Mom's 90th Birthday
Words limit my ability to describe the essence of my mom.
I wonder what she’d say about her ninety years. I know she’s said that many years of rearing the kids were a blur. But I wonder if family, national and world events stand apart from her other memories?
What did she see, hear, feel and experience in the years of her life, from 1926 to 2016?
She started out in MacMillan, Michigan as a child. Her family, the Neys, lived on a farm. No electricity, no television, no car. Twelve siblings and Mom’s mom raising basically alone. Mom’s father was off working port to port on the Great Lakes ships.
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| The Era of the Great Depression The Great Depression https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NH20lpFu_3Q |
Mom was raised in the Baptist religion. The weeks revolved around the chores, school and church. It didn’t sound like there was a lack of fun, music and adventures, though.
When she was five years old Mom wasn’t expected to live. The local doctor tried a procedure to drain the fluid from her lungs (pneumonia) when she was 5 years old. He stuck a large tube through her back. They kept her in the hospital for days. She thrived. The chances were slim for a child during the depression to survive pneumonia as severe as she had.
Did they worry about food rations? Food cards? Or did the farm sustain all of them?
Our greatest task is to put people to work. This is no unsolveable problem if we face it wisely and courageously. It can be accomplished in part by direct recruiting by the Government itself, treating the task as we would threat the emergency of war, but at the same time, through this employment, accomplishing greatly needed projects to stimulate and reorganize the use of our national resources—Franklin D. Roosevelt
4 March 1933
It’s hard for me to fathom how they found out what was going on in the world. Radio was their internet of the time. (Chances are they often couldn’t get the reception needed to listen to radio) Mom said she use to listen to:
“The Creaking Door”, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gX_cRMGes3I
Max Schmelling fights,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pU5Mb3FrNSs
Stella Dallas https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1X0s6hIkxI
and baseball games, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8jGPNgYzElk
The CCC camps reached Newberry, Michigan. Lumbering, mining were all a part of the economy where she was raised. There was also a major mental hospital in Newberry which was a big employer in the area.
Mom played basketball in high school. A time when she met my father. Graduating from high school was a big accomplishment for a woman in the 1940s. She went to high school in St. Ignace in order to complete her schooling.
A hell of a time to be growing up. All those traumatic events in the world, ripping at the peace of mind.
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| Better Photos to Come (Have to edit them) |
Pearl Harbor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3e99lfmmDN0
Bombing o Hiroshimahttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3Ib4wTq0jY
Declaration of War 1942 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YhtuMrMVJDk
When Mom became Mrs. Cronan she spent most of her married years on Truckey Street, raising her children.
A slide show of historical St.Ignace https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sx_rkLLBZ6k
President Kennedy’s assassination, the Vietnam War were big events. But, my guess is Mom was more focused on her son, Bob, who enlisted into the army when he was eighteen years old.
I remember Mom being quiet during those times when there was no word from Bob. When he got wounded, twice, she just wanted to see him to make sure he was okay.
Was she excited when we got our first black and white television? Her first washing machine? Her driver’s license at forty? Her first car?
I wonder how much T.V. she really watched. Maybe she was glad when we were all in the living room and she had some peace in the kitchen.
Martin Luther King, Jr. and the civil rights movement came at the same time some of Mom’s older children were leaving home. Was she worried about the telecasts predicting riots and chaos in the cities as her children were branching out, away from Northern Michigan? The Baby Boomers left St. Ignace for work, for higher education. Anything but what tradition had stuck them with before.
I wonder, as I think of her upcoming birthday, if she felt threatened by the Rock Music Movement, the Free Speech Movement, the Sexual Revolution or were they culture occurrences that circled around her as she kept herself moving through the day-cooking, cleaning, mothering, spousing, etc.
All those baptisms, first communions, confirmations, dresses, dress shoes, hats, ties, tights….Just getting all of us to church on Sunday, a feat! All those Sunday dinners. Birthdays, illnesses, graduations. How did she manage a household to feed so many people? To clothe so many people? To comfort so many people? To discipline so many? To get us all to bed and all of us up (for school, work, etc.)?
I wonder if she ever got depressed? Ever got feeling alone and overwhelmed? Or did having children around give her the laughter, change and inspiration to keep moving?
How does a person live through all those eras?
I watch Mom and I’m astounded. She lives alone. Dad passed away seven years ago. She has a big-screen T.V., a personal computer, a Smart Phone, a dishwasher, garbage disposal and a Fitbit. She has a car that can park itself (almost) and her garage opens with a remote. She has an account with FaceBook and she tells ME what’s going on with friends and family!
My emotions have been a roller coaster lately, knowing her big 90th birthday is inevitable. Strange. Now that I write about the years (forgetting MANY huge things, I’m sure) of Mom’s life, I feel more relaxed about her coming age.
She has survived. She is young. Her life didn’t break her, as difficult as it had to have been. It made her Paula, my mom. It has made her deserving of a celebration of her life past and her life ready to tackle and live in the future.
Happy 90th, Mom. I love you.
to having an account on Facebook, using a “Smart Phone”, texting, taking photos and having a wide-screen HDV television with multiple channels.
What did she hear?
What flavors, tastes,
The hardest thing for me to understand is outliving close friends, family and more devastating, her own children.
Margaret, this is such a cool story of your Mom. It's amazing to consider just how much the U.P. has changed in her lifetime. Happy 90th to her!!
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