The Comet Cometh

This is a photo I found online that supposedly shows Halley's Comet over Texas in 1910. While I cannot guarantee the authenticity of the photo, I think it would be so cool if that's really how it appeared in the night sky.   

Excerpt from the diary of Mary E. Potterf in Raymond’s 125 Years of Memories book: 

Wednesday, May 14, 1910

The day on which the world ends. The comet hits the earth today. Sat up late to see the comet but could not see a thing of it. Someone in town sent up a big balloon and tried to make people believe it was Halley’s Comet. 

Mary Potterf was referring to the week in 1910 when Earth passed through the end of the 24-million-mile-long tail of Halley’s Comet. There were rumors that the comet contained poisonous gases and that it might even collide with the Earth. It was at its closest point to earth (about 14 million miles away) between May 14-22, 1910. 

 A family friend, Grace Leslie (1902-1996), a resident of Morrisonville, never forgot her experience seeing Halley’s Comet in 1910. When Grace was in her 90’s, she told me that she clearly remembered going outside to look at the comet every night with her father. She described it as "huge," and said it seemed to just hang there in the sky, so close to Morrisonville. Grace, who was about 8 years old at the time, said she was terrified of it and felt so relieved when it finally disappeared. 

Grandma Gamlin (the only grandparent I really knew), would have been in her early 20’s in 1910, but I don’t remember that she ever mentioned it. Mom always said that back in those days, people were always predicting the world was going to end due to one thing or another, so I suspect that grandma probably didn’t pay too much attention to all the hype. 

A random, yet interesting connection to Halley’s Comet is that Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) was born in 1835 when Halley’s Comet passed over Earth. He predicted that he would die the next time it appeared, and he died on April 21, 1910 of a heart attack.

People from the Past: Jess and Francelia Broaddus

From Raymond's 125 Years of Memories book published in 1996:

(Back from left) Paul, Robert, Betty, William, and George
(Front from left) Francelia, Norma, Linda, and Jess

Jess C. Broaddus was born August 19, 1900 in Richmond, Kentucky. Francelia C. Broaddus was born February 17, 1902 at Chatham. They were married in Springfield on February 21, 1921. They moved their family of seven children to the Fitzgerald farm northwest of Raymond in 1940. Their children are William H. who married Mary Jeanette Kelmel; George W. who married Helen Ragland; Robert L. who married Evelyn Edge of Farmersville; Betty J. who married Robert R. Poggenpohl; Paul Eugene; Norma R. who married Donald Jones; and Linda L. who married Marvin Waldeck from Farmersville. They had 24 grandchildren. 

Jess and Francelia retired from farming in 1963 and moved to Raymond. Jess passed away in 1990 and Francelia in 1994. Jess was a World War I veteran. They attended church at the Raymond United Methodist Church. 

Main Street Musings: Fires in the Business District

Riffey's Drug strore burns in 1941

The Raymond 125 Years of Memories book published in 1996, has a few references to fires that occurred on Main Street in 1892, 1915, and 1941. The pictures are from the 1941 fire and very little information was given other than the fire on Broad Street destroyed Riffey’s Drug Store.   

Another view of the fire on Broad Street in 1941

A fire in August, 1892 started in a building known as the “Old Tackett Store” and extended to the Costley building, the Casper Young Building (where Scott Tilden ran a post office), the Whealen building, burning out Dr. Harmon’s Office and Dudenhoffler’s Saloon, and ending at Starr’s Store where Chas. Scherer kept a grocery store. Lost in this fire was estimated at 10,000.

In 1915, fire swept through a portion of the business district, located on the East side of Broad Street. A store owned by Mr. Bishop, a jewelry store owned by Sam Bentley, a movie house, and a bakery belonging to Steve Schulte were destroyed. Mr. Schulte said that he had his bread baked, but that the cookies burned a little.

 

People from the Past: Leo and Opal Wagahoff

Leo and Opal Wagahoff

The following information appears in Raymond's 125th Anniversary book published in 1996:

Leo and the former Opal Herman married and lived on his father’s farm, east of Raymond, for several years. Leo farmed and worked part-time for Raymond Township, operating the road grader. He also ran the steam engine with the thrashing ring, which went from farm to farm at harvest time. The women followed, cooking dinner each day.

In winter, it was butchering time. Since there was no electricity, freezers, etc., the meat had to be cured, smoked, or fried down and stored in large crocks, then covered with lard. Butchering usually consisted of five or six hogs. When it was time to grind the sausage, the men jacked up the Model A car and hooked the grinder on the back wheel. They seasoned it, mixed it in large washtubs, and stuffed it in casings, which had been cleaned. Making headcheese, rendering lard, and making scrapple were all accomplished in one day.

Canning fruit and vegetables was another hot job. Everyone had large gardens and had to can in order to have produce throughout the winter. Canning was done with a coal stove.

Water was heated in a large black kettle outside for washing, which was done once or twice a week by hand. Later, washers were run by gasoline engines. Winter nights were cold when you slept upstairs with no heat. Leo and Opal became the parents of Harold, Robert, James, Mary Frances “Toot” (Mrs. Lester Walch), Kenneth, and Jack.

Although times were rough (sometimes we put cardboard in our shoes to cover the holes), because we lived on a farm, we had our own meat, milk, fruit, and vegetables, so we always had plenty to eat and lots of love.

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Leo was born 12/21/1886 and died 3/22/79.
Opal was born 10/22/1900 and died 6/10/90. The couple was married in 1919.  

Thank you to Carl, Janet, and Toots Walch for their help with this week's post!

"Back in my day..."

I'm at the age where I enjoy regaling my son with tales about how hard life was “back in the day” when I was a kid. One of my go-to hard luck stories is about having to “warm up” the television set.

The television in our living room was in a big wooden console with a whopping 23-inch screen. There was no such thing as a remote control, or if there was, we didn't have one. The same knob that you turned to power up the TV was also used to adjust the volume. There was another knob that you could turn to select one of the three or four channels that was available back then. Once you clicked the power knob, a small dot would appear in the center of the screen, and after what seemed like an eternity, the dot would gradually expand and reveal the full picture. It was imperative that you allowed plenty of time to warm up the TV prior to your show, or you risked missing the first couple of minutes of it. To make matters worse, you were never guaranteed a good quality picture since that often depended on the weather and other factors.

I came across the following advertisement from Illinois Power while looking through the September 24, 1964 issue of The Raymond News and it reminded me about our television woes back then. The struggle was real!

So long, Gus

The following information appears in Raymond's 125th Anniversary book: 

Gus Sutter on retirement day in 1993

Gus Sutter, a rural mail carrier the Raymond-Harvel area, retired on January 21, 1993 after 64 years with the U.S. Postal service. A reception was held in his honor at the Raymond Post Office where representatives of the U.S. Postal Service and the Rual Mail Carriers Association presented him with special certifcates and awards recognizing his status as both the oldest and longest-term mail carrier in the United States. 

Gus' retirement recieved national press coverage with television crews from NBC, CBS, ABC, and CNN hovering over him on his final day of work. The event was also well documented in all the local papers, as well as the State Journal Register and The St. Louis Post Dispatch. 

Buckeye 4-H Club Elects Officers

 From the Raymond News, December 31, 1964: