Celebration of Her Life
By
Gerry Niskern
I lost my sister Wednesday morning. She was 94.
When she graduated from Phoenix Union High School she wanted to follow her passion and go to Cosmetology School. When dad said he would pay for her to go to ASU and become a teacher but “certainly not Beauty school”, she asserted her stubborn, independent spirit. She went to work and saved for the Cosmetology School tuition.
As a younger sister I witnessed that spirit lots of times. I remember my mother telling her, “Take care of your sister, or take your sister with you”. She hated that! I remember when she was called into the first grade room to sit with me at lunch time because I was so homesick I couldn’t eat. “Please, take a bite. The team is waiting for me. I’m their pitcher.” she pleaded. I would take a bite, a crying spasm would hit, and food (that she had to clean up) flew everywhere! That went on for a couple of weeks and needless to say, she was not happy with her little sister.
Another occasion that’s a vivid memory is when my parents said she had to take me along on her first date. She was furious. It was a rainy night and the young man arrived with a large umbrella. They walked under it and I trudged behind. She turned from time to time and hissed “Stay back there”. Funny thing was I was around nine or ten and , I understood. I didn’t think I should go on her first date either!
When she started her Cosmetology career, her first position was with Goldwater’s prestigious Antione Salon, but was soon invited back to become an instructor at the School. She continued to work as an instructor while running her own Salon in later years. She was always active in the Arizona Cosmetology Society and advocated for more rigid and professional requirements to be licensed as a stylist in Arizona. She became a member of the state Cosmetology board and was hired to visit and certify new schools ready to open.
She joined the National Cosmetology Association and as a talented stylist she traveled giving demonstrations at their conferences. She was invited to be part of a goodwill delegation sponsored by the U.S. government to travel to the Soviet Union and several European countries to promote U. S. techniques. She talked about being in a Moscow hotel years ago and being awakened by the building shaking. Huge military tanks were rolling down the street and the coup that broke up the Soviet Union was beginning.
As proud as my sister was of her career and accomplishments, she was even more proud of her family and her role as a mother and grandmother. She loved her three children, Mike, Pat and Eva, her grandchildren, Candace, Kurtis, Kendra, Kayla, Amber, Aurora, Kyle and Brandon and her great-grandchildren, Ethan, Eric, Evan, Tyler, Emily, Stella, Shea, Baztian, Justin, and Christian. She managed to take some of the first grandchildren along, for one on one time, on her demonstration trips.
Ileane Eileen Craig Murtey loved her family immeasurably

Backing up a Bit”
By
Gerry Niskern
A while ago I wrote about my first home in Arizona, titled “Historical Tranquility”. A lot of you enjoyed it but I realized that I should have started with describing the first home that I remembered; my home in West Virginia.
The house actually came with a little farm that my folks rented. My dad worked “down in town”, in the Ohio River Valley. At that time (before Ralph Nadar!) the valley was full of coal mines, steel mills and other manufacturing. We moved out into the “country”, up a steep mountain road into clean, fresh air when I was around two.
The home was built on a hillside with the front porch facing Rural Route # 1 and the basement facing the rest of the farm. On the path from the garage we entered the basement where I remember having lots of fun over the years. The floor was covered with linoleum where we were allowed to roller skate. There was a trunk left behind full of clothes for hours of make believe and in the spring we were enthralled watching over the chicks pecking their way out of their shell in the incubator. There was an adjoining “fruit cellar which my mother kept full of jars of fruit and vegetables she canned on a big wood cookstove in that basement. I remember how hot she was working, but I think she didn’t want to run up the electric bill using the new stove upstairs.
Going up the stairs you entered the kitchen where we always ate at little maple table with flowers painted on the backs. My mother had a brand new electric stove that was her pride and joy. It had a deep well feature that actually was an early version of the crock pots used now days. The aroma of her chicken and noodles cooking is still with me; also suppers of entirely corn on the cob from her garden. The best rhubarb pies came out of that electric oven, thanks to a large patch of rhubarb that came up every year.
On into the dining room, which we never used, into the living room. The living room had a fireplace with a hollow wooden mantle. One time a mouse was trapped in the mantle for some reason and it took a while for the horrible smell to go away. Down the hall was two bedrooms and a bath.
I didn’t spend much time except for sleeping in our bedroom because there was so much to do outside. Although my dad worked in town, my mom was a farmer at heart and she did her best to run the little farm. She put in a huge garden and there were many fruit trees and a large berry patch to tend to. I guess you could say our play was sometimes work, but work was always play too. I remember spending lots of time climbing in the apple trees with our dolls playing make believe games. Sometimes we were allowed to drop down thru a nearby meadow to the creek and spend countless hours playing in the water.
But I also recall spending hours in the sun picking the raspberries and strawberries. We built our own little stand out front along the highway out of bricks and some wood boards. We were allowed to keep the money we earned at our fruit stand and every evening my sister and I took our precious earnings down the road to the gas station and bought candy bars. The orange wicker furniture and swing on the big front porch held a tired but contented family munching on Clark Bars. We also picked the grapes from the grape arbor and rode with dad into town to sell them in peck baskets door to door.
That front porch had two huge pine trees on either side of the steps and in my memory we always had to be careful if we went out that way to the mailbox because my mom’s White Leghorn roosters hung out around those trees and they were mean. They had sharp spurs on their legs and they didn’t mind chasing us and using them. I never felt sorry when one of them ended up in mom’s slow cooker!
One fond memory of that house was an Easter morning when we were told to go out and look in our Collie dog’s doghouse. (dogs weren’t pampered in those days). We found ten plump little puppies born that snowy morning. Our dog was pure bred Collie and a friend of my dad’s had brought his beautiful male Collie to visit our dog weeks earlier. Not being as sophisticated as kids are today, we were totally surprised by these adorable puppies. Some were sold, and the most handsome one was stolen. No matter how much we begged we were no allowed to keep any.
I learned many things in that little farm home in those West Virginia hills. How to be responsible for some housework while mom was working outside, and how to work in the sun sometimes too. Salesmanship, handling money, caring for tiny chicks and puppies, were just a few of the skills I learned in the first house in my memory; the first “Historic Tranquility” place in my heart.

Basket Full of Easter
By
Gerry Niskern
Easter is next week and everyone will be recording the events with their cell phones; memories saved for anytime they want them.
I have a basket full of memories of Easter as a kid, but most weren’t recorded in photos because cameras and film development was too expensive. My mother started a roll at Christmas, took a little at Easter and maybe finished it to be dropped at the drugstore after a birthday party. So, special memories you just kept in your head and close to your heart.
When I was just past two my uncle had a Candy Store. He sold chances to win a large stuffed rabbit at Easter time. I don’t know if it was just a coincidence, but my mom won that rabbit for me. It was taller than I was. Mr. Rabbit stood upright with orange and green stripped trousers, a green tuxedo coat and very long ears. The rabbit got dirty very quickly in that little coal mining town with me playing with him all the time. One day I looked up and saw him hanging on the clothes line by his ears. Mom had washed him! I was heartbroken because I thought she was hurting him and she couldn’t convince me otherwise.
My dad had serious surgery that year and everyone who came to visit brought him one of those big decorated chocolate covered Easter eggs. Mom always said that every time they went to have one they found a tiny tooth mark where a bite had been taken out of each end of every one! I don’t recall that memory.
Up until I was nine I had to wear brown hi top corrective shoes. I hated those shoes. One Easter memory that I fondly remember is when my dad said, “Hey, while we are waiting for everyone to get ready for church lets play a game of checkers. Get the board.” I reached up high on the mantle and resting on top of the board was a pair of brown and white low cut saddle shoes, for me! First pair of low cut shoes like everyone else was wearing and that made my Easter!
When my kids were growing up their grandma and grandpa colored dozens of eggs and left early to hide them out in the Carefree area among the boulders. When the kids and their cousins arrived there was a wild Easter Egg hunt. Everyone was fine until they noticed Grandma taking the youngest toddler that year and showing him where the eggs were. “ No fair,” they always complained. “Grandma is showing him where the eggs are”. Of course she was. She was the Grandma!
So, do you have any memories in your Easter basket that are not recorded in photos and are yours and yours alone?

Historical Tranquility
by
Gerry Niskern
There was an interesting article in Wednesday’s Arizona Republic by Tirion Morris. It seems an old home, in the Roosevelt district, built in the early l900’s was recently purchased and turned into a Cocktail Bar. The neighborhood wanted to preserve the house and so did the new business owner.
The family that had lived in the old home for over forty years were thrilled to hold a reunion there when the bar was finished. How great was that? Wouldn’t it be fantastic to revisit your childhood home.
The house I lived in at l729 West Madison is gone, but not forgotten. I remember the night my mom and dad bought it. It was the summer of l942 and we had just arrived in Phoenix. Houses were so scarce during the war that there were several families waiting out on the sidewalk hoping to buy it if my folks didn’t.
This three bedroom, one bath was the first home my parents had ever owned. I remember climbing the wide front steps to a spacious front porch. There was a porch swing (handy for courting later on). The floor inside was beautiful hardwood. On cold nights you could stand on the big floor register from the furnace in the middle of the room to get warm. The fireplace was a great place to pop popcorn over the coals.
Next came the dining room where we always had supper. It had a built-in china cupboard for my mom’s glassware. Then thru a swinging door to the kitchen where the drain boards were made of soapstone; very scratchy.
My sister and I reveled in the fact that we would each have our own room for the very first time. My floor was stained dark walnut, I was allowed to paint scenes on the walls and a large area rug made from luxurious Llama furs adorned my floor. (my uncle in the U. S. Navy had sent it to me from Peru.)
But our joy was short lived. The government asked all families to help the war effort by renting a room to a service man’s wife. Since there were four air bases in the valley training fighter pilots at that time, there were lots of wives!
My parents gave up their room since it had an outside entrance. They took my precious bedroom and I was sent to share my sister’s room. (She never forgave me) It’s strange, but I don’t remember us all sharing the one bathroom being a problem.
There were many nice older homes all around the state capitol at that time and it’s too bad everything changed. The State of Arizona bought up the whole block to build a new Highway Department building.
I lived in that wonderful sanctuary from age ten to eighteen and even though it has been gone for many years it will always live in my memory.