Coming of Age In Limestone

The eruption of war in Europe in 1914 did not immediately impact Frank Larson’s family. As his children matured he introduced them to the family grocery business. By 1910, most of Frank’s children were either in their teens or had reached young adulthood. The census of that year shows all of the children still living in Frank’s house except for Jane, who had married and moved to Bradford.

Despite the stiff competition of numerous general stores in town, Frank seems to have found financial success, and apparently he had the reputation of driving a hard bargain and perhaps even cutting ethical corners here and there. (I hate to desecrate the revered Larson name, yet I am compelled to tell the story even with the warts and skeletons that appear along the way.) In a self-published and researched account of the history of Limestone, which includes first person memories of life back in the early 1900’s, I found this:

Pape’s Garage was once Frank Larson’s General Store. Larson was a very affluent man. He used to say that the way he made his money was that he took enough flour out of five barrels of flour to make a sixth barrel and sold it all to his Swede buddies and was able to get away with it.

Oh, Frank, say it isn’t so!!! A few pages later there is this memory from someone else:

Then there was Larson’s grocery. They had cheese and milk, etc. He’d give you a little raw deal whenever he could.

Arrrggghhh!! And yet, he served on the school board, was village president and mayor for several terms, attended church regularly, and raised a large, close-knit, family with strong values. So we can forgive some minor transgressions…!??? But he (or someone in the family) did redeem the family’s reputation somewhat, for in the same historical account of Limestone is this fond memory:

On Saturday nights Jessie Carlson, my friend, would go down to Larson’s to pay up their week’s bill for groceries. They kept the bills written down in little books with the people’s name on them and when she paid the bill they always gave her pieces of candy. Several of us girls would go with her to get the candy, too. We would get back home by eight or nine o’clock and we thought we had had a wonderful time, but we never got beyond Casey’s.

This last memory, giving candy away to children, sounds just like something my grandfather Fred would have done. Good customer relations, right? The reference to Casey’s will be relevant in an upcoming article.

When Florence graduated from high school in 1911, Frank was back in Sweden visiting his mother, who was now 81. This was two trips to Sweden in less than ten years for Frank, another sign that he was indeed fairly affluent. I’m sure Anna Stina was very glad to see her son and spend some precious time with him near the end of her life. She would die in Redslared Parish five years later, in 1916 at age 86. Although Frank couldn’t be at Flo’s graduation ceremony, he did return from his trip with a gift of a silver jewelry box for her.

In 1912 Frank sent Flo to Bakersfield, California, where Jane’s family was now located. Jane was sick and Flo was sent to help care for her and their four-year-old child LaMar. Apparently Flo was there a couple of years because she worked several different jobs while in Bakersfield. She was back home in Limestone and working at the store by 1915.

Also sometime around 1915 Walter left Limestone to join his sister Jane and her husband Bob to seek his fortune in the California hills a bit north of Bakersfield near White River. Walter and Bob went prospecting for gold while Jane and Flo LaMar, who was seven years old by then, maintained the campsite which served as their base of operations.

The War Years

From all accounts everyone served honorably, and all were fortunate enough to make it home to their families. That said, it is impossible to tell what kind of physical and emotional toll this war took on their young lives. One of the hallmarks of World War I was the stagnation of a long trench-warfare campaign, and it is well-known as one of the most traumatic experiences of that era for the young men who were on the fighting lines. There were signs that at least two of Frank’s sons had some trouble adjusting after their return home, despite their best efforts to lead normal and productive lives. Both Walter and Alex would at some point begin turning to alcohol to soothe whatever demons were lurking inside them. We have no way of knowing for sure whether or to what extent their war experiences contributed to these choices, but once they headed down that path, for them there was no turning back. More to come on those two as the stories that are directly relevant to the 1938 trip to Alabama and San Francisco unfold.

Love and Marriage

The Siblings

By 1920, Fred, Alex, Walter, Raymond and Helen would all be married. They were also beginning to spread out to other parts of the country: Alex joined his sister in California and got married in San Francisco in 1918. Walter married a girl and moved to Mobile, Alabama in 1919.

Ray stayed closer to home, marrying in 1914 and eventually settling in Oil City, Pennsylvania. Helen got married in 1919 but she would be divorced by 1928. The records are suggestive of a possible elopement to this first husband, as there appears to be a record of marriage at Fort Erie, Ontario, in 1919 and a second wedding to the same person in Limestone a few months later in 2020. (pure speculation on my part as I imagined a reason there might have been a wedding in Canada and another one in Limestone). In any case the two ceremonies were not enough to save the marriage, and she later met and married Wendell Hayes and moved to the Cleveland, Ohio, area for a number of years. Sadly, Helen would eventually divorce Wendell as well.

Fred and Josie Lucille

My grandfather Fred married Josie Lucille Willis in 1914. The story we all knew growing up was that Fred had his eye on Josie from a very early age, but he was eight years her senior so he had to wait until she turned 18 before they could marry. She was a Limestone girl so they would have known each other as children. Josie’s mother, Loretta, was part of a large family that had been in Limestone for several generations by the time Josie was born. Josie's father, Daniel Willis, grew up on a farm in the area. He married Loretta Fisk and they had three children. Josie was the youngest.

Official pension records indicate that Spaul Brown was already receiving disability payments when he proposed to Loretta. This fact left me wondering whether this was a marriage of convenience for both of them. Spaul, who was twenty years Loretta’s senior, ensured her financial stability by marrying her before his own death, and Loretta would have been there to care for him during his declining health. Josie, who was 10 years old when he died, always remembered him with fondness.

Loretta, who lived in Limestone most of her life, was quite involved in town affairs and, like Frank, was a founding member of the Free Methodist church. Spaul was also very involved in the town’s governance, serving on different councils and committees through the years, just like Frank did. These facts suggest that Josie’s family and Frank’s would have crossed paths regularly.

I can imagine the flirting and conversations that must have taken place when Josie was a blossoming teen and Fred was an ambitious young man working in his father’s store. He made no secret of the fact that he appreciated beautiful young women and I’m sure he would have made no secret of his intention to marry Josie at the earliest opportunity.

Knowing my grandmother as I did, I’m not surprised that he “chose” her from among all the other eligible young women in town, and knowing what I know about Fred, I’m not surprised that she fell in love with him. She probably enjoyed the years-long courtship that went on while he waited for her to finish school. Josie was a fun, social, personable, family-oriented grandmother who loved her children and grandchildren. I’m quite certain she had the same upbeat, loving, caring traits back when Fred was courting her and I have no doubt that a sociable, gregarious, up-and-coming businessman like Fred would have noticed her. I can understand why she would be attracted to his bigger-than-life confidence, curiosity, and love of people and life itself.

Next Steps

I appreciate those of you who are sticking with me as I continue to sort through mountains of family and historical material and try to find the breadcrumbs that are the most compelling to me to expand on in this blog. My next article will move into the Roaring Twenties and Prohibition, which had a pretty big impact on little Limestone. From there we head into the 1930’s, where several significant events occurred that I believe led directly to the trip to California in 1938. You will also get to meet the five travelers from 1938 and know a little more about each of them. You already know Frank and now a little more about Fred and Josie, but there were two others on the trip as well.

In the meantime, I am also planning my own trip to replicate the one in 1938. I leave October 1, and will be travelling for two months. Along the way I will be chronicling the trip on this blog as I weave my own story into the historical one I am retracing. What was it like for them to go on that trip? What will it be like to experience their trip through my eyes? I don’t know how it’s all going to unfold, or what other experiences (theirs and mine) I will end up writing about, but stay tuned if you want to find out!

Resources

Some of the information in this article came from the following sources:

• Buffalo Evening News. (September 28, 1917 edition). Limestone residents honor conscripts.

• Park, Martha Wilson. (1991). (Untitled). Self-published history of Limestone. Held at Cattaraugus County Historical Museum and Research Library.