4 - Olden Days Travel

My first recollection of cars was our old 1917 Dodge Touring Car. It was a 12 volt system and the horn was on the drivers door. It had a glass windshield with manual windshield wipers when it rained or snowed the driver if alone or a passenger had to wipe the rain or snow away. There was no windows and had a cloth canvas top in inclement weather. It had side curtains to snap on to keep the cold and weather out and no heater so winter travel was to be avoided if possible. It had a starter, but if the battery was low you had to crank with a hand crank. Lots of people went around in those days with right arms in a cast, as the damn things would sometimes kick and if you didn’t get out of the way "bamb" a broken arm.

Everyone tried to park on a hill so you could coast down and start it that way. Always we tried to park by Memorial park and walk down town to shop. Then back up hill to the car so we could coast to get it started. Most everyone did the repairs on their car as it was costly to have a mechanic. One morning mother was coming home after taking one of my older brothers to work. The axle broke, so dad got another put it in the car so we were back on the road again. Times were something else none of them was good and everyone had to be adept at fixing flats. Patching the inner tube and putting the tire and wheel back on the car. Then pumping the tire up with a hand pump. The concrete roads only went no more than ten miles out of town. There not only were expensive but all the work was done by hand. Hauling the sand, gravel and cement but the mixture had to be mixed by hand also (manual labor). After you left the concrete it was crushed rock to the next town. Going South from Wenatchee to Rock Island there was concrete. North it went up to where the new bridge goes across the river. There was no concrete South towards Malaga and towards Cashmere after you crossed the Wenatchee River at Sunnyslope it was rock. That doesn't sound bad but that rock really did a job on tires. It was nothing to have a flat every five miles and everyone had them. Being an emigrant my day was very proud of his new country and we always had a big deal for the 4^th of July. Usually went up to Waterville to visit with the pioneers and friends. Picnic in the park watch fireworks and rodeos. Really makes a big day of it. Once a year we got a band put around the filler cap of the radiator. It held six flags and they really flew when we were on the road. It seemed we were going fast but it was probably twenty or twenty five miles per hour. We always left with three or four spares tied to the back of the car so you could go about fifteen miles before you had to stop and repair. Pine Canyon had a spring and picnic tables with shade and there was always lots of people stopped fixing tires going to the outside toilets and picnicking. In those days, there was even a small store selling pop, candy and a few staples. This day we stopped fixed the tires and pumped them all up and left for Waterville. I remember from a time, the road was dirt, so didn’t get any more flats that morning. After the big day was done, the people from Badger Mountain said come on to our big dance before going home. We did and the dance was held outdoors on a wooden floor erected in a grove of aspen trees. There was a piano, violin, drums and they played everyone danced. All the kids made a slide on the floor near to the edge to skid back and for the on the edge of the dance hall floor. People didn’t know about baby sitters so everyone went to the dance, baby’s and all. When the kids tired out they curled up went to sleep on blankets in cars in wagons, whatever. I cut this out of the Wenatchee World seventy five year column 11/3/99 it looks like my Dad’s 1917 Dodge touring car. They didn’t change too much from year to year flat tires and all.

When the Gurnards moved to Dryden about 1929 they couldn’t afford a car and a truck both so they had a truck as it was a must on the ranch. When they came down to visit us the older boys would sit on the truck’s flat bed. The two older boys were on the outside with the younger boys between. They would cover up with blankets as it could get very cold on the trip. In 1936 Joe my brother-in-law got his World War I bonus. He bought a brand new, 1936 Dodge four door sedan. When they took delivery my sister Ethel asked where the crank was. They told he that with a good battery they would never need a crank. The car cost about $800.00 in those days. In 1941 before the war started a car was selling for about $750.00 depending on the make and model. Wages were about fifty cents an hour and the fruit sheds didn’t pay overtime. We would work from six in the AM till maybe two or three, then back to work at six AM again. When the war started the shipyards was paying eighty-five cents an hour (big war time wages).

When we first moved from the mountain we lived on the old Van Cleve homestead. It was 360 acres bounded by what is now Eastmont on the west Kentucky on the East Grant road on the South and 9^th on the North. It had an Apricot orchard north of the house and originally the water had to be hauled from the river. There were cisterns all over the ranch as the stock had to have water. It had an apricot orchard north of the house and originally the water had to be hauled from the river. There were cisterns all over the ranch as the stock had to have water. When we moved onto the place the East Wenatchee Water District had domestic water running to the house but it was on the back porch not in the house. We had two bedrooms a kitchen a living room and a front porch, with two beds out there, to be able to sleep everyone. It got cold, real cold in the winter but in those days most houses didn’t have more than two bedrooms. Most boys slept in the barns along with the horses. In the summer we would make a tent out of wheat sacks and move out into the yard to get a cool place to sleep. All that room outdoors gave us a lot of space to play in and we would play games and run all over the 360 acres playing hide and seek or as we called it Run Sheep Run. We had two sides and one side would hide and the other side would look for them in the dark. There was always the chance you could fall into one of the cisterns, but as they were dry there wasn’t much danger. The only bad thing was in the summer they were filled with Russian Thistles if you went into one of them in the dark those thistles were something else to get out of. Going to school we had to walk to the bus the first year about a mile down to the highway and then at night back up the hill home. In those days two buses carried all the kids that lived more than a mile from school. Our school had six grades when I started. When Howard was ready to start the seventh grade they added an addition of three grades onto the school. After the ninth grade we had to go to Wenatchee as they had the only high school. South Wenatchee East Wenatchee and Malaga, Stemilt Hill and Sunnyslope plus Monitor all went to Wenatchee High School. Cashmere, Dryden, and Leavenworth all had high schools.

The Wenatchee Valley 1-Family Matters 2-The Family Farm 3-When I Was A Boy <Previous 4-Olden Days Travel Next> 5-Growing Up and Winter Sports 6-Events