North Dakota- Dori and Gary's Stories

Dori's Story - She remembers that she was sick a lot, I got car sick whenever we left home for farther than Kirkland (five miles away from Juanita) Dori was counted on getting car sick, mom brought a coffee can. We called it a thunder mug because that is what is sounded like when I would barf into it, I threw up every time I got car sick,. I have a very low threshold for vomiting, I don’t care it doesn’t upset me to vomit I feel better after I do. Gary, it really. he has to be deathly ill to vomit and it really irks him to do it, The last straw to have to do it I just go in a get rid of it. I am 100% better once I do because I have done it all my life. So we drove every day and we slept in the car, I think the folks slept in the car too in the front, we slept in the back it was a station wagon. We were very tight n money and we didn’t have a lot to rent motels and I don’t remember that we had a tent or anything on the way back. I remember that we slept in the station wagon. And we would stop in the shell station to gas up and use the restroom to freshen up and empty my thunder mug and get it fresh for the new day.
Drove there to visit Dad’s father, grandpa Anderson. He was nine and I was about 7. We weren’t very old and it was the old time we went to N Dakota. We got to see some really beautiful country we went through Bad Lands, Yellow Stone Nation park, Old Faithful, and the beautiful bad lands in there, Flaming geysers and the sulfur pots almost got us sick. Saw lots of wildlife going through yellow stone, buffalo, bears elk, deer, prairie dogs, we took a lot of pictures and slides.

(Top from left to right: Hank, Grandma Peg, Grandpa Gene, Andy; Bottom: Genie, Loran)

We saw our aunts and uncles that were around our age, he had a second marriage family. And they were a few years older right around our age, it was like having cousins, we had a reunion out at Gary’s a year or two ago and Josh and Jeremy got the meet a couple of them, Jeanie (between Gary and my age), Loren (possibly younger than Dori), Melton (couple years older than Gary), Merle ( the oldest). They met all accept Lauren.

Tornado? Only tornado ever experienced, it was thrilling and exciting we went down to the cellar because we thought we would get hit with it. Name of town??? How far from Fargo??? Cecil and Grandpa out fishing they got hailed one and you know it is pretty close the tornado when you get hailed on.

There during 4th of July setting off fireworks in the town, it was exciting. We were gone for 2 weeks traveling by car, we didn’t have freeway systems that we have now days.

Gary’s Story – I absolutely loved the North Dakota trip! It was a magical time for me in my life. I was 11 years old and life could not have been better for me. 1957 cars had just hit the market; they don’t come out in January, but just after school starts. There were huge changes in body style. I memorized all of the cars, I saw every model from Cadillac to Nash Ramblers…I saw everything on that trip. That was the year the fins came out. So my parents had bought a 56 Nash Rambler Station Wagon, red and white. And of coarse back in those days there were no seat belts in the cars, none, no seat belt law either. If you wanted to load your kids on the top rack of the car you could do it. We didn’t even know what seat belts were they were only worn on race cars drivers.

I spent all my time in the back of the wagon, sleeping, dreaming, looking at cars and sights; my mind was racing with all sorts of adventures and make believe. That was, in my memory, the very best year of my life. I was making a transition from real boy hood to man hood a little bit. I could talk to my parents about cars, I knew the make and model of every car passing us better than my mom and dad did and they knew it. That was a boost of my self confidence they would go me for information, “What car do you think that one was?”, “That was an imperial”. I studied it, memorized it, and watched TV commercials. I knew them all that 1 year. They were so radically different that it was easy. There are car museums dedicated to 1957 cars only that is how big of an impact it was. Detroit changed cars. Fins were huge. Kids would put fins on their cars for decoration but this year the cars came that way. Also cars went from single headlights to double headlight. Not all cars but some. Kids customized their cars and put extra headlights on, Detroit copied it.

Some of the things we saw at Yellow Stone (I recently went with Bonnie and we only saw 1 bear) as a kid a mommy bear would walk down the road and the babies would attack your car looking for food. There were tons of bears, all sorts of wildlife and grizzlies. We also saw the badlands of South Dakota. It was called that because years ago if they would get in trouble with the law and had ‘Wanted Dead or Alive’ poster the criminals would hide out in South Dakota. You could get lost out there. But there were roads through it in my day. We saw lots of Prairie Dogs, little critters that were about twice the size of a gray squirrel, they had colonies with 150 holes in the ground each hole had a prairie dog with its head sticking out barking at ya. That was fun, we saw Buffalo too and we headed to North Dakota and into city with dirt streets where Grandfather Clifford Eugene Anderson lived.

For the 4th of July we let off fireworks in the middle of the street, not safe or sane. There were no laws or safety codes against this it wasn’t until people died and there were deaths every 4th of July that people said we have got the be safe. Then all of the good fireworks went to the Indian reservation. At this fireworks show they stuck a Roman Candle in the dirt and lit it gets real bright light goes up and burns out. This Roman Candle fired up in the air then lost its footing and laid down on the ground, the second round and third rounds straight down the street and into the barn. It wasn’t a huge fire but it created a huge ruckus. The volunteer fire department came out and someone had to grab the firework and aim it some where else.

A tornado came while we were out there. I have never seen hail that size it was the size of golf balls, so huge you could not stay out in it, it would beat you to death. That was the year that Fargo was torn up pretty bad they had a lot of deaths that was North of us. My dad happened to be out on a house boat fishing, they saw a funnel come down and hit a farm but it did not get close to them.

They had a house and in front of the house was a tavern grandpa owned and operated. Under the house was a cellar, it was filled with food and cans, but was also used as an escape route in case of a tornado. It was scary hail! When golf balls start falling from the sky, it could tear a farmer’s crop up, dent cars and tin roofs. It is scary stuff. I would rather endure hurricanes then live in tornado alley.

Clams and Oysters- Dori (with recipes)

Started out clam digging when we were quite young. Mom and Dad and I and Gary would go over Kapalis and Moclips beaches along Washington coast. We would stay with Aunt Helen and Uncle Harry? If they had there place then or where we stayed. We would wait for low tides to go out and we would go down even by lantern for oysters. We would go down and walk out on the beach and you watch for little dimples the sand and when you see one you start digging. If it is a razor clam you have to dig really fast because they can move really fast only a foot to foot and half below surface. You have a special long and narrow shovel like half of a post digger it’s curved but twice as long. Attached to a small handle so you have to bend over to dig. It doesn’t take very long to get them if you don’t get them in the first couple digs your not going to get them because they move that fast.
They have a sharp shell you have to watch when you grab in the sand I would wear rubber gloves to protect my hands. That is where they get the name razor clams. They are really good for eating, we would clean them really well when we got them to the camp site. So that we didn’t have and grains of sand in them at all, we made clam chowder out of them and “Oh, is it ever good!” We would grind them up on a meat grinder to cook with them.

We dug Horseshoe clams the most. They were wonderful, about twice the size of a razor clam and built more like a gooey duck and slower moving. They weren’t too fast to run away for you and you could dig them with a regular shovel. About 2-3 below the surface of the sand. They made wonderful clam chowder and dip, really good tasting. You had to steam the necks and peel the skin off them. The boys dug horseshoe clams. I don’t think that they dug while Grandpa was alive. He was only over there 3 months before he passed away. They had the property out there for many years. The boys went there to travel trailer before that but not till the big house.

Oysters you pick off rocks and you have to leave the shells on the beach so you can only take the meat away with you. Occasionally you can take the whole shell during the right season. We would have Oyster bakes on a BBQ in the shell. When they were done the shell would pop open and you knew the oyster was cooked. Other wise you have to pry the oysters open and clean them out. I like my Oysters fried like we used to do them. Dori will train you to clean oysters of you ask…and how to fry them it takes a knack ion a seasoned (Old is better than new) cast iron skillet. I asked why, she said they don’t stick like they do on new skillets.

We also dug up gooey ducks. A gooey duck is about quadruple the size of a clam. It is way down in the sand and doesn’t move. You need a garbage pail, old metal. You shore up the side on a dig of a gooey duck because the sand can cave it on you. You use a big shovel it takes a lot of energy to dig them up. They are really sweet meat. One time we went out and dug a patch of Piducks (unsure on spelling). They were a cross between a razor clam and a gooey duck and they were in clay and you needed a crow bar and pick axe to get them out. They didn’t move at all, they were hard to get out but once you got to them they were all over ht e place so we got a lot of them in. It was back breaking work because of the clay. They had a different flavor; you really had to wash the sand off of them. The neck had a very strong sand flavor to it so we used the foot on those, it was sweeter and more tender.

Grandma and Grandma did this up until their 40’s and 50’s. I look at the age I am now and mom and dad did that until their later years. I wasn’t involved when Gary would take the boys clamming with Grandma and Grandpa.

Grandma Anderson’s Clam Chowder (Quick version, no clam cleaning!)
Coming soon!

Clam Dip
1 Clove Garlic 2 /3 Ounce Cream Cheese
1 TBL Mayo 1TBL Worcestershire Sauce
1 TBL Lemon Juice ½ tsp Salt
½ cup (can) Minced Clams, drained but save the juice
1TBL Clam Broth

Mix together, add more clam broth and chill!

Double Pnemonia -by Gary

I got really sick and the doctors asked my mom if we had any family in the Spokane area. My mom said yes lots of family. So he suggested I go to Spokane for the summer to get better. I stayed with Grandma Grandpa in Usk, Washington (just north of Spokane). I stayed with them for the three summer months of 1958. They lived in a firehouse; grandpa worked for the forest service and ran a firehouse. He had a crew of younger guys and they had old wooden lookouts on al the high peaks. Whenever there was smoke in the area they would look through a glass with a x on it like a scope, they had a 360 degree compass, they would call Grandpa on telephones and they would give him the baring and he would look at his maps and know exactly where the fire was. Then they would head out with shovels and water to put out the fire. They didn’t have any plumbing accept for a shower, which was really strange to just have water pumped in for a shower facility and that was near the outhouse.

Sputnik and The Dawn of the Space Age - by Gary

History changed on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union successfully launched Sputnik I. The world's first artificial satellite was about the size of a beach ball (58 cm.or 22.8 inches in diameter), weighed only 83.6 kg. or 183.9 pounds, and took about 98 minutes to orbit the Earth on its elliptical path. That launch ushered in new political, military, technological, and scientific developments. While the Sputnik launch was a single event, it marked the start of the space age and the U.S.-U.S.S.R space race.
Out in front of the fire hall at my Grandparents house in Usk, WA (just north of Spokane). When it got dark enough, it got dark! There were no street lights and most of the houses out there were lit by kerosene lamps so there wasn’t much light coming from them either. You could go outside and you could see the Milky Way! When the Russians sent out sputnik that was the time my mom and dad came out to pick me up from my summer stay after having pneumonia. We stood there in the yard and saw sputnik rotate the earth, I don’t know how long it took to rotate but we went in and went back outside again and saw it again.

Gary's Childhood Interests

I have always been interested in the heavens since I was a little tiny kid. I used to love to spend summer nights lying on inter tubs at night and looking at the stars.

I loved to draw; especially birds and I loved to identify birds as well. I loved to draw hydroplanes as well. Hydroplane racing was big when we were kids! We had 3 channels in Seattle eventually, ABC, NBC, CBS; and that was it for years. When we had hydroplane races all 3 channels would cover the race. We didn’t’ have super bowls back then, but when a football or game was on TV only one station would cover it. But when hydroplane races came to Seattle all stations would cover it. You could just flip back and forth through the stations. I loved to draw them.
Later when I got older I took mechanical drawing in school I learned techniques and had straight edges and I would draw houses. That was really fun, I don’t know if I submitted them to contests or not. I loved houses full of windows, high and low, my houses had a lot of windows.

I was also knows for my good penmanship. I had to learn to print for the military and then for the fire service. All of our paperwork had to be printed and now I print for the bus so I am now illiterate in long hand. All I do now is sign my name, but I print everything else. I really enjoyed writing in long hand.

I also enjoyed telling stories. I wasn’t much pf a story writer but I could tell good stories. I could tell a story! I remember I could tell a sad story and I would have all of my cousins crying. I could tell a scary story and I would have them just about ready to leap out of bed and run to mom. Whenever we went to the Jones’ the four younger kids were our ages. When it was time for bed our parents would tell us to go to bed and the kids would say. “No, Gary has to tell us a story”. Our parents would grumble and say okay because they knew we were stalling. But we would get ready for bed and I would tell a story. A good story had to have a dog getting injured to have an effect on them or scary woods. I knew how to scare the daylights out of them, I would even scary the daylights out of me. I remember I would be telling a story and my voice would begin to shake cause even I would be scared.

I didn’t like to tell stories to the adults. When ever my older cousins would come in to listen I would quit because I would get embarrassed.
I would never tell them to older kids or adults. My fame spread all over the place.

The Jones'- by Dori and Gary

We loved to visit our favorite cousins, the Jones’, and would visit them often. Aunt Audrey and Uncle Lyle, cousins Sharon and Joe and Denise and Dale. Sharon was like a sister to me she was just between Gary and me in age, Joe was a younger than I and the twins were a couple years younger than Joe. Aunt Audrey and Uncle Lyle were quite a bit older than mom and dad. They took care of 3 other kids Alan, Connie and Rose when they had polio. (??? Need more information about this.)

The Jones’ were quite poor, they lived in Rainer Washington; and had an outhouse, and no electricity. It was quite and adventure to go to their house, before going to bed you had to get a friend and go to the outhouse. You didn’t want to have to get up in the middle of the night and go to the bathroom. We were really close and would see them a couple times a year. They would come to see us and loved our electricity and indoor plumbing. They thought we were rich, but we didn’t have a lot of money. When they moved to Castle Rock they got electricity and they thought they hit it big.

Once when we were there during the holiday season they cooked a turkey and Connie babysat us while adults went dancing, when they got back all of us kids had eaten the turkey right to the bone.

Gary-
We had a good time; they had a good piece of property. They had a rain barrel and we would draw water out of it and boil it. They had a wood burning stove, kerosene lamps, no phone, no pole or anything going to the house or in the ground. You had to sit on a toilet in an outhouse and there was always a stick there. You had to take the stick and stir it in the toilet before sitting down to make sure there weren’t any black widow spiders. If you hit a black widow spider web it would make a snap. As a kid I was so traumatized by this, I would have to go to the bathroom, but once I got out there I would get so cared I wouldn’t have to go anymore. Black widow spiders were especially present in Eastern Washington, they were common outside every once in a while they would be in a toilet. You had to be careful because a bite could kill a man or make them very sick. The old expression was that a black widow spider could kill a horse and that would take a lot of venom.

Gary the Storyteller - by Dori

Gary would tell stories and he was a wonderful story teller. We would just sit there enraptured by his stories, funny about bunny rabbits and animals of the woods and how they interacted with each other and other times they would be scary stories they would be so engrossing that he would even scare himself. He was even so good that he would write these stories out and I wish I still had it I kept it for years and in one of my moves I lost it. He had a wonderful imagination, he could keep us entertained so well with these wonderful stories and that is one of the things we loved to do. I can remember it very well from the time we were very young.

A Few Recipes to Hand Down- by Dori

Grandma Anderson's Tuna Noodle Casserole

1pkg egg noodles - 2 can cr. Mushroom soup
1 sm can mushrooms - 1 cup diced cheese
1 can albacore tuna - potato chips

1. Boil water, add noddles. Remove from heat and cover with lid. Let cook for 10 minutes, drain.
2. Mix ingredients and pour over noodles.
3. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes; pour pepper and chips over top.

Grandma Anderson's Maccoroni and Cheese
8 oz. Elbow noodles - ¼ cup butter

¼ cup flour - 1 tsp. salt

½ tsp pepper - 2 cup milk

2 cup cubed cheddar cheese - ½ an onion

1. Boil water, add noodles. Remove from heat and add lid. Let cook for 10 minutes, then drain.
2. Simmer butter and onion in pan until onion is clear. Combine flour, salt and pepper in a bowl and add to onion in pan. Stir for 2 minutes on low heat.
3. Add milk, turn up heat, let boil and add cheese until all melted. Combine sauce and noodles into a casserole dish. Sprinkle grated cheese over top and bake in oven for 15 minutes at 350.

Aunt Dori's Easy Chicken Chili

1 ½ lb ground chicken - 1 LG yellow chopped onion

1. Brown together until no pink shows

4 pkgs French’s chili-o-spice - 2 cans chili beans

2 cans pin quito beans - 2 cans kidney beans, drained

3 cans mexi style stewed tomatoes, cut - 1 Lg can chopped tomatoes

2. Heat through. Makes a very large batch!

Aunt Dori's Fabulous Fudge
18 oz chocolate chips - 2 tsp vanilla
½ lb butter - 1 jar marshmallow cream
2 cup walnuts - 4 ½ cups sugar
12oz can evaporated milk

1. In heavy saucepan mix sugar and milk. Bring to brisk oil on small burner on high heat.
2. Reduce to med high for 9 min stirring constantly.
3. stir in other ingredients. Mix well until melted then add nuts.
4. Pour into buttered pan. Makes 5 lbs.

Cooking and Crafts - by Dori

Mom was the one that taught me how to sew, she taught me how to cook, she taught me housekeeping. She taught me just about the basics of all the good things in life.

She started teaching me to cook when I was young, it was something that I wanted to do and she encouraged me to do it. She taught me the basics like how to not burn myself and how to boil water and cook rice and pasta. I just learned things as I was cooking with her. She would say, “This is how I used to do it”, or, “This is how Grandma used to do it”. And I would pick up on it. I actually started home economics in school and they helped me with cooking too. I won a school superintendents award my senior year in home economics.

When teaching me to sew she would be over my shoulder and I would work the patterns and she would be right there to assist me. And it was really wonderful, she wasn’t criticizing she would help me though it and she was kind about it. She would say, “You’ve got to start over because you don’t want to do a half-way job. You want it to be nice”. So I would start over and make it nice. Now I am so particular about my sewing. I remember the dresses I made for Angie, I was so particular about them and they turned out so nice. Mom was a very patient instructor. She was never critical she just wanted me to do a good job and was very patient about how I did.

We did crafts when I was younger, she got me sighed up for a craft of the month club. I would get them once a month and I would finish them and then give them out as gifts. Sometimes I would be selfish and keep them for myself; I’d hang them in my room or around the house. I still have some of them hanging in my house now. We had a lot of fun working on crafts together. She taught me how to crochet, I tried knitting but I was too nervous, I just couldn’t catch it. I never enjoyed it, but Mom loved to knit. She would knit early morning before work, she would get up earlier than she needed to each day and knit for about an hour or so, then get ready and go to work. She would knit beautiful things like dresses, sweaters and coats, she’d even make whole outfits. She would knit gifts for Dad and me and Gary and Pam.

I remember she knitted some little bunny sweaters for Jeremy and Josh. Pam didn’t like them for the boys, I think the bunny wasn’t manly enough. They wore them the day they got them but that was the last time. Mom knitted a pineapple poncho for Pam and she loved it. She wore it often and got complements on it for years. She even knitted a matching sweater for Gary that same year for Christmas.

Mom didn’t start her egg crafts until after she retired and moved into the mobile home. She and her friends Pat, Glee and Betty; there were 4 or 5 of them that lived across the street and they would make projects together. They made the 3 Wiseman, and earrings and other things. Then they started making eggs. John showed mom how to use the circular saw on the eggs and made it so much easier for al the ladies. They did crafts together for years, until they started having health issues and they slowly dropped out one by one as health issues got worse.

Hunting with Dad - by Gary

My dad loved to hunt and fish. And he bought paraphernalia for both. Often times he would build his own fishing rods. He usually saved money by buying an old WWI military relict infield riffle, with a wooden stock all the way to the tip of the barrel, from a magazine. He would have it re-chambered, and bored out the barrel to take a 300 magnum round. Then he would put a scope on it. So the rifle didn’t have sights, if the scope got bumped or broken he couldn’t shoot. I’m sorry to say that I did not keep that gun, I should have kept it but I didn’t think I needed it because I don’t hunt. Mom sold the gun after Dad died.

He was a big game hunter; he would hunt for deer all the time. But he would even go up to Canada and hunt bear, moose an elk. I remember he got a moose in Canada once. He had a storage locker in a store in Juanita for the meat. Back in those days you could rent the freezer space in a store to keep your game. Hunting was more acceptable. Today there has been a big movement to limit guns and for animal rights. You used to be able to wear a fur coat but now if you run across an animal rights activist you get spray painted.

I was on a trail once when I heard a deer coming. I knew it was a deer because of the thud, thud, thud sound. Not like horse trotting, but the thud of a deer bouncing as it runs. I was standing on the trail and heard it coming toward me, I got down with my 30-30 lever action gun, I cocked it and put it up to my shoulder. Then up over the hill came a doe bouncing, as soon as she saw me she jumped off to the side and was gone. I could not shoot a doe because I did not have a doe tag. If it had been a buck it would have been an easy kill for me but the buck would have probably fallen right on me. I remember I was scared to death wondering if I was going to be able to do this. I was looking for the antlers and didn’t see them then the deer bounded sideways and I was very much relieved.

He would take me hunting with him and he had a hunting partner, Cliff Schroeder, an auto mechanic. That is where I really developed my love for listening to Husky football. My dad made sure that were ever we were we had a portable radio. We would go out hunting early in the morning; we were on the trail long before the sun came up because the animals need to eat at twilight and dusk. But by noon we would be back at camp cooking up lunch on the campfire or stoves, and listening to Washington play football.

This was back when I was 14, 15, 16, somewhere in that vicinity. I never got interested in hunting, I wasn’t into killing deer. I hated to go out and kill animals I had all the meat I needed in the market. I did like to fish but Dad got me hooked on listening to Husky football. I knew it was important because my dad hunted on the weekends, but we had to be back at camp at noon to hear the game. You could get away but you couldn’t get that far away.

A Bit Of Husky Information
Seattle didn’t have a professional football team for years and years. When pros started out they had a real small national football league. They eventually expanded into AFL and NFL. So we only had one football team in the area, The Husky’s. Seattle has always been a football town. Do you know when people stand up and do the wave at a football game that stared in Washington Husky’s stadium. Even today we are the loudest team. WA stadium and Qwest field (Seahawks) are the hardest stadiums to watch a game in because you can’t hear the plays. Seattle has the loudest fans and some of rowdiest. The number 12 is flown from the top of space needle because we where the 12th man. It all started with WA Huskies. Did you know this? WA Huskies have a rooter club, fan club, that follows the team. It is the largest travel team in college football. When WA went down to Florida to play Miami (longest trip to an away game in the US) we filled a whole side of the stadium with our team. We pack it in! Huskies are never without a lot of noise and fan support wherever they go, even clear to Florida. Unlike some schools that don’t even have a rooter club, there is no crowd noise when playing away games.

That spirit is what my dad caught. I’ve followed the Huskies all my life, but this summer will be the first time I will seen a game in the Husky stadium, ever. Josh has caught the spirit if Husky football, I’m not sure how but he really has.