As our family went through my mother’s personal effects, we discovered these essays, handwritten in a spiral notebook. Immediately, we knew we had found a very special look into the early life of someone we loved and admired. We’re sharing them here in the hope that others may enjoy them as well.
November 23, 1986
These essays are being written because I have often thought how nice it would be if, say, my great-grandmother had written about what life was like when she was growing up. It would have been so interesting to know how people’s daily life and experiences fitted in with the history that was being made at that time.
Airplanes
An airplane passing over was an event recorded in the weekly paper. People asked each other if they had seen it. Lindbergh’s flight across the Atlantic was a headline, a marvel at the time.
I vaguely remember someone landing a plane at the Fairgrounds in West Point. Mostly barnstormers landed at Baxter’s pasture, west of Fort Madison. Lindbergh’s flight in 1927 was headline news – he was considered a hero. My first plane ride was probably in 1936 at Burlington. Don’t remember what kind of plane, it was an open cockpit, I sat behind the pilot and he gave me a helmet or it would have blown my hair off my head. I went up in closed planes a couple of times after that, one was a Ford Tri-Motor and once we went up for a plane ride at Midway Airport in Chicago – took my mother for what was her first plane ride. Carl (Hoel) had taken a couple of lessons, then broke his arm working on the section gang (the crew that built and repaired railroad tracks) out of Galesburg and then never had the money to go on. World War II came along and he never got around to taking more lessons.
When planes became more numerous beacon lights were installed. I remember when they installed a beacon at Charleston, Ia. We could see it flash from our house in West Point. I remember when the Graf Zeppelin came across Iowa. We spent one afternoon looking north, trying to catch a glimpse of it, but it was too far north for us to see it. I think the beacons were installed when the planes started carrying mail.
Trains
Train travel was so common and so many were available many years ago as compared with now – it is hard to believe West Point had a depot and passenger service. Herman Kaltefleiter used to go to the depot morning and evening, pulling a cart, to pick up the mail, take it to the Post Office, northwest corner of the square then, to be sorted and distributed. Mr. Poelmeier, editor of the weekly newspaper, The West Point Bee, always went to meet the train to get news of people traveling. When the West Point Fair was on, special trains came out from Fort Madison for fair visitors. When St. Mary’s High played basketball with the Fort Madison teams, special trains brought fans. The train used to run west to Ottumwa where there were connections.
One time, my mother, sister Louise and I took the train to Fort Madison and spent the weekend at my Great-Uncle George (Gerhard) Kruempelmann’s, 2800 block of Ave. I. Uncle George was a brother of my Grandma Wellman. They had 5 daughters, Elsie Niggemeyer, Ella Higdon, Cecelia Bellew, and twins Loretta Nichols and Elvina Buechel. They had a piano, also a large stove I think they called a base burner. It burned hard coal. Uncle George worked at the Santa Fe Railroad Shops. They had a 25 foot lot. I remember thinking how awful it would be to live on such a small plot – I was used to rambling around on the Bruegenhempke place.
Walt’s Comments
There were still freight trains from Ft. Madison to West Point when I was a kid. I’m not sure if they still ran all the way to Ottumwa at that point though. The tracks ran pretty close to highway 103 (now J40). At one place there was a pretty cool timber trestle across a creek.
Air travel in Iowa
There were a large number of early aviation pioneers with ties to Iowa. The Wright brothers and Amelia Earhart lived in Iowa as children, as did Clyde Cessna.
In June of 1910, the Curtiss Exhibition team of J.C “Bud” Mars and Eugene Ely (an Iowa native) were the first pilots to fly in Iowa at a Show in Sioux City.
Eugene Ely is credited with the first powered flight from the deck of a ship, the first landing on a ship, and the creation of the arresting gear that stops a plane when it lands on a ship.
Digging Deeper
Iowa has a solid history of aviators and aviation. The Iowa DOT has a page of history of flight in Iowa here.
Read more about Iowa Railroad history here.
Sherrey
So interesting. Maybe she should’ve been a writer!
Marilyn Wellman Zimmerman
I did not know my Grandmother Wellman had family in Ft Madison. I thought they all remained in Germany.
Michelle
Marilyn, there were two brothers who also came to this country. Anton Heinrich Kruempelmann (born October 15, 1861, died February 9, 1951) and Gerhard (George) Anton Kruempelmann (born February 4, 1868, died October 11, 1927). Maria came over in 1885, and Georgina’s notes say that one of the brothers was already here at that time. I don’t know which one.