n the fall of 1917,
my parents decided that the children should be in school, so we reluctantly left the home where we had been so happy and moved to Junior. Here I completed grade school, taking the state examination at the end of the seventh grade,
skipping the 8th. I made the second highest grade in the county, and my cousin, Stark Shomo, made the highest. Our scores were 89.6 and 91.8%. We had moved again, living in the house just behind the school, a six room, eight-grade
institution. It was to this 24 house, while a freshman at
Belington High School, that I was called home to find my mother dead. It was on March 29th, 1921. She had been seriously ill since Christmas, and died just four days before her 38th birthday. I was the oldest of five children, left
motherless in my 14th year. Sister Rosalyn, the youngest, was just past four.
The law forbidding the practice of chiropractic was repealed in 1920, so Dad began his work again. His method was to travel from house to house, so that his patients could rest after treatment. This kept him away from home from 9 a.m.
until about 8 p.m. The second year in high school was a distressing one for me, with poorly prepared meals and unkempt clothing. Sister Zylpha, only 13, was in charge of the household. The high school was at Belington, four miles from our
house. The first year, four of us cousins walked each way. By the second year, two of the boys, brothers, were able to afford an old Model T Ford. I and the other cousin paid 20 cents a day for transportation. I made mostly only B and C
grades, distracted by Mother's death, home conditions, and in my last two years, by my interest in girls.
In my junior year, my stepmother came. She had a violent temper, and we soon clashed. I left home about September first of my senior year. Too proud to ask for help, I slept in the band practice hall, on the floor in front of the gas
heater. My cousin, Stark Shomo, discovered this by accident, and made me go home with him. We told my dad, and it was arranged for me to go to Grandma Brady's for the winter. I was given work on the coke ovens at
Gage mine on Saturdays. I made five dollars a day for shoveling coke from under the coke screen. This I gave to Grandma to help buy the groceries. She kept my clothing much more
presentable, and I had a good diet. On May 28, 1924, I graduated from Belington High School.
Uncle “Shake” (Francis) Brady was out of work that summer, and staying with Grandma. He and I painted houses for an income. Dad had wrecked his Model T Ford, and we bought it for ten dollars and remodeled it into a 'runabout' to haul our
ladders. We made one trip to Morgantown to try to find work, and had to rework a connecting rod bearing five times in the 180 mile trip, over mostly dirt roads.
I received an offer to work on the grounds of Davis and Elkins College in return for part of my college expenses, so I enrolled there. Failing
to get a personal loan for the balance because I couldn't pass a physical examination for insurance, I had to leave after one month. I was able to get a job breaking stone on a local road job. I had to walk seven miles each way, and work
ten hours for $3.00.
When a Mr. James Bennett offered to get me an insurance loan of $200.00 and enroll me at Mountain State Business College, in
Parkersburg,
W. Va., I was glad to get away from the 'slave' labor on the road. Grandma Brady co-signed my note for the $200 and I left on November 17th, 1924 on what proved to be a move of destiny.
Now, since I am leaving the town of Junior permanently it seems to be a good time to tell something of that town. It was in many ways an unusual place.
In 1920, while we were living in my Uncle Glen Brady's house on the hill by the town reservoir, my mother and dad reviewed the population of around 700 in Junior, and found that we were related to every family there, by blood or marriage,
except three. These later became related by marriage.
I have noted that great-grandfather Row and Grandfather Brady had owned all of the land on which the town was located. The streets were surfaced with cinders from the coke ovens, a long row of which paralleled Main Street. In 1925, a
concrete road was completed from Elkins to join the four miles of bituminous cement connecting our town to Belington, which had been completed in 1919. It now U. S. 250.
I am sure that every male in the place was nicknamed. There were four men named Charley Bennett: "Long Charley," "Short Charley," "Mountain Charley" and "Post Office Charley." The last one was so named because he was in love with Birdie
Lee, the postmistress, and had to be elbowed away from the window in order for anyone else to ask for the mail. He later married her. My uncles were "King" Brady, "Big Nose" and "Shakespeare" (later shortened to "Shake"). The last named
because he was always writing rhymes in school.
————————————————
1."Bennett" history at Rootsweb.com; 2.
"Bennett" history at Rootsweb.com
The Midnight Gang" was a group of fellows who stole chickens from the local coops and roasted them over the coke ovens. One of them was 'Cateye' because he could see so well in the dark inside the chicken coops. His brother was 'Weasel'
because he could crawl through such a small hole to get inside the coops. One irate West Junior resident, awakened by squawking chickens, caught one of the gang going over the fence and filled his backside with birdshot.
Other nicknames were "Pigtail" Corley, "Tater Digger" McDonald, who had boasted how many potatoes he had dug in a day, and "Knothole" Daniels, who had cried when someone told him his father had fallen and ran a knothole in his eye. One
young lad, reading in class about an Irishman's shillelagh, had called it a shilololly," and his nickname was sealed by that mistake for the rest of his life. I'll always remember him for one incident: One warm day his father had told him
not go swimming, but the boys talked him into going along to the river. All were in the water in 'birthday' suits when someone saw his father coming. He managed to get his trousers on before his dad caught him and began to paddle him with
a board. The boy had his hip pocket full of kitchen matches (for smoking cornsilk) and they caught fire the second lick of the paddle.
'Shilolly' began to yell "Ouch! Pa, Fire! "I'll give ye fire, you little devil!" Then a patch of brown appeared on the trousers and smoke began to roll. "I God, ye are afire!" the old man cried, and shoved the boy off his knee into the
water.
One woman in our town loved to hear gossip. She would not repeat what she heard, but relished every scandal. She had heard that the local policeman was visiting another woman when her husband was away. When she saw the man coming down the
sidewalk, she went out and leaned on the gatepost with one elbow. When he was near enough, she said, "Is it so that you have been going to see _ when her man is away?"
"Who told you that?" he blustered.
"Well, I heard it, and I thought if anybody ought to know, you would."
A maiden lady operated the local millinery and dry goods store in the village. She ate her meals at a boarding house next door to her store. The local bank cashier was new in town, and came in to dinner. He sat down by the old maid. His
sleeves were rolled up, and he had very hairy arms. She looked at his arms and said, "My Gawd, man! Ye must be part hawg!"
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