By Staff
Growing up with my neighbor, Eugene Biek from 1930 until 1942, who lived just across the street from me, many years ago, I wrote him this, which I titled "Following the Yellow Brick Road" but I don't know why.
In it, I tried testing my memory of our 12 years we shared. We don't get to see each other very much anymore, as he lives in California. Gene, I remember, do you?
Remember the softball work-up games in the vacant lot in back of your house and the touch football games on unpaved Orchard street? Our friend Dave Mosier could throw my rubber football darn near the full length of the the 500 block of Orchard, and the many nights after supper, how we played kick the can, hide and seek and so many other kid games?
We used to climb all over the buildings of Tices Welding Shop as we played cops and robbers. Lucky we didn't break a bone falling off the roof.
We also played ball and games in the big lot of the old Adams house. Old Mary Conklin and her chainless bicycle, now in the possession of my neighbor Vern Murphy.
Remember lawyer old Don "Deac" Reshore riding his bike to town with his pants leg rolled up so it wouldn't get caught in the chain?
Old Mr. Byers that lived across the street from you was Oral Barnes wife's father and he worked at the Tices Welding Shop.
Do you remember all the penny candy we used to buy at John and Ruth Watson's little neighborhood grocery on Front Street? Old John was always angry when we couldn't open the door to get in. And, next door to Watsons lived Billy Schurchert, who was the leader of the Round Oak Band. He always wanted me to learn to play the violin.
Bill and Marie Gillette lived on the corner of Orchard and Wayne. They had two boys, Billy and David. Billy was a bit slow. David went up high in education at the U of M, I think.
Just down the street from us lived Earl Anthony, who was our milkman. His son Howard started the Heath Company and he used to fly over our house to buzz his folks place. He was killed in a plane crash in Tennessee.
I remember you had a big drawer in the kitchen where you kept your toys. I remember your neat wind-up tractor caterpillar and we each had a cast-iron policeman motorcycle toy. Your grandma Stevens used to make a lot of baked apples and she peeled them on an old cast-iron antique peeler.
Your cousin John Stevens used to come and play and we played at his house on Penn Avenue. Gene and Eva Corwin were our neighbors and he was a barber.
Remember the miniature golf course on Orchard across the street from Judge Fields house? Bill and Mike Biek, your uncles, had a small factory upstairs on Penn Avenue and we used to get small scraps of balsa wood to work with. They once made a little wooden gun that shot burnt kitchen matches.
It was fun laying on your front room floor and hearing all those neat radio programs. We used to send away to get premiums for 10 cents and a boxtop of some cereals.
I recall having some of the original Superman and Batman comic books. We used to get used comic books for two cents at the Hatfield Drug Store.
We used to tease your sister Evelyn and her playmates when they were in her big playhouse in your back yard. We were never allowed in it, if I remember.
The old Crowel brothers on Wayne Street used to bake bread and sell it in the neighborhood.
We used to walk and pull our sled way up to the golf course to slide down the hill and over the bunkers. We also slid down the small hill at Larry Reshores house on Wayne.
Dale Lyons rented a room at Iva Russell's house across from ours. He worked at Rudys or at Premier Furnace. He later married Doris Stevens who also was our neighbor. Doris used to come to our house to play our old player piano.
We used to make rubber guns and had a lot of rubber gun fights.
Remember when your Uncle Lyle Stevens took us to Decatur to see Edger Bergan and Charlie McCarthy? Edgar was born in Decatur. Lyle used to pull us around the block behind his car with our sleds tied to his bumper, back in the 1930s.