Our family home on the Menominee River (circa 1948)
Dear George,
This is the eleventh archive
of family photos that my dad, Vic L., took between the 1930’s and the 1970’s in
Menominee, Michigan. Most of these
come from postcards that my brother Peter reproduced from Vic’s negatives in
the early 2000’s. Past archives
can be accessed by going to the right hand column of this blog, clicking on
“Archives” in the “Labels” section, and scrolling down. I put one new photo of Vic’s in the
right hand column each week, and I’ll be posting more archives in the future.
Love,
Dave
My mother Doris L., the only
child of insurance executive Guy Cramer and homemaker Nora Cramer, grew up in
Omaha, Nebraska. She was an honors
student in high school, met my dad in college, and married at age 22 in
1932. Doris and Vic lived in
Menominee for nearly all of their married life, were members of a wonderful
long-term friendship group there, raised four kids, and enjoyed a rich life
together. I think this picture was
taken when Doris was in her mid-20’s.
Vic and Doris and their
friends would have regular social get-togethers, including costume parties and
theme parties of all sorts. Here
Doris and Vic look like they’ve stepped out of a L’il Abner comic strip.
Florence Caley and her
husband Bill were very good friends of our parents, and we often visited their
home on the Green Bay shore at Northwood Cove. Their three boys, Bill Jr., Tom, and Bruce, were friends of
myself and my siblings. Florence
was a former teacher, and she was a very generous and warm person. The Caleys were enthusiastic boaters
and we’d sometimes join them on trips across the bay to Door County.
I was eight when my dad
returned from the war. He was a
Lieutenant JG, served in the Pacific theater, and spent months in postwar
Japan. I was initially let down
when I learned that he was on a communications ship rather than a destroyer or
aircraft carrier, but I felt better when I learned that he’d had been in battle
zones. My dad regarded his wartime
years as the most important and meaningful in his life, He and his Menominee friends would talk
about their military experiences, and he’d occasionally get together with
former Navy shipmates.
The end of the war and the
return of husbands, fathers, sons, and brothers were huge events during our
childhood. My dad came back from
the Navy, Mike O’Hara from the Marines, and Pat Steffke from the Army. Here are Jean O’Hara, Pat, and our mom,
Doris L., relaxing at a get-together after the veterans’ return.
This
is my sister Vicki with our beloved Irish Setter, Mike, on the window seat at
river house around 1948. I have another of my dad’s photos of Vicki and Mike
when she was a teenager, so Mike lived quite a while. He was a very smart dog, faithful and loving, energetic, and
very good with us kids.
Peter was born in June of
1945, the third son in an eventual family of four kids. Peter always had a keen sense of humor
and an unflagging spirit. He and
Vicki were very close. As an adult
Peter knew more about our family life than any of the rest of us and was the best
source of family history. It’s his
postcard project that made available most of “Vic’s Photos” shown here.
Here’s
Doris with Vicki and Peter at some sort of summer outing. My siblings look mildly amused, but our
mom, as was characteristic, was much more ebullient.
This is my sister Vicki and
our cousin Thor, Kent and Millie’s oldest child, at Washington Grade
School. I think Vicki and Thor
were in the same grade, though I’m not positive. Washington Grade School was an important part of all of our
lives. It’s where I learned that I
could do well in school, got a reasonable grounding in the 3 R’s, and began my
lifelong academic career.
This is my Aunt Martha, Vic’s
younger sister, and my cousin John, probably at their house at Pine Beach in
Marinette. Martha’s husband,
Ralph, along with Clarence Nelson, ran the Marinette drugstore, and Martha and
Ralph had two kids, Ann and John.
Martha was a long-time librarian at the Stephenson Public Library on
Dunlap Square in Marinette. John
has recently retired from a long career as a physical therapist in the twin
cities. He’s a devoted mountain
biker, and we enjoy getting together on visits to Menominee.
My grandfather’s Menominee
Rexall drugstore had a fountain that served lunches and ice cream. Steven and I ate there daily when we
attended Washington Grade School, a half block away, though we usually ate in my
Uncle Kent’s office so that the fountain stools would be available for the
customers. One of the great
thrills of my childhood is that my dad used to bring us to the drugstore after
hours and allowed us to make any ice cream concoction that we deserved, with
the sole limitation that we had to eat whatever we made. It was a child’s dream come true.
Dooley Worth was the oldest
daughter of Jean and Margaret Worth, two of my parents’ closest friends. Jean was the editor of the
Herald-Leader in Menominee, and our families enjoyed many happy outings as his
hunting camp in Cedar River.
Dooley was a couple of years younger than me and went to the University
of Michigan, eventually becoming a medical anthropologist. She was smart, funny, and full of
spirit. We enjoyed some e-mail
correspondence a couple of years ago, but then lost touch. I’m sad to say that she passed away in
2014.
Here are my brothers Steve
and Peter and my sister Vicki posing on the window seat in the living room of
our house on the river. This was
probably taken around the time that I’d left for college. Steve is looking handsome, Peter is the
most animated, and Vicki seems happily absorbed in the mysterious object that
she’s holding. My siblings were great, and, despite the usual rivalries and
occasional spats, we got along well and grew still closer as the years went
by.
My brother Peter, who played
football at Menominee High, was always annoyed that he was a bit shorter than
average. He dealt with that as a
teenager by taking up weightlifting as a serious enterprise. He definitely wound up the most
muscular of us kids.
This is Mary St. Peter, a
close family friend, in her teenage years. Her brother Frank St. Peter and I were the same age and did
lots of things together, including YMCA and boy scout camps. Mary was a couple
of years younger. Katja and I
visited Mary and her husband John in San Francisco in the early 1960’s, and we
still keep in touch via occasional e-mails or e-greetings. Mary and John now live at Orca Island,
Washington.
Aunt Martha was the family
genealogist, and Katja and I would visit with her on each of our Menominee
trips and find out about her latest projects on our family.
Katja first visited my
family’s home in Menominee in March of 1957 at age 19. Having grown up in center city
Philadelphia, she found everything about Menominee amazing, and she took
readily to my parents, siblings, and family friends. This photo was taken in 1960, the year we got married. She certainly was a pretty family member.
In the Autumn of 1963 Katja
and I did a six-week tour of western Europe. We met up with my dad in the latter part of the trip, and he
hosted us to a French Riviera stay for several days at a hotel in Rocquebrun
which was built into a mountainside overlooking the sparkling Mediterranean
below. We enjoyed a fancy, exotic
get-together which included continental breakfasts on the high-rise outdoor
patio each morning.
When my parents purchased a
large tract of land in the Birch Creek area, they initially had no interest in
the dilapidated Farm buildings on one portion of the property. Within a few years, though, they began
renovation of the log cabin that dated back to the 1890’s, with the aid of
Menominee construction expert, Jim Dama (pictured here) and then George Jansen
Jr. Very quickly Farm became the
love of my parents’ golden years.
This
is the log cabin at Farm in its original condition when my parents bought the
property. After its renovation,
Vic and Doris sold our house on the river and lived at Farm for the last decade of their lives. They loved their new home and, during
our many family reunions there, taught their children and grandchildren to love
it as well. Now Farm is jointly
owned by Vic and Doris’ nine grandchildren, and it continues to be a source of
family togetherness and enjoyment.
