1. What were the names of grandma and grandpa's brothers and sisters?
Grandma:
Rita
Earl
Mary Grace
Ada
Inez
Harry
Jeannine
(I think that's in order from oldest to youngest, but not sure about Mary Grace and Inez.)
Grandpa
Dave
Bill
Don
Betty
Dorothy
Audrey
Lois (Loie)
(Not in any particular order, except that I know Loie is the youngest and Dave the oldest. Don't know about the others.)
2. What were grandma's parents names?
Harry Alvin Adams and Mary (Burley) Adams (Maiden name Burley.)
3. What type of literature, music and love of fine arts did they teach you?
I grew up in a time when "eggheads" were frowned upon. (Adlai Stevenson ran for present and was defeated because he was considered one.) But mother did read the classics to us when we were very small, Peter Rabbit, Uncle Wiggily, Black Beauty, and a Child's Garden of Verses are the ones I remember. But her idea of fine art was a kind of mobile of a fisherman catching a mermaid, which embarrassed me no end. Once the priest was coming for some reason and I begged her to take it down. It hung over the doorbell, just inside the front door. As for music, my mother, as you know, loved singalongs. And we had music lessons. I played clarinet and piano; Bill played cornet (I think maybe Dan learned that later, too) and Jimmy didn�t play anything that I can remember. Funny, he�s the one interested in instruments now. No one but me liked classical; I must have discovered it through my piano lessons. The rest of the family thought I was putting on airs. Well, maybe I was, but I still like classical whether anyone knows it or not.
4. What type of clothes did they wear, traditional culture clothing or what was popular during the time?
We wore modern clothing (for then.) Girls wore dresses to school. You know that mother wore shorts and halter tops whenever she could.
5. What did the family eat?
Mostly German or Pennsylvania Dutch foods. Meat, potatoes, vegetables and dessert. Every Saturday we went shopping and ate hamburgers and gravy bread when we came home. On Fridays we had tuna casserole or occasionally fish. School was out early on Fridays and we ate lunch at home, grilled cheese sandwiches and tomato soup most of the time. Sauerkraut and pork was a favorite, and something called "pot pie" which was really a kind of flat dumpling or pasta, cut in squares. And of course you know about pickled eggs and kidney bean salad. We had roasts rather than chops; we liked a lot of meat and one chop wouldn�t have been enough; we couldn't afford more. Corn on the cob in season was a great favorite.
6. Who cooked?
Mother cooked weekday meals, but Daddy liked to experiment with food. If we were having a picnic, he'd make the potato salad and decorate it with slices of hard cooked eggs in a pretty pattern. He also loved gadgets. (You know about the one slice toaster.) He had a meat grinder and used to make "ham salad" from cold cuts and pickles. He also had a sandwich maker--you put bread with a filling in it and held it over the gas burner until the bread was toasted and the filling melted. He would eat one thing over and over until he got tired of it, then go on to something else. We all learned to bake cakes from scratch; we had the two main recipes memorized. Even the boys were asked to bake, from the time wee were 8 or 9.
7. What type of rites of passage does the family have?
There were the religious milestones, first communion and confirmation. A driver's license was, of course, a proof of maturity. Weddings, funerals and family reunions were frequent.
8. What games did the family play?
Mother loved to sing, of course. Daddy loved to pack us all into the Chrysler and take us for Sunday drives. We sang on the way to nowhere, just following a road. We had bathing suits in the trunk and if we saw people parking along the road and getting out of the car in bathing suits, we�d change to ours in the car and follow them to the swimming hole. We all loved to swim. Daddy loved to tease and had his special game for each of us. I remember he would get a bag of Hershey miniatures, take one at a time without us seeing it and let us take turns guessing whether it was Hershey, Crackle, Mr. Goodbar, or whatever. Whoever guessed it got it. I liked the semi-sweet (called Special now) and guessed that every time it was my turn. I got all of them that way. When I was 12, I got the encyclopedia out and learned how to play chess. Then I taught Danny so I'd have someone to play with but he was better than I. I also got my Dad Scrabble for Christmas when it first came out. He always beat me at that. He loved crosswords, too, and got mad at me once for working on one I thought he had discarded. But he taught me how to do the diagramless ones when I was older. On picnics we played baseball � Uncle Earl had bats, balls and gloves in the trunk of his car.
9. What types of beliefs does the family have?
Daddy believed in "Live and let live." He had the prejudices of the time, but he was very tolerant of anyone with whom he interacted. My mother was strict in her Catholic faith, but had a lot of superstition thrown in. She had absorbed some of a heresy called "Jansenism" which was very legalistic. She took us to confession every four weeks then worried about whether we�d be able to stay "good" until Mass the next morning. She was more rigid than her brothers and sisters. The family today is still Catholic, whether practicing or not. The customs of the church have changed a lot and I think most of us have changed with them. I think we were raised with the traditional values (and prejudices) of the times. We were raised to follow the rules, and yet we had the example of my mother stealing from restaurants and hotels and then bragging about it. My father's family was very conservative and proper. Mother's family was more spirited. I'm rambling , not sure what that has to do with beliefs, but we did learn that our extended family was important.
10. What was the concept of beauty that your parents instilled in you?
Hmmmm. People were supposed to be white, slim, with regular features, high cheekbones and large eyes. I'm not sure whether that was what my parents instilled or what society did. As for esthetic beauty, I think we agreed that mountains and streams and lakes are beautiful. A fire in the fireplace was beautiful to my dad and us kids. Short curly hair was beautiful to my mother, but not to me, not my own, anyway.
11. How did the family solve problems?
Did we? I guess we must have learned, because when we were grown we tried to work together to help my mother. But most problems were shoved under the rug when we were growing up. Appearances were important. I can't remember any problems that we had to work on together. We teetered between trying to keep mother happy and defying her. Decisions were up to my parents; we were not consulted. Daddy rarely got angry and when he did we knew we'd done something seriously wrong. Bill was in trouble most often, but Jimmy and his friend "borrowed" the friend's family car and got to Florida before running out of gas and money. Or maybe it was one of the Carolinas. Anyway, my Dad went down and got them and my mother said, "I'm glad he (Jimmy) showed some gumption." We did not discover my mother's alcoholism until we were all grown and on our own. I suppose that was a problem, but I don�t remember it being the source of trouble. I suppose we ignored it.
12. How did people behave in public places?
My mother would be mortified if we "created a scene." We were supposed to be quiet, cheerful, and obedient. We didn't call attention to ourselves or intrude on the privacy of others. But maybe that's just my internalization. Certainly, mother talked to everyone she saw.
13. Who were the dominant and subservient people in the family?
Mother and Bill were dominant. Daddy and Jimmy and I were subservient. I'm not sure about Danny. He got pretty much what he wanted, but he didn�t have to demand it.
14. What were the sex roles?
Stereotypical. I think my Dad was sorry that I wasn't a boy. He was proud of me but didn't have the same ambition for me that he would have if I'd been male. He and mother both thought that college was unnecessary for a girl
15. What types of diseases has the family had and who had them?
There was cancer on my mother's side of the family. I think her mother had that, though she might have had Crohn's. She died during an operation on her stomach or colon, but I don�t think Crohn's was even recognized then. Grandpa died a year later, of kidney failure, but the consensus was that he died of a broken heart. Earl and Rita had cancer. Harry had polio as a baby and wore a heavy brace. His growth was stunted and he had a hump back. Several of my cousins have auto immune diseases. Daddy had rheumatoid arthritis. Aunt Betty and Uncle Don both died of cancer and Uncle Bill had some kind of anemia. I�m not sure about Dave.
16. How did the family deal with these diseases?
Daddy's arthritis didn�t become serious until we were grown. He did have a gall bladder attack, had to have surgery, then developed a hernia and had to have surgery again. I was a teenager and I remember being scared, then relieved when he started complaining in the hospital about "not being able to get a damn aspirin." I figured he was getting better then. Mother was a hypochondriac and because of that we never took her too seriously. She did have a real attack of diverticulitis once and was hospitalized overnight. At the same time our neighbors had asked us to pick the cherries from their tree and gave us a basketful. I baked a pie and she was very proud of me for some reason. We did get extra attention and privileges when we were sick, for a while. But if it went on too long, we were urged to "get over it." When her father was dying, my mother went and bought a black dress and told us not to tell anyone. I don't know whether any of this is helpful; sorry it's so long.
17. What was the work ethic of the family?
Well, people were expected to work hard, but there wasn't much encouragement for schoolwork and homework. We had regular chores, which, of course we tried to get out of. But they were gender based. I would have rather taken out the garbage sometimes and the boys would have rather done the dishes, but we weren't allowed to switch.
18. What were the different sex roles within the family?
Well, I�m not sure how to interpret this. Mother and Daddy were openly affectionate. When she was pregnant with Danny (we were still pretty young) he sang "June is busting out all over" to her. And yet we were taught, whether openly or by insinuation that sex was "dirty." There were parts of my body that didn�t even have a name, it was just "down there." So we didn't talk about it. Now if the question means gender roles, I guess I've answered that.
19. What was the families definition of insanity?
I think people were called "crazy" if they didn�t think the way "others" did. If anyone was ever institutionalized, we didn't know it.
20. How did the family solve problems?
I think I answered that in 11.
And please add anything else you think my class might be interested in. Thank you mom, sorry to bother you with all these questions but my professor has moved up the due date on our project. Josie
I think I've probably included most of the family dynamics along with some useless information, but it�s just off the cuff. Also, you might be interested in the first couple chapters of my novel. They have some more detailed information that is pretty much descriptive of our family, though I left Jimmy out. He's too good. You can read it by going to my web site and clicking on Novel on the links.