Ghosts of Xmas Past - miscellaneous

 

This would have been Christmas of 1955. Donna and I were both one year old. Not sure where the picture was taken. (Donna is a cousin -- the daughter of my mom's cousin Oma Dell.) Looks like I'm playing with a pump from an industrial size ketchup dispenser. (Weird) 

Dianne, Richard, Grandpa Thomas, Eileen, Kim, Ricky, Mick, Greg. (Grandma is there, too -- behind Mick.) This would have been 1958, I think -- Ricky would have been two years old, and Kim a year and a half. This was taken at Bernarde and Eileen's house -- before they moved over to the new house on the lake. The old house was across the street from the lake shore. I don't have a picture of that house. I wish I did. I have some good memories of that place -- playing hide-and-seek out in the yard, catching fireflies, walking over to the lake to go swimming... The boys' bedrooms were upstairs -- I remember them playing with one of those 'electronic' football games where the whole thing vibrated and the little plastic football players would run all over the field... That was high tech back then!

Wathada and Aunt Eileen. This looks like our house on Haver Street in Hartford, so it would have been around 1969 or 1970. 

This is me, sitting in the living room of our house on Haver Street in Hartford. Probably 1969 -- our first Christmas in that house. The room behind me was the dining room. The door in the background was the door to my bedroom. The electric guitar on the floor was most likely Rick's -- looks like this might have been Christmas Eve (there are still some wrapped presents behind the guitar). I think we had everyone at our house for Xmas Eve that year. See that ultra-modern TV with a swivel base? 

Ghosts of Xmas Past - at Bernarde and Eileen's

 

I'm not sure these were all taken the same year. It would have been around 1967 or 1968. I think it was the first Christmas after Bernarde and Eileen moved into their new house on the lake.

Grandma & Grandpa Thomas, Wathada, Eileen & Bernarde (and John eyeing the food). Probably 1967.

Grandpa Thomas and Dianne

(Remember stretch pants with stirrups?) Looks like I got a new white shirt this year.

When we were little, Mom always threatened us not to complain if the presents we got from Grandma and Grandpa were clothes -- they usually were -- instead of toys. 

Kim, Red, Mick. Looks like Red got a new shirt, too.

John, Mick

These last two pictures might have been 1968. 

We always spent Christmas Eve with Dad's family, either at our house or Grandma & Grandpa's or Bernarde & Eileen's. Christmas Day we usually stayed home to open 'Santa' presents and play with our new toys.

Ghosts of Xmas Past - 1964

 

Cardboard fireplace. This was in the dining room where our table usually sat. I don't know what we did with the table. It's possible this was Xmas of 1963 -- we moved into this house in the middle of the school year -- so maybe we had not put the table up yet. 

Me and my dolly. My hair is not naturally curly -- don't know if I've had a perm or if I just curled it with curlers or a curling iron. 

Papa Burford, Lori, Rick, Dianne, Mark. Grandma Burford in background. We didn't usually have company on Christmas Day. This was the year John was born -- he would have been 4 months old -- so maybe that's why everybody came to our house. 

Foreground: Dianne, Rick, Lori.

This is the house where these pictures were taken. We lived in this house from the middle of my 4th grade year through 7th grade. It was a few miles outside of Hartford, and we rode the bus to school. Our bus route included Webster Hills, where the roads were dirt, and the bus got stuck in the snow a few times. One time they actually had to send another bus out to rescue us.

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When we lived here there was a big tree stump -- about 3 feet wide and maybe 18 inches tall -- about six feet in front of the front door. One time Uncle Ron came to visit and found that we were not home. (We were probably at K-Mart.) He decided to wait a while and see if we came home. Pretty soon he got bored and walked around to the back of the house and looked around in the garage for something to do...  Later on, when we got home, we found that our tree stump had turned bright purple while we were gone! No note. No explanation of any kind. But it didn't take much thinking to figure out that Uncle Ron had been there. Sure enough, in the garage there was a can of purple paint and a used paint brush. (I have no idea WHY we would have had a can of bright purple paint in the garage.)

Ghosts of Xmas Past - 1959

 

The stockings were hung by the fake cardboard fireplace with care...

I got a new doll for Xmas every year of my life. (Sometimes two!)

Looks like Ricky got one or two Tonka firetrucks. Back in those days they were made of metal, not plastic -- they were indestructible. Looks like he got a fireman's hat, too. Ask me about the time Dad and Uncle Morris played with Ricky's new Tonka truck so long that they wore the batteries out. (See below)

I don't think Dad looked like this EVERY xmas morning. Maybe he just hadn't had his coffee yet. 

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    One Christmas Santa brought Ricky a new Tonka truck. It might have been one of the ones in these pictures, I'm not sure. Uncle Morris was at our house. (That might have been the same year we didn't have a Christmas tree... remind me to tell you that story...) The truck was motorized and had some lights that lit up -- maybe even a siren. It took flashlight (D-size) batteries. Well, Dad and Uncle Morris ran that truck all over the house, with Ricky toddling along behind them, until the batteries gave out. That made my mother so mad! She told Dad to go and buy some more batteries for that truck -- and don't come home until he had some! Now you have to understand that this was the 1950s -- NO stores were open on Christmas day. There's no telling where Dad had to go to get batteries that morning. Maybe a gas station... Anyway, all I know is he did come home and he did have batteries for Ricky's truck. And he didn't play with that truck any more that day. But Ricky did.

   And then there was the time (could have been this same Christmas) that we somehow got all the way to Christmas Eve without getting a tree. We always spent Xmas Eve with Dad's family -- either at our house or Grandma and Grandpa's or Bernarde and Eileen's. I think that year we went to Bernarde and Eileen's house in Decatur. I don't have any specific memories about it, but it's pretty safe to assume that there was some rather tense discussion in the car on the ride to Decatur about us not having a Xmas tree. The part of this story that I actually do remember was when we came home late that night. When we walked in the front door, there in the living room was a Christmas tree! It was all set up, lit up, and completely decorated. And there on the couch, fast asleep, was Uncle Morris. 

That's my dad in the middle, and Uncle Morris on the right. The guy on the left is Donald Hawley.

Morris was 14 years old when my dad married my mother (Dad was 18). He and Uncle Morris were very close friends through the years. There are probably a whole lot more stories to tell, if I only knew. I wonder if they get together and reminisce, now that they're both on the other side of the veil...

Ghosts of Xmas Past - 1962

This is the house we lived in when these pictures were taken. This is how it looked in 2003 -- it has had extra rooms added on since we lived there. In 1962 the center section was the entire house. By today's standards it would be considered a "tiny house". It was at the intersection of two county roads, near Van Auken Lake, several miles out in the country between Bangor and Hartford. We had a Hartford phone number, but were in Bangor school district. We lived in this house for one year, and it was a bad winter with lots and lots of snow. This is where we lived when my Uncle Morris got stuck in a snowbank one night on the way to our house. He ended up spending the night in his car and walking to the nearest farm house in the morning to use the phone to call us. There's a lot more to that story -- something about a road sign coming up through the floorboard of his car as it sunk into the snowdrift... and nearly being hit by a snowplow... 

The table is in the kitchen, and that's the living room behind us. Grandpa and Grandma Thomas apparently came for Xmas Day dinner. (Usually we spent Xmas Eve with Dad's family, so I don't know what was different about this year. Maybe we did both.) 

This was looking from the living room toward the bathroom and bedrooms -- the bathroom door is the one with the mirror, directly behind me. There was a bedroom to the right (Rick's and mine) and another bedroom to the left (Mom and Dad's). In this picture we're showing off our Xmas presents -- Rick got a guitar, I got a baby doll and a gun belt. I also got some books and my first diary. The dog's name was Missy -- I think she was a beagle, or beagle mix. 

Ricky and Missy. He's sitting on the living room floor, and that's the kitchen behind him. 

Me, Missy, Mom, and Ricky

Ghosts of Xmas Past - 1958

How we did xmas before email and social media.

Top left: Grandpa Thomas, Wathada, Dianne, Grandma Thomas, Ricky

Top right: Dianne, Kim, Bernarde, Eileen

Bottom left: Ricky and Huckleberry Hound

Bottom right: Ricky and Dianne

Mom and Dad had run across the street to Ashel and Marian Miller's house for a few minutes, and I took the opportunity to get an early peek at my Xmas presents under the tree. I told Ricky to go to the picture window and be my lookout. Well, at the time we had not yet discovered that Ricky's eyesight was so bad -- he couldn't have seen Mom and Dad coming across the street to save his (my) life! Fortunately, I didn't get caught. But I well remember that Xmas morning... trying to act genuinely surprised when I opened my presents. That cured me, and I never tried it again.

These pictures were taken at our house on Union Street in Bangor, Michigan, in 1958. My dad built the wooden room dividers, turning the huge space into a living room and dining room. That house also had a parlor on the other side of the entryway. (Oh, and the house was haunted. I recently ran across a family that lived there 20 years after my folks sold the house -- and they confirmed that it was still haunted when they lived in it. The house has been torn down since then.)

Ghosts of Christmas Past - 1967

Goin' through all the xmas pictures from the family archives...

There are a whole lot more than I realized. Where to start? How 'bout 1967.

Four generations in one house - Lester & Cleffie's house in Watervliet, Michigan

In attendance, by generation: Annie Hicks (Cleffie's mother)

Lester and Cleffie Burford

Lester and Cleffie's kids: Wathada, Morris, Bob, Ron

Wathada's husband Red, Bob's wife Jackie, Ron's wife Maxine

Wathada and Red's kids: Dianne, Rick, John

Bob and Jackie's kids: Mark, Lori

Top left: Annie, Morris, Bob. Top right: Annie (Grandma Hicks)

Bottom left: Morris, Annie, Lester. Bottom right: Dianne and Rick

Top left: Lori, Lester, Wathada, Rick, Ron. Top right: Cleffie in the dining room.

Bottom left: John (Lori and Ron in background). 

Bottom right: Wathada, Rick, John, Maxine, Annie, Mark, Jackie, Lori