The Perambulator

Following graduation from high school I taught country school for one term and then went to business college. After business college I worked for brother Fred in Sauk Centre who had the bus and transfer business.

In the fall of 1922 three of my friends and I started for California in a Model T Ford touring car. We enjoyed our trip very much. Had no particular trouble with the car, An experience that we had at Colorado Springs, Colorado might be of interest. Ordinarily we camped out in the country someplace, fixed our own meals but this particular night there was some mechanical work that had to be done to the Ford so we got permission from a garage that stayed open until midnight to work on the car in the alley in back of the garage. The fellows in the garage fixed us up with an extension light so we could see to do our work.

After finishing the repair work we decided that it was too late to head out to find a place to camp so we went to a rooming house and rented two rooms and parked the Ford in the rear yard. The next morning after my room mate and I got up and I went to the bathroom down the hall. I was still there when my friend came to the bathroom. In a few minutes I was ready to go back to the room. As I went into the room I saw the land lady, a plain clothed detective and a uniformed policeman in the room. They had my suitcase up on the bed and were rummaging through it. They quit looking through the suitcases as soon as I entered the room.

Very shortly my room mate came back to the room so the policeman told us to finish dressing and to go along with him to the police station as our friends were there. What a shock. I knew in my mind that that they had not done anything to cause them to get arrested. Well, all we could do was to go along with the officer.

Arriving at the police station, sure enough we found our friends. The desk sergaent took our names and addresses, told us to empty our pockets and then they locked us up. We talked things over but could not come up with any reason for this treatment. Nothing we could do about it.

The next day we were taken to the courtroom where the judge called the roll and then we were taken back and locked up. The next day the jailer came and got one of my friends and took him someplace. Finally they brought him back and took another and when they brought him back they took me out for questioning. I answered all their questions truthfully. After several questions one of the detectives turned to another and said that everything seemed to be alright and wondered if they shouldn’t let us go. The others agreed.

I suggested that if it was agreeable with my friends we would like to stay another night as we had some tires to repair before we could get going. The officers agreed and my friends agreed, so we remained until morning. The reason for our being detained was apparently they were checking to see if we were driving a stolen car. The answers we gave the officers when we were being questioned all coincided as all of us were telling the truth. We were a bit miffed or disgusted but realized that we had not been charged with any crime. So we weren’t so bad off.

A couple years later in California… George and Anna <3

When I was fourteen years old which would have been in 1913 dad decided to give up farming in that part of the world as there was not enough moisture to grow farm crops. He decided to go to Minnesota to try to find a farm to buy. He found about what he wanted about four miles south east of Sauk Center, Minnesota. He came back to the homestead and made preparations to move to the new home. In December of 1913 everything was ready and we left for Faith. Brother Ray and I had to walk the twenty-one miles and drive the cattle. It was a real nice balmy day, the snow was melting but the cloth topped overshoes that we had on got our feet very wet and believe you me we caught about the worst colds that anyone could catch. It is a wonder that we didn’t get pneumonia. When we got into Faith we had to sleep in the livery stable which didn’t help with wet feet. Everything finally got loaded on to the freight cars. The cattle and horses in a stock car and all the rest of the gear in a closed box car. We three boys went with the freight cars. Our first real stop was at Aberdeen where the cattle had to be unloaded so that they could be given the T.B. and Bangs tests before they could continue into Minnesota. While at Aberdeen those few days I had a lot of fun riding on the switch engines with the engine crew and then it was quite a thrill to go up town in such a large city. Of course I had been in larger cities but had had no chance to walk the streets and window shop before. We finally arrived at Sauk Center, Minnesota without furthur delay. Everything was unloaded and either hauled or driven out to the farm. The buildings on the farm were considerably different from any I had ever had access to before. So much larger and so much more conveniently fixed up on the inside. We arrived at the farm a few days before Christmas of 1913 so one of the good neighbors invited our family to their place for Christmas dinner! I enjoyed it very much.

After the Christmas vacation was over I had to ride the horse drawn school bus to the city school in Sauk Center. I guess I must have been rather nervous being that I was going to a large school after attending a country school with only eight pupils and all eight grades. Here each grade had a room to themselves. I was half way through the eighth grade when I started city school. It was rather hard for me to get acquainted with the different method of teaching than I was used to. But I finally became accustomed with the new method and passed into high school for the next year.