As you know, we have a few memories from our aunts and uncles that we’ll post from time to time. But we don’t have all that we’d like to have. If you have any stories that you’d like to share, you can use the contact link at the top of the page to send them in. This one is by Uncle Mahlon, and it’s really familiar to me. It almost seems like it was published before, but it’s listed as a draft now, so I’m just going to go ahead and publish it again. We’ll teach it.
One time Cleo and I wanted to play ball but we didn’t have a ball. So I found a tin can and put rocks in it and bent it shut. We played ball with this for awhile till the sun got in my eyes and it came down and hit me on top of the head and cut my head. Cut a hole in the top of my head. Mom promised to give me a nickel if I’d let her sew it up. It took three stitches. I let her but I don’t remember if I ever got the nickel.
That was one of three times she had to sew me up because of some nonsense. The second time she sewed me up I was trying to jump a barbed wire fence and I didn’t jump quite high enough and cut my ankle and she had to sew it up. Three or four stitches in it.
The third time I was chasing a calf. I caught it by the tail and it drug me for a ways. I cut my knee. Mom was good about it. She just soaked the needle and thread in Lysol water to disinfect it and sewed it up. That kept us from having to go to the doctor so often.
I was five or six years old and my namesake Gladys gave me a Santa Claus for Christmas in a box that had a pair of knickerbockers in it. Both of these were my pride and joy. I don’t ever remember having anything like that. I still have the Santa Claus. The knickerbockers pants and coat I always wore to church. I came home from church and had to go out and see if we had any eggs. The chicken house was divided in two parts. There was about an 18 inch square door between the two areas so when I gathered the eggs in one side I crawled to the other side and gathered the eggs putting them all in my pockets. When I came in the house to take out the eggs, I had already mashed the eggs in one pocket to where I had all these eggs running inside my pocket. Mom was a little displeased with me. I just remember her saying take it off so I can clean it and that’s the last I remember of that.
But I don’t think I got any more eggs with my suit on.
I think it’s amazing that there are all these stories that I (at least) have never heard before.
If Uncle Mahlon was 5 or 6 which house do you think they were in at that time? Certainly not the farm house we know, since the chicken coop there never had two parts!
We were at Schuberts when I through the can up and it came down on his head.
We were all out in the barnyard as i remember it. I couldn’t lie out of it, everyone saw it.I dont remember ever getting sewed up myself. I remember when Naomi cut herself crawling threw a bob wire fence. It was a pretty nasty cut as I remember. She was not real small at the time.I cant remember Lolly getting sewed up, but I would be supprised it she wasn’t sewed up a numbeer of times. Lolly like to do things. She would try anything. Like she couldn’t wait to milk. She wanted to do it. I was hoping I never had to and I got out of it for awhile.I never started milking until I came back home from Cousin Frieda’s. It was the spring after I was a freshman. I have a picture here with Mahlon in those pants. It might be one of those pictures that Jane put on a disk for me. I want everyone to know Sherie Kraus. Sherie is one of Aunt Rosies Grandaughters. She has written volumes on her family. I believe that Aunt Biancia (mothers sister) married the first time A Fischer who was a brother to Aunt Rosies husband. Aunt Biancia children were August Fischer Morris Fischer and another boy.By her second husband she had 2 girls Rose and Tootie Miller,They are all dead now.
Sorry I threw the can up .
Sorry about the delay. It was at Schubert’s down by Taos.
Here are my stitch stories…I feel like I’ve written this before, but can’t find it on the site…Anyway, when I was about 5 or 6. I was bothering Felix (I was such a pest to my older brothers when they came home) and he nudged me away from him and I fell against the butterchurn. Mother sewed up the back of my head, but I don’t think it was too many stitches. Then, the barbed wire I ran into that Cleo mentioned was the barbed-wire gate that shut off the barnyard from the road and it was laying half down…not closed and not fully open. It was dusk and hard to see it and I ran into it and I still have a big scar on my leg even though Mother sewed it up. The stitches didn’t hold because of the leg muscle, I guess. I also fell off of the “front?” porch railing when I was pretending it was horse when I was about 6 and got a cut on my forehead, but it didn’t require stitches. I have a scar on my upper arm that she didn’t sew up (I think she decided I was a hopeless case). We were cutting paper dolls out of the JC Penney’s catalogue and we were not supposed to used razor blades to do this but I did anyway and accidently cut my own arm. End of Naomi’s Stitch Story.
I can remember the night Naomi and I went out to the barn yard to shut the first gate,(closest to Lloyd’s house) The other gate was by the barn, it was laying down for some reason, and we both ran through it ok, we were scared to death of the booger man and wanted to get the heck back home. We closed the first gate, and took off running, I went to the side and got through the lying down gate, but Naomi went more to the middle, and got hooked in her upper leg by a barb. I don’t remember her crying, but we looked at her leg, and it was about an Inch and a half, or so long but that wasn’t the worst part, it was about an inch deep, and standing wide open, IT was awful!!! We ran back to the house and showed it to Mother and Dady, I remember, mother telling Naomi that she would give her a dollar if she let her sew it up. I thought, No!! you have to be nuts to let Mother do that! It was after 9pm and I guess they didn’t want to go to town. Naomi agreed to let Mother sew her up. Cleo, Lloyd and I couldn’t stand to watch, so we went out in the yard, I remember, we were slumped down in the yard with our hands over our ears. We couldn’t stand to hear her cry. Daddy helped Mother, I guess he held Naomi down. The stitches didn’t hold very well, because the wound was too deep, Naomi has a big scar, It didn’t hurt her good looks any, but I sure felt sorry for her. There was no way I ever would have let Mother sew me up!ha
I remember being at the little blue house and having Sam and Steve over one time (their parents were there as well) Lloyd, me, Sam and Steve were jumping on Lloyd’s bed and Lloyd fell and hit his head on the headboard and sliced it open. I remember them laying him on the table so dad could sew him up. Seems like the thread was a strange color, maybe bright red.
I don’t remember ever needing stitches, which is good because I was aweful just having a splinter removed!
I remember the jumping on the bed and the hitting of the head and the bleeding, but I don’t actually recall anything after that point.
You probably passed out…..like when you gave blood with Andrew to make him feel better about the whole needle thing. I’m pretty sure that you passing out made him feel a lot better! LOL!
Yes, looking back on it, I clearly wasn’t the right person to calm anyone’s nerves.
I have read 2 thing today on the Sommerer web site that I can hardly believe. One is my little brother sewed up someone. Not to mention it was his son. Our cute little nephew. The next thing was that picture of Cletus Goetz and Vernon. I did not believe it was Vernon, until Vernon told us it was. I am really looking forward to pictures of the youngsters. Maybe by family reunion next year I will be able to identify all of the younger family members.Happy Halloween everyone.
I always spent a couple of weeks at Grandpa and Grandma’s every summer. One morning I woke up and went to the living room and there was Grandpa sewing his finger up. Grandpa always helped Grandma with the dishes and that morning he cut his finger on a knife. I thought that I had ONE TOUGH Grandpa! I can still see him standing there with the needle sewing up his finger.
I also remember Grandma sewing up something for me. I think it was my shirt! Same story though – barbed wire!!
Also, I would like to thank the two people that voted me their ‘favorite Sommerer.’ Whoever you two people are, I love you!