Old Putt-Putt

Our mother was room mother for Bobby Joe or me every year. This involved making cookies and punch for parties, and being chaperone for field trips. All the kids wanted to go in our car, which was a '28 Model A roadster with a rumble seat. We didn't open the rumble seat, but I recall one time it was open and Uncle Frank, Sissy, Bobby Joe, and I rode in the rumble seat and sang "My Bonnie Lies over the Ocean" along Fredericksburg Road. Uncle Frank was a veteran of World War I, and that song dates from that era. The kids at school called our car Old Putt-Putt.

Daddy had promised to buy Mama a brand new car if she married him in 1938, and in the 1960s he still hadn't. I think he forgot about telling her that, but she didn't forget. After a series of used Chevrolets and Old Putt-Putt we finally got a new car when the Japanese came out with a four-cylinder. Daddy never would drive the Model A outside of town, but the mother of the lady next door bought it from us and she took it quite often out of town to see her other daughter, so it was road-worthy.

At school, for Valentine's parties the teacher made a Valentine's box covered with paper lace and hearts. Everyone put their Valentines in the box to be handed out at the party. We brought a Valentine for everybody because Mama said it wasn't fair if somebody didn't get any. We spent hours deciding which card to give to whom. We had the little hearts that had the sayings on them.

For Halloween we wore costumes, At Christmas we each brought a gift and each of us took one home. There were days off for military parades, and every year we had a Wednesday off for the stock shows and Southwestern Days, and they had a parade. We also had off for San Jacinto Day; there were events all week and the Battle of Flowers parade Friday afternoon. They had the river parade on Monday and Fiesta Flambeau was a lighted parade on Saturday night. All these matched up to the Rose Bowl parade at that time. The only difference was ours used paper flowers where they use real flowers.