Chapter 11
1920-1934 EDUCATION, MARRIAGE, BEGINNING OF THE NEXT GENERATION THE GREAT DEPRESSION-FARM LOST
During this time, as Louisa had anticipated, some of her boys
were meeting wonderful women and getting married. There is a story about the
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Some of the Warner boys were invited to a gathering at the Ingrams where Roger and Rodney met Esther. The story was told later that Roger had made a date with two of the girls and Rodney stepped in to cover for him by keeping Roger’s date with Esther. It seems that one of the Warner qualities is the ability to really turn on the charm during courtship.
Both of the ladies in this picture are wearing the uniforms they wore while working at the Worthington Children’s Home. Their hair is fastened up in back as was the fashion of the day. I wish we could see more of the detail in the quality of the suits the twins are wearing. |
Rodney, Esther, Jesse and Roger
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Roger was the first to marry. He married Jesse Von McAdams
from Cable, |
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What impressions were these Warner men making? Jesse & Roger Warner There is a clue of what they were like in a document
written by Esther Winget,
Esther wrote:
On the fifth day of April in the year of our Lord One Thousand and Nine Hundred
and Twenty I take my pen in hand and attempt to characterize the Honorable R. J.
Warner. He is a man of medium height and build, has auburn hair, blue grey eyes,
and a rather pleasing open countenance. My first impression upon meeting him was
that he was one of the most genteel and religious young men I had ever met. He
stands out alone among many as a young man who from early childhood to maturity
has walked in the way of the Lord. Religion has been his constant companion. His
loyalty to God and friend is quite marked. He is composed, patient and tolerant with
those who sorely try him. Principle and right are his guide stones. Self-confidence is
shown in his various lines of work. He speaks success and finds it. Unselfishness and
freedom from jealously are two marked characteristics in his makeup.
Tho he be energetic, honest, pure of heart, virtuous, intelligent and Christian he is
not without blemish for he is human. We find him somewhat conceited or egotistical.
He is inclined to be dominant over those with whom he is closely associated. His
seriousness of thought is beyond his years and somewhat perplexing. It takes a solver
of riddles to understand him thoroughly – to distinguish between joke and truth. He is
abrupt and free of speech, yet to those who know him best, this is an admirable quality
- to the stranger it might appear gross.
Everyone has their hobby. Psychology is his. He must know the ways and wherefore
of everything that he is interested in and as well the psychological effect. …he is a
student seeking to learn the best that he may be the better prepared to serve Him whom he
loves and to serve humbly and trust in all things. … Esther Mae Winget
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Esther Winget graduated from the Esther was a supporter of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU). This effort had grown out of colonial Puritanism and by 1835 nearly all |
Esther Winget Warner Protestant churches supported temperance as a
solution to some of the problems of society. Prohibition began
After Esther’s written consideration, she accepted RJ’s proposal and they planned a wedding including members from both of their families.
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Rodney and Esther Winget were married on Rodney graduated from James Mordecai was born |
Rodney and Esther Warner
The Chillicothe Newspaper printed the following Story about the wedding:
At
Esther Mae Winget
of
city, became the
bride of Mr. Rodney Johnson Warner of
The bridal couple entered the church together to the strains of Lohegrin’s Wedding
March, played by Miss Elizabeth Stout. They were preceded to the altar by the ring
bearer, Ethel
Warner, the maid of honor, Miss Esther Y. Peitsmeyer of
and the best man,
Mr. Gail Guyton of
read by Dr.
Austin Phillpot of
The church was pretty with decorations of autumn flowers, palms and ferns. The
bride’s gown was of white crepe de chine with crystal bead trimmings. Her veil was
caught with a wreath of orange blossoms and she carried a bouquet of sweetheart roses.
She wore a string of pearls, the gift of the bride-groom. The maid of honor wore a frock
of pale green georgette with white net trimmings and carried white asters. The ring
bearer, sister of the bridegroom, wore light yellow organdie. The bride’s gift to her
maid of honor was a beautiful gold pin, and she presented the ring bearer an amethyst
set ring. Mr. Warner’s gift to his best man was a pair of cuff links.
Five generations of the bride’s family were among the one hundred and fifty guests.
The oldest was Mrs. Mary Ann Dunlap who is one hundred and two years of age, the
bride’s great aunt….
Fifty guests were invited to the reception and wedding dinner at the home of the
bride’s mother. Decorations were in green and yellow. Mr. and Mrs. Warner left for a
motoring trip, not making their destination known. The bride’s going away suit was of
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We do know about the honeymoon “motoring trip.” On more than one occasion, Esther, my
mother, told about visiting many of the Warner relatives in the hills of
eastern |
The RJ Warner-Winget Wedding Party
Thurman took over the chores of the oldest boy at home. His
day started at four in the morning with a trip to the woodshed for kindling to
build a fire in the kitchen cook stove. Then he removed ashes and brought in
coal for the heater in the living room. During his senior year he fell in love
with a young freshman girl who lived with her mother and grandmother. She was
an only child having lost a sister and her father. Her mother, Lena Woodward,
was an operator in the new telephone exchange. Thurman and Josephine Woodward,
both from
six miles away.
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MH supported his effort, loaning him the necessary horses and equipment. Sometimes his brothers helped him with harvest of oats and hay. In 1924 he moved his family back to the farm and began to work with his father for ten dollars a week the first year and then on a percentage share basis. Joy May (Warner) Campbell, was born April 4, 1924; Lenabelle (Warner) Wellman, November 8, 1925; Joseph Harvey (Pat), March 17, 1927; James Thurman (Jim), January 4, 1930; Hildred Eugene, February 19, 1931 (he lived for three days); Ethel Ruth (Warner) Lees, June 11, 1932 and Jane Josephine (Warner) Droke, |
Thurman and Josephine Warner
JH graduated from high school in 1923 and his dad asked him
to stay home and help with the farming. He joined with his father in buying and
selling sheep. Hubert wrote that he enjoyed working the farm but decided to go
to
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His last two years at During the next twenty-two days he bought a Model A Tudor
with $600 from Louisa Belle, rented and furnished a house in He recorded that Helen’s parents, sister and sister-in-law were present at the wedding. His mother, Ethel, TG & HH were also present for the single ring ceremony. He paid the preacher $20. They had a picnic by the river and spent their first night in their new home. |
Hubert and Helen Warner Helen was the daughter of Harry Elmer and Grace
(Hinton) Borst. On
HH graduated from
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Winfred Arthur and
Myrtle (Hall) Arthur. She attended Teachers were not to be married at that time. Her
daughter, Mildred Rheumilla (Warner) Schildkamp, said she doesn’t know how they kept it from being known since
she was |
Hildred and Rheumilla Warner and Mildred born Sept.17, 1933. RJ was the superintendent in the Bath Township Schools; we can only wonder if they told him about their secret, since he is credited with introducing them.
HH began teaching Vocational
Agriculture and coaching at
The MH family was growing and Ethel tells about the Thanksgiving after Hildred married. With all the wives that had been added to the gathering, her mother had seated her at the smaller table with the children. In her protest of such treatment she simply sat on the lap of each of her brothers in turn and ate from his plate.
The Great Depression - Farm Lost – 1934
The first ten or twelve years of my life were during the great depression. Of course I was not aware of how hard it was for the families of many of my classmates. Neither was I aware of the effect of the depression as a cause for my grandfather’s moving. I was eight years old.
There are several stories about the loss of the
During 1928, the year I was born, the average prices of stocks began to rise and by September of 1929 had risen 40 percent. This boom was largely artificial. The decline in the stock market started a recession and then a crash that began Oct 24. BLACK TUESDAY refers to October 29, 1929, when panicked sellers traded nearly sixteen million shares on the New York Stock Exchange (four times the normal volume at the time), and the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell twelve percent. The losses for the month were sixteen billion dollars. Ten million banks failed. Thirteen million Americans lost their jobs.
Among my earliest memories is one of Mom feeding the strangers who came to our door asking for food. She would open the refrigerator, get something to warm and fix them a plate of food. (I also remember when the electric refrigerator was delivered in the early thirties). I sometimes sat with the stranger on the back steps and watched as they ate. Years later I learned that there was a camp in the woods near the railroad tracks at the edge of town called a “hobo camp,” and a map was posted showing that our house was a place to get food.
Elvira (Warner) Covey remembers being told the debt on the
farm increased substantially when a buyer refused to honor a contract. MH had
apparently raised a large number of
One of the stories about MH was that he tried to get out of debt in a card game, bet the farm and lost. Aunt Ethel said this was not likely because she remembers the time when Thurman brought a deck of cards into the house. MH was furious and threw them into the flames of the living room heater. In later years she taught MH to play 500 Rum and he never wanted to quit at bedtime.
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MH was not prepared for foreclosure on his farm. He was embarrassed and so were his wife and daughter. I overheard one of my uncles ask if the banker could have skimmed off some of the money. MH had always kept finances in his head. The family could not believe the home farm was lost but
they did come to the rescue. Thurman found two available farms in
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MH and Louisa Belle
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Could this be the herd of cattle that cause the loss of the farm? |
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The hard fought battle on the
The MH Warners began a new era with the move from
Some Memories from
One of the first experiences at
Support for World War I made for an exciting time in
Juanita remembered a story told by her father. Roger and
Rodney stayed with their Grandmother Gilmore and her daughter, Aunt Lib, for a
time while they were attending
Ethel wrote what Eskham remembered about working in a
grocery store. Some of the prices were: kerosene for cooking and lamps was 8
cents a gallon, bread 9 cents, round steak 25 cents a pound, and 41/2 pounds of
sugar for 25 cents. The grocery store also carried shoes, tools, and gasoline
for 15 cents a gallon. He opened the store at
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MH’s first car was an Overland Sedan. It had side curtains
to put up if it rained and for winter and he had to leave one window open or
Ethel would get sick. She remembered they drove most of the way to her
grandfather’s funeral near |
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On that trip she was taken to see MH’s sister Jenny who was bedfast and lived Gravity Gas with Aunt Nellie. Aunt Jenny was hard of hearing and held a rubber hose up to Pump her ear as a hearing aid. To talk to her you spoke into the metal funnel on the other end of the hose. This seemed unusual to Ethel and she would not speak into the funnel end.
It was in 1920 while working on a barn roof that the boys heard the first tractor in the area. Worked stopped as they watched and observed that the tractor was plowing twice as fast as a team of horses. MH reluctantly said, “That’s the end of the horse.”
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MH felt like a traitor to his love of horses when in 1924 he bought his first Farmall Tractor. Horses were still retained and used for certain chores as the development of equipment like corn planters, corn pickers and other attachments were becoming available. |
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HH and TG had acquired an old Ford Model T truck for $25. JH borrowed it to move the possessions of his new bride. He loaded two washtubs, a washboard, a kerosene stove with an oven and her other belongings. On a hill headed for home the motor nearly stalled. He wrote, “I shoved the pedal to the floor so the drive band would slide to the most power and |
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pulled the throttle down. It crept along. I thought sure
it was going to stop. We did not have much brake but I knew how to use the
forward bands to brake in case it stopped and started rolling down the hill.
If that happened, I intended to back into the bank along the side of the
road. We made it alright and laughed about it all the way home.” The next
morning HH drove the truck to Radnor. Ethel rode with him and they helped to
clean the house for the arrival of the new furniture from a The young brides in the early twenties were grateful for the “coal oil” (now called kerosene) stove pictured here that did not require the use of a wood fire and ashes. |
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Two Grandpa’s Church Stories
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This story began with a chair. Mom had told us that a low
backed chair with a reed seat was from the church where her grandfather had preached
his first, and fifty years later, his last sermon in 1916. Her grandfather,
Cyprian L. Winget, had lived in |
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and became an itinerant preacher.
Cyprian Winget died in 1917 and the Wingets attended his funeral in the Christian Church.
A short time later the Warners became connected to this church
when MH learned that it was for sale. He
bought the Christian church and attempted to make it into a
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For some reason the church did not make it. I wonder if the pastor that was accused of being a spy for the Germans was one of the reasons. Some of the chairs from the church were stored in Uncle Roger’s barn in Ashley, where over tine the parts that touched the dirt floor rotted. When this was discovered RJ salvaged the good parts and reassembled several chairs. These were distributed to some of the family. |
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The Christian Church
When MH and Louisa Belle had first visited
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would discover that one of the churches had a very unique
stained glass window. Twenty-nine men from MH did not like their doctrine of “final holiness and happiness of the entire |
human race,” and wanted a church more to his liking. Even though MH did not agree with this church, Louisa Belle encouraged Ethel to attend Sunday school and sing in the choir.
A recent visit to
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The local Lions Club had taken on the renovation of the church to preserve it as a Civil War memorial. Roof leaks in the main sanctuary had caused severe water damage and the pews had been removed. Aunt Ethel stood on the spot where she sat during High School Baccalaureate and pointed to where she had sung in the choir. All the Warners would have attended High School Baccalaureate here. |
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John Westfall also
took us see the house where Aunt Ethel had grown up. (
Aunt Ethel was saddened to see that the mulberry trees that
had lined the lane were gone. One of the old pictures of the farm had
The brick farm house was built by Orris Fairchild about
1844. The house was partly purchased and partly a wedding gift from Steven
Fish, father of Orris’ wife Sarah. Their daughter, Susan Fairchild, born
Below is the house as it appeared in one of the old pictures. The lane was on the other side of the fence under the mulberry trees on the right.
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Home of Cyprian Winget where Esther Winget
Warner’s father was born 1857. A brick and stone porch was added before the MH
Warner family moved here in 1915 (see page 46)
The MH Warners occupied this house until 1934. This farm was home for nineteen years.
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