The house was on a large lot with a large barn still in the back yard. It hadn't been used for some time and was immaculate. We liked to go up in the hay mow where a door opened out. Here we could sit , dangle our feet and watch the streetcars a block away come and go. We had never known streetcars.

Next door in a nice big house on a large lot, all fenced in, lived the Fried family. We and the Fried little boys and Annie would often have a picnic lunch in the barn. The Frieds always brought some beer (said their father didn't allow them to drink anything but beer.

Aunt Rachel was not at all like Grandma Walsh who was always laughing about something. Aunt Rachel seemed so dignified and distant. They had three daughters, Belle, who sold yardage in a department store for years, Jean, who taught school, Ella, who married Fred Burke. They had two sons, John, a printer and Lonnie, I think was a farmer. Belle never married, but Jean married later and lived in Oregon. Afternoons they were dressed in black skirts and what they called at the time "House Jackets"--white or white with some black small flowers or figures--made with a belt and generous peplum.

The Frieds were nice neighbors. Mrs. Fried did beautiful embroidering. She tried to teach me but I didn't much want to embroider.

One day when Annie was going to be away, told me I could have her bicycle for the day and learn to ride. It was an awful hot summer day. I worked at it on that hot dusty road in the sun until I almost collapsed. Mama put me to bed and I can still see her standing over me wringing her hands and saying, "You look so awful--Why did you do that?" I finally recovered from it and I had learned to ride a bicycle.

Mama loved to read and now she had time for it. She and Mrs. Whitmore, near there, went to study classes together. She enjoyed that a lot.

Across the street from Fried's was the Bridges' home. Gretchen and Faye Bridges became very good and close friends. Fern and I were friends.

Papa's Aunt Rena was a widow. She was, at that time, Lincoln's police matron. She told lots of stories of her experiences. She was real jolly and the folks enjoyed her so much. We had never known her before and Floss wanted to know when that woman that was tall as our curtains was coming again. She was really very big and tall.

Now the folks had to buy all the meat, milk, eggs, and butter which Mama had been used to churning. There was no place for garden so this was not their way of living and in the Fall, bought a house, a place where they could have chickens and where there was a large lot next door that Papa could rent for garden.

The house had a big kitchen which Papa made into a dining room and he added a kitchen on, using the big back porch. We still had to burn wood and coal for cooking and heating and lamps for lights. We had a nice L-shape front porch and a rustic settee and chair had been left there. We had a mail box beside the door and a doorbell on the door that one had to give a twist of the handle to ring. Mail was delivered twice a day and this was the day of 2 cent stamps for letters and penny postcards. We had to get our water from a pump on the back porch. And we still had to take baths in the wash tub. But we had a fancy front door--upper half was frosted glass with little squares of various colored glass all round the frosted center.

We were only about three blocks from a school, about two blocks from Duncan's grocery store. On that same street a streetcar ran into the center of town.

We started to school and were all put back half a grade. They said Plattsmouth schools were behind Lincoln schools. Floss was old enough to go to school now and the teacher asked if anyone could do anything to entertain. So Floss got up in front and sang, "My Mother and Father are Irish." They said it was so cute they had her do it for the other rooms. When Lela came home she said Floss had disgraced her and she would never go back to that school. Gretchen was going to high school to get credits she needed to enter the University.

Griswolds (a big family) lived across the street. They were real friendly neighbors. The youngest, about the same age as Floss, named Harold wrote letters to Floss. Then he and his little dog, Sportie, would come to the door to say there was some mail in the mailbox.

Mama made Lela and Floss new summer dresses--how she ever did all the sewing for five girls, I'll never know. Then she told them they would have to have new hats. Everybody wore hats. Many of the older women secured them with hatpins (some very fancy) but for kids, our hats were secured with an elastic under the chin. In those days to buy a hat, the only store was a millinery store and the chief one there was Sadie Puckett's. Lela and Floss didn't want to go. So from then on until they did go, they went around saying, "Old Sadie Puckett, puke in the bucket." They got wide brim straws with long ribbon streamers hanging down the back. Floss looked so cute in her new dress and hat, I drew her back. Mama said it was really such a likeness she saved it. The dress Floss said wasn't a polka dot--it was a polka thirkle. She always had a lisp.

One day a man with a team of horses and a lumber wagon drove through our street. A beautiful shepherd dog was running alongside. Somehow a wheel or something struck the dog and while he laid there, the man drove on never looking back. Mama saw it, and went out to investigate. We brought the dog up in the shade in the yard. Mama took care of him and fed him. When he was healed up, he made a wonderful pet. Mama named him "Kruger." She said it was for General Kruger she had read about in the Boer Wars.

The folks bought a washing machine--all wood and it had to be turned by hand. So we each had to take our turn at it. Of course, it had to be filled with water carried from the pump. It had a spigot for draining.

Gretchen was going to high school, of course, and making many friends. When another school's team came to play Lincoln's football team, they were always entertained in the evening with a banquet and dance and dates were arranged for the visiting players. The young man Gretchen was to go with that evening was killed during the game--a visiting player.

Usually when Lincoln's team played and won, there was a big celebration. Right down town in the middle of the main street, they built a big bonfire (usually by swiping fruit crates from a big packing co.) They danced around the fire and went wild in general.

Our Aunt Annie and John moved to a farm in Western Nebraska. During the summer I went to visit them for a week. The folks put me on the train and Annie met me. She had come in her one-horse, one-seat buggy and had brought some things to take to the general store--eggs and butter mostly. Their bedrooms were upstairs and I thought always smelled a little like straw. I think they had straw under the carpeting. Our Uncle John played the fiddle--he would sit on a kitchen chair, tip back and keep his toe tapping with every tune. Then he would tell us stories and try to scare us with ghost stories. When we visited them, we were allowed to look through their stereoscope which always lay on a table next to the red plush horse-hair sofa. The cards had scenes from different places around the world.

It was harvest time when I was there. All the neighbors took turns helping the others out and since it was their turn to be helped, they served the dinner and the other wives helped. That table was loaded and those men sure put it away. Annie let me make a cake--my first. I remember it wasn't much to brag about.

Not too far from us was a big horse barn of Sullivan's fancy horses. It caught fire and burned to the ground with some of the horses inside. It was awful and one of those things hard to forget.

Salt Creek ran through this area sort of diagonally in back of us. It had fairly deep banks but there was seldom much if any water in it. We had a very heavy rainstorm one night and that creek rose fast and came up into our yard where the chickens were. The folks had a good many newly-hatched chickens and very young ones. The folks spent most of the night gathering the little chickens, putting them in boxes, then bringing them into the warm kitchen to keep them dry and safe. It had been many years, they said, since the creek had overflowed like that

When we had such a severe winter and I had tonsillitis so much and they said I was so run down, the folks took me out of school for the semester. Now, all together, I have lost one year. Mama spent as much time as she could with me--taught me about sewing and domestic things. Every time we had moved, Papa had our furniture moved, so we still had the organ. I loved music and I played some by ear. Mama knew very little about music but did know how to read simple notes and the corresponding keys on the organ. She sat beside me and showed me how it was done. We worked on "Flow Gently, Sweet Afton" until I finally had it. From there I went on to other songs. After a while I was playing "My Darling Nellie Gray" and singing it. Floss always cried with this while I kept on playing and singing. She said it was so sad. Mama finally told me I was not to play it anymore--guess she couldn't take it.

By the time I was in the eighth grade, Hazel was in High School and Gretchen was going to the University. I finally graduated and received my diploma. Now I was ready for High School in the Fall.