Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - Did you know they were coming?

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Yes. It was on the very first night back from being married. We got back from Hilda’s on Sunday and the shivery was on Monday night. All the relatives from Toledo were invited too. The house was full. The yard was full.

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - When we lived with Grandma and Grandpa, I can remember having to come down to the living room whenever there was a thunderstorm.
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Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - He was always afraid that he wouldn’t be able to get us down from upstairs if the house was ever hit by lightning. So, in the middle of the night, if a storm came up, we had to get dressed and come down and sit together in the living room until the storm was over.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - We had to get dressed since we were not allowed to come downstairs in our night clothes. That’s the way us kids were raised.

When Marie got married and the first storm came along, she woke Brick up in the middle of the night and said, “Get your pants on and get downstairs.”

He came into the living room and asked, “What’s wrong? Where are we going?”

Marie said, “Don’t be smart! We’re not going anyplace. It’s storming.”

Brick said, “Oh, for crying out loud.” and went back to bed.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - It seems like we used to have more serious storms back then too.

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - Remember the balls of lightning that would come right through the telephone lines and into the house?

Mildred (Roggerman) Heiden - It did that once when we lived at Suchik’s (8420 Dixon Road). The lightning came right through the phone and blew it clear across the kitchen. It was a wonder that one of the girls wasn’t talking on the phone at the time.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - Edna used to be very concerned about electrical storms. I used to stay up there with them sometimes.

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - That was probably because they didn’t have any electric lights. They just had a kerosene lamp hanging from the ceiling.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - When Henry (Rambow) (right) would blow that lamp out, it went pitch black in the house. You could hear the sheep “baa” out in the barnyard in the night. I used to lay there in the back bedroom saying to myself, “I hope it gets to be morning soon!” That was really scary.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - How about the time while Helen, Wilma, Marie and Helma were all still at home. Helma and Marie went out on dates one night.

Helma and Wilma were supposed to sleep together and Helen, Marie and I shared a bed. I always had to sleep in the middle.

We were scaredy cats so we talked Wilma into sleeping with us. When the others came home, Marie climbed in too so we ended up with four of us packed like sardines in one bed and Helma by herself in the other.

Mildred (Roggerman) Heiden - Ask Ralph why he liked to work for Herb bailing hay and straw in the summers.

Ralph Heiden - For Helma’s great meals! She would put out a wonderful spread every day at noon when we would come in from the field.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - Helma (right) was the best cook!

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - She taught me how to clean house.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - I stayed with her one summer when Larry was little. She taught me how to cook and how to make good gravy.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Well, I learned how to cook and clean at home. I used to help Ma a lot. Of course, when Jeanie was born, I was 17 years old and I was practically her mother.

Ma had a heart problem by then and had to take it easier. That’s the reason Jeanie was the only one of the thirteen kids that was born in the hospital. She was six weeks early and Ma was weak afterwards for a while. Jeanie was delivered by Dr. Douglas in St. Vincent’s Hospital in Toledo.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel -   Boy, you’re memory is still good to remember all that stuff!

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - And then we’d sing The Old Grandfather’s Clock.

(Everyone singing together) -

“And it stopped short,
Never to go again.
When the old man died.”

Helma (Heiden) Nickel -   We had parent-teachers meetings way back then too. I remember I was in the second grade and we all had to get up and say a nursery rhyme. I played the part of Jack Sprat in the rhyme about Jack Sprat could eat no fat.

That is when Leo gave me the nickname, Jack. He had a nickname for everyone.

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - So that’s where that came from, I remember him calling you Jack.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - We always had music at school. Harrison Dentel played the piano and we had the old Golden Song Books.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - I still have a copy that we bought at a yard sale. We used to sing out of that every morning at Bridge School.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - I have the 100th Anniversary Book for Bridge School if you would like to see it sometime, Ralph.

Ralph Heiden - When you reached the end of the eighth grade, then what?

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - People back then always thought that 8th grade was enough schooling for anyone.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - You didn’t have to go on to high school in those days. I was the first one in our family to go.

Harrison Dentel came to the house when I finished the 8th grade. He said, “She’s only twelve years old. What is she going to do here at home? She should go on to high school.” Pa didn’t like the idea at all.

Mildred (Roggerman) Heiden - Art wanted to go on to high school so bad too. But when he was in 8th grade, they wouldn’t even let him go to Ida to take the entrance exam.

Norma "Jeanie" Heiden - They thought going to high school was foolishness. But finally, Harrison Dental talked and talked to them about Wilma and they gave in.

Then, when my time came several years later, I had to beg and beg. Pa said, “All Wilma learned up there was foolishness. Going to parties and such foolishness.” But, they finally gave in and I got to go.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - I was in the class play my junior and senior years. Elizabeth Johnson lived across the river and she would come to pick me up to take me to practice. When it was time for the play, they asked if my mother and dad were coming. I had to say, “No.” I wouldn’t have thought about asking them. Pa would have thought that it was really a lot of nonsense.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Back when I would have gone, you would have had to pay tuition to go to high school. The pastor’s kids were going to go and I could have gone with them but I would have had to walk to the parsonage to catch the ride every day.

Helma (Heiden) Nickel - Our road was mud at that time and we often had to walk to the corner to get a ride somewhere. You could usually get down to where Henry and Edna lived.

When I started working at River Raisin Paper, I rode with John Beaudrie and I had to meet him down at the corner at 6:30 every morning.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - I remember one Christmas Eve, everybody who came over for the party got stuck on the road. They had to get the tractor out and pull everybody out of the mud.

Ralph Heiden - Did you get snowed in very often back then?

Mary Lou (Heiden) Opfermann - Oh, I can remember walking down the ditches that were full of snow.

Wilma (Heiden) Bicking - We would still walk to the Bridge School no matter how deep the snow was then. It used to get a crust on top and it would be up as high as the fence posts. We would walk across that and have a lot of fun. There were always a bunch of us on the way to and from school each day.