three men into her house and made up the rooms for the night.  She handed Rose Mary to Don Robertson, a desperate looking Robertson, who seemed glad to hold an infant who would not say one single word to him.

Minerva climbed onto Lindbergh’s lap and played with his collar. 

The next morning while the mechanic worked on the broken plane, Lindbergh remained in the parlor, quietly reading magazines.  

Source

By mid-afternoon, the broken plane had been repaired and they all flew back in the two planes to St. Louis.  

Lewis, Marie, and their children were planting corn in the field, as they looked to the sky.  Lindbergh dipped down his wing to them.

After Lindbergh had flown across the Atlantic and was in Paris, he sent to the Cardiff family
a postcard with his photograph printed upon it.  They both read it many times. Well, then.  He made it.  Sure was a nice man.

Nearly seventy years later, Marie said this about Lindbergh:

“He was a quiet man, a gentleman.  Yet he talked about his childhood on a farm, and about his father, who was a Senator.  His mother was a teacher, he said.”

Somewhere in our family history, the postcard was stolen. Who would do such a thing?  Why, no one we know would do that.

For Lewis and Marie, life and living is about going on, going forward.

Hell Freezes Over

Oh, how we loved you!

February removes any doubt some may have about the beauty of snowfall and ice-covered bare branches.  White pure white snow from December had disappeared with Santa, as did the joy of making snow angels. Now white snow was a brown slush that froze at night and then became cold slush in the morning.

We sat on the back steps with cold butts and red noses because Mom had had enough of us.  She threw us out the door and told us stay out here until I let you come in. We understood why.  We had had ‘flu for a week and puked and puked and puked some more.  When we finally stopped puking, we started fightin’ and racin’ around the house, screamin’ and laughin’.

That was when the back door opened, and Mom tossed us out. So, there we sat with ice covering our sockless shoes, since Mom didn’t give us enough time to put socks on. Mitten less fingers and frozen butts, we were in a world of misery.    We were lucky enough to have coats on.

Robert said, “We’re gonna die, ‘cause I heard Mom tell Dad that she could not. stand. us. anymore.” I nodded solidly, mouth turned down and an icy tear or two on my cheeks. I had heard the same words.

That was when we saw wisps of smoke rising from the garden. Smoke rose and then disappeared. Surely it had frozen in mid-flight.  We saw our salvation there, right there!

Mom had burned trash that day out in the garden.  Everyone burned trash in their frozen gardens.  During summer the gardens were sacred grounds, ‘cause no one, not no one went into a neighbors’ gardens. 

Moms would stand on edges and chat about tomatoes and green beans, pointing out plants. Then they talked about other neighbors and husbands, who was doing what and where they were going and what they were wearing.  We never stuck around but we did not ever step foot in the gardens. 

But today, we were gonna step foot in the garden. Yup.  That’s what we were doin’. We would not die.

A garden in winter was a bunch of twisted brown plants stuck in their own hell of frozen ground. There were frozen tomatoes hanging onto those vines, tassels of corn and twisted plants that died back in November but wouldn’t give up. But there in the garden were the embers of burning trash. We were saved. Thank you, Jesus, we were saved! We wouldn't freeze to death.

Squatting down close to the smoking blackness dotted with glowing embers, we saw in the center of it all, a treasure: Monkey Ward Christmas Catalog.  The stuff of dreams fulfilled, and dreams not fulfilled, the Monkey Ward was there in among the embers.

Burning that catalog is sacrilege to any child, for each page held the magic of a child’s dreams, hopes that someday those toys would leap from the page and find a way to be in their hands.  But there it lay in smoke and glowing sparks with all its promises. 

With a rusted and burnt coat hanger, Robert snagged it and pulled it to our feet.  Oh, to live and hope again for those treasures! We flipped through the gift-laden pages, gasping in delight and joy. This, this one!! See! Oh, there’s one like Santa gave you!  Page after page, quickly then even more so, we fanned those pages giggling.  All our wishes, maybe for another Christmas!

Then, disaster turned Catalog from sparkling embers to a full fire.  Jesus! Help us!

We did what any four- and five-year child would do. Robert used the coat hanger to flip the fiery catalog out away from us, into the brown garden.

Glowing then flaming, it landed smack dab in the middle of the sacred ground, bursting and sending flames.  Fire crawled up the tomato vines toward the round red globes. They exploded, yup, they exploded! Red goo burst and splattered! We jumped and laughed, so glorious, so spectacular!

The fire became a snake, a red snake that curled around green beans. It grasped the corn stalks and wormed its way up to the tassels where they were fourth-of-July fireworks!  We watched with joy, and then it became horror. The fire was embedded in the center and was working its ways to the edges.

Screaming. That’s what we did. Lots of screaming.  What? Where? We are in biiiig trouble!

Robert was an expert in big trouble, he knew it well, being a five-year-old. But, me? What did I, a four-year-old, know about big trouble? He took off to the garage with me in tow. Robert scurried to a place he knew well, the work bench. There was a hole he had made over time, one that could be hidden by buckets and paint cans.  He scooted over just enough for a little girl with a skinny butt just big enough to fit. Our butts were now warm, but the rest of us shivered in fear.

The fire engine siren rang, at first blocks away and then in the garden.  Voices, we heard shouting and more shouting.

Over there, it started over there…Hey, hey…cut the stalks down…bastards, don’t you see that…water, we need more water…grab the hose by the porch…WATCH…it’s heading to the propane tank…dammit! Didn’t hear what I said...That man’s shed, hose it down…Grab that…

The neighbors were there. Every person in the whole town was there.  Some brought buckets and filled from their own houses.  One to another, one to another, they threw water onto the spots that still burned.

We peered through a hole under the work bench. Even Grandma was there with Mom, both watching the fire as it was extinguished. Grandma had that kind of clenched mouth look that meant she was, well, she was, I don’t know what.  But Mom? Mom looked scared, even though her fists were clenched.

One of the men held up the remaining pieces of Monkey Ward catalog and showed it to Mom, who immediately saw what had happened. Her face crumpled with tears. Where are they?  Has anyone see Robert and Susie? 

Neighbors scattered, each heading to places they knew where we would, could be. We were never shy about invading our neighbors’ yards, garages, outhouses, their back porches, bushes, trees, even churches.  Nothing was holy, nothing was sacred, nothing was just theirs. After all, this town had been our kingdom

They called our names, shouted out our names, screamed out our names.

I rested my forehead on my knees and started weeping.  Robert cried in hiccups. We had no where to go, to hide. We’re gonna have t’ leave forever.  

Robert nodded. We can catch the train when it goes through town. They  were kinda slow, and we can jump on one and hide.  I nodded.  But we both knew we were doomed.

Dad’s truck rumbled, we heard the door slam and wrapped his big arms around Mom.  The blackened catalog crumbled into his hands, and he knew immediately what had happened.

That half smile he had when he wasn’t exactly mad showed on his mouth. Robert always hid in that same spot, so Dad walked straight to the garage, pulled the barrier apart, then pulled us out. He scooped us up and carried us to Mom.

I don’t remember much after that.  One moment we were in the kitchen, the next in the tub, and then Grandma was toweling us dry.  We ate hot dogs and corn, and then were in bed. We were worn to a rag.

I heard Dad reminding Grandma about some of his stupid adventures.

Grandma harrumphed and Dad hawed.  Mom said some words we never heard her say before.

Doing something so magnificent is exhausting.