Dick and Jan Reunion 2019
where it all began...
Above is the lumber yard business, and home, of T. W. Engles and his wife, Florence [Zimmer], the parents of Dick and his siblings, Mary, Pat, and Joe. And below is the lumber yard business, and first home in Elmwood, of Dick and Jan. T. W. gave Dick the Elmwood Lumber Yard, and one in Dunbar, NE, when Dick and Jan got married. So Dick and Jan moved to Elmwood. It was truly a great place to grow up. We kids had the run of the town, with the various parents around town keeping watch on us. Have bicycle, will travel!
Elmwood now has a population of about 600. When we lived there, it was 450. Elmwood is basically a farm support town and, as we saw, is still vital and has actually gotten larger. There's more family history, pics and stories, at the end of this blog.
And above, Dick and Jan's second house in Elmwood, the one we all remember and grew up in. Well, we older ones had a lot of years there anyway. Bennie, the youngest, was just 3 years old when we moved and eventually ended up in Colorado.
And Jan's parents, John and Elsie Reagan, retired to this house below, in Dawson, NE, after a life of farming. I have fond memories of that farm! And then, of course, Elsie, Grandma Reagan, spent the last years of her life living with Dick and Jan.
Oh, the memories I have from the Elmwood Roller Rink, the one thing there was to do on a Saturday night in our rural Nebraska area. Babe and Eula, retired farmers, had the roller rink, which was only the quonset hut part of the Quonset Restaurant where we ate, back then. They played rock-'n-roll records, literally 45 RPM vinyl records, most of them brought in by the kids. It was the place to be on a Saturday night!
We awkwardly learned about courting, or at least I was old enough to experience puberty in good old Elmwood. There were occasional 'slow skates,' a couple of slow songs, and the lights were lowered so the boys could ask the girls to skate. Round and round. With a girl!
We bought Pepsi's, in the bottle, and a small package of Planter's Peanuts. We drank down the Pepsi some, and then put the peanuts in the bottle with the rest of the Pepsi. It was rather fizzy of course. Ahhhhh!
And now, 60 years and a couple of generations later, bellied up to the bar at the old roller rink...
And below, posing for a photo on the floor where we older siblings roller-skated countless miles back in the day.
But who needs skates...
