Going Home!

We spent a few days with Uncle Edwin in Glendale, resting up and knowing it was probably our last visit with him as he was too sick with asthma to come back east and it would be many years before we would return to Arizona.

Finally the day came for us to leave. We had breakfast with Uncle Edwin. We packed up the car, taped the refridgerator shut in the trailer and filled our water tank for possible vapor lock. We hugged Uncle Edwin goodbye with tears in our eyes. We loaded the children and Inky in the station wagon. Roland backed up to get in the right position to head out to the street.

CRUNCH!  We had backed into the water pipe. Water sprayed across the back of the trailer. Roland climbed out to see the damage. The pipe has just been knocked loose.  Uncle Edwin waved his arms and said, “Keep going. I’ll fix it. No problem”

We did. We left him standing on the desert, water spraying up behind him, waving until we were out of sight.

I remember little of the trip east. It took many days. The weather was brutally hot. The heat cut into the tires and caused flat tires each day. Here’s a photo of Roland down beside the wheels, as he was frequently all the way back home. Lesley, being aware of the sound of each tire going flat, realized that if she stood behind Roland as he was driving and made a hissing sound he would slam on the brakes thinking it was another flat tire. This didn’t make him laugh as much as she thought it would.fixing-tire

Finally we reached Quincy and Braintree, Massachusetts. The grandparents were beyond happy to see their granddaughters and us.

More photos to come.

 

Still Crossing the Long, Hot Desert

Journal: July 13, 1953
It was now three or four in the morning. I was dozing in the trailer when Roland finally returned with a used shackle. He had found a junk yard where he could wake up the owner, who lived onsite. He immediately jacked up the trailer high enough so he could work on the shackle. It didn’t take him very long to install the new one. Then he added new lugs on both wheels. Now we were ready to go. It was 6 am. What to do? Should we just go stay in a motel during the hot July day or should we press on? We decided to press on. Roland hooked up the trailer to the car.

By now the children were awake. We had breakfast, loaded everyone back in the station wagon and took off. It was cool in the early morning but by late morning it was getting very warm. By the time we reached Yuma it was hot! As we were driving past motels we noticed a swimming pool beside one. Several people were swimming. We pulled into the parking lot. I asked the owner if we could swim. He saw the children and said “Yes, have a swim.”

We donned our bathing suits and jumped into the pool. Roland stayed with Lesley and I held Sandy while we dipped and cooled for about a half and hour. Then we thanked the motel owner, offered to pay, but he refused. We climbed back in the car, leaving on our bathing suits to try to stay cool in the 100+ degree heat.

We drove all day across the baking desert, stopping only for lunch and supper, . It was late and the children were asleep when we finally reaching Gila Bend in Arizona. By now, Roland was exhausted. It was dark and cooler. We took a back road toward Phoenix. Away out in the country we saw a deserted, and empty motel off the road. Roland pulled into the long driveway which ran behind the empty building. We parked back there so Roland could sleep. We carried the sleeping children back to their beds in the trailer. Roland lay down in the car and fell asleep immediately. I rested in the back of the car.

For maybe an hour or two all was quiet. Not much traffic on the road. Suddenly along came a car full of young, rough looking men. They pulled into the driveway and headed for our spot behind the motel. I jumped out of the car and headed for the trailer. I was halfway there when the car pulled up beside me. Two of the men got out of their car. They shone a flashlight on me, playing it up and down. I froze. I still had on my bathing suit. Roland was still asleep. I was terrified. I pictured rape, robbery and even murder. There were no other buildings or houses anywhere around. After what seemed like forever, with the men staring at me by flashlight, in the dark, saying nothing, they got back in their car and took off.

I was afraid they would be back so I woke up Roland and we drove on until we reached Glendale and drove into Uncle Edwin’s yard in the wee hours after midnight. He turned on his lights and greeted us in his pajamas. We were soooo happy to see him!

Crossing the Desert

Roland pressed on the brakes and we scraped and screeched to a stop. He opened his door and jumped out. Minutes later he came back to tell me that the left wheel had come off the trailer. I sat with the children (who miraculously were still asleep), while Roland went to look for the wheel. He found it, got out the jack and jacked up the trailer and put the wheel back on. He borrowed two lugs from the other wheel to hold it on.

Meanwhile we were in the middle of the road just before a traffic signal. Good thing it was two o’clock in the morning but still there were some cars which pulled around our bulky blockage. No one stopped.

Roland climbed back in the car and turned the key. Silence! The battery was dead from all the running lights on the trailer and car.

“I’ll have to push it,” said he.

“You can’t push all that weight, car and trailer,” said I

“Quiet! And don’t steer into the curb!,” said he, a bit irritated by now.

He climbed out of the car. I jumped behind the driver’s wheel ready to steer but having no hope that Roland was strong enough.

Roland (who was not a big man), put his back against the back of the station wagon and pushed with all his might. It must have been desperation that did it because soon the car began to move and he managed to push car and trailer to the side of the road.

“We’ll have to unhook the trailer so we can push the car and get it started,” said he.

I didn’t argue. By now the children were awake. I lifted Sandy up and took Les by the hand as we headed back to the trailer where I put them in their beds. Back outside Roland had unloaded the water tank (the one that saved us from vapor lock), and put it by the side of the trailer. He had the jack out and was jacking up the trailer so we could lift it off the hitch. We put wood blocks under the trailer hitch to rest the trailer on. He was so stressed and angry that they may not have been lined up. Finally it was high enough and he lifted the trailer off the car hitch. For a moment it hung on the blocks and then crashed down, hitting the water tank as it fell. Instantly the big plexiglas window in the front of the trailer popped out and fell, landing in Roland’s arms. The air was BLUE.

Now we could push the car which we did, me in the back and Roland steering and running beside the driver’s door. Up the road we went until I said,

“Roland we’ll have to push it back because we can’t leave the children.”

Back we went to the trailer. It didn’t start so we tried again. The third trip back and forth the car finally started. Roland took off down the road to find a junk yard where he could buy a shackle. When the trailer scraped along the road it wore out the shackle on one side. The shackles on each side hold on the axle and therefore the wheels. It was now about three in the morning. Not so many places would be open.

I climbed back in the trailer with the children to wait.

(More tomorrow)