One of the great things about the family was all the Aunts, Uncles and cousins. The family reunions were always a hoot with lots of kidding, yelling, singing and love.
Beer and brats at Uncle Jay and Aunt Dot’s were always well attended family reunions. Dad used to bring the brothers down to hunt in New York and that was always fun with the same kind of brotherly kidding. Uncle Bob would always say, “Don’t pick on me, I’m an orphan”. Whether or not we got any deer was secondary to the story telling and brotherly love that overflowed when they were there.
Learning to “Reed” and “Rite”
Grandpa was illiterate until he went to Milwaukee, so in order to write to his wife Mary, he taught himself to read and write. Not very well at first because most of his spelling was phonetic. I would love to have a copy of some of these letters as dad said they were very readable as long as you sounded out the words and didn’t worry about how they “wer speld”.