I was born in the year 1929 in the city of Harrisburg, Pa, We lived in a three story brick row house that my grandfather helped to build.

I can remember my first day of school, I thought my mother was leaving me with these strangers forever.

There was my mother and father, me and my fathers mother, my grandmother living together. Times were hard during these years and I remember my father making the second floor into an apartment for his sister and her husband. They shared expenses because it was hard to make a living at that time. I remember my father working all the time, he worked building houses during the day for a contractor and at night he remodeled houses and apartments on the side. It was tough for everyone but my dad always shared what he had.

I can remember taking our little wagon and dad put a bushel of coal in it and a bag of food and going down the back alley to a friends house who could not find work and had three children. I guess maybe the children in that house might not have eaten much if it weren't for dad.

I can remember hobos ( we call them homeless people now but then they called them hobos). My mother never refused any one who knocked on the back door something to eat. Some times it was only bread and butter and a cup of hot coffee in the winter and ice tea in the summer.

Sometimes for breakfast we would have what we called Coffee Soup, it was 1/2 cup coffee and 1/2 cup milk and you tore up toast to put in it. And we didn't have automatic toasters either, we had a little contraption you put on the stove burner and it made four pieces of toast, you had to watch it or it would burn, sometimes you put the bread on the broiler pan of the stove and it toasted but again you had to be sure to turn it.

When I was three years old I acquired a baby brother. He was just like my dollies. Except he had bright red hair. Later on when he started school, he told something he shouldn't have. You know how families joke around well he over heard my dad joking and said my brother belonged to the ice man because of his bright red hair. Then we had what you called ice boxes to keep food cold. They usually held 50 LBS of ice and you always had to be sure to empty the pan under the icebox or you had a small pond on the kitchen floor. Well to get back to my brother, he is in first grade and he told the class in show and tell that his dad said he belonged to the ice man, because the ice man had red hair. Boy was that a mess. Mom and Dad were called to school and my brother never repeated anything again. Even when he got older.

Our school was in the next block from home and I can remember hurrying home at lunch time not just to eat but to listen to the radio soap opera called "Aunt Jenny". I don't remember what it was about but my mother would never miss it. My fondest memory of my dad I think is that when he would come home he put me on his lap and would sing the song "Your Are My Sunshine". He would sing it to me often. The song was recorded by Gene Autry.

When I was 8 years old I lost my Grandmother that lived with us. It was the first time that I was faced with death and it was very confusing. All they told me was she went to be with God and would watch over me from heaven. I was not allowed to go to the viewing or funeral. So she was never really dead in my mind.

Christmas was always a very special day in our family. Since money was scarce, my dad would gather up orange crates; then they shipped fruit in wooden crates, and he would make most of our gifts. One year he made me a sink, stove, and dish cabinet, and that was before the toy makers even thought of them as toys. He made my brother little cars he could sit in and a beautiful work bench like dads with real little tools so my brother could work beside him when he was there.

I was nine years old when I discovered there is no Santa. We were always forbidden to go to the cellar work shop from Thanksgiving on till it was Christmas. Well nosey child that I was, I sneaked down and saw daddy building our Christmas toys. Afterward I was sorry I did it because Christmas was never the same. Some of the toys he built have lasted long enough to be repainted and handed down to my bother and my children.

Thanksgiving was family day... Every one came to our house. The men would all go deer hunting in the morning and by the time they came back the dinner was ready and we would all sit down and eat and eat and eat. My Family was very close. My parents tried to raise us to live by the Golden Rule. And I think my brother and I have learned how to do that. We had a floor model Zenith Radio that dad could pick up short wave on. We would all gather around the radio at night and listen to the foreign countries and how their speech was so different from ours. Lets see, I can remember listening to the Lone Ranger, The Shadow, and Ted Macs Talent Show. In the afternoon mom would listen to Stella Dallas. But no one but dad or mom could turn it on, except when they were both gone and wouldn't know about it.

The first washing machine I remember was made of wood. It had an electric motor on it to make the agitator move back and forth and the wringer had to be turned by hand to wring the clothes out to hang in the yard (no electric dryers). I was ten before we got the first metal washer and we didn't have to turn the wringer by hand.

We use to keep the bottles of milk between the back door and the screen door in the winter time. The cream wouldl freeze above the top of the bottle and my brother and I would fight over who would get it on our cereal. We also had what they called a window ice box in the winter to keep the meats etc. in. Winters were pretty cold and no problem with the food spoiling. If we got a warm spell we either ate the food that day of got ice to put in the ice box.

We would always save every penny we could. Before people had air conditions like they do today, I remember my dad made a unit that hooked on to the furnace and mounted a large fan on it. Each spring we had the furnace and pipes that went to the different rooms sucked out. There was a big truck with a large vacuum and it would pull all the soot from the winter heat and then dad would get dry ice and put it behind the fan and we had a nice cool house.

There was a big cinder lot behind our house and we would play stick ball there in the evening, and of course it gave us an excuse to be close to the boys in the neighborhood, so we tried to play a real good game so they would notice us. We also played Red Rover which we would make two lines of kids and then each line would join hands and dare one of the other line to come over and try to break through the line.

I was kind of shy in school. I remember they wanted me in the play in first grade and I actually got sick to my stomach. I just couldn't stand up in front of any one and play act. So I kind of stayed back out of the front line for everything. I never volunteered for anything.

I can remember that President Roosevelt declared war on my 12 birthday. After we got into the war, money seemed to become more plentiful. There were jobs everywhere.

The Songs I remember I liked were A Tisket A Tasket, I Double Dare You, Deep Purple, Blues in the Night, As Time Goes By, In the Mood, Till the End of Time, Old Lamp Lighter. and of course the song my Dad sang to me, You are My Sunshine.

I use to spend my summers with my mother's mother, Grandma Rockey. Grandpa Rockey worked on the railroad so he had free passes for the family to ride any where they wanted. My Grandma and I use to ride to Philadelphia to shop. That was about 70 miles from home. We sometimes just took a ride on the train on Sundays for something to do. I remember in 1939 we took the train to New York and went to the Worlds Fair. I was only nine and I don't remember too much of what was there, but I can still see the sphere and ball in my mind that were the symbols of the fair.

Twice a month in the summer my grandparents and I would go to my Great Grandmothers farm to see that she was OK, as she lived alone. My Grandfather had a 29 Ford Roadster, with a rumble seat. The little bull dog and I always sat in the rumble seat. It was great fun with the wind blowing in your face. My Great Grandmother had 5 acres of land, a farm house, a barn, a pig sty and a chicken house. A little spring where she carried water from, as there was no water and no electric in the house. She always had a milk cow, chickens, and raised one hog for meat for winter. She had what we called a small truck garden that she canned the veggies for winter. She would always have fresh baked bread, fresh milke and Black Berry Jam that she made from the wild Black Berries. She was little only 4 ft 11 in, but she was very strong and hearty. She was 97 when Grandpa decided to take her off the farm and home with them. She only lived a year after she left the farm. I often wonder how long she would have lived if they had left her on the farm.

My Grandma's passion was bingo, so from the age of 7 I learned to love it too. Sometimes I was lucky and she let me keep my winnings. We would travel all over to play bingo. But then it was a penny a card and the most you could win would be five dollars which was a fortune in those days. Grandma and I would sit up after Grandpa went to be and played dominos. I loved that game. Our favorite snack was to make butter bread and put brown sugar on it and eating it. Best treat I ever had. I still like brown sugar today.

In the summer time there was a man with a truck that would come door to door and sell meats, mostly lunch meats. Every one would buy from him. Grandma would buy what was called summer sausage; today they call it Lebanon Bologna. We would fry it and make sandwiches. It was the best. I can remember on my 12th birthday, my dad gave me a beautiful cross. It was gold and he told me never to take it off and I have it on today (I have had chains replaced 3 times). He also told me if I told a lie God would know and the cross would burn me. Well being curious, I told a LITTLE LIE, and I swear the cross felt warm around my neck.

I was an A student all through school. Never had to study, BUT in my senior year at Thanksgiving I met Fred (who I now call my soul mate ). He was just out of the Marines. I knew right away he was for me. My dad said NO WAY so we went to Maryland, because you needed no blood test and no waiting period at that time. My only regret was I never got a High School Diploma.

I was pregnant the first year, but the baby was born at six months and then they didn't have the things in medicine they do today. He only lived a few hours. I wanted a baby so bad but it didn't happen again for three years. Then I had two sons in one year (Jan and Dec) and another son two years later, then three girls and three more sons. Every time I saw a new baby I wanted another one.

When our first girl was twenty months old she caught pneumonia and we lost her on the 23 of Dec. That was a hard Christmas, as we still had to have it for the other children. We lived in the city of Harrisburg until the boys became teen teenagers and then we moved to Grantville, (18 miles away) to a farm, as I didn't want them to have the temptations of the city.

A tidbit: When anything happened in the neighborhood in the city, they always looked for the Reinhold Boys first. One time a fire was started, and I had a knock at the door but the boys were in bed taking a nap and I showed them where the boys were. But my boys were true little hellions. At home it was always bickering, but when they were out some where else and in the company of older people they were perfect little angels. I guess that is something to be thankful for.

I was a den mother for ten years, long after my boys went into regular boy scouts, it was hard to find a mother to take the position of den mother because no one had time. I remember one time we had a pretzel sale, no one wanted to take delivery and dole them out to the boys to deliver. So Dee raised her hand. Well we had the living room and the dining room so full of boxes you had just a small walk way to the kitchen. I was never allowed to raise my hand again. I finally quit the cub scouts as ( I don't know if you want to know this) The Cub Master was so good looking and I was afraid of the attraction so I quit before anything developed. But the Cubs use to knock on the door on their way to school just to say good morning, and it made me feel so good.

After we moved to the country, it wasn't long before the children wanted a pony so......................................... the children got a pony. The first winter the snow drifted so much it was above the corral fence and the pony got up and over the fence. We caught him five miles down the road. We had a pet bantam rooster. One winter one of his legs froze and fell off but the little rooster got round like it was still there and could even get up in the trees. We raised a hog the second year we were on the farm. Well I guess she became a pet and we called her Sally Ann. She would roll over on her back so you could scratch her belly. When the pig was still little and the pony was just new to us, we had a bad winter that year and I made them put the cars out side and put the pony and pig in the garage. We had a pot belly stove in there and kept it going so they were warm. When it came time to butcher Sally Ann they took her to the next farm because they knew it would upset me. Now I must tell you I love ham and pork, but the first meal I used the meat, my daughter Cindy asedk if it was Sally Ann and I couldn't eat.

My Husband drove long distance 18 wheelers and wasn't home much and I use to wait on table on the weekends at the American Legion to make ends meet. The children made it through school but no one went to college.

When my girls were in High School, and Junior High, my husband wanted to come to Florida, but I was afraid because I was never more than 50 miles from where I was born. He was determined and said I could go with him or he was going alone. So we farmed out the children among the family with the understanding that as soon as we were settled and had an income they would be sent to us (they really wanted to finish school with their friends there in Harrisburg). Well we took off with one paycheck, a car loaded down and nothing more. I drove nights and he drove days straight through. He said it was less traffic for me as I had only been driving for a year. I had never had to learn to drive in the city because there were buses every fifteen minutes on every corner. So I was thirty five before I learned to drive.

When we got here we fell into a job with a new dealership that was being built. Fred did construction on it and I worked in the office keeping things in order and seeing things were paid. We stayed aat the dealership after it opened for ten years. We got a house near by, but no one told me about the size of the bugs here or that there were chameleons every where, sometimes even in your shoes when you got up in the morning.

The three oldest boys joined the service when they got through school. I had 2 Marines and a Soldier. The girls came to us before they were finished school because they were giving their grandmother problems. They were 14 and 16 and she didn't want them to date, and the oldest had hair to her waist and to punish her for talking to a boy after school her grandmother cut it all off. (Does that sound like Germany in the second world war??) Shortly after the girls come down the younger boys came down, and so I put them in school here, but what they were learning here for the grade they were in, they had learned two years before in Pa. I guess Fl is just behind the times. I fought with them but they were not happy in school no challenge. They eventually all got GED's but that isn't the same in my eyes.

Let me tell you if I had my choice with raising boys or girls I would pick boys, there are problems with both but not as many worries and heartaches. To my dismay all my girls decided to live with their boyfriends without marriage. It was not how I would have planned it, but I guess even if we don't like our children's life style, it is their decisions, I still love them. You don't have to approve to love them.

All my children were married by the time they were 20, I am sure you all have memories of weddings. They are both happy and sad times.

Then the miracles began to happen, my grandchildren started to arrive. Oh the happiness that was brought into my life with these precious little souls. But happiness doesn't last for ever. It seems my children didn't have the happiness in their lives that Fred and I have. All but two of my children have had divorces. The two youngest look like they may make it to the number of years of happiness that their parents have. Matter of fact some of the children have had two divorces. I guess young people today don't work at marriage like we did in my day. The young today just walk away from their problems, and it is sad. The best part of disagreeing and arguing is making up for a married couple.

One of my happiest moments was being with my daughters with the delivery of their babies and being the first to hold them. It is true there is a kind of bond, a special bond with a baby with the one that first holds and cuddles them. I love all my grandchildren the same but there seems to be a little more of a bond with the five that I held first.

When my children were born they kept you in hospital for ten days. You didn't get out of bed for three days, Boy have times changed. At the present time, my children are all settled into loving marriages it seems, but there are in each home, your kids, my kids, and our kids, and boy does that cause problems sometimes. But that is a whole other story.

My sons all still stand up when a lady comes into the room, help a lady with their coat, open the door for them both in the car and in the house. Help with the kids, and cleaning the house, and sorry to say some of them are better cooks than their wives. And the wives don't have to ask them to do any of it. Another thing my sons were taught is that you never hit a woman. Walk away, it takes a man to walk away, only a coward hits a woman. Two of my daughter in laws have said several times it is very frustrating because my sons won't fight back.

My daughters are another story. They have not absorbed what I tried to teach them. A mans ego is his life, and if you take that away from him, you don't have a man. If you cater to a man, he will return the pleasure to you. Always be honest with your husband, don't hide anything because the older the problem gets the harder it is to solve and there will be additional problems because you failed to tell your Husband the truth, at the time it happens. If you suggest something to your husband and he disagrees, drop it for the moment, it will give him time to think about it, a few days later let him know that you respect his decision, he may decide you had been right. If you get stubborn about something your Husband is not going to give in.

I want to tell you when my children divorced their mates, they lost their mates but I didn't lose my daughter-in-laws or so-in- laws. I didn't divorce them, they still call on the phone, stop in, and never forget my birthday (which occasionally my own forget).

Now I have seven grandsons, ten granddaughters, 2 great-grandsons and one great granddaughter.My children have gathered also four step-granddaughters, three step-grandsons, and four step-great-grandsons. So we are a dynasty of our own. At last count 1999 - 2002 we were a total of 53 in the family.

We try to get together once a year for a get together. It is hard sometimes. I have one son back in Penna., a daughter in Virginia, and the rest are here in Florida, but spread out over a 300 mile area. When we do get together, we go to Fort Desota Park which is a beautiful park with camper space, fishing, swimming, bike paths, and walking paths. My Children up north come down in campers and the ones furthest away in Florida come in Campers and we try to make it Friday, Sat, Sun & Monday when possible. It is so great when we can all get together.

I didn't realize that I was aging until my oldest Granddaughter graduated from High School, then it was just one after the other doing the same. I really knew I was getting old when my oldest Granddaughter got married. My Goodness where did the time go to.

When I was 67 I had an automobile accident. It was my fault. I broke my shoulder. I was on company time so workmen comp paid for it. I was laid up for 6 months. We don't mend as quick as when we were younger, but I guess I was pretty lucky. It was the first bone I had broken in my whole life. I had a fear of driving after that, so I turned my license in. There are enough idiots out there on the road, and if I had a fear I could not be a good driver. So I decided to retire, not only from driving but from working too.

When I first retired we traveled to the children's homes and visited, fished and just relaxed, but I still wasn't comfortable on the road so I spent more time at home. Two of my sons and my grandson build computers, so they made me one, which I said I didn't want. I didn't like the new fangled things, preferred typewriter, phone and mailman. But slowly I started to learn how it worked and now you can't call me on the phone as I am always on the computer. I guess I spend six to eight hours a day on it. I would spend more but by eight hours my poor body is aching and I know I have to turn it off. That is another indication that I am aging some. And of course since every one in the family has computers we use e-mail instead of the telephone. But does that save a buck.

I don't cook much anymore except when we know the kids are coming, because I can no longer cook for just two, and Fred refuses to eat left-overs Of course he never had to when the kids were all home because there was never anything lift over. And when you learn to cook for twelve it seems you can not go back to cooking for just two. So we do go out to eat a lot. Of course sometimes, it is MacDonalds, Wendys, or KFC. And we have a very good little Greek Restaurant right across the street and believe it or not you can get a full course meal with refills on drinks for 5.00 each. Don't find many of them around any more.

Once in a while I will cook a roast on the weekend, and mash about 5 LB potatoes, and I buy the little cans of veggies, just enough for two. and I make a platter and heat it in the Microwave. One night we will have gravy on it, one day some barbeque sauce, one time some spaghetti sauce. and by the end of the week it is Hot Beef Sandwiches. This is also a good idea when you both work, it is time saving during the week and you can use pork roast or meat loaf too.

The only way I can keep track of everybody's birthday, anniversary or special day is to mark it on the calendar, and boy does this family fill up a calendar. But since we all have computers, I don't have to buy cards. I just make one and send it e-mail.

Sitting here trying to remember my life has really brought back some very good memories. A few bad ones but most of them were good, maybe they didn't seem good at the time they happened but today they are happy memories.

For instance Fred, my Soul Mate had been dating my best friend when I met him. It was bad for me to take him for myself but even today I think we were meant to be together. So I lost a good friend and gained a life time mate.

My brother was my Moms favorite, I was My Dad's favorite, and I spent most of my life trying to please my Mom and very seldom succeeded, but I loved my Mom with all my heart and she is the one that instilled my beliefs in me. Looking back now I guess sons always are Moms favorites and daughters are Dads favorites.

I tried very hard not to have a favorite in my children, but they tell me today I always favored my second son. and looking back I guess I did. One day I saw my Dad with another woman, and I was so hurt for my mom, I confronted him and his answer was I am your father and you will obey me. "You do as I say and not as I do." That was the only time in my life that I lost faith in Dad, but he was a wonderful father and husband and I guess we are all human.

We had hard times too. I can remember some Christmases that we relied on the Salvation Army and Church to give our children a nice Christmas. When we were on our feet again we donated to the organizations that helped us so that they could help others. One year the Auto Dealership that I worked at took the gift certificates that we were given and gave them to a needy family. I felt so good at that, our family ever since, (the adults in the family) do not exchange gifts. Just the children get gifts. The adults pool their money and adopt a needy family for Christmas. We get their names from the local grade school and since we live so far apart, each year it is a different area that we choose from. You don't know what a good feeling you can get from doing this.

I guess really to sum our lives up we have been very blessed in everything we did. and everything that happened to us. I know God has always been by our side. No matter what problem we faced, if we tried and had the faith, someone always was there to help us. And the biggest blessing of all is my family loves one another.

I have been asked several times about things that happened while I was growing up, so I thought for a while and came up with the above. It of course doesn't cover everything in my life, but I thought if you are interested, I would add things as I remember them. with ten children and a husband I could probably fill several books. If you would like to be notified when I add to my Memory Page please leave your email address below.

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