February 20: a Date of Some R-e-a-l-l-y BIG Shows

[This article was published in the Chariton County (Mo.) Historical Society^’s Newsletter, January 1999 issue.]

Borrowing a phrase familiarly associated with the late Ed Sullivan, I make mention that on said date of this year - l998- a Chicago TV newsperson sounded amazed when citing the birth of a fourteen pound baby to a woman in California. On that date in 1962, Lt.Col. John H. Glenn, Jr., became the first American to orbit Earth, and now as that feat is being referred to, the man is back up there again! This time on an extended orbital outing, showing the world that a Senior Citizen (age 77) can still have ... "The right stuff." Way to go, John Glenn!

Jane and John, 31 months old, 35 and 32 lbs. (All along, I was the biggest and the hairiest and to think - I was once asked if we were identical twins. Have yet to hear of such when both are not the same sex. Jane H.)

No doubt there are numerous other February 20th events that are noteworthy, but in this instance the concentration will be focused upon one concerning a Chariton County couple - John Prosser Haskin and wife Mary Ann (nee Ward), who were making their home in Fort Smith, Arkansas in 1924, when a bit of a phenomenon befell them - the birth of twins. Not just twins, but TWINS!! TWINS of a world record combined birth weight of 27 lbs., 12 ozs., as has been reported in the Guinness Book of World Records since 1975, under the heading (what else?) - Heaviest Twins. However, the given names of John P., Jr. and his sister Jane do not appear in the listing, but that poses no problem for me - after all, it was our mother's accomplishment, under remarkable circumstances, considering today's routine procedures of prenatal care and delivery.

The enormously burdened mother-to-be was attended - in her home - by an aging Dr. B.W. Freer and her best friend, Mrs. Pearl Duggans, in the wee hours of a blustery winter morning. As I was told of the event, I was born first and when the good Doctor saw the size of me, he went into somewhat of a nervous rigor, then when Mrs. Duggans spoke of noticing there was still a large abdominal protrusion and concluded, "Doctor, I believe there is another one in there!" he was said to have paled and denied the possibility by declaring, "Oh no, there can't be! Not after the size of this one!!" Ah, but there was, and six minutes after I was born, the poor man was probably wishing he'd taken a winter cruise in southern climes, because the second humongous Haskin was making his entry into the world - feet first! He had to work desperately to prevent strangulation per contraction. During all this, our mother was only administered a whiff of chloroform for pain easement. Years later, a Chicago doctor was puzzled over findings in a chest X-ray, until our mother told him of the outsized burden she had carried, which he saw as reason for her heart not being in its normal position and the tips of both lungs being paralyzed. Another Dr. had been skeptical, until he found the birth cited in a medical journal. Well, if he had known the lady like I did, he wouldn’t have been surprised; she had many capabilities.

Even now, as John and I approach our 75th birthday, the story keeps cropping up - mainly, I suspect, due to its entry in the Guinness Book. I saw an extensive newspaper article about a twins convention, which the writer concluded with some twins facts gleaned from the Guinness Book which he began with our data under the clever heading: He Ain't Heavy…He's My Brother. Then there was the time multiple births was the topic on a morning radio talk show and the host himself brought our birth up and ended his comments with: "That woman must have looked like a mountain!"

As mentioned, I was born first, but right from the start we were referred to as "John and Jane" and as we progressed through one bit of childhood mischief after another, we were often stopped in our tracks by what had come to sound like one word - "Johnnjane!" all too often, there being an older brother and three sisters who would, in time, become relentless teasers.

Having violated the unwritten law of womankind against revelations of age and weight, I might as well make a full confession and admit that from the start, I was the one who carried the extra 12 ounces; the heaviest and the one with hair that was first cut by Dad when only two weeks old. Straight and dark and cut much like Moe's of the Three Stooges, whereas when John's hair grew, it became a mass of blond curls. He was a beautiful baby, but there are pictures of me about a year old in which I look exactly like Oliver Hardy without the little "cookie duster" - I'm not joking!

In the press we were dubbed "the little heavyweights" as was the caption above a photo taken with our mother at five-days-old, which was clipped from the front page of a Washington, D.C. newspaper and sent in a letter of congratulations (on a U.S. Senate letterhead) to our parents by the then-Senator of Arkansas, Thomas Caraway. It is kept in my genealogy files.

I also grew in height considerably faster than my twin, which caused a school teacher to mistake me for an older child who had failed a grade and got held hack. I could not understand why she seemed so scornful of me, so Mom went to see her and ended up setting her straight. Mom was also very good at making a point.

Then in high school, John had been in a class of an English teacher a semester before I was one of her students ... and she consistently called me - John Haskin. She retired after that semester. No comment.

About the older sisters and their teasing - I won't make an in-depth report; let it suffice that they had a way of saying my first given name - Patsy - that really set me on edge, but it was not until about 1978 when I'd begun genealogy research (so what else would a 10th generation American in both parental lines come to be doing?) that I finally had the last laugh. I had ordered birth certificate record copies of all seven of us Haskin siblings and thus learned I was registered simply as being - Jane Haskin! Never was anybody's Patsy, after all! That pretty much told me how really "shook up" that poor stunned doctor had been. Still, in early adulthood, I got the notion Patricia and Pat sounded more chic than Jane and began using those alternatives and at this phase of life, I am Jane to most; Pat to some and hope it doesn't suggest a split personality. The name thing was never a problem for John - that is, before one of his sons was named John Prosser, III.

Currently and family wise, John and I are the last left and I deft him to join the rest of the family before me. Though he has made his home in Michigan since before he served in the Marine Corps in WWII, we keep in close contact per letters and phone. He and wife Helen recently observed their 50th wedding anniversary with all of their family present - a daughter and two sons; the spouses of the two married ones and four grandchildren. I have been a widow for twelve years; have a son and two daughters and two grandchildren, all nearby. Johns' greatest joy is in working with his computer and going to his cabin in Canada with "III". Mine lies in uninterrupted time at this keyboard.