Sending Our Best Wishes for Christmas Your Way!

This mailbox is in our backyard and is a repository for gardening tools. I think thoughts of green, growing things should bring a little warmth to the long nights, no?

TerMaat Christmas 1957

In the picture below, I love how Mom is all prim and proper in an apron, oblivious to how bizarre her son posed in a rainslicker with gun is going to look fifty years from now. It sure is more interesting than our other standard Christmas poses of cute kids in 'jammies! So take this as a tip for your photos this year: try to get your kids to look as ridiculous as possible for the benefit of future generations!

Christmas in Ann Arbor II

Speaking of pipsqueaks that won't sit still for their Christmas portaits... Actually I think capturing the wigglies on camera like this is rather brilliant.

Grace and Friend

Mom doesn't recognize her travelling companion here, probably a fellow orchestra member.

Backyard Adventure

Perhaps Chris remembers this location, probably Tiffin. He looks like he is surveying the neighborhood in hopes of a big adventure.

Christmas in Ann Arbor

Two different Christmases here, one at Marshall Court and the other at 1228. One with fidgety pipsqueaks and one without. Be sure to click on the picture above to see Gracie's bird.

Pete TerMaat: Hambone

Max did a little dance for us last time he visited which reminded me of this picture of his Daddy being a goofball. These photos were taken in Hattie's backyard in Sheboygan-- apparently they had a bit of a flood that year. (And no it's not your eyes. It was a crappy camera with a shaky operator.)

Chris makes a Snowman

Not sure how Chris' snowfriend got to be bigger than he is.

State of the Art

Previously, I featured a photo of Dad at work. Now here is Mom's workplace, the junior high computer room filled with state-of-the-art Apple IIe-s. For you technology nostalgia buffs, did you know that there is an entire website dedicated to the history of the Apple IIe? Nursing aides at the Kinnick Home and other random people about town still remember Mom as The Computer Lady. She made her mark as a technowizard for her time alright. Too bad we have no picture of her swapping cables or something.

Robert Haan with Baby Chris

Sunflowers

For those who are tired of winter already and want to look to greener times ahead, here is a 1992 photo of our farmer and his healthy crop of sunflowers.

Brad and Gracie in a Jolly Mood

This picture was taken on our back porch, so obviously not in the winter, but don't they look like a couple of Christmas elves?

Brad's Menagerie

Mom sent the following note to Brad for his birthday. Mary may have details to share from Brad. Or you may have questions for her... perhaps about the trauma of encountering slaughtered guinea pigs? It's giving me nightmares!

The pictures don't necessarily date from the same time period but they strike me as the kinds of things that children like to take pictures of that adults never bother with.

I'm trying to remember some of the life we shared on Marshall Court and I have a few questions to ask you.

1. What animals did you have in the basement room menagerie? I remember an extravagant guinea pig double decker cage that you or Dad made out of wood. Did it have as many as 30 guinea pigs on it before a dog came in and slaughtered them? Did that episode put an end to the whole animal collection?

Seems to me there was a wounded squirrel that bit you. A couple of white rats. A nest of wild mice that Dad found in the coal bin and turned over to you. Any wounded birds? Snakes? Lizards? Were the rabbits your thing before they were turned over to me?

2. At what point did the basement room become your bedroom? Surely you did not share the space with all those critters. Was there ever any heat in that basement room? I remember you had to walk through the basement hallway past a cellar which at one time had homemade wine and/or homemade root beer except that most root beer bottles exploded their caps. Maybe there were home canned tomatoes and other veggies on the shelves there too. Next to the cellar room there was the remains of a once functional toilet room with a charming pull chain "water closet". Then there was a large laundry room with a workbench for Dad along the inside wall that you had to walk through to get to the door to your room or the outside door.

I'm running out of sittin' time with my legs for now. I could go on about your tin or lead soldiers you bombed with clothespins in the sandbox. Or wondering if there is any photo record of the several years of fireworks displays you put on from the narrow ledge by Kaufman's house...

Picnic

Here are a couple of photos of little Gracie and brother Bradley on a picnic with AK and Angelyn and some friends. The infamous Bluppy the Puppy is enjoying the day in the park too. Anyone know who the mystery couple is?

Happy Birthday Brad!

Angelyn gives baby Brad a squeeze in 1927. Here's a big virtual hug to Uncle Brad on his 81st birthday. The shot below is from 1928. (Click to enlarge)

Roottown School

Chris asks in comments to this post if the building visible in the third picture is the same as the school A.K. and the other Stevens children attended near Fremont, Michigan and which Chris and I, with Mom and Mary, visited in 1996. Below is a picture of the school around 1913 with various Stevens children in the assembly. This photo is also in One of Ten (p. 40). In addition, the Newaygo County Historical Society has a collection of Roottown School pictures which can be found here (enter search word 'roottown'). By the way, in case you don't keep your copy of One of Ten with you at all times as I do, the Newaygo folks have scanned a few of its chapters, including the one describing the school building, for your online reading pleasure. (And did you know you can even buy an extra copy from Amazon!) I do wish the NCHA had given better attribution to the document.


Click to enlarge. The key below will help you find the Stevens children.


Here is a slideshow of our field trip to the Stevens farm. Photos of the school appear near the end.



Browse here. Slideshow on Flickr here.

Bottom line. The building has changed over the years, but it does look like the same one.

Happy Halloween!

This somewhat surreal sequence of photos (numbers on the back) made spooky
by a camera with a light leak, appear to be from our first Halloween in
River Falls in 1965 when the neighborhood was alfalfa fields and constructions sites.
They star Bridget who was still really a pup at that time.
Perhaps they were taken by Chris?

The end of Sunset Lane.

Our house is on the left in the picture above.

Dad at Work

Dad's Office

(Trying to date this photo... looking at the shiny doorknob,
I'm thinking this was taken just as the department moved into the Fine Arts Building - 1972-3 - to 'celebrate' the move, but before Dad rated a window office?)

Gink-gone!

The day after I captured our glorious golden ginkgo at its peak
we had a freeze and...

Charlie Brown tree!
If there was indeed a single moment when this happened we missed it.

Cousins

Little Gracie with cousins Elinor and Gretchen Bouwsma and Uncle Oets.

Great Expectations

We were culling books for various donation piles
and came across this book, a 1910 edition of Great Expectations.

The book belonged to Edward Bouwsma, a gift from Oscar (an uncle?).
Alas, we only have Volume I. I hope no one was left expecting more...

Gink-go!

I know you've all been waiting for a ginkgo tree update (you can see last year's pictures here). I've been waiting for this moment when I could record our little tree in its autumn golden glory.

I haven't experienced a midwestern fall in many years, so I am impressed at how many humble little trees are just sorta there 360-odd days of the year and then for about 48 hours they decide to be stars. Of course our little ginkgo is kinda sparkly all the time but in the picture below you can really see it holding its own amongst all the sugar maples. Those of you who were around for email exchanges about ginkgo lore may recall that the tree is rumored to drop all its leaves at once. So what we need now is a gingko-cam...

Wystan and the Whale

I hope there is a whale of a tale behind this charming picture.
How about it Wystan?

Perhaps David knows?

Brat Fry

This is a little collection of portraits from a brat fry (though no brats are actually featured-- but really, what else would we have been eating?) in Sheboygan summer of 1979. Jim and Jayne appear to be newly engaged? married? Everyone is looking quite jolly.



You can click on the symbol with four arrows to make the slideshow fill the screen or you can browse the set by clicking here or view the slideshow on flickr here

Schoolmates

This photo is from "Aunt Tena's collection" and the note on the back suggests that these might have been her students. In the photo below, Mom thinks the woman in the back on the right smiling proudly may be Tena [Stevens]. The other ragamuffin photos provide no clues to their origin, but perhaps they belonged to the same collection? Additional insights appreciated! (Remember to click to enlarge!)