Road Trip Dad

There was nothing my dad liked better than a road trip. It wasn't about the destination, it was about the planning and the drive. He researched everything down to the last detail and travel was no exception. My dad would have loved the Internet; and GPS- he would have been among the first to buy one. I doubt he would have had much use for it, though; once my dad read a map or traveled a highway the route was retained in his brain forever. He never met a road he didn't like, and he never forgot a route.

Here he is with my sister, Barbara. Perhaps he's making vacation travel plans, or maybe a visit to one of his brothers. My mother would have chosen the vacation destination; it would have been to some place of historic significance. A visit with relatives would have been my mother's decision, as well. My dad's job was to work out the travel details and do the driving. If we didn't have someplace to go, he would just take us driving. Almost every Sunday was spent doing the "Sunday Drive". Mom and Dad in the front seat with one of my sisters in the middle; my brother and I in the back, with a big sister in between to keep us from killing each other. We would spend hours touring the countryside looking at cows. We didn't have seat belts then and we'd hang out the windows like dogs, letting the wind blow into our mouth and yelling, "Mooooo!" We didn't have air conditioning then, either so if it was warm weather the windows were all the way down and the wind roared through the car. One of my favorite drives was to O'Hare Airport. We never traveled by airplane, but O'Hare had an observation deck and we loved to stand out there with our fingers in our ears, smelling the exhaust and leaning into the wind created by the jets. My brother and I would pretend the noise deafened us and say, "What? I can't hear you," when our parents would tell us it was time to go home.

Like other dads, my dad would never stop for directions, but I don't think he needed to because he was never lost. Also like other dads, he didn't like to stop for bathroom breaks. Our family had strong bladders from all that waiting between rest stops!

I wonder what my dad would say about today's gas prices. The price of gas was never an issue when it came to the Sunday Drive. Whatever the cost, it was a small price to pay for a day of family entertainment. Weekends were family time; go for a drive and have a picnic at the Forest Preserve, or play croquet in the yard and barbecue hamburgers with the neighbors. We didn't play sports or run from activity to activity like today's kids. We didn't play soccer, we played the 'ABC' game using billboards or competed at out of state license plate spotting. I don't know if my dad's excursions did anything in the way of preparing us for life, but to this day I can remember the state slogans and color combinations on the license plates...and I'm betting my sisters and brother have taught their own children and grandchildren how to play the 'ABC' game and have even gone on a Sunday Drive now and then. Thanks Dad, for making happy memories.

Christmas Card

The Bowes family Christmas card, 1959. Clockwise from top left: Barbara (15), Becky (18), Richard, Patricia (19), Christine (6), Edna, and Bobby (3). This is the only time I can remember having a family photo Christmas card. It must have been a very extravagant thing to do at the time. The reason we were able to afford it was because an African American photographer had moved to our small Illinois town, and was having a tough go of it. A neighbor recommended him, from his church charity work. The price was right because, well, he was the wrong color. His family was living in a rental, a shack really, not near our house, for heaven's sake, but down the road, back in the trees. His son and I, both about 6, got a ride home from school from the neighbor occasionally. I actually told the boy once, "My mom says your dad's a good photographer, for a colored man." I thought I was paying him a compliment, couldn't understand why he looked so mad and was so anxious to get out of the car and away from me. I don't even know if that was something my mother had said, or something I just made up because I thought it would be a nice thing to say.
So, here we have the Bowes family in their cut-rate Christmas photo. Of course, Pat isn't really a blood relative. She was a neighbor of one of my father's brothers in Pennsylvania. One day while Pat was visiting our cousins, my sisters were also there, excitedly telling their cousins about moving to Chicago. Pat said she thought that was just about the best thing that could happen to a girl and my mother said, "Come with us then," or something to that effect. Pat's parents said, "One less mouth to feed," or something to that effect. She really wasn't their daughter, anyway; she was a foundling, just like you hear about, a baby left in a basket on the doorstep. They were a poor coal miner's family, but they took her in and raised her as their own- until she came with us to Illinois. She left Pennsylvania and never looked back. My mother also said, "Come with us then," to her mother-in-law and one of my dad's nephews, and they came, too. The farm was sold and we all moved to a little brick box of a house on a dusty highway in flat, wanna-be-suburban, ex-cornfield, Marcum, Illinois. Nine people moved into that three bedroom, one bathroom, less than a thousand square foot house. It was a new, modern development house, nothing like what you'd see in the farm towns of Pennsylvania. There were 5 model homes on the highway, and we were lucky enough to get one of them before the developer went broke and skipped town. My dad's nephew soon returned to Pennsylvania and went into the service, but everyone else stayed; we had arrived. Yessir, look at those Bowes people, they moved to Chicago and got their picture on a Christmas card. Well, aren't they somethin'.

Thank you, Bud and Irma

Here I am with Bud and Irma. It looks like I'm about 7 years old, so this would be about 1960. The photo with the pony looks to be a year or two later. Sadly, I don't remember exactly who Bud and Irma are. If my sisters were still here, they could probably tell you all about Bud and Irma. I only have a dim memory of these people who were once so important to me.
I can remember each of their voices; I think Bud had been in the military, and I know they lived in Pennsylvania. They were not relatives. The reason Bud and Irma are important to me is because they liked me. Everyone adored my brother, who was three years younger. He was always the crowd favorite, with his dark hair and fair skin, freckles across his nose and bright blue eyes. He was active and noisy, and everything he did was hilarious. Even I thought so. I was skinny and too tall for my age, with brown hair and eyes. I was shy and quiet, afraid of almost everything. Everyone loved Bobby. Bud and Irma loved me. I loved Bud and Irma. After we moved to Illinois, nearly every family or holiday vacation meant traveling 500 miles to Pennsylvania. We would stay with our Grandma Palmquist and Robert (her husband since the 1930s). My mother would drag us around to visit relatives, or the local historic sites, but for me, the highlight of the trip would be a visit with Bud and Irma. They always had a little gift for me, a cupcake or a tiny doll. One time, knowing my love of horses, Bud arranged to borrow a neighbor's pony for me to ride. How I loved Bud and Irma! I don't know when or why we stopped visiting Bud and Irma. I think they moved to another state, but that could have been just a story my mother invented to pacify me. I'm sure Bud and Irma have long since passed, but I have held their love in my heart for more than fifty years. Thank you, Bud and Irma, you meant the world to me.