BILL AND EFFIE ENGER, CONTINUED

In my last blog “Happy Days Were Here Again” in Worthington, Minnesota.  World War II was finally over and our boys were coming home! At least some of them did, and thank God the Enger boys were among them.  In a telegram to Bill and Effie from son Billie, dated Sept. 26, 1945: “Dear Folks, Expect to dock in New York about the first of the month. Am working in the Orderly Room again and am busier than a cat with fourteen kittens. Don’t write any more.  Love, Billie.”  As usual, a man of few words, but that was all he needed to say—he was coming home!

Gale, on the other hand, sent a more wordy missal, in the form of a letter postmarked January 3, 1946 at Camp McCoy, Wisconsin.  He had come back from overseas after VE Day and VJ Day and was biding his time at Camp McCoy, Wisconsin to serve out the remainder of his term.  He wrote: 
“This morning I sent out a duffel bag crammed full of stuff that I’ve picked up around here.--Things look pretty good for an early discharge now. Maybe even by the 15^th of the month. That’s a pretty optimistic point of view, but it could really happen.”  (In actuality Gale’s official separation date was January 26, 1946.)

(Note to the younger generation:  V-E Day stands for Victory in Europe Day, and V-J Day stands for Victory over Japan Day. After the German surrender a treaty was signed in Reims, France on May 7, 1945 and President Harry S Truman declared May 8 as V-E Day, the end of World War II in Europe.  However the war did not officially end until the surrender of Japan on August 14, 1945.  Japan signed the terms of surrender September 2, 1945 on the battleship USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, and that date was designated as VJ Day.)

While the Enger sons were away Bill Enger the father had taken the plunge to start his own lumber yard.  The younger Albinson brothers had taken over Albinson Lumber Co. from their half brother Clarence Albinson so Bill’s services were no longer needed.   Bill, Effie, Hope and Nonie had spent the winter of 1943 in Crookston, MN where Bill was operating saw mills in the area but that was not a good life for the family.  By 1945 Bill’s innate entrepreneurial spirit kicked in and he decided to take the gutsy plunge to open his own lumber yard in competition with Albinson—Enger Lumber Co. was born at Oxford Street and Smith Avenue. Somehow Bill was able to finagle a load of lumber on credit, and he started selling the boards right off the vacant lot.

It was an opportune time for this kind of venture.  Thousands of young service men were streaming back from overseas, getting married, and starting families, and the Number One need would be for housing!  Bill was there to get in on the ground floor of this post war boom and he jumped in with both feet.  He sold the house on Smith Avenue and bought an old dilapidated house right across the highway from the lumber yard where Oxford. and Smith Avenue met. 

The first lumber pile and the first office of Enger Lumber Company, Worthington, Minnesota.

The  new lumber shed was under construction in the background.

The first lumber yard office was a small square shed surrounded by piles of lumber. Soon a larger lumber shed was added to keep the boards under cover, and Enger Lumber Co. was off and running.  Now that Billie and Gale were home Bill wanted to bring them into the business, but Billie still had unfinished business in Redwood Falls. He went back to his pre-war job at the auto parts store, and back to his former church, the North Redwood Evangelical where Oscar Monson had been the Pastor when he left for the service and had recently moved to Rochester, Minnesota.

Rev. Monson had kept in touch with Billie during the war years, and Billie faithfully tithed to the church all the time he was in the Army.  His letters home would often contain instructions such as: “Today we got paid for Feb. and March; I received $103.00 and bought an application for a Money Order blank for $100.00 which I will send to you as soon as I get it.  If I have any money at home now, I would appreciate it if you would give $10.30 to Monson (at Redwood) or Heitke (at Worthington church) for my tithe.”

But one thing had changed while Billie was away.  During the three and a half years he was overseas the preacher’s daughter Ruthie Monson—just a kid of 16 when he left—had grown into a lovely young woman and romance soon blossomed!  Ruth had attended Western Union College in LeMars, Iowa to become a teacher and was teaching in a country school.  William J. Enger and Ruth Naomi Monson were married on August 22, 1946 at the North  Redwood church where they had met, with her father, Rev. Oscar Monson, presiding.

August 22. 1946 in North Redwood, Minnesota

Ruth Naomi Monson married William John Enger.

Sister Hope had been married eight months earlier, January 1946, to Durward “Dude” Reyman of Valley Center, Kansas.  He was a first cousin of Aunt Vivian’s husband Clarence Erbes, and Hope saw a picture of him in uniform when she visited Clarence’s parents, Carl and Lizzie Erbes, in Round Lake, Minnesota.  There was a big campaign on during the war urging people on the home front to “write to our service men overseas,” so Lizzie suggested to Hope that she should write to Dude.  Hope did, Dude answered, and before long the letters turned from “How are you” to “I love you!”  Much to Effie’s consternation Hope and Dude decided they were engaged to be married without ever meeting in person.  A mother’s nightmare!

January 19, 1946, Evangelical Church, Worthington, Minnesota

Hope Carol Enger married Durward Lee Reyman

After the letters had gone back and forth for a while Swede was on leave and wanted to come and see Hope.  Even though I was just five years old, I still remember the scene, it went something like this:  The phone rang and my Mom answered:  “Mrs. Enger, this is Durward Reyman and I would like to come and visit your daughter.”  Effie:  “I just don’t think that would be a good idea, please don’t come!”  Hope:  (Lying on the bed sobbing as though her heart were broken): “But I love him!”  Effie: “How can you love a man you’ve never met?  You don’t have any idea what he is like!”  After being rejected by Effie, Dude talked to his Mom in Valley Center, Kansas and she gave him some sage advice:  “If you love her you’d better go after her!”  He did, and the rest is history. When Dude (by then known as Swede) passed away from cancer in 2009 he and Hope Enger Reyman had celebrated 64 years of marriage, had raised four boys together, and were blessed with a big, wonderful family of grandchildren and great-grandchildren!

Gale Edward Enger and Cecelia Marian Roberts were October 31, 1947

in Worthington with brother Bill and  Ruth as attendants

Gale was the last holdout in the marriage department, but after coming home from the Army, he met a Worthington girl, Cecelia “Cece” Roberts.  On October 31, 1947—also known as Halloween—they were married at the Emmanuel Evangelical Church in Worthington.  As of this writing and after many adventures they are now living in retirement in Poteau, Oklahoma.  Last October they celebrated their 64^th wedding anniversary.  They have two sons, four grandchildren, and several greats.

Enger Lumber Company in Worthington,Minnesota, Circa 1950

As the three older Enger kids were being married off one by one, Bill Enger was prospering in the lumber business.  Gale had joined the firm and was drawing the blueprints for houses and in 1950 Billy and Ruth moved from North Redwood to Worthington with one-year-old Timothy and a second baby on the way, who turned out to be Thomas Richard.  Billy went to work at the Enger Lumber Co. and both the boys built houses in the new Sunset Addition to Worthington just off  Diagonal Road.  . Aunt Vivian’s husband, Clarence Erbes, also came to work in the lumber yard and built a home on MacMillan Street where they lived with son Steve, born January 21, 1947, and Grandma Hannah Enger.

Bill and Effie eventually remodeled the old house on Oxford Street and made it into quite a showplace.  The old front porch was torn off and a large living room was added across the entire front.  The former living room became a large dining room, and a room next to the dining room became my bedroom 

A variety of wood paneling, apropos to the lumber business, were featured throughout the home— birds-eye maple in the living room, red cedar above the fireplace. etched-wood paneling in the dining room which was painted and then wiped so the etched grooves were accented with color.  My bedroom was knotty pine with built in wardrobe, desk and dressing table and a private ½ bath with blue fixtures. Quite a novelty for that time!  The kitchen was wainscoted in tile with leatherette paneling above. The master bedroom was paneled in mahogany.  Bill and Effie made several trips to Daytons in Minneapolis to choose the furnishings which included wall to wall carpeting, custom made sectional couch and matching draperies in “dusty rose”.  A huge enclosed porch with concrete floor was added across the back at ground level along with an attached double garage.  Only the old attic with small guest bedroom and the basement were left pretty much as is.

Emmanuel Evangelical United Brethren Church in Worthington, now United Methodist

Times were good— Effie was in seventh heaven and Worthington was her Eden.  She loved her newly remodeled home, and her involvement in the Evangelical United Brethren Church where Grandma Hannah, Vivian and Clarence and the Doedens also attended.  Effie was a Sunday School teacher and an active member of the Ladies’ Aid..  I can remember wonderful Sunday dinners after church with Aunt Hazel and Uncle Herman at the Doeden farm, where the women visited, Aunt Hazel cooked on the wood stove, the men argued about politics and I played with my cousin Janet who was just a year older.

To make life even better the grandchildren began arriving for Bill and Effie!  Gale and Cece produced the first grandson, Alan William, in 1948, and three months later Hope and Dude’s first son, Durward Lee Reyman, Jr. was born.  The next year, 1949, Gale and Cece had Larry John in February, followed soon after by Billie and Ruth’s first son, Timothy John.  One year later in 1950 Thomas Richard was born in February to Billie and Ruth, and Hope and Dude followed in May with William Craig Reyman and on Valentine’s Day in 1952 there was James Mark Reyman, born shortly after Hope and Dude had moved to Linch, Wyoming.  After seven boys in a row and no girls, Bill offered a $100 prize for the first girl (which didn’t happen until several years later).

Bill’s entrepreneurial spirit was in full force during those years as it had been throughout his life.  He joined Frank LaPachek in a partnership to build the Shady Lane Cabin Court on property which was an old apple orchard next to the lumber yard.  It featured an office building and a dozen or so individual log-sided cabins and later six motel-style units were added.  The Enger and LaPachek partnership also purchased a small acreage with large trees outside of town for future development, called Whispering Pines, but that project never happened.  Bill even started a branch lumber yard down the road in Jackson.

Shady Lane Log Cabin Court

, Worthington, Minnesota

Bill was into horses, too.  He had a big, beautiful riding horse named Blaze and joined the Saddle Club. I got a little black Shetland pony named Black Beauty, complete with red saddle, bridle and martingale.  I can also remember a horse named Betty and finally, a spirited half-Arab called Stormy Weather. The horses were kept at the horse barns at the fairground which was a short distance from our house.

Bill on Blaze

Bill, always a farmer at heart, in 1950 invested in a farm 250 miles north of Worthington at Mora, Minnesota which started out to be a “gentleman farmer” project.  He sent one of his lumber yard employees up there to live year around as the hired man in the “big house” and oversee the farm and the animals.  The plan, as I knew it, was that we would go there for vacation times in the summer and stay in the “little house.”  That was a lot of fun for me because I usually got to take a friend with me, and since it was summer we could spend our days catching frogs in the pond, playing with the kittens in the barn and experiencing farm life without having to do the work!

But little did I know that this idyllic life of ours was about to take a sinister turn!  In October of 1952 Bill was on a quick trip to Mora checking on the farm and Effie and the daughters-in-law had spent that Sunday afternoon cleaning the lumber yard office from top to bottom.  All at once in the early evening the sound of a fire alarm pierced the air and soon the sirens became louder and louder.  I quickly learned that the Enger Lumber Co. office and main lumber shed were on fire, and what a conflagration that turned out to be! 

I ran to the corner where a crowd was already gathering across the street from the fire, and I was horrified to see people standing around watching, casually talking and laughing as the flames grew more and more spectacular.  Why wasn’t everyone else as upset as I was?  I stood there sobbing and then finally ran away to hide and cry my eyes out.  Paint cans exploding inside the building sounded like bombs going off and the wood in the lumber shed crackled like a huge bonfire!  Billie and Clarence heard the news and rushed over to try to get inside to save what they could, including a brand new lumber truck in the shed, but they were stopped by the firemen.  All they could do was stand there and watch along with everyone else.

When the fire was finally out the office and the lumber shed were virtually destroyed.  When my Dad arrived home I thought that he would start making plans to rebuild as soon as possible.  But I was dead wrong!  After the dust settled my father announced to me, and I assume he had already told my mother, that he had decided to sell the lumber yard property and move all of us to the farm in Mora. 

“NO!!!  I’M NOT GOING!!” was my immediate reaction.  How could my father even think about taking me away from Worthington where I had been born and lived all my life, where all my friends were, my beloved Grandma, aunts, uncles and cousins and our beautiful home!  The old farmhouse in Mora didn’t even have an indoor bathroom!  In my mind my father—William D. Enger—instantly became the meanest man on Earth!

It took a while after that to clean up the lumber yard details and make all the arrangements for the move but true to his word, one year later in October of 1953, Dad, Mom and devastated Me were headed for Mora, Minnesota with all of our worldly belongings.  Looking back I am sure that my Mother was as unhappy as I was, but she went about the process as her usual stoic self.  Whatever Bill wanted to do, that’s what they did and that’s the way it was—always!

Aerial view of the Mora farm in it’s heyday, circa 1960

The farm that I had loved in the summer time now looked old, and dark, and dreary.  I won’t even go into the indignities I suffered by having to use the outhouse that first winter after I was used to my own private bathroom;--and how do you think I felt at age 13 to walk into a brand-new eighth grade class that had already been together for two months and not know even one soul.  Of course everybody stared!

But Mora was a small farming community, and the school was small compared to Worthington.  Most of the kids lived on farms too, and it didn’t take long to make friends, both girls and boys!  Before that first school year was over I had to admit to my parents that I actually liked it there.  It helped that after the spring thaw we were able to install a septic system and a former nursery room on the upper level was converted into a large INDOOR bathroom!

The Enger farm house in Mora, Minnesota

The farmhouse was huge and had been built before 1900, but it had been constructed in the old hand-crafted style, and with a little sprucing up it was actually a beautiful house.  It had dark woodwork and hardwood flooring throughout which was restored to its original beauty   Mom painted all the rooms, which included a big eat-in kitchen, dining room with sitting area (which later became our TV room), a parlor which was hardly ever used, and an office/bedroom on the main floor. Upstairs there were four large bedrooms, the nursery/bathroom, and another steep stairway up to an unfinished attic for the keeping of treasures.  A full cellar underneath housed a huge coal and wood furnace. There was an open porch with columns outside the parlor door, a screened porch facing the road, and a closed-in porch which opened into the kitchen.

My Dad, as usual, jumped into farming with a vengeance.  Before long a brand new milk and hay barn with siloes  was under construction, an old log barn had been torn down and replaced with a new hog house, and since Gale and Billy were moving their families up to join the farming operation, the “little house” was remodeled and two bedrooms added for Gale, Cece and boys. Another farm with a very old house was acquired just down the road where Billie, Ruth and kids would live.  The farming operation was incorporated into “Engco Farms” and was truly diversified, with an award winning dairy herd, sheep, hogs, some beef cows, chickens, and crops such as oats, alfalfa and corn.  Of course all of this activity required lots of labor and my Dad, being a workaholic, was in his glory.  He could sit all day on a tractor and watch the soil turning over behind the plow,which he always said was the most beautiful sight on earth.

Effie, on the other hand, went into kind of a “retreat mode” on the farm.  She didn’t drive so she quit going to church; she and Cece joined the Leisure Hour club in the neighborhood, but she mostly worked at home.  In addition to taking care of the big house, she and Cece were given the added chore of washing milking machines every day, and at harvest time literally “cooking for threshers.”  My belief is that Effie always yearned for her Worthington life but she never complained.

Billy and Gale were not as enamored with farming as was their father.  If you ask Gale even today about his years on the farm he will tell you, “I never want to see a black and white cow again as long as I live!”  When you have a dairy herd, they have to be milked twice a day, seven days a week, 52 weeks a year, and there is no such thing as a day off!  Billy had a herd of milk cows at his farm, and he was expected to do his own work and also work at the “big” farm.  Bill bought another small farm with a lake he called the Cook Farm, and they leased more farming land from the airport, where Gale also started a flying school in his “spare” time. 

I was oblivious to the problems and conflicts that were going on behind the scenes as I was too busy being a teenager, but I later learned that my Mom often took the role of “peacemaker” between Dad and the boys.  Dad didn’t understand Billy’s quiet and easy-going ways, and he and Gale were too much alike in temperament.  Still, at its peak, the Enger farm was a real showplace in Mora and always on the list for one of the top dairy producers.

Dianne Enger at age 15 and a Junior at Mora High

By the time I was 15 years old I believe my middle-aged parents (age 55) were overwhelmed by dealing with a teenager and I pretty much was allowed to do my own thing. I started dating at age 14 and had several boyfriends but nothing serious, until around Christmas time of my sophomore year, I fell head over heels in “love” with a boy two years older and a grade ahead. His name was LeRoy “Roy” Gries, the “tough-guy-leather-jacket” type, a football player, and as handsome as all get out!  He came from a family of six boys and two girls, and he and his brothers had the nickname all through school as “the fighting Gries’s.”  My biology teacher. Miss Rasmussen, warned me several times to stay away from “his type” as it would only lead to trouble, but of course that is exactly the type I wanted!  To make it brief, a year after we started “going steady” we eloped during Christmas vacation in 1955—me just barely 16 and he 18—but that is another story for another time.  The next summer in June of 1956 Roy and I moved to Linch, Wyoming where Hope and Dude were living, and Roy was hired on by Conoco Oil Company, so my parents were finally empty nesters at 56 years of age!

That’s all for now, but this is far from the end of the story.  Stay tuned for the hardest and final chapter in the Bill and Effie Saga, coming soon!
 

BILL AND EFFIE ENGER—FROM THE GREAT DEPRESSION TO THE WAR YEARS

The Good Life in Kindred, ND

Billy, Hope and Gale

In the previous blog, Bill and Effie Enger—aka My Parents—were happily settled in Kindred, North Dakota with their three children, William John (Billy), born in Bottineau, ND in 1921, Gale Edward, born March 3, 1925 and Hope Carol, born July 18, 1926, both in Kindred.

Bill was employed by the Adams Lumber Yard and joined the Sons of Norway Lodge.  Effie was involved in church and in taking care of the family.  That’s the way it was done back then for the most part—the men went to work and the women raised the kids.

The Enger family made many good friends in Kindred—Joe and Helga Owen, the Thompsons, Hansons, and Olsons, to name a few—and life was good.  Relatives lived close by also, including Bill’s great uncle Palmer Enger and his large family in Davenport.  Forever after my parents talked often and with fondness about the Kindred years. 

But the good times were not to last.  In 1929 the bottom fell out of the United States economy, the stock market crashed, and the Great Depression was thrust upon the entire country.  Banks failed, people were forced to stand in soup lines, and stock brokers were jumping to their deaths.  Of course the lumber business was greatly impacted by this chain of events, as people without jobs and struggling to feed their families were not building houses, so as the Depression wore on Bill eventually found himself among the unemployed. 

 Bill on the Mahnomen Farm-circa 1935

Never one to give in to defeat, he and younger brother Art Enger decided to try their luck at farming and they both moved their families to neighboring acreages near Mahnomen, Minnesota, circa 1935.

I am not clear on how the acquisition of these farms came about or whether they were tenants (more questions I should have asked) but, contrary to the good stories I heard about life in Kindred, the stories about life in Mahnomen were far from good, especially as told by Effie—no electricity, no running water, bedbugs, the seven year itch (better known as scabies) and the bitterly cold winters were just a few of the hardships to be endured.  Hope and Gale walked to a country school a mile away, but Billy, who was entering high school, had to be boarded in town during the week in order to attend classes.

The bedbug story I heard many times:  When the Enger family moved into the old farmhouse they soon discovered that it had previously been invaded by little creatures that would appear after dark and inflict misery on the humans that were sharing their domain.  If a light was shined on the critters they would scurry away back to their hiding places, and in the daytime they stayed safely hidden.  The saying, “Good Night, Sleep Tight, Don’t Let the Bedbugs Bite” took on a whole new meaning!  Bill waged war by dragging all the iron bedsprings outside, pouring kerosene over them and lighting them on fire.  The bedbugs came out in droves; “there must have been a million of them,” according to the horror stories being told many years later.

Scabies, or the “Seven Year Itch” was another affliction imposed on the entire family, spread by a tiny mite that causes a skin rash and unbearable itching.  The remedy in those days was to rub a pungent-smelling salve over affected areas and then donning long underwear for an entire week without bathing. Whew!

It is no wonder that “life on the Mahnomen farm” didn’t last.  In 1937 Bill and Effie packed up their family and belongings and moved to Worthington, Minnesota where his mother Hannah, now a widow, and all of his siblings were then residing.  Sister Hazel was married to Herman Doeden, a farmer at Indian Lake near Worthington, brother Art had married a Worthington girl, Vera Nyberg, and brother Earl had been married to Evelyn Hawkinson of Shell Lake, Wisconsin whom he met while working with her brother on the railroad.

By 1937 the Enger siblings had added 13 children to the mix—Bill and Effie: Billy, Gale and Hope; Art and Vera: Vernon and Beverly; Earle and Evelyn: Deane, Shirley, Carol and Earle, Jr. (Bud); and Hazel and Herman Doeden: Gaylord, Donald, Lowell and Merle.  Vivian was just 21 and still at home with Hannah.

The Enger home on Smith Avenue, Worthington, MN

Bill returned to his former occupation when he was hired by Albinson Lumber Co. in Worthington and the following year Bill and Effie built a home in a nice little growing neighborhood called Smith Avenue.  .  Once again, with the unpleasant years of the Great Depression and the Mahnomen farming fiasco behind them, the family settled in to a new life on Smith Avenue

, Worthington, Minnesota.
.  Effie took to Worthington like a duck to water. She loved her home, she became involved in the Immanuel Evangelical Church where the rest of the relatives attended, and she enjoyed the family get-togethers with Grandma Hannah, Hazel and the rest.

Dianne Sonia Enger, six months, 1940

Little did they know, but Bill and Effie’s active life was about to be interrupted by an unplanned event!  In the spring of 1939, with three nearly grown children and the “empty nest” just a few years away, Effie sprang the news to Bill that a new addition to the family would be making an appearance around the first of January, 1940.  By that time big brother Billy would be turning 19, Gale 15, and Hope 13.

Effie and Bill didn’t tell anyone their big secret at first—it took a while to get over the surprise themselves.  But one day when Hope was looking for something she opened the drawers of a small dresser in the upstairs hall and it was full of baby clothes.  She couldn’t wait to tell Gale.

“I think Mom’s going to have a baby!” she told him. His response, “You’re crazy! “No, come and look,” as Hope showed him the tiny baby clothes in the dresser drawers.  “Well, if she is you’d better start helping her more!” Gale retorted, leaving himself out of the responsibilities that lay ahead.

But secretly Gale was excited about being a big brother again. Reportedly, he rode his bike up and down Smith Avenue telling everyone,  “My Mom’s having a baby! My Mom’s having a baby!”  I’m sure he would never admit that if you asked him today, but I have it on good authority from sister Hope!

I’m sure Effie must have been anxious about having another baby at her age—she would be turning 40 in August and Bill in November.  That was considered “old” to have a baby in that time.  Bill hired a woman to help with the housework, but according to my father’s account Effie cleaned the house thoroughly before the hired girl arrived so she wouldn’t be thought a bad housekeeper! 

One day late in November things started to happen and on November 27, 1939, Dianne Sonia Enger came into this world.  I heard the story many times:  Bill rushed Effie to the Worthington Hospital and she was having a hard time in labor.  At one point the doctor came out and told Bill, “The way things are going I may be able to save only one of them.  If it comes to that should I save the mother or the baby?”  Bill replied, “By God, you’d better save them both!”  And so he did.  Effie came through it OK, and after a short stint in the incubator the baby was OK too, weighing in at 5 pounds. Dad always said that when he first saw me I looked like a red, dried up prune covered with black hair.  Not an attractive picture, but I guess they loved me anyway.

I teased my Mom in later years that she did me a great disservice by having me early.  I was scheduled to be born in January 1940 and instead I came in November 1939.  Forever after I would have to say I was born in the “1930’s” instead of the “1940’s” making me seem a lot older!  My Mom would counter by saying, “Well, you paid me back by ruining my Thanksgiving dinner!”

.When I was just two years old another life-changing event happened, which affected not only the Enger family, but the entire nation.  On December 7, 1941 Japanese planes bombed Pearl Harbor in Hawaii, and World War II was upon us.  Adolf Hitler from Germany and Benito Mussolini from Italy had been raising havoc in Europe for some time but America had managed to stay out of it.  Now, with the bombing of American territory and the killing of American citizens our country was instantly at war.

Billy had graduated from Worthington High School in 1939 and left the nest to work for an auto parts company in Redwood Falls, Minnesota.  By 1941 he was just the right age to be called up for the draft.  His “Notice of Selection” was dated June 11, 1942, and stated:

“To William John Enger, Order No. 10,373.  You have been selected for training and service under the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940.  You will receive an Order to Report for Induction—such induction to take place on or about July 1, 1942, when adequate facilities are expected to be available. If you are employed you should advise your employer of this notice and of the possibility that you may not be accepted at the induction station. Your employer can then be prepared to replace you if you are accepted, or to continue your employment if you are rejected.  The Order to Report for Induction will specify a definite time and place for you to report.”

Billy on leave and Gale saying goodbye at the train station

Billy dutifully reported for induction, he was not rejected, and on July 1, 1942 he was in the United States Army where he remained on active duty until September of 1945, most of that time overseas.  Gale, who graduated from Worthington High School in May 1943, was inducted for the draft only one month later at age 18, and was also sent for overseas duty.

So Bill and Effie found themselves with their two sons fighting in a World War on foreign soil.  Letters came from faraway places: France, England, Sicily, Czechoslovakia, North Africa; and packages went out from the Enger household to these faraway places. Some reached their destination and some didn’t, but it was therapeutic just to send them;--to at least feel that they were doing something to help their beloved sons.  

Commodities such as sugar and flour were rationed, and each person in the family was issued “tokens” to use in trade for these commodities.  I still have one of the coupon books issued to me.

Effie saved every letter the boys sent home and years later Billy’s grandson, Ross Enger, transcribed his letters and the combat history of his 1^st Infantry Division.  This came about when Ross and his dad Tom Enger were watching the movie “Saving Private Ryan.” Tom mentioned to Ross, “Your Grandpa was in that war.”  Ross wanted to know what his grandfather did in the war, and Tom had to admit, he didn’t really know because his Dad had never talked about it.  Sadly, Billy had passed away from cancer in 1982 at age 61, long before Ross was born.

Ross was not satisfied with “I don’t know,” and set out to do his own research on his Grandpa Bill’s war record.  He did a fantastic job and I was so impressed by Ross’s efforts that I followed his lead by transcribing Gale’s letters home.  The soldiers were not allowed to say exactly where they were located so the letter headings read “Somewhere in Germany” or “Somewhere in France.”  All homeward bound letters were censored by the War Department and any information considered “sensitive” would be cut out with a razor blade, so some of the letters have holes in them.  Since the boys were forbidden to write about specific events or activities the letters were mostly about mundane happenings, but the underlying feelings of fear and homesickness are easily detected.  Each company or battalion had an “APO” address for families to send packages and letters to their service men but it often took weeks for the mail to reach the recipients who were constantly on the move.

During the war years, 1941-1946, nearly every person in America had a father, brother, husband, uncle, son or fiancé overseas and thousands of them never came home.  Gale was inducted at the same time as his two best friends, Dick Stowe and Bob Schaefer; and of the three Gale was the only one to return. The other two are still listed as “Missing in Action.”   Aunt Vivian was married to Clarence Erbes in 1942 and she went to Washington DC with him to work until he went overseas.  Clarence’s brother Leland Erbes had been killed in the initial Pearl Harbor attack.  Hope, responding to the nation-wide plea to "write to our servicemen overseas," started corresponding with Clarence's cousin Durward Reyman from Valley Center, Kansas.  The romance blossomed and eventually "Swede" Reyman became her husband of 64 years.  Aunt Hazel’s son Gaylord Doeden, Uncle Art’s son Vernon Enger, Uncle Earle Enger and his son Deane were all involved in the war and by some miracle they all came back alive.

Two Enger boys in World War II

I have the small flag with two blue stars that my parents kept hanging in the window of our house to show that two sons from that household were in the war.  Fortunately they never had to paste a gold star over the blue to depict a son killed in action—the origin of the term “Gold Star Mother.”

I have very little memory of the war years due to my young age but I do remember the day the war was over.  When the announcement of surrender by the enemy and victory for America and its allies came over the radio, everyone on  Smith Avenue ran out to their cars and started honking the horns and shouting over and over with tears running down their cheeks, “The war is over, the war is over, our boys are coming home!!”

That’s all for now.  The post-war boom years are coming soon!

The Continuing Saga of Bill and Effie Enger, aka--My Parents

               When I left off with William D. Enger and Effie J. Mestad in the previous blog they had met, dated and eloped to Minot, North Dakota to get married on March 29, 1920.  After that they lived a happy and romantic life for the next 56 years, right?  Well, not exactly.  If that were the case there wouldn’t be much of a story to tell.  They were married for 56 years all right but, as with most people, there were many tragedies and triumphs in between.

Bill, who had been working with his father on Rice Lake Ranch in Ryder, ND branched out on his own in the fall of 1920 and took a job with a lumber yard in Bottineau, ND near the Canadian border.  By this time Effie was already blossoming out in pregnancy with their first child who turned out to be William John Enger, born January 16, 1921, in Bottineau.  My ever-joking father always said, much to my modest mother’s chagrin, that Billy waited just long enough, as he came along a respectable nine months and two weeks after the marriage!

At the time Bill and Effie were living in an upstairs apartment in a Bottineau boarding house.  As the story goes, the day Billy was born was one of the coldest days of that cold winter and since they didn’t have a car Bill froze his ears walking Effie the six blocks to the hospital. 

In later years when I saw a copy of Billy’s birth certificate I was surprised to see that the baby’s name was Everett William Enger.  My Mom told me the story:  She and Bill had a little trouble deciding on a name, since they wanted him to be named after his father but they didn’t want him to be stuck with “Junior.”  Bill was at work the day the hospital nurse came in and said they had to pick a name that day in order to register the birth, so Effie wrote down the name “Everett William.”  When Bill arrived that evening he was not at all happy about Everett, so instead they changed it to “William John” after Effie’s father John Mestad.  However, Everett William was the name that was registered with the State of North Dakota.  This turned out to be a problem for brother Billy later in life when it came to applying for a Social Security card and enlisting in the Army. When I asked Mom why my father didn’t like the name Everett she said, “I guess because he knew I had a boyfriend in Kenmare named Everett before I met him.”  The green-eyed monster strikes again!

Bill and Effie were quite homesick in Bottineau as they didn’t know many people and there was no family close by.  The next year the lumber company where Bill worked wanted to transfer him to Cole Harbor, ND which was even farther away and more remote than Bottineau, so they decided to bag the north country and go back home.  By this time Bills parents, Ed and Hannah Enger, had moved to Valley Spring, SD east of Sioux Falls, and Ed told Bill that he could come there and work on the railroad with him until he found another job.  That summer Bill and Effie packed up their baby and their few belongings, headed south, and moved in with Ed and Hannah Enger in Valley Springs.

 

Second baby Robert Edward Enger--Bobby--died in his third day of  life

By the fall of 1921 Effie was pregnant with their second child which was to be born in July of 1922.  In June Ed and Bill were away  working in a nearby town, and when they boarded the train to come home for the weekend Bill noticed that a crewman was loading a tiny casket on one of the boxcars. Bill thought to himself, “Some poor family must have lost their baby.”  When he arrived back in Valley Springs he was met with the sad news that the baby was his;--Robert Edward Enger had been born one month early on June 26, had lived only three days, and had died on June 28 despite the valiant efforts of Effie and Grandma Hannah to keep him alive.  My mother told me that the baby was perfect and beautiful, but he was too weak to eat.  He wouldn’t suck at all and Grandma tried heating milk and feeding him from an eyedropper, but to no avail. 

My aunt Vivian was just a little girl at the time, and she remembered that for the rest of the time that Bill and Effie lived with them Effie would put Billy in th baby buggy every day and walk to the little cemetery on the hill where her baby boy was buried.  She never forgot him, and until the day she died a picture of “Bobby” in his casket was displayed on her bedroom dresser.  Even in the 1960’s when Effie got her mother’s ring there was a stone for Bobby right along with rest of us.  My kids learned about their aunt and uncles by counting the stones in Grandma’s ring: “Billy, Bobby that died, Gale, Hope and Dianne.”  He was then and always will be a part of our family.

            I remember visiting the Valley Springs cemetery several times with my parents when I was a little girl, and although my parents hadn’t been able to afford a stone marker at the time of the burial, my father had built a wooden frame with a glass in it to put over the grave with a little metal plaque inscribed, “Our Darling.”      When I stopped at the cemetery in the early 1990’s the grave site was nowhere to be found.  Obviously the wooden structure had deteriorated over the years and was removed.  My parents apparently salvaged the metal plaque at some time as it was found with my Mom’s keepsakes after her death.  I now have the plaque and the photograph of Bobby that sat on her dresser all those years. 

Entrance to Pleasant View cemetery, Valley Springs, SD 2009

I was able to locate a death record for the baby in the South Dakota state archives, but the burial records and location of the grave have been lost to time and the elements.  I still stop at that peaceful little cemetery whenever I go by Valley Springs while traveling I-90 between Sioux Falls, SD and Worthington, MN.

            Epilogue:  After the death of their baby Bill and Effie decided to leave Valley Springs, and Bill received a job offer as office manager for the Adams Lumber Company in Kindred, ND.  There they built their first home and as my Mom always said, they had some of the happiest years of their married life in Kindred.  Their third son, Gale Edward, was born there on March 3, 1925, followed by their first daughter, Hope Carol, on July 18, 1926.

The Enger kids, Gale, Billy and Hope, in  Kindred, ND circa 1930

            In 1991, sixty-plus years later,  my sister Hope and I attended an Enger family reunion in Kindred.  We went to the old house where she and brother Gale were born and the current owners welcomed us in.  The house looked the same on the outside as the pictures I had seen, it had been remodeled inside and was in new condition.  We were happy to see that our parents’ first home was still receiving tender, loving care after all those years.

The Enger home in Kindred, circa 1930

            That’s all for now!  Stay tuned for the continuing story of Bill and Effie’s life journey.  After all I can’t stop now, as there is still one more child to be born.  That happens to be ME!

William D. Enger and Effie J. Mestad, AKA, Opposites Really Do Attract!

            Effie Mestad, age 3            "Little Willie Cigars" photo, age 2

                  William D. Enger was born November 19, 1899 in Hanley Falls, Minnesota to Edward Ellingsen Enger and Hannah Larson, both children of Norwegian immigrants.  Bill Enger, or Little Willie as he was fondly known, grew up in Hanley Falls surrounded by a large extended clan of grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins.  Ed was the town Marshall, Deputy Sheriff, and Fire Chief at various times, and belonged to several fraternal organizations such as Odd Fellows and Masons.

Before long younger brothers and sisters joined the family, too;--Earle 1904; Hazel 1907; and Stanley 1911, were all born in Hanley Falls.  Arthur, 1902, was born in Lengby, Minnesota because Hannah and Ed went there to stay with her parents, Martin and Mattie Larson, for a time while Little Willie recovered from a nearly fatal case of measles and pneumonia. The doctor in Hanley had recommended to Ed and Hannah that they take their sick baby to the woods to recuperate, and so they did—and he did—after which they came back to Hanley Falls.

In 1912 when Bill was 12 years old Ed was hired by the M & St. L Railroad as a water expert, and in order to be closer to his work he moved the family to Winthrop, Minnesota for two years, then to a small farm in Wisconsin for three years, on to Minneapolis where their last child Vivian was born in 1916, and then to Hopkins, Minnesota for a year. During World War I there was a real shortage of men to work on the railroads, and Ed was asked to go to North Dakota to take over the supervision of railroad bridge building and water stations in the Missouri River Division near Washburn.

 

Bill and Effie Enger met in 1919 on the North Dakota prairie

Bill, who was the only one old enough for army duty, was rejected due to “flat feet” so he was working on the railroad with his Dad. (Note: He could outwalk anyone with those flat feet, even up in his 70's). In 1919 Ed had saved some money and decided to buy Rice Lake Ranch north of Ryder, North Dakota, which was for sale with its stock.  The ranch came with 1200 owned acres, 2500 leased acres, 200 cows and 50 horses.  Bill moved to the ranch with the rest of the family, and thus fate once again intervened to change the course of history!



Vivian, Effie, Bill and Art at Rice Lake Ranch, 1920

 

It so happened that a new young schoolteacher came to the nearby one-room schoolhouse in 1919 for a teaching job.  She was Effie Jeaneatta Mestad from Kenmare, North Dakota who had graduated from Kenmare High School in 1917 and then attended the Minot Normal School to become a teacher.

Effie, born August 1, 1899 in Wallingford, Iowa,  was the youngest daughter of John Mestad of Kenmare, son of Norwegian immigrants from Voss, and the late Caroline Jacobson, the daughter of Danish immigrants from Aalborg.  John and Caroline Mestad were married in Iowa and homesteaded to North Dakota in 1900 with their four daughters.  Caroline died on the homestead in 1902 leaving John to raise the four girls. He moved to Kenmare and in 1906 was remarried to Olga Estabrook. After the four daughters left home John and Olga moved to Minot and ran a small grocery store.

Bill Enger’s younger siblings, Hazel and Stanley, were students at the Ryder School and Effie became their teacher.  Bill was a young man of 19 by then and he was curious about the new gal in town.  He \asked his father Ed what the new school teacher was like, and Ed, in his usual teasing manner, said “Oh, she is just an ugly old hag and you wouldn’t like her.”  Bill took him seriously and didn’t bother to go near the schoolhouse.

Effie, in the meantime, was rooming with the Dopp family on a farm neighboring Rice Lake Ranch.  On the 1920 census for Ward County, Rice Lake, North Dakota, taken on January 24, 1920, we find Edward Enger, 46; farmer; Hannah, 40, wife; William 20; Arthur 17; Earle 16; Hazel 12; Stanley 8; and Vivian, 3 ½.  The very next entry is Ira Dopp, farmer, 34; wife Bell, 35; daughter Dortha, age 13; and Effie Mestad, boarder, teacher in public school.”

One day Effie decided to go on a visit to Rice Lake Ranch to meet the parents of her students and she came  riding up the Enger’s driveway on a horse.  Effie was indeed a beautiful young woman and she immediately caught Bill’s eye. “Who is that!” Bill asked. “Oh,” said his amused father, “that’s the ugly old schoolteacher I was telling you about.”  Bill was quite upset with his father for fooling him like that, and now he definitely wanted to meet that schoolteacher.  He had wasted too much time already!

Bill worked up the courage to ask Effie for a date.  She said yes, and to impress her Bill borrowed a team of horses and a buggy from a friend.  He proudly drove over to the Dopp residence and helped Effie into the buggy.  To show off a bit he cracked the whip, startling the horses so they took off and separated themselves  from the buggy, leaving it behind in the dust.  Bill was still holding tight to the reins and the horses dragged him for a ways before he got them stopped.  When he came back to where he had so abruptly left Effie, the buggy was upside down and she was under it.  What a way to impress a first date! 

Luckily neither of them was hurt, except for Bill’s pride of course.  Years later when they were telling me this story I said, “Wow Mom, and you went out with him again after that?” She smiled coyly and said, “Well, we were about the only two young people out there of dating age. We didn’t have a lot of choices!”

In March of 1920 a North Dakota blizzard of epic proportions visited the Ryder prairie.  Effie and her students were already in the schoolhouse when it hit and it soon became obvious that this was going to be a big one.  Effie made up her mind that she and all of her students were going to stay in the schoolhouse until it was over, as some of them lived quite a long ways from the school.  A few of  the older boys said they thought they could make it to their homes but little Miss Effie Mestad, who was smaller than most of them, put her foot down and said, “NO!”  No one was going to leave that schoolhouse until the storm was over or until someone came to rescue them.  She went so far as to follow them outside if they had to relieve themselves to make sure they came back inside.

If you know anything about North Dakota blizzards of those days, the fierce winds and blowing snow made it impossible see your hand in front of your face.  All the farms had ropes tied between the house and the barn in the winter so they could make their way back and forth to care for their animals. 

Bill and Effie were seriously dating by that time, and in fact were secretly engaged!  Bill knew Effie was at the schoolhouse, and the harder the blizzard raged the more worried he became.  He went to the barn, hitched the horses to the sleigh, and started them in what he thought was the direction of the school but the horses were too smart and just went in circles right back to the barn so Bill had to give up.  Others also tried to get to the school and were turned back.

Meanwhile Effie and the students—all of them—were perfectly fine.  They used their coats for beds, kept the heating stove going, and ate the meager leftovers from the lunches they had brought to school that day.  When rescuers were finally able to make it to the schoolhouse the next day by following the fenceposts they found everyone hungry but safe. Later it was discovered that some students from neighboring schools had tried to make it home during the storm and had been found frozen to death.  Effie was touted as a heroine for keeping her children safe.

Effie wrote to her father in Kenmare telling him of her experience and John Mestad was so proud of his daughter that he published the letter in the Kenmare newspaper.  My Mom had often told me this story but she no longer had a copy of the article.  In 1992 I visited Kenmare and decided to try and find the article in the newspaper but I didn’t know exactly where to look.  I knew it had to be in the winter of 1919 or 1920 but I looked through all of those issues up to April and didn’t find it.  I was just about to give up when I came to the issue dated April 8, 1920, and there it was.  It had been a very late blizzard!

The Kenmare News, Oldest Paper in Ward County, April 8, 1920:  Ryder, N. Dak., Mar. 21, 1920: 

“Dear Papa—I suppose you are wondering how we got over the blizzard;  that is if it was as bad there as it was here.  In the school south of Ryder there were four little boys started home from school in an open sleigh and the horses got down in a slough and couldn’t get up again.  The two oldest boys worked with them a long time but no use.  They were 14, 12, 10 and 9 years of age. The 12-year-old boy was all tired out so sank in the snow and went to sleep.  The 14-year-old boy got almost within calling distance of the house but could go no farther, so sank there.  The other two were in the sled and the 10-year-old boy covered the other one with a blanket and laid over him to try and keep him alive, but as you know the snow was wet and then it would freeze, so being all wet it was impossible to keep alive.  The father had started out about four o’clock to meet the children if they should be coming from school, but it was impossible for him to face the wind so he went back in the house, saying that the teacher would surely keep the children at the school house as she had board and lodging there for herself.  That night the father and mother felt so gloomy, but the father kept telling the mother that he knew they staid (sp) at the school house and that God would surely take care of their little ones.  In the morning it was just as bad so the father started out to the school house with something to eat for the children.  When he had gone a little ways he saw an overshoe sticking up in the snow, and he commenced kicking at it and found it was solid, so he kicked a little more and saw a leg and then he knew.  He didn’t seem to realize so he carried this boy to the house thinking he had started out walking but the others were still at the schoolhouse.  There was a little life left in the boy but he died before he reached the house.  The father went on and then when he saw the sled he realized what had happened.  The horses were standing with their backs to the wind still alive.  The one little boy in the sled lived a little while after he got home, but he died soon.  They had a funeral Saturday in Ryder.  Think of a poor father having to buy four little coffins.  They have one 16-year-old boy left now.  It seems a pity but I suppose it is all for the best.

There was a bachelor south of here found leaning against a barb wire fence frozen also.  In Max the man driving the school wagon started out with the kids but his horses got down and couldn’t go any farther.  He went out and unhitched the horses and let them go.  Then he crawled into the covered wagon and stayed in there all night with the children and kept the fire.  He was pretty wise.  I hear in several other places there were school children frozen.  I heard there were seven frozen around Berthold.

Now, I will tell you about my school.  At recess Monday afternoon I warned the kids that not one of them should leave the room.  The little girls and little boys didn’t get a smell outside unless I went along and then didn’t go only outside the door.  The big boys didn’t get out either unless it was absolutely necessary.  After school it was no better so I said not one of them were to stir outside unless someone came after them.  The Peterson boy, 16 years old, had a sled and horses there and his brother 14 and 5 little sisters.  He said he thought he could get home all right, but nothing doing!

Believe me, I watched that door like a cat and every five minutes I counted the kids to see if they were all there.  The time dragged on and we had no supper and were getting hungry, as we only had a cold lunch for dinner.  But it got no better outside so about ten o’clock we made beds for the little girls and boys on the desks with coats.  The boys laid on the floor around the stove curled up like dogs.  It seemed like there were kids all over.  I sat up all night and kept a good fire as the kids were laying around with nothing over them.  I locked the door, too, and there we were.  The water leaked in the ceiling so one side of the room was all wet.  Luckily we had two lamps with chimneys and kerosene.  I kept one lamp burning low all night, waiting for it to get better and for somebody to come.  I believe it was the longest night I ever spent.  I made the kids shut up and try to sleep a lot.

Morning finally came and it was comical to see the different positions and sleepy heads.  Late Tuesday morning a couple of men got to the schoolhouse, and believe me we were hungry!  They brought us something to eat but it didn’t last long.  We didn’t have any school the rest of the week because I was too tired and then it was all wet in there.  It was quite a nervous strain, too, you know.  I guess it was hard for the parents, too, as they did not know but what I was some little greenhorn that didn’t know anything.  You have always told us about those blizzards so I guess that’s why I was so careful.

It is real nice and springified today. Write and tell me how Kenmare cam out in the blizzard.

Lovingly, Effie

P. S. One teacher in Max had to stand by the door and lock it and hit the big kids over the head with a ruler to keep them.”

            I was so thrilled to find the article, but that wasn’t the end of  my bonanza.  I hit the jackpot again when I looked through the rest of the paper of April 8, 1920.  There on the social page was the following announcement:

Bill and Effie Enger circa 1921

“Miss Effie Mestad surprised her Kenmare friends the latter part of last week when she arrived from Ryder to spend the Easter vacation with her father, J. H. Mestad, and gave out the news that she was married.  The ceremony occurred in Minot on March 29^th.  She was united in marriage to William Enger of Ryder.  The groom is a well-to-do young man and is associated with his father in conducting the Rice Lake Stock Ranch near Ryder.  The bride is a fine young lady and was reared in this city; a graduate of Kenmare High School and is teaching her third term of school in the Ryder district.  The many friends of the bride in this vicinity join extending congratulations.  She is at present visiting her sister, Miss Mayme, at Portal but expects to return to Ryder about the middle of the month to finish her school term, after which they will take up their home on the groom’s farm.  The ceremony was performed by Rev. Lund, pastor of  the Lutheran Church.”

It turns out that after the “big blizzard” of 1920 my parents decided to elope to Minot and get married, then go back to their homes and not tell anyone until school was over.  The main reason was that in those days school teachers were supposed to remain single.  Somehow the word got out but the school board thought enough of Effie to allow her to finish her school term.

(Note:  The part about my father being a “well-to-do young man” was a bit of a stretch, but I am sure that it was written by Effie’s  sister Cora who aspired to be a writer and an actress and was always slightly over-dramatic!)

Effie and Bill were married just short of 56 years when my Mom died on February 26, 1976.   They were the parents of five children who brought forth sixteen grandchildren who now are bringing forth the greats and the  great-greats.  That’s all for now.  Stay tuned for the rest of the “Bill and Effie” saga in a future blog!