Our House

This house actually holds most of my childhood memories. In this picture you can see the front porch, what you can't see is the back porch and the wrap around roof. When you went out of the kitchen door it was onto a porch and to the left was a room or walled in porch, it had shelves and lots of junk and stuff was stored in there. I know we hated to have to clean it out. To the right the porch wrapped around to the end of the kitchen. Straight ahead on the porch was a sink, dad eventually tore the porch down, I for one was sad . Dad told me it was because it was dangerous and we children would not stay off the roof or out of the porch room. I do remember one of the older siblings going out the door one day and a wood plank, which the floor was made up of, broke and they hurt their leg pretty bad, it was Roy or Kathryn I think. That was the beginning of the end for the old thing. The porch was so fun for hiding, there was lots of stuff to hide behind or under. It was dark in there and you could look out the broken planks at the bottom and see others as they were looking for you when we were playing hide and seek or kick the can. We also spied on Anna when she was dating Vern, they were mushy and when we giggled Anna would say, I think it's the cats. Vern lived in Midvale too so they would walk on dates. Marian was usually in a car when she came home from, or went out on dates, but back then the boys came in for their dates and we could tease Marian then. She hated it big time but mom never tried to control us.

There were lots of big trees, some were close the house and we would hang ropes from them for swings, we would go upstairs climb out the windows onto the porch roof grab the rope and swing off the roof, now that was fun. Dad would get mad, he said it was dangerous and Anna did fall and get hurt pretty bad, no broken bones though. Dad worked out of town all the time so we still had free run of the house and yard, mom was too busy it seemed to pay too much attention to what we did outside until someone got hurt then she went ballistic. Actually you never wanted to go to mom when you were hurt, she came undone. The house was a ramshackle and there was never any grass or flowers, dad tried a time or two but he said we didn't take care of it or stay off it so there was just a lot of dirt, but I actually liked it, there were sheds in the back we would climb up on the roof of those and play, I remember we would holler at cars and duck down when they went by, I always thought it was funny.

Out the back door before the sheds there was a cellar, I hated to climb down the dirt stairs to the cellar but that was where mom stored her bottled fruit and vegetables. There was a tree over that as well and the cellar was a dirt hill. We had ropes off that tree and we would put a board on the bottom of the rope to create a seat for the swing. We couldn't swing really high on that one because it was pretty close to the house. We would also hold on to the rope and swing off the hill and back. We would slide down the small hill in the winter on the snow.

The fence you see to the side of the house had wood accross the top. It was like 2 by 4's and we would walk the fence like a balance beam and see who walk it the fastest without falling, I fell more than once and it hurt, it seemed like I always had skinned knees.

You can see the front porch with the balcony in the first picture, we had slumber parties on that and it was another play ground in my eyes. It was another sore spot with dad. He knew it would fall down on someone someday, but we continued to play on it and have sleep overs, sounds like we didn't mind dad too much but he was gone all the time and you know kids, we felt like all was well. I always wished he would just try and make it more sturdy and not tear it down.

We had lots of stray cats, and I think that is why we all hate cats. Grandpa Pearson would come over and get the baby kittens, put them in gunny sacks with rocks and throw them in the Jordan River. Boy would he be in trouble today, man oh man he would be tarred and feathered for just thinking about it. We were all glad when he came and got them, they were a pain in the neck and of course they were wild and not very friendly. We did play with the more friendly ones.

We played a game called Annie I Over, we would throw the ball over the roof of the shed and the person on the other side would catch it. I am not exactly sure how it was played anymore, I think you would trick the person on the other side some how, I bet Judy can remember, she was good at it. Like I said there was lots to do and play, I loved it. I thought growing up in a big family was great, there was always someone to play with and our house and yard had everything anyone could want in my eyes. I really was happy.

This is how the house looked when the porch was torn down. It looks like the windows are broken, I am not sure if they are or when this picture was taken it may have been just before the house was torn down. You can see the big trees I was talking about, the sheds were off to the left and behind the house, none of them can be seen in either picture. Dad did do some remodeling off and on, I don't think it ever got painted after the porch and balcony came off, Anna would know more, her and Vern actually lived in it for a while when we first moved to California in 1965. There was so much to be done it was hard for her. There was never any carpet or extra's it was very plain. If it got painted on the outside it would have been by Anna and Vern. They did plant some grass that actually took in the front and side of the yard. I think mom and dad just eventually left it, they may have received some money for it from the city but I don't really think so. It was torn down by the city who eventually owned the property. I have lots more to tell about this house and life there, like I said I was happy there, I have lots and lots of great memories.