Story & Photos by
Beth Christian Broschart
THOMAS – With age comes wisdom and the memories of times from the past.
Four Tucker County residents who now make their home at Cortland Acres shared their recollections of growing up and of the Christmas Holidays from years in the past.
Rinda Bonner, who is 80 years young, said she grew up near Red Creek. She said Christmas when she was growing up was always wonderful.
“We got presents and we had a Christmas program at our school,” Bonner said. “We went to church.”
Bonner graduated from Harman School when she was just 16-years-old. “I was the youngest in the class,” she said. “After that she got married in 1955 in Oakland, Maryland.”
One thing she said she enjoyed doing as a child was decorating the Christmas tree.
“We went out and chopped down the tree,” she said. “All of our ornaments were store-bought. One present I remember well was when I received a pretty doll when I was about 8-years-old.”
She said the Christmas holidays have changed over the years.
“People just don’t do the things we did long ago anymore,” Bonner said. “We sang lots of Christmas Carols and we baked cookies as a family. We always had a good dinner.”
“We used to go out and sled ride. We went down a hill. I always felt happy during the holidays. At midnight on New Year’s Day, they would go out and shoot their guns in the air,” Bonner said.
Bonner’s roommate is Helen Newbrough, who grew up in Parsons.
“I went to Parsons High School and got my GED when I was 50,” Newbrough said. “I went to work early to help my mother. My father had passed away and we still had a boy in school – Bill Rosenau.”
Newbrough said so many things have changed over the years. She said her most precious memory of Christmas is her mother and father, along with her siblings, decorating their Christmas trees.
“There were eight of us kids, and that was a big family. We popped popcorn and strung it to wind around the tree. Then we strung cranberries and made homemade decorations to put on the tree,” Newbrough said. “My mother was especially good at making ornaments from corn shucks.”
“I don’t know how she did it, though. When you are young, you don’t pay attention. She always made us dolls for Christmas and sewed our clothes from feed sacks,” Newbrough said.
“All of my clothes used to be made from feed sacks. They were well-made and were very nicer than you can buy now,” she said.
Newbrough said at her church, families would visit with one another during the holidays.
“Christmas was a very special time,” she said. “We didn’t have a turkey all of the time because you had meat your raised. Mom would have a chicken or something she would roast with homemade dressing and dumplings. We would get together and talk and have a good time. People are not thankful enough anymore for all they have.”
Newbrough said that her family was ‘as poor as church mice’ but said they loved one another.
“That should be what this country is about today instead of being me, me, me and it being about the biggest present you can get,” Newbrough said. “The gifts are not anything. If you don’t have the love that goes with them, you have nothing.”
She said back in the day, her family did not have fancy socks to hang by the chimney with care.
“We used our old dirty socks,” Newbrough said. “We hung up what we had and were thankful we had them. We would get a piece of fruit, maybe an orange and an apple and three or four pieces of candy. We really enjoyed one another.”
Bohon and Newbrough have been roommates for about a year and said they really enjoy one another’s companionship.
Junior Myers, who is 92 years old, grew up in St. George and graduated from a little country school in the 1920s and 1930s. He said when he was growing up, Christmas was very different.
“I don’t like turkey. We always had chicken for Christmas dinner. We had all kind of pastries and huge popcorn balls with caramel on them,” Myers said.
Myers said his mother was a very good cook. “She could make anything,” he said.
He said his family used to go out and cut down their fresh Christmas tree and said they had one in their front yard they used to decorate, too.
“We decorated the tree with bulbs because we didn’t have electric back then,” he said. “We occasionally would light the Christmas tree with candles.”
Presents usually were articles of clothing made by his mother.
“She was a good seamstress. She would make us pants and shirts and everything,” Myers said. “I had seven brothers and two sisters. There were 10 of us kids. We had enough for a ball team. We would play baseball quite a bit for fun.”
“One year I got a new pair of shoes, and on the side of the shoe there was a place to carry my knife,” Myers said.
Myers said he feels Christmas is too commercial these days.
“Back then it was more about family and staying in your means. Today people go in debt for Christmas presents,” he said. “One thing I can think of was when I got an old car for Christmas. It was a Model A Ford. It had a little four cylinder mother and came with a mother-in-law seat.”
During the New Year’s holiday, Myers said they lived on a farm and they raised lots of things.
“We had our own pork and on New Year’s we treated ourselves,” Myers said. “It was different and it tasted good with the sauerkraut we made.”
Vincent DiBacco, who is 95-years-old and proud of it, grew up in Thomas. He said he remembers Christmas in the past was full of suspense.
“A nickel meant something back then,” DiBacco said. “We used to go to midnight mass and would come home and spend time together doing things like roasting chestnuts. It was lots of fun.”
DiBacco said they didn’t have much – their pants had patches – but said they enjoyed being together and spending time together.
“Our Christmas meal was mostly pasta because it was inexpensive,” DiBacco said. “That was our main meal.”
DiBacco said he was very young when his mother died.
“I remember the very first Christmas without her,” he said. “It was a very traumatic holiday for me that first year without her.
He said for New Year’s Eve, they shot off guns and made a lot of noise.
