If you had asked me,.. I never would have thought that
I would stand up for him. But it involves
our Mother as well… so here goes….
Not that any of this is any of your business, but my
mother was a typical teenaged girl. She got into trouble. Many years later she said to me, “be careful
of those good-looking men. They think an awful lot of themselves.” I did not take her meaning at the time,
being a teenaged girl myself…but several years later that light bulb above my
head came on.
She was only 15 years old. He was older, and very handsome. He took her into the barn and had his way
with her. He did not care one bit about
her, he was only interested in satisfying himself. He did a good job of
satisfying himself alright,… he made her pregnant.
I do not have the details. I know that her older sisters, who raised her
from age 4, realized that she was pregnant at some point. Their father was
told. The sheriff may have been involved, as the young man was brought before a
judge. I do not know who was present,
other than the pregnant girl, her father, the judge, and the man who impregnated
the girl. The judge gave the young man a
choice. This was the custom of that era. The young man would do one of two things: he
would give the pregnant girl the sum of $500 (a lot of money in 1934)… or he
would marry the pregnant girl. (I am
sure that refusal would have meant going to jail.) He did not have any money, and so they were
married. She may have still been smitten,
I do not know.
What I do know is that they were married, and their
son was born. They lived in the upstairs of a house in Arlington Heights,
Illinois. And some time in their son’s
second year of life the man went out for cigarettes,…and never returned. That was the sad and sorry ‘tune’ of the times.
The woman divorced the man, no longer interested in
being tied to a bastard, scoundrel who did not care a whit about her or their child.
After a few months the woman secured a job taking care
of a widower’s children. Due to circumstances
I will not share here the child went to live with his aunt and uncle, and he
grew up with their sons. He did not live
far away from his mother, though, and they saw each other weekly. When the boy was 11 or 12 years old he went “home”
to live with his mother and her second husband.
The facts I need to emphasize are these:
The boy’s mother and father were, in fact, married to
each other.
There exists a newspaper clipping that proves that
there was a divorce.
(I am sure that court records could be located, but no
one who matters needs that kind of proof of anything.)
The boy’s mother loved him dearly. She was proud of her son and his achievements.
People who don’t know what the hell they are talking about
should keep their damn mouths shut.
People who were younger than the mother of the boy have
no business gossiping and spreading lies.
Certain cousins should be very ashamed of
themselves. They caused the man to doubt
that his mother even loved him. They
caused him to believe that his parents were never married.
He believed your damn lies. He died doubting his mother’s love.
You people are despicable. You know damn well who I am
referring to if you are related to them. You should be ashamed of yourselves for your
gossip and filthy lies. You all are not happy unless you have made someone else miserable.
The next person who even suggests that our Mother was
not married to his father: I WILL SLAP
YOUR FACE.
His mother loved him.
His children know it. That is all
I need to know. But I do not ever want
to hear your slanderous filth ever again.
If his children see this: I have more information that
only you have a right to know.
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