Edgar Hugh Williams Sr Part 1 son Louis Milton Williams

Edgar Hugh Williams Sr. and Wilma June Johnson

Grandma and Grandpa Williams moved to Roosevelt County, New Mexico where Grandmas Uncle Fred Danforth was a successful farmer near Lingo in 1924. Grandpa managed to rent a farm 13 miles south of Portales from James David Autry of Dora where he raised cotton and maize. While living on this farm Grandma found herself pregnant with her third child. Another son was born in the rural town of Portales on the 19th of January 1925. She named this baby, Edgar after her brother Edgar Danforth and Hugh after the doctor who delivered him. Grandpa Williams father was also named Edgar but Grandma only knew him as Edd and even thought her father in laws full name was Edwin.

Dads uncle Edgar Danforth had just the month before married, 14-year-old Beulah Kelly. She was a great help to Grandma taking care of little 18 month old Raymond Williams and helping Grandma get back on her feet. Beulah Danforth just doted over Dad and treated the baby as if he was her own.

In February of 1925, Beulah Danforth, being a young teenager, became homesick for her own Kelly family and she had her young husband, Edgar Danforth, move back to Erick, Oklahoma to live with her folks. While in Erick, Oklahoma Edgar Danforth borrowed money from his father in law J.W. Kelly and bought a small café. He asked Grandpa Williams to come to Oklahoma to help cook.

The Danforths and the Williamses lived in Erick Oklahoma for about a year until returning to Earth, Texas in March of 1926 after the café failed. The Kellys also moved from Oklahoma to Earth. Before leaving Oklahoma, on 19 January 1926, Beulah Danforth now age 15 years, baked dad a birthday cake to celebrate his first birthday. Beulah said dad was so excited about the cake and the candle that he dove into the cake and started squeezing it to bits while giggling in delight. Grandma Williams was all apologetic for her son’s bad behavior, but Beulah thought it was the funniest thing she had ever seen.

In the spring of 1926 the Danforths and Williamses returned the community of Earth but they failed to make a crop when a June storm hailed out their cotton and maize While at Earth, Grandpa Williams lived near his brother-in-law Edgar Danforth and his family who lived about a half mile east of Earth on a farm owned by Beulah's father, J.W. Kelly.

The Williams and Danforths moved back to the Portales area in the fall of 1926 where Dads cousin Marjory Fern Danforth was born 20 October 1926. Grandpa and Grandma Williams were living on a farm rented again from a Mr. Autry. Grandma Williams herself was six months pregnant at that time and she delivered a fourth son on 17 January 1927, two days shy of Dads 2nd birthday. Grandma Williams named this son Willard Wallace Williams, again after the doctor who delivered him.

Edgar and Beulah Danforth however returned to Earth, Texas where Buelah Danforth gave birth to a son whom she named Norman Edwin Danforth. He was born 19 March 1928 in Earth.

In 1928 Grandpa Williams rented another farm from a Mr. Bryant at Rogers, New Mexico to be closer to his father-in-law Mabry Danforth and to the town of Portales. There, Grandpa Williams and Mabry Danforth both worked as masons and carpenters during this time helping lay the bricks for the new Portales High School.

In 1929 Mabry and Minnie Danforth left Portales and moved back to Earth, Texas to be near their son and daughter-in-law. Mabry Danforth 54 years old, found work for himself and his wife Minnie at the Springlake Ranch that was also known as the Mashed O Ranch because of the shape of its brand. Mr. Halsell was the wealthy rancher who owned the ranch and who had sold off much of it to farmers in the 1920s. Mabry and Minnie Danforth were chuck wagon cooks for the ranch hands.

Minnie Danforth according to her daughter was a very good cook although her daughter-in-law Beulah didn't think so. Grandma Williams said that her mother was the best cook she ever knew and that she made the best pies she ever ate. Minnie Danforth learned to cook for a large bunch being the eldest daughter of twelve children and she had cooked when Mabry Danforth had the livery business ten years earlier.

Mabry and Minnie Danforth cooked plenty of biscuits, milk gravy, pork sausages and coffee for breakfast for the cowhands since Minnie Danforth told her daughter that they loved that more than about anything else they could fix. Minnie's own specialty was a wild plum cobbler that was thick, crusty and fruity which she said she could never make enough of to suit the cowboys. Mabry cooked Texas style chili with pinto beans and corn bread but his job mainly was to help with the food preparation and take it out to the camps in a chuck wagon when the cowboys couldn't make it back to the ranch. Mabry Danforth and Minnie only worked at this for about a year because the work was getting too hard for Minnie who had a hard time dealing with the heat of the South Texas Plains and cooking all day.

Grandpa Williams moved his family to Muleshoe, Texas, 18 miles west of Earth, where he worked in another café as a cook. In October 1929, the New York Stock Market crashed ending a decade of prosperity. The Great Depression of the 1930s was in the making.

On Christmas Eve 1929 Grandma Williams went into labor while living in Muleshoe and gave birth to a premature baby girl. She was so tiny she could have fitted in a shoebox. Grandma Williams named the baby Minnie Lee Williams after her mother and her Uncle Lee Peacock. Later that night the Muleshoe Hotel where Grandma Williams and her baby were staying caught fire and they were carried out of the burning building in a folded mattress. On Christmas Day 1929 they were homeless and returned to live with relatives at Earth.

Grandpa and Grandma Williams brought their four children back to Earth, Texas in 1930 where Grandpa opened a café simply called "Louis”. Edgar and Beulah Danforth helped with this enterprise with Beulah making pies for the café. Beulah Danforth had a still-born baby boy on 2 April 1930 at Earth. Edgar and Beulah Danforth never named the baby but just called him Baby Boy Danforth. He never took a breath of air. This bonded Grandma and Beulah as that Grandma had lost her first child when he was 11 days old in 1922.

Times were hard and the place did not make a go of it so Grandpa Williams returned to Portales to work in construction when his second daughter, Bonnie Ruth Williams was born there on Halloween 1931. They remained in Portales for two years and it was here Dad first attended 1st grade.

Money was extremely scarce but Grandpa’s father in law Mabry Danforth had received a $600 inheritance from his Uncle Charles Danforth who had died in January 1934 in the Memphis, Tennessee area. That money was a windfall during these harsh times. Mabry Danforth helped out Grandma and Edgar by giving them each $200 from his inheritance. With this and having saved a little bit of money Grandpa and Grandma Williams returned to Earth, Texas and opened another restaurant that was more successful. Their youngest child, Milton Bradford Williams was born on 5 November 1934 although his birth certificate mistakenly made an error on the date. Grandma also said, I should know when he was born as I was there.

In 1935 the Depression was making life very difficult even in the small rural communities such as Earth. Farms were being foreclosed upon and people lived on just the food they could raise themselves. In 1935 times were tight and Mabry Danforth and his son Edgar Danforth went to Hobbs, New Mexico to work as cooks for the road workers who was building the Hobbs New Mexico Highways as part of a government project to put people back to work. Mabry Danforth was 60 years old when he went to work for the highway construction outfit at Hobbs and Minnie Danforth did most of the cooking while Mabry Danforth ran water trucks out to the laborers as a water boy.

Mabry Danforth and Edgar Danforth came back to Earth in 1936 after the highway was finished where Mabry worked a small farm and Edgar Danforth went to work for his father-in-law, J W Kelly, at his grocery store. Grandpa and Grandma Williams were still able to make a living keeping their little cafe going throughout the rest of the depression. Mabry Danforth still worked in carpentry and masonry and did handy man jobs building outhouses as well during these years.

Dad continued elementary school at a farming community called Spring Lake a few miles south of Earth. For the Danforth and Williams cousins this was a happy time even during the Great Depression as they were doted on by their loving grandfather Mabry Danforth who was renting a farm outside of Earth. Their grandma Minnie Danforth however was a scold who didn’t care much for her grandchildren as she did not care for children in general.

The Williams and Danforth cousins from these two families used to walk back and forth between their uncles houses to play with each other. Aunt Bonnie learned to ride a bicycle for the first time at her cousins house.

Dads favorite cousin was Marjorie Fern who was, as a girl, always playing at beauty shop, fixing up her cousins, Bonnie and Minnies hair in the latest fashion. This one time she talked her cousin Dad into fixing his hair and she put Chamberlains Hand Lotion in it which made his hair stick like glue. His mother felt so sorry for her embarrassed son as she tried to wash the lotion out of his hair, but she thought he was so pathetic looking that she couldn't help but laugh.

One time Dad and his brother Wallace came home with a stray dog and asked if they could keep him. Their mother said to them, "You kids can keep the dog if you build a house for him." Both Edgar and Wallace thought they were fine carpenters from helping their Granddad Danforth, and they said to their mother that this was not a problem. Their little sister Bonnie was watching her older brothers and said she wanted to help when she discovered that they were building a dog house. So Wallace told her to hold on to a post he wanted to drive a nail into. He then took a mighty swing and came down flat square on Bonnies finger and split it wide open. Grandma was able to clean the wound and bandaged it and it healed without any infection. Dad’s dog died chocking on a chicken bone and he always impressed us kids never ever feed a dog a chicken bone.

In 1937, when Dad was 12 years old his father rented out his Cafe and moved to Hereford, Texas where his grandparents had moved to work a harvest. While at Hereford, the family picked potatoes and pulled cotton while his youngest brother Milton started kindergarten. About this time his oldest brother, Ray, who was fourteen, went to live with his Danforth Grandparents which caused some jealousy among the other grandkids. Ray Williams was the Danforths oldest grandchild and perhaps the only grandchild whom Minnie Danforth cared anything about.

Grandpa and Grandma only stayed six months at Hereford, Texas but during this time Grandmas children played a dirty trick on her that she never forgot. Grandma was deathly afraid of mice and her children knew it so this one day Dad discovered a nest of field mice while picking potatoes and he and the other kids decided to put them in the bottom of a basket filled with potatoes to give to their Mother. Grandma unsuspectingly pulled the potatoes out of the basket but when she saw the mice come running out from under the potatoes, she just about fainted.

From Hereford, Grandpa moved his family to Olton, Texas in 1938 where Bonnie was to injure her foot. Here Grandpa ran another Café with the help of 13 year old Dad and 11 year old Wallace who were now expected to help with the cooking as well as the cleaning of tables. The family lived in rooms behind the café but after six months Grandpa said he wasn't making any money at that location so in the spring of 1938 he moved his family back to Portales, New Mexico. They only stayed in Portales for a couple of months before returning to Earth where Grandpa opened his Café again. Here Grandpa and Grandma lived for the next three years.

Dads sister Minnie said Christmas 1938 was spent at Earth Texas and she recalled that it was "the best Christmas I can remember when I was a little girl. Granddad Danforth built us a little red table and chairs to match and mother got us some dishes and dolls. Dad and Mom gave Milton a little red wagon and that Christmas meant a lot to us. We didn't have a lot but we appreciated everything because Mom and Dad worked hard in the Cafe." Dad and Wallace probably got new clothes as they were getting too old for toys.

Easter of 1939 was spent in the sand hills near Earth where Grandpa took his kids for an Easter egg hunt. Grandma had the family get all dressed up and there while Milton was trying to light a lamp his little tie caught on fire. This man, who was a fry cook for Grandpa and had come out with the family, acted quickly and ran his hand over the tie burning his own hand. In the process but he did manage to pull Milton’s tie off which kept Milton from getting seriously burned.

In 1940 Dads younger brother, Wallace, dropped out of school, left home at the age of 13, and went to work for himself at the Spring Lake Ranch. Grandpa Williams had a quirk in his personality that believed that the most important thing a body could be doing was working and making a living for him­ self. He thought that work was more important than education and he discouraged his sons from getting an education at the expense of working and making a living.

So by the time Grandpa Williams left Earth in 1941 to move to a farm in the community of Spade, both Ray and Wallace had already moved away from the family, leaving Dad alone with his younger sisters and brother. 17 year old Ray Williams had stayed with his Granddad Danforth in Portales and 14 year old Wallace Williams boarded at the Spring Lake Ranch. Grandpa Williams then began harassing his son Dad to quit school and go to work.

Grandma Williams had noticed that Dad had a very inquisitive mind and was always trying to figure out how mechanical and electrical objects worked. Once she came home to find that he had taken apart her toaster just to see how it worked. She was not at all happy when he couldn’t put it back together. Dad also took band in high school and learned to play the saxophone but he had little encouragement to keep it up. The Church of Christ worship service only believed in a Capella music. Grandma however wanted Dad to stay in school and get an education which led to many quarrels with Grandpa.

During Dads Junior year at Littlefield High School, the United States entered World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor. In 1942 Grandpa told 17 Year old Dad that he had to quit high school and go to work at the Spring Lake Ranch where Wallace was already working. Wallace was bringing money in and giving part of it to Grandpa and he wanted Dad to do the same.

Dad did not want to quit school and went to his Aunt Beulah Danforth to try and get her to talk to his dad about staying in school and she said to him, "Well hun, I can’t make your daddy let you go to school. Now you are going to have to work that out with your daddy somehow." Beulah Danforth, stated when asked about this incident, she said "Louis, he was a bull headed one and poor Annie couldn't get him to change his mind don’t you know. Louis, he didn't think kids needed an ed­ucation. All they needed was to be making money and a living."

When Grandpa found out that his son had talked to Beulah he just got angry with his son and after a quarrel and a whipping, Dad decided to run away. He ran away and stayed with his cousin Jessie Roden “Jake” Peacock who was just two months older than him. Jake was the son of Victor Peacock who was Dads grandma Minnie Danforth’s younger brother. Jake was actually Grandma Williams first cousin but with an age difference of more than 20 years. Vic was living at Earth and Jake convinced Dad to run away together and join the navy.

Jake Peacock said that Dad had lifted five dollars from Grandpa when he ran away and off they went to Portales, New Mexico to the recruiting station. When Annie discovered Dad had run off she went over to her sister-in-laws house all upset and crying. Beulah Danforth remembered, "You'll never know how she cried over Dad and she said to me 'Beulah if there is anyway in the world you can keep Dad from joining the navy please don't let him join the navy. He’s too young.' So I said, "Well Louis wouldn’t let him come to live with me before he ran off - No way- but will Louis let him live with us now?" and both Grandpa and Grandma said "Yes" so Ed and Beulah talked it over and Ed Danforth said, "Edgar Hugh is a good kid and I don't mind to having him. I just love him to pieces."

Anyway Beulah learned from Vic Peacock that Dad and Jake were at Portales just fixing to sign up when Grandpa and Grandma found them. Dad saw his parents and his aunt and uncle coming for him and started to run when Beulah Danforth hollered, "Edgar Hugh, you come back here!" But his cousin Jake Peacock said, "C’mon! Don't go! C'mon!"

Then Beulah Danforth hollered, "Edgar Hugh do you hear me! I said come here!" and Dad gave in, came back, grabbed his aunt and hugged her neck. Then he started to cry. "Edgar Hugh, Hun, you don't want to join the navy," she said, "You'll have to go soon enough. Now your Mama and daddy have promised me that you could come live with me and Uncle Ed and finish this year of school so don't cry. I'll see some way that you have clothes for school if you'll come live with us."

"All right" said Dad but I'm not going back home!" and he didn’t. His cousin Jake Peacock went ahead and enlisted in the navy and served in the South Pacific on battleships as a gunner. He was in some of the fiercest battles in the South Seas.

So Dad left home and went to live with his Aunt and Uncle so he could finish his schooling, with his cousins Marjorie Fern and Norman. Ed and Beulah treated Dad as one of their own, buying him clothes, and feeding him. He was able to finish his Junior year but as he felt he was too much of a burden on his Aunt and Uncle, he went to his parents and convinced them to let him enlist in the navy as his older brother Ray had already enlisted in the army. Grandpa and Grandma agreed and allowed him to join the Navy and Dad was sent to San Diego for boot camp.

Before joining the navy, while his folks lived at Spade, Dad at the age of 17 began dating Mom whose full name was Wilma June Johnson but was known as June. Her older brother JW always called her “ Junebug”. She was 13 year old and the daughter of Wilburn and Tressie Johnson when she met dad.

Grandpa Johnson was a farmer living in the community of Hart Camp about 4 miles from Spade, long with the Jarnagin and Sullivan families. Mom was friends with both Mattie Lee Jarnagin and Otice Sullivan who both were dating Wallace Williams off and on. Mom said she “palled up” with Dad while he lived out in Spade and before he went into service.

One day after Dad had joined the navy, Mom and her girlfriend Otice Sullivan decided to go over to Spade to visit with the Williams’es and see how Dad was doing in the Navy. They were 13 year old girls and Grandma said she liked them well enough but really didn't know much about them at the time. Otice had been dating Wallace so she was familiar with the family at the time and when they stopped by the house seven year old Milton started teasing the girls. They told him they would both throw him into the sticker patch if he did not stop being a brat. Well he kept on teasing them, so the girls made good on their threats with Otice grabbing his hands, and Mom carrying his feet, and they carried him outside and threw him into the sticker patch.

By the end of 1943, Grandpa and Grandma Williams sold their farm at Spade and moved to Littlefield, the county seat, where Grandpa ran a little hamburger joint at the end of town. Grandpa and Grandma had rented a house near the Littlefield High School.

They had two sons in the war at the time and just the three kids, Minnie, Bonnie, and Milton, at home. Wallace was still too young to join the service so he continued to work on the Spring Lake Ranch, twenty-two miles north of Littlefield, and was out on his own.

About this time Dads Uncle and Aunt Danforth decided to move to California where the war effort made jobs plentiful in the Southern California shipyards. Uncle Ed and Aunt Beulah moved to a small community called Hines in Los Angeles now located in Paramount and Downey. Dad said that while he was in boot camp in San Diego, whenever he could get off base, he would hitchhike up the Pacific Coast Highway to stay with his aunt and uncle and Danforth cousins.

In 1943 Moms brother J.W. Johnson Jr. had joined the navy and was stationed in the Naval Air Station at Oakland as an electrician. The base had been transformed into an airlift base for military flights to the Pacific islands. In August 1943 J.W. married his Hart Camp sweetheart, Pauline “Polly” Allen who was a half sister to Otice Sullivan, Moms girlfriend. Polly took a train to California to marry him in Oakland, California.

Shortly afterwards, J.W. became very ill with tonsillitis and received an operation to have them removed while in the Oakland Naval hospital there. Earlier, in the spring of 1942, just a few months after Pearl Harbor, 25 barrack-type redwood buildings were built which became the nucleus of the sprawling "temporary" hospital the Navy built to receive the thousands of World War II casualties that were to be brought back from Pacific Battle zones.

When Grandma Johnson heard from Polly that 19 year old J.W. was in the hospital waiting an operation, she went to California to be with him and took Mom with her. Mom said her brother had just had his tonsils out and Grandma insisted she go to him because he was “her Baby.”

Mom said it was one of the great adventures of her life, what with her mother and her being “Old Country Bumpkins.”  It being in the middle of World War II, mom said “The blame old train was filled with soldiers and marines and the train they were on was like those old trains from the 1890s.” Her mother warned her not to be talking to soldiers but she did to this one sitting across from them who was not much older than she was.

The train ride was thrilling but also monotonous. Mom recalled that the conductor was drunker then a skunk. There wasn’t a club car or porters from whom to buy anything to eat or drink. Grandma had packed a small food basket but they ran out of food at Kingman, Arizona. When they stopped at the station everybody got off the train and went to closest restaurant which was the Harvey House. Mom and Grandma Johnson left their coats, luggage, and magazines on the train to save their seats but by the time they were done being waited on and eating they found that the train was leaving the station.

Grandma Johnson went in to the ticket office in the station and demanded they hold the train but they said they couldn’t as it was also a troop train. They wanted Grandma to buy another ticket but she was a fighter and refused. She showed them her tickets and tore off the back of one of the ticket before  they issued her a new ticket. “That is what we came on home on was the darn ticket.”

Mom and Grandma caught up with the original train in Barstow, California. As luck would have it, they met the young soldier whom mom had befriended who had taken their luggage and coats off the train and waited for them. He said he hope we didn’t mind. “And of course we were so grateful”. Mom said she and the young soldier corresponded for a time but when his letters stopped she assumed that he had been killed.

The rest of the trip up to Oakland was uneventful and “I guess Pauline met us at the depot. She had found us a room in a hotel where the three of us slept in a regular size bed. The room “must have need been on second or third floor and didn’t have a radio. The bathroom was down a long hall which was shared but it was real clean though.” The place was noisy and her mother would bang on the wall telling the guys in the other room to shut up and go to sleep.

As Mom wasn’t allowed to go to the naval hospital with her mother and sister in law she spent much of the time entertaining herself by looking out the window into the streets below. Even Grandma had a time getting in and out of the base hospital and often mom said “Mother would sit over there until they let her in because she will fight for what’s hers.”

The hotel they stayed in was across from a “honky tonk” and mom would lean out of the window and watch the foot traffic below. She said she would never forget seeing some drunken soldier hugging the lamppost in front of the “honky tonk” which blared the hit song of 1943 “Pistol Packing Mama” day and night. She recalled seeing soldiers wearing their brown kaki uniforms and some, after seeing her sitting on the windows cross beam, would call for her to come down to the street. She would just laugh at them and throw them bread crumbs from sandwiches she was eating. Once some soldiers called up to her asking where was she from and when she said Texas and they said “Do they grow them that big in Texas?”

Another time before heading back to Texas on the train, Mom and Grandma were walking to the hotel when two sailors came up beside them and interlocked their elbows and swung them around, saying to each other, “I’ll take the young one and you take the older one.” Grandma swatted their arms away and said, “Y’all won’t be taking neither.”

Mom told me that she really didn’t know the Williamses very well when they farmed southwest of Spade and it was from Spade that Dad went into the service. Shortly afterwards, Grandma and Grandpa Williams moved into Littlefield. The Jarnagins had also moved into Littlefield where “Old Man Jarnagin” was driving propane trucks to the farms and was also the school bus driver. While in Littlefield, Mattie Lee was hired by Grandpa Williams to work as a waitress at his Café there in town. Grandpa liked having pretty blond girls work for him as they brought in more customers. Whenever Mom was in town with Grandma Johnson shopping, she would hang out at the café which was a type of hamburger joint. Often after high school her pals would also hang out at the café. This way she could get news on how Dad was faring in the navy.

Mom said she and her friends often borrowed Grandpa Johnsons car and had as much gas they wanted even though gasoline was rationed “because daddy was a farmer.” They would go into Littlefield to go roller skating and to the shows. She said once while “fixing to go to a hamburger place, on the way, some old drunk ran into us.” An old boy friend of hers, Pete Hammock, “went and told daddy that there was a wreck” and he came to rescue them.

Mom suspected that more was going on in Grandpa Williams’ café , but being naïve at the time (she referred to herself as a country bumpkin), she didn’t think much about the gambling and card playing that she heard was going on in the back room. Mom however once told me that she thought “hanky pank” was going on in Grandpa Williams’ place because she recalled a time when Grandpa Williams came up to her once and said, “See that man over there? If you are real nice to him he will give you some money.”

Mom at the time said she had no idea what he was talking about but it made her uneasy and just told him that she didn’t need any money and was waiting on Grandma Johnson to come get her. It was not long after this that Grandpa sold the café and moved to California after Grandma Williams threatened to leave him if he didn’t.”

In October 1944, when Dad was home on leave from the Navy before being shipped overseas, Mattie Lee and Wallace, who had been talking about marriage, decided to elope as they were underage. They both were 17 years old and Mattie Lee knew her father would not give his consent. Wallace wasn’t too popular with Mr. Jernigan according to mom. Wallace Williams talked Dad into driving them as neither one owned a car. Dad took with him mom, unbeknownst to her parents, his 15 year old girlfriend.

They drove over to Muleshoe, 30 miles northwest of Littlefield, where they had to wake up the preacher as it was early in the morning. Mom said that since it was war time they thought they could do just about anything. Dad and the preachers wife were the witnesses, as Mom was legally too young. After Wallace and Mattie Lee were married, Dad took the newlyweds to Clovis, New Mexico to hide from anyone that might be looking for them.

Clovis was another 30 miles northwest of Muleshoe. Mom said they made her get out of the car and walk across the state line because she was only 15 and Dad could have gotten in trouble transporting a minor across state lines. The Mann Act was a federal law that made it a felony to transport a minor across state lines for immoral purposes. Whether any “immoral” purposes went on Mom, didn’t say and I didn’t ask.

Mom said that once in New Mexico, they took Wallace and Mattie Lee into Clovis where they got them a motel to spend their honeymoon. As Wallace had no money, Dad gave him some to come home on and then he and Mom left.

On the way back home Dads car broke down in Muleshoe and he called Grandpa Williams, who refused to shut down the Cafe to come get them. Mom said they had no way “to get a hold of daddy” on the farm but she knew Grandma Johnson was in the hospital in Littlefield with gangrene of the appendix. So they called the hospital hoping Grandpa would be there although she said “Boy was I dreading telling Daddy what happened.”  Grandpa was at the hospital and came and got mom but Dad stayed with the car.

Some time much later Dad saw Wallace and Mattie Lee coming home on the Grey hound bus when it had stopped in Muleshoe. They got off and Dad and Wallace worked on the car and managed to get it started. They were so relieved because the bus took off without them.

Wallace and Mattie Lee stayed in Muleshoe for a time before returning to Littlefield to face their parents. Grandpa Williams was indifferent, just glad to put Mattie Lee back to work but Grandma Williams insisted that they live with them. Mom said she really don’t know how Mattie Lees mother took it but Mr. Jarnagin came out to her folks house at Hart Camp demanding to know what had gone on and what Mom knew about it. Mom told me “I don’t know exactly what was said because mother sent me outside. I don’t know what Mr. Jarnagin said. Daddy never said, but he was as mad as a wet hen. Old man Jernigan started drinking after that and never drew a sober breath. I only knew Walter Vernon and Mattie Lee well.”

At this time in the fall of 1944, Grandma and Grandpa Williams were having a rocky time in their marriage. Grandma wanted to move to California to be near her Danforth folks and probably to get Grandpa out from the cafe where I suspect Grandma knew what was going on. However Grandpa stubbornly refused to even consider leaving Texas.

Dad who was still home on furlough begged his dad to move to California. Dad said to him, "Dad you could get a job there as a cook and really make some money instead of the fifty dollars a week your making cooking in Texas!" But Grandpa flatly refused to budge. He was afraid to leave the security of a familiar place for the uncertainties of making a new beginning in California. It was only when Grandma Williams threatened to leave Grandpa that he caved in and agreed to move to California.

After Boot camp and while stationed in San Diego, Dad was assigned to a minesweeper named the U.S.S. Gamble and served in the South Pacific theatre of the war. The Gamble was a 314 foot long, 1,090 tons Destroyer Minelayer. It had been commissioned on 29 Nov 1918 and in 1930 was reclassified as a light minelayer.

The Gamble had just returned from offshore patrol when Japanese carrier planes pounded American ships in Pearl Harbor. The Gamble would spend the rest of her career fighting the Japanese Imperial Navy.

Before Dad was a shipmate on board the Gamble, in mid-February 1942 she helped safeguard convoys to Midway Island during that crucial Pacific battle. Later in August,off Guadalcanal, she became the first destroyer type ship to sink a full-sized Japanese submarine.

The next year in May 1943, the Gamble laid mines at the entrance to Kula Gulf, the favorite route of the "Tokyo Express." Four Japanese destroyers entered the mined waters, one went down, two others were damaged and sunk by aircraft.

When Dad was posted on board the Gamble in late 1943, the ship continued with its mine laying operations. Dad’s Commanding officer while he served on the Gamble were CDR Donald Noble Clay who served from July 25 1944 to Feb 25 1945 and LT Richard James Peterson who served  Feb 25 1945 until Jun 1 1945.

Dad held the rank of Coxswain in the Navy which was the first rank above a seaman 1st class. On the Gamble he was in charge of the mess hall and other clean up duties aboard the ship. Dad said that the ship normally carried thirty men but in January 1945 it was carrying 100 men in preparation for the invasion of Iwo Jima.

After an overhaul and refresher training, the Gamble departed San Diego on 7 January 1945, en route via Hawaii, then to the Marshalls Islands and from there to Iwo Jima where she arrived 17 February. Dad’s ship was to lend fire support to the various sweeping units there, and to explode floating mines before the impending invasion. One of its duties was also screening the battleship USS Nevada. During her shelling of the Iwo Jima, a direct hit on an ammunition dump from the Gamble exploded an enemy's ammunition magazine “like a giant firecracker” at the foot of Mt. Surabachi.

As Gamble’s crew was retiring for the night, on 18 February 1945 about 9:30 p.m, a small kamikaze enemy air raid attacked Dad’s ship. The Gamble was hit just above the waterline by two 250-pound bombs. Dad was off duty and was below deck in his bunk when the bombs hit. If he had been up deck he would have been killed.

Dad said he was asleep when the bombs hit and was tossed out of his bunk by the explosion. If the bombs would have hit a few feet differently they would have hit the ships magazine and the ship would have been blown sky high. Five men in the fire room were killed instantly, one sailor was missing in action, and eight wounded. The one missing was later found dead. Those killed aboard Dad’s ship were Donald M. Clay, Kenneth W. Fourtner, Richard Hansen, Hugh Holman, Ralph G. Kelly, and Lyle C. McGann.

As it was both fire rooms immediately flooded and the Gamble became dead in the water with two holes in her bottom as all hands fought raging fires, jettisoned topside weight and shored damaged bulkheads.

The USS Hamilton stood by to assist the Gamble and to remove casualties as U.S. Marines stormed the shores of Iwo Jima the next day. The Gamble was taken in tow by the USS Dorsey who turned her over to another ship for passage to Saipan. She arrived at Saipan 24 February for repairs. Dad was stationed on Saipan while some hope that the Gamble could be repaired.

When it was determined by the navy that the Gamble could not be repaired, on 1 June 1945 the ship was decommissioned and was scuttled and sunk at Apra Harbor off Guam on 16 July 1945. The USS Gamble had received seven battle stars for service in World War II. As of to date no other ships in the United States Navy have borne this name.

Mom said she wrote dad everyday even if just a paragraph. She said she had a feeling something was wrong in February 1945 when she didn’t hear from him for over a month. It was Grandma Williams who wrote to mom telling her that his ship had been hit with a bomb.

After the USS Gamble was decommissioned, dad was transferred to another ship. On that ship in August, 1945 he said he had a buddy who was secretary to the admiral of the fleet and he told dad that he and his company had orders to go home even before the captain received the official orders. Nobody believed dad that they were going home until a couple of days later they received their orders and that the war was over.

Outside of Hawaii, Dads ships engine broke down and they were towed back to Hawaii. Another try to get on the way was aborted too and eventually Dads ship was just towed all the way back to San Diego.

Dad was once asked if he ever was claustrophobic from being on board the ship. Dad simply said no because he hadn’t heard of claustrophobia and he said you can’t be afraid of something you never heard of.

As that Dads main job was in maintenance and working in the mess hall, he was low on the totem pole in the chain of command. Dad did not enjoy life in the service, once writing to Grandma Williams that they treat “you worse than a dog”. He said that all they served in the Navy was creamed “chipped beef” on toast, a classic American Military dish known as “shit on a shingle” or fish which he came to detest and as long as I can remember we never had any type of fish for dinner.

Dad was mustered out of the Navy in San Diego in February 1946 and hitchhiked to Downey to see Grandma and Grandpa Williams before he bought a car and went back to Texas to marry mom. He said he went out into the fields to ask Grandpa Johnson if he could marry mom and Grandpa said “I don’t suppose I could stop you. He didn’t stop them but also he didn’t go to the wedding either in Olton. He thought mom was too young as she was only 16 years old. Grandma Johnson however was concerned that Mom might get pregnant and agreed to her getting married at a young age and attended the wedding. Mom said the only thing new she had was a pair of undies that Grandma bought for her for her wedding night.

Mom and Dad were married by a Church of Christ preacher with just Grandma Johnson attending. They came back to Hart Camp and lived with Grandma and Grandpa for a time. The next day after the wedding, Grandpa saw dad and dad must have looked upset about something because he said to dad, “It wasn’t that bad, was it?”

Shortly after their marriage, Dad and Mom moved to California and stayed with Aunt Beulah and Uncle Ed until they rented a small house on Dinwiddie Street near Grandma and Grandpa Williams place. They were living here when mom became pregnant with Charline who was born 9 June 1947 in a hospital in Los Angeles. Mom said that Charline was named after one of Dads “old girlfriends” but I doubt it. Mom was always under the impression that Dad had lots of girlfriends before they married and even use to tease that we had half brothers and sisters all over the South Pacific Islands. I think Dad was too much of a prude for that to be true. Charline wasn’t given a middle name and the spelling was from the lack of Mom’s education. When asked to spell Charlene for the birth certificate she spelled the name with an “i” instead of an “e”.

After Charline was born Mom said that Dad and Mom bought a new house in Norwalk on Fairhaven for $5000 and was living there until Dad was laid off.

In 1947 Uncle Ed and Aunt Buelah Danforth had moved to Verdera Street in Downey while Grandma and Grandpa Williams were still living on Dinwiddee, raising chickens and a garden to supplement their income.

During that year both of Dads Danforth cousins were married. Norman Danforth met a Minnesota girl named Betty Morrisette living in California and Marjorie Fern Danforth married Bill Damron who was her childhood sweet heart. Both Norman and Marjory Fern Danforth had set out to have a double wedding on the 10th of December 1947 but Bill Damron and Marjorie Fern Danforth jumped the gun and were married on 22 November 1947. Norman and Betty waited until 10 December 1947 but they went to Yuma, Arizona to marry since Betty Morisette was underage. Both cousins had their wedding receptions at Grandma and Grandpa Williams’ place on Dinwiddee.

Dad at the age of 22 became unemployed when the post World War II factories and ship yards closed. It was hard to find work in Southern California. Even Grandpa Williams was laid off and was out of work for almost a year. Grandpa Johnson wanted Mom and Dad to return to Texas to help him farm so in 1948, they sold their house in Norwalk at a loss before it could go into foreclosure. Mom and Dad then settled in back in Hart Camp where he helped Grandpa farm his place until renting a small farm of his own in nearby Fieldton.

While living in Texas, Dad and Mom had Donna and myself. Donna Fay Williams was born 25 June 1949 at the farmers cooperative hospital in Amherst, Lamb, Texas. I was born 10 April 1951 at the same hospital. Mom always said we were born in Amherst rather than Littlefield because she did not trust the “quacks” in Littlefield but truth be known it was probably less expensive. After I was born, Dad had a vasectomy performed so mom and dad would not have any more children. There was no form of birth control in those days besides condoms. Dad wanted a son and once I was born, that was it. Mom wanted to name me Edgar Paul but dad insisted that I be named after him thus I became a “Junior” to my family for much of my life.

When the 1950’s began, Dad was still in the Navy Reserves even after he left active duty and Mom was distressed when the Korean War broke out on Donnas 1st birthday but even more so when she became pregnant with me in July. She was anxious that Dad would be called back into active duty as America sent troops to South Korea the entire time she was carrying me. Fortunately Dad, as a farmer with dependents, was exempted from going back into the service.

Dad and Mom were farming on a place near Fieldton in June of 1952 when a hail storm destroyed their cotton crop and it was too late to replant. At that point Dad gave up farming and took an offer from Claude Kelton, the husband of his cousin Mildred, to join the Lubbock Police Force. Claude Kelton was a Lieutenant on the force. Mom was 23 and Dad was 27 when they moved us kids from the farm to Lubbock about 40 miles southwest of Hart Camp. Dad made only $125 a month on the Lubbock Police Force.

While in Lubbock, Dad became close to his great uncle Lee Peacock, Grandma Williams’ uncle. In his youth Uncle Lee was kind of an out law hooligan. He had an old Colt Single Action Army pistol known as a “peacemaker” and Uncle Lee wanted to give it to dad. Dad however refused because he thought that Uncle Lee should have given it to his sons. Dad said he always regretted it though.

Dad was only on the police force for six months which he didn’t care for at all for the same reasons he didn’t like military service, and Mom was worried about him the whole time. When Dads partner was shot and killed in an unrelated event, Mom insisted that he quit the force. She was not about to become a 23 year old widow with three children under the age of five.

           

It was about this time that Grandma Williams, Minnie, Bonnie and RL came back to Texas to visit relatives. Grandma told Dad that Conveyor where Grandpa worked was hiring so it was decided to move back to California to make some money.

I don’t remember any of this time in Texas except what was told to me after I was grown. Grandma Johnson however said that I had a little palomino toy horse like Roy Rogers Trigger that I was inseparable with, how ever as we were packing up and saying our goodbyes, Grandma said I gave her my little horsey to remember me by. She kept that memento all her life on a knickknack shelf in her bedroom.

Mom said we first stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Williams for a month at their place on Cole Street before moving to a chicken coop that was converted to a house during World War II on the Dinwiddee lot This place is where my earliest memories are. On my 3rd birthday in April 1954, Mom planned a birthday party for me, however, I had come down with the measles or something and could not attend even though the party went on outside without me.

Grandma and Grandpa Williams had moved back to the front house on Dinwiddee by then and their house was where we played mostly, had our Christmases, and family get togethers The Dinwiddee house was fun because you could go around from room to room like in a circle, from the front room to the kitchen to Grandmas bedroom to a pass through hallway where the bathroom was on one side and a huge walk in closet on the other side which passageway led back to the Front room.

The kitchen had a door to go outside that led to Bonnie and Bills house, and through the kitchen another hallway had bedrooms at the back of the house where another doorway was that led to where the garage was. Aunt Minnie had a room in one of these bedrooms and perhaps even Milton after he got out of the service and before he married. I know he was at the house because he use to carry me around piggyback style. Our chicken house was behind the garage. Way behind us was the space where Grandpa kept his chickens and rabbits and behind that was a fence that kept us away from the railroad tracks.

Dad went to work as a steel welder at the Conveyor Company in Maywood a few miles away and saved enough money to buy a home of his own for his family. Orange County was virtual rural when Mom and Dad began looking to buy there. It was full of Orange groves, strawberry fields, and truck farms, without any sizeable towns outside of Anaheim and Santa Ana. The development that Mom and Dad chose was called Highland Estates off of Highway 39 and Katella in Western Orange County. I remember as a very small boy driving out to see the property. I vaguely remember seeing our house being framed but I do remember a huge billboard with a picture of Scotsman with a bagpipe.

The move was making Dads drive time much longer from when we lived in Downey when Conveyor only about 3 miles away. Now we were going to be nearly 20 miles away adding an hour drive time both ways. They only freeway at the time was the Golden State Freeway which could only be reached going up Highway 39 which later became Beach Boulevard, to Buena Park. Dad however was making $125 a week instead of a month.

Mom and Dad moved into their new house in November 1954 which address was given as 11562 Dale Street between Highway 39 on the west and Magnolia Street to the east. Just north of us was Bryant Street which became Orangewood, and south of us was Chapman.

On the corner of Orangewood and Dale was a large farmhouse and a barn and beyond that were dairy cows. Mom and Dad were the second family to move in to the new subdivision which was located then in unincorporated Orange County. Not for two years would we be included in the newly incorporated city of Garden Grove in 1956. We were on the western edge of the boundaries, as across the street, on the other side of Dale, it was still unincorporated although their city address was listed as Anaheim.

Mom and dad bought this 1,158 square foot four bedrooms, two bath house, which sat on a 7,752 square foot lot, for $8,000. They made $125 a month payments and although it was only a fourth of dads monthly wages, they struggled.

The house was bare boned. It had a wall heater in the front room and at the end of the hall but had no air conditioning. No carpeting, all black linoleum tiles except in the kitchen which had a yellow tile speckled with red, and an asphalt driveway which led to a one car garage.

The house had two bathrooms which was a luxury back then. The front bathroom off the living room was called the “Green” bathroom because the tub, toilet, and sink were green. It only had a bathtub and it was used primarily by us kids. Down the hall leading to Mom and Dad’s bedroom was the “Blue” bathroom because the fixtures were blue. It only had a small shower.

Mom and Dad’s bedroom was at the end of the hall, next to theirs was a small bedroom which was mine, and next to my bedroom Charline and Donna shared a room. There was a room across from the green bathroom that was used as a television den .

The kitchen had white metal cabinets which was popular in the 1950. With that many kids we also had a washing machine but dad installed a clothes line in the back yard. The kitchen had a door that led to the backyard.

Towards the front of the house off the kitchen was a small dining room containing a Formica dining table and five yellow padded chrome chairs. Donna always sat to the left of me because she was left handed. Dad sat at the end near me and Charline sat opposite him. Mom of course sat nearest the kitchen to get up and fetch dad whatever he thought was missing from the table. For most of the 1950’s we ate supper in the dining room and Dad would say the blessing over the food always ending with the phase “guide guard and direct us.” We always ate what dad liked to eat which was usually fried steak and mashed potatoes and a vegetable. We also had white bread on the table and as dad liked his deserts we usually had cake or a pie. We never ate out nor had food delivered. It was always home cooked even if it had been frozen, canned, or from a mix.

Our first phone was a “party line” which meant that other families shared the same phone and you could pick up the phone and hear other peoples conversation. I don’t remember the full number but the phone’s prefix was a word. Ours was “Lehigh 9”. We only had the one phone and it was a black rotary.

Mom and Dad had to landscape the lot. Almost immediately dad built a cinderblock six foot wall clear around the backyard except it was lowered to 4 feet on the south side because our neighbor Madelyn Battreall wanted it lowered. Mom said she was a short busy body and wanted to look over the fence. Dad planted a Chinese Elm in the center of the back yard and Mom a rose garden against the back wall. Oleander bushes were planted along the north wall of the fence which had white and pink blooms. At one point dad planted a banana tree up against the house in the back yard. However time and mom and dads busy work schedule the back yard was never kept up very well.

In the front yard Mom planted a poinsettia bush that bloomed for years near the garage and the porch. On either side of the porch entrance they planted a small evergreen shrub but only one survived.

I cannot remember a time we did not have a black and white television set but we also had an old upright radio console as many programs were still on the radio. Mom always liked to listen to music but I don’t think dad did. He enjoyed watching Warner Brothers westerns which were popular in the 1950’’s. We watched Maverick, Sugarfoot, Cheyenne, and many others.

Because of dad’s work and long drive he was often impatient with us kids when he came home. Sadly he would sometimes whip us with his belt without any real reason except we were noisy or acting up. Mom had little control over these outbursts and never let him go too far. Mom never spanked us only dad. Dad I am sure learned this behavior from his father and he never showed remorse for this which made me actually fear my dad as a little boy.