Their Story, part 5: Return to College

A bit of ephemera found among Dad’s things.

I find it amusing when Dad says he was discouraged in his first two years in college as his grades “weren’t real good.” It’s the kind of grammar Mom would correct in him all their lives, but he held onto it. The following continues the saga. By the way, Part 4, about their post-wedding trek to the west coast in search of work, was posted earlier under “Traveling Blood.”

Dad often mentioned the special newlywed summer working at this place (and doing real good financially).

From Dad:

There was no steady work to be found. I had many jobs, lasting several days to a week or more. After almost a year of this we decided that I would be able to make up some of my low grades and complete my education as an electrical engineer.

We had a rough time that first year financially but by my junior year I was able to get a job as a park ranger at Devil’s Tower National Monument for the summer, and a job in the fall at a Laramie tourist camp which gave us room and $50 per month. So we did good financially.

From Mom:

His university yearbook exists, but oddly no photo of him. However, the one below seems to have been taken for the occasion.

Jobs continued to be sporadic so one day Hy said, “What do you think of me going back to college?” By that time we had $100 saved, so we took off for Laramie in March to attend the third quarter of school.

The following summer Hy worked for the railroad at Tipton, on the section, replacing ties, and we lived in our little trailer. Hy’s dad was a brakeman on the railroad and he would often throw out a large block of ice from the refrigerated freight cars, keeping our ice box full.

The following fall we went back to Laramie again and Hy graduated two years later from the College of Engineering. That was in the spring of 1942. We sold our trailer and gave the car to his youngest brother Burwin because we didn’t think it would make the trip to the east coast.

We took the train to Camden, New Jersey, where he had been hired to work for RCA.

And that is how my brother and I happened to be born on the east coast . . . though not raised there for long.

NEXT: Anne and I will be traveling to Jericho and Israel. Who knows what Internet connections we’ll find? Maybe you’ll hear from us, maybe not. We’ll see.