Daddy became chief of Santa operations as we improvised a whole new system of holiday logistics. Guided by our clandestine letters, he was keeper-of-the-secrets, and did almost all of our family shopping. He bought not only his presents to us, but also most of the things we gave each other. He managed to do this while still preserving absolute secrecy. Before mailing the gifts, he wrapped each article in heavy brown paper and labeled it for the person who had requested it. (e.g., “To be opened by John.”) Since several gifts might be in one package, Mother was our local Santa coordinator — the official box opener. She was also the custodian of all presents, once they had been gift wrapped and tagged by the giver.
She missed the independence of shopping on her own, but gave my father inside hints she gleaned from our holiday chattering. Mother and I had the perfect idea for John — a new pair of ice skates. He had outgrown his old ones and had to settle for using his sled when we went ice skating on a nearby lake. But John had other ideas for presents, a little car or maybe a train….
Mother suggested sending some cloth and imitation leather that I could use to make a dress and shoes for Betty June. She recommended getting a book for each of us, but knowing Daddy’s preference for masculine frontier stories, she specified the one for me should be about girls my own age. She asked him to quickly send some samples of wool jersey or flannel material in pretty colors, and silk thread to match so she could make me a new dress for the school Christmas program.
Her Santa’s helper role became more difficult after the tips of her fingers were frostbitten one day as she worked outside straightening up the woodpile. She told Daddy it was painful to knit, sew or do anything with her hands….
John’s ever-changing gift priorities finally narrowed to one item at the top of his list. Mother wrote, “If you want to make a little boy happy give him an ax. He’d rather have it than skates or anything else and I don’t believe he’ll get hurt. They can change off using Ruth’s skates if the ice is still good.” Her expanding list also included a card game like “Old Maid,” and some candy canes for the tree.
Wary of extravagance, she wrote Daddy, “We must be as saving as we can I guess, though I don’t think anyone could make the money go farther than we do.” For her own gift she asked if our radio could be fixed to run on batteries rather than house current, but shortly afterward said, “Never mind about the radio, it would probably be too expensive.” Actually, that conversion would have been nearly impossible…. Despite the comfort it would have given her, she never considered spending the money to buy and operate a battery radio that was powerful enough to pick up the Twin City Stations.
Blisses had donated a fresh-cut tree to the school, and delivered it in their horse-drawn sleigh. On their way back home they stopped by and surprised us with a nice spruce, which we left standing in a snow bank outside so it would stay fresh for Christmas.
When the temperature got down to 20 below zero, Mother kept us home, where we happily passed the time making Christmas decorations. Daddy had sent us some crepe paper, red and green wrappers from rolls of coins, shiny silver foil inner wrappers he’d saved from Hershey chocolate bars, and a package of colored construction paper from Woolworth’s. Mother let us use last year’s Christmas cards and lining paper from the envelopes, which had glitter, gold, silver, and colorful designs. With this vast supply of materials, we were free to cut and paste at will.
Our favorite work spot was in the front room near the heater. There we could lay on the braided rug, with our work on the bare floor, so we didn’t need to worry about stray paste. We had plenty of natural light from the north window. On washdays we had a canopy of clothes hanging overhead, with their fresh scent of the winter sky. We always knew when Mother was at work, as the smell of baking fruitcake or Christmas cookies drifted in from the kitchen.
At first we wondered why The Mother Cat showed such an inordinate interest in our projects, hanging around and sniffing them curiously. The mystery was solved when we noticed our paste started disappearing. Like some grade school kids, she considered paste to be a snack. No doubt our home-made flour and water variety presented a welcome change from raw mice. With her newly developed hunting prowess, she would wait until we were engrossed in our work, and then dart over and lick it up. Even after we were aware of her tactics, she always managed to outwit us at least once each day.
We made wreaths by cutting out large circles of green paper, trimming them with little round red paper holly berries, and a fringe of red or green crepe paper. Sometimes our generous applications of paste dried into white patches, which an imaginative observer might charitably describe as snowy accents. We proudly lined up our finished products on the phonograph in the living room. We kept a running total, comparing and admiring them, and attempting to outdo ourselves with each new design.
With the big day only about a week away, I reminded John that he had been so preoccupied with decorating he had neglected to write his letter to Santa Claus. “Even if you write him now he’ll never get the letter in time — so you can just forget about your old ax…. ” As he considered for a moment, I watched his face register first shock, disdain, and then…. inspiration. He quickly found a sheet of tablet paper and scribbled a message. Folding the paper, he grabbed the potholder near the woodstove, opened the door and threw it into the blazing fire. Closing the door with a bang he said “There! It will go up the chimney in smoke and the wind will carry it to Santa in time.” Score one for John’s imagination….
Daddy was due to arrive the day of our Christmas program. While John and I were at the last rehearsal for the program, Mother asked Leslie Shaw to come over and help her start the car for the drive to Park Rapids to meet his train. Miss Eula decided to let us out early to allow plenty of time for everyone to eat and get dressed up for the seven o’clock production. When we got home Daddy was there to greet us.
Despite her sore fingers, Mother had finished my new dress of rust colored jersey, so I could wear it to the program. Our trusty Model-T didn’t have a heater, but it protected us from the wind and was certainly faster than walking. John and I sat in back, with the cowhide robe tucked around us, while Mother had a wool blanket over her lap in the front seat. When we arrived, the normally empty schoolyard was filled with horse-drawn sleighs. The animals’ steamy breath billowed in the cold, shining bright white in the Ford’s headlights. We found a place to park, and Daddy draped the cowhide robe over the hood of the car to prevent the engine water from freezing while we were inside.
The room blazed with the warm light of gas mantle lamps brought by some of the parents. Mothers and children shared the desks, which had been turned to face an area in back that served as our stage, next to the decorated tree. The men stood against the wall. Usually in overalls, they were hardly recognizable in their dress suits.
Miss Eula was the star of the evening; it was her finest hour. She was fully in command, and with their parents present, all children were on their best behavior. The evening’s program of recited poems and a capella Christmas songs went beautifully. We had each drawn the name of another child for a gift exchange, and once these presents were distributed and opened, Miss Eula gave each of us her gift — a pencil and tablet.
Then Henry Vokes, the president of the school board, rose to take charge. It was apparent from his demeanor that he considered himself host of the festivities. He passed out small brightly colored boxes, each with a red or green ribbon handle, to all the pupils — and also to their little brothers and sisters. They were filled with the most amazing Christmas hard candy….
Some were shaped like chunks of log, with green on the outside and creamy white centers. A tiny picture of a Christmas tree or bell went straight through from one end to the other; we could never figure out how they made those. Ribbon-like strips of hard candy, bent in loopy curves, were hard to eat except by sucking at one end. There were pillows, striped or plain, some with centers of peanut butter or soft red raspberry. As we all emerged from the building, calling out thank-you’s and good-bye’s, we could smell the candy breath of melting cinnamon, anise, and peppermint flavors in the cold night air.
By Christmas Eve, we had festooned our tree with the ornaments John and I made. With meticulous care, Daddy supervised placement of the candles on the tree, making sure they were not too close to any branches or paper decorations. As an additional precaution, he set a full pail of water out of sight but close to the tree.
After supper he lit the candles. At first I was surprised and disappointed to see they all burned yellow. Since the candle wax was different colors like electric tree lights, I expected the flames to burn in colors as well. But as I watched their flickering light in the darkened room, the tree seemed to come alive. Then, framed by yellow curtains, the candlelight danced on frosty windows, filling the room with Christmas trees reflecting from every pane of glass. I was mesmerized….
We went through our annual ritual of selecting stockings to hang for Santa — the bigger the better of course. It never occurred to us that we would receive the same contents, regardless of the size of the stocking. Daddy helped us secure a string at the top of our stocking so we could hang it.
As we sat by the woodstove and admired our tree, Daddy began reminiscing about his favorite boyhood holiday tradition — spinning the top. His father, David Linsley, received the top for Christmas back in 1868, when he was only six years old. It was his only present that year. The brass top is tarnished and dented with age, mounted in a wire frame with a wood handle. David found the toy so captivating that he treasured it throughout the years, and observed each anniversary by spinning it on Christmas Eve. Grandpa David would be marking the sixty-fourth year in West Concord that night…
The top would remain a meaningful part of our family Christmas celebrations for generations….
We finally got ready for bed after the long day. When Daddy was there, our parents had the bedroom to themselves, so John and I slept in the front room. With his cot and my mattress on the floor, it was obviously not the most convenient arrangement for Santa to make deliveries. And Santa also had to wait until our young little minds — spinning like tops, with holiday thoughts — were finally overcome by sleep….
At dawn, the curious bulges in our stockings told us that Santa had made his rounds. Perhaps to most kids, the few little gifts we received would have seemed modest indeed. But wrapped in bright tissue paper, covered with seals, and hidden deep in our stockings, they were treasures. We tried to guess the contents of each package as we pulled them out. We had card games of Old Maid and Rummy, new pencils, a set of beads for me, a coin purse for John, chocolate crèmes, candy canes, and the traditional oranges buried deep in the stretched-out toes of our socks. Carefully laying these on our beds, we opened other packages; the four of us took turns, each person opening one gift at a time, so that we made the anticipation last. We gave full attention and appreciation for each present and its beautiful wrapping. I got Louisa May Alcott’s Rose in Bloom, some dress material and ribbon for Betty June, and an outfit that Mother had knit for her — I couldn’t stop smiling and looking over my bounty.
But no one was happier than John when he finally found his ax, its sharp blade gleaming from behind the tree. His letter-by-fire had worked, and he had tangible proof. He also got Robert Lewis Stevenson’s The Black Arrow.
We were startled later in the day by a loud rapping on the door. No one had ever knocked before; we always heard visitor’s cars pull in, and met people in the yard. Daddy opened the door, and found himself looking at a gray-bearded man with a blanket roll slung over his shoulder. The stranger offered to shake hands in greeting, and asked if he could come in and have a glass of water. Daddy handed him the broom to brush the snow from his boots and motioned him inside, and he happily entered the front room to sit and warm up.
He told us he was “on the road” with no particular destination, and was willing to split and carry wood, or do other chores, in return for a hot meal and a spot to bed down in a barn for the night. We had neither a barn nor chores, but Mother put together some food for him, including some of her home made bread and Christmas cookies, which he ate like a ravenous child. After about an hour of casual conversation he left, saying he had more distance to travel before nightfall. Perhaps he stopped next at Jensens. We never found out his name, but he gave us the opportunity to express the spirit of Christmas, and to feel gratitude for our humble bounty….
My father’s December visit was the closest thing to a vacation we had since the move. The only pressing work was splitting up the wood Jensons had delivered and stacking it in the shed, to allow space for the ten loads Leslie Shaw was cutting. Daddy and John worked together, each one at his own chopping block. Mother and I could hear them, John’s new ax making the sharp pinging sounds as he happily split kindling, while Daddy generated deep thumps as he split the big chunks.
Using a long handled single-bit ax, he swung as hard as he could at the center of the log, so the blade was buried deeply enough to stick firmly. Then, raising the ax and wood to nearly shoulder height, he would deftly twist the two on the down-stroke, and when the heel of the ax landed, the momentum of the wood drove the blade deeper. A few repetitions of this maneuver was sufficient to split the wood in two.
When the day’s work was finished, the four of us sometimes played Rummy or Old Maid, or John and I read from our new books while our parents chatted in the front room. We all walked down to Jensens for the milk, and on warmer days we hiked in the woods. All of these activities were a welcome respite for Daddy — who enjoyed them more than anyone. He looked forward to living this dream life all year instead of just for occasional visits. Allowing the fire in our woodstove to go out during the night was not his style, so he took on the job of keeping the home fires burning. With Shaws delivering more logs soon, we weren’t concerned about using extra wood to stay warm.
It was a welcome luxury for Daddy to live a normal schedule, eat Mother’s home-cooked meals, fresh baked bread, and the fudge and popcorn we made in the evenings. He saw for himself how we spent our days, how happy John and I were, and he could spend hours talking with Mother about getting through the winter, and plans for the future. As his visit with us came to a close, it seemed like our days together had raced by. As soon as we became aware of time, we found ourselves clinging to each moment, desperately trying to make it last. We knew he could not come up as frequently, and we didn’t know when we would see him again.
A winter storm was forecast the day he left, and we passed several stretches of snow-drifted road on our way into Park Rapids. At the train station, saying goodbye was especially hard… Once inside, Daddy waved from the high coach window; we reached out our arms trying to hold him back. But his window slipped from view as the train pulled away in a cloud of steam, the loud bell clanging. We tightened our scarves and headed for the car as the menacing wind picked up velocity.
It was the hill just after the Dorset turnoff that we were dreading the most. There was a farm at the top, and Daddy suggested that we stop there on the way back and ask one of the men to drive us past the biggest drifts on the road. When mother turned in the driveway, an old man came out who spoke with a strong and unfamiliar accent. He seemed to know enough English — and impromptu sign language — to understand what she was saying, and went to get his son.
Mother moved over to the passenger side, while the confident young man took control. His foot hit the low gear pedal as his hand deftly slid the gas lever down. The car jumped ahead in response. He drove through the yard and into the cornfield running parallel to the road — an area that had been swept bare by the same wind that piled snow on the road. Choosing just the right speed and direction needed, he plowed through a final drift before pulling back onto the road.
Mother offered to pay him, but he grinned and refused to take anything, saying he had nothing better to do. We could tell he rather enjoyed rescuing us. Mother took over the wheel, as he faced the blustery winds for his long uphill walk toward home. We learned later that their family was from Finland, and folks in the area referred to them as “the Finlanders”. It was not the last time these friendly people came to our aid.
The wind had already filled in the ruts we had made driving into town, and Mother found she had to keep the car in low gear most of the time. Before we were halfway home, the overtaxed engine was spewing steam, forcing us to stop and allow it to cool off. We would have enjoyed having some of that superfluous engine heat inside the car — but the rest of the trip home was trouble free.
By the time we finally pulled into our yard in the middle of the afternoon, the storm had developed into a full scale blizzard. There was still fire in the wood stove, but getting warm and eating cookies had to wait until we had drained the water from the engine, removed the battery, jacked up the rear wheel, and covered the car with a tarp….