My Father.....

I was thinking about things last night and then for some reason the thought of my father, Clarence L.(just an initial) Batty. He was a tall man, or so it seemed to me, when growing up. Humble, not a great education, ( eighth grade) but a kind man but a diciplinarian too! He had to be with 10 kids!!! He was born on a farm in Colton, Washington (closer to Pullman than Wawawai, where I was born). Colton was known as wheat country. There was a lot of wheat grown in that area of Wa. and was called by some writers and also by those who lived there as "the Palouse country" Where that name came from I don't know, possibly Indian as there were a lot of Indians in the Wawawai area when my Grandparents moved there and Dad had a lot of Indian friends!!! How they got along, I don't know as I don't think that Dad spoke any Indian! I do remember him though, doing some of the Indian dances for us when we were small! That just came to me!!!! My grandfather's house was about a mile from the Snake River. and it was a big two storied house set in a grove of Locust trees. There was a creek that ran behind it and when we were small we used to play there. My father of course was first and foremost a farmer ! The way he met my Mother was this! Mother was a school teacher and when she got a job teaching school in Wawawai, my Dad was tricked into picking up the new "schoolmarm" He had told his sister-in-law, where the teachers lived, when they were there, that not to "rope" him into meeting thre train! (the train ran along the Snake river.) but everyone else somehow "managed" to have something to do that day!!!!! Fate? or just smart planning! Anyway since Dad was living in his own place about two miles away from Aunt Kates he started asking her to go with him to the "dances" that were held upstairs over the one "store" in the area (You talk about a "general Store"! They sold everything from soup to nuts even when we, in later years lived there. Dad had taught himself to play the "fiddle" and played for the dances in the hall over the store!! Anyway they got married in March of 1918 and the next February 21, 1919, I came into the world. Dad and one of his brothers had bought a farm together with 10 room! There ws no electricity even up to the whole time that we lived there as kids! Outside toilets and a "pot" with a lid under the bed for those nighttime runs!!!! My Uncle was married too and had two kids, Cecil was five years older than I and he had a little sister, Eva, whogot into a bottle of aspirin as a child and she died. So, after Uncle Scess died, ( I hope that's spelled right!) my Aunt Della somehow took over the house and the property!!! So, off we went to Western Wa. to Everett, Wa. where we lived till I was in school. Dad did Longshoring down on the docks, and worked long hours and it was very heavy work! In the meantime, the good old Depression was starting and Aunt Della decided to sell the farm back to Dad! We not only lost that farm but moved into my Aunt Kate's place, just up the road from us, and then, things got so bad that Aunt Kate had to sell, and besides there was no money in fruit, and the chickens I mentioned yesterday, and so my maternal Grandfather had the house where my Mother had grown up in Coeur D' Alene, Idaho. So my grandfather was living with my oldest Aunt, (Aunt Josie) and they said to come up there!! That was really a time. Depression had hit but good but also Franklin Roosevelt had come up with his "New Deal" programs, one of which was the W.P.A.! So here we were, a family of, by this timeeight, and my Grandpa and Aunt Josie, living in a two bedroom, outdoor toilet, house but we did have ELECTRCITY!!!! Dad, because he had sone some building over the years got a better job than a whole lot of others who were getting, as the saying was at the time, $44.00 a day, once a month!!! Dad got $60.00 a month!!! And of course we had "Relief"! (Welfare in today's language!!) Somehow we made it, with a lot of prayer and help from neighbors, friends, etc. More about my Dad later!!!! Quite a man!!