The Legend of Great Uncle Charlie

(From the Janesville Messenger, 10-5-2014)

            In downtown Janesville, at a place they called the Corn Exchange, sits a monument dedicated to the local men that served in the First World War. A soldier at the top wears a bowl-like doughboy helmet and stands among twisted barbed wire, rifle in one hand, grenade in the other. All four sides of the monument's base list the names of the fighting men whose lives were changed forever by America's entry into the great conflict. On the north side, you'll find the name of Charles A. Lyke, my grandfather's brother. An asterisk next to his name indicates that he was a “casualty,” killed in service to his country.

            And that is where The Legend of Great Uncle Charlie begins.

            People liked Charlie. His obituary states that he was “well known in this city,” “naturally of a jolly disposition” and “made many friends wherever he went.” It's clear from their mail correspondence that my grandfather and Charlie were fond of each other. “Charles” was chosen as my father's middle name when he was born five years after Charlie's death.

            Charlie died four days shy of his 24^th birthday, and two weeks past his first wedding anniversary. Six months after his marriage, he arrived in France. It was the tail end of the war, but the fighting was still intense. According to newspaper reports, “he saw action in several of the biggest battles,” including Chateau Thierry, St. Mihiel and Soissons. “He went through the hardest fighting of the war,” the article claims, “without receiving a scratch.”

            The armistice was signed in November, and Charlie's regiment became a unit of the Army of Occupation. Apparently, post-war France wasn't a bad gig. In a postcard to my grandfather, he described it as a great time and characterized the French women as “friendly.” Charlie also said that he believed he would be coming home soon.

            By the time that postcard reached my grandfather, Charlie was dead. He died in Germany, and was indeed traveling via rail for his return trip to the United States. The articles and obituaries all state that he was killed instantly in a train accident. “No details of the accident were received,” said one news story. “No information relative to the nature of the accident was given,” reported another.

            My grandfather claimed to know the details, and told them to my father.

            The story, as I remember it being told, was that Charlie was drunk and passed out on the tracks when he was hit by the train. We don't know how my grandfather came by this information.     

So that interesting bit of family lore is being passed on to my kids. And that is how family legends survive and evolve. Another generation or two down the line, the story might get more interesting.

            In a strange coda to this story, Charlie's widow also suffered a violent death 20 years later when her house on Cherry Street exploded. Authorities found that the house was “full of gas” and that the stove was turned on full blast at the time of the explosion. Though the news article refused to call the death a suicide, the reporting certainly inferred that. A close friend was quoted as saying she seemed “depressed,” and a gas man stated that he had inspected the gas lines and found nothing wrong. “Whether she was asphyxiated by illuminating gas or by the force of the explosion could not be definitely determined,” according to the coroner.

            Viewing the war monument downtown, I used to ponder whether Charlie deserved the special designation next to his name that implies he died in battle. I'm convinced now that he did. He served his country half a world away and lived through things you and I will hopefully never see. His inglorious end doesn't change that.

            As Victor Hugo once said, “History has its truth, and so has legend.” Rest well, Great Uncle Charlie.

           

I Was A Mail Order Homeowner

When I was a kid, the postman's arrival could be a big deal.

I had mailed off my three cereal box tops or twenty Bazooka bubble gum wrappers to get that special toy, and then the waiting game began.

For days, neither of my parents had to walk down the long driveway to pick up the mail, because as soon as a delivery was made, I ran to that box like a greyhound after a rabbit. If anyone in the family was watching, they knew from my body language whether my package had arrived. They either witnessed an immediate slumping of shoulders, or an excited dash back toward the house.

If a child can get that excited over the delivery of a cheap toy, I can only imagine Roy Sizer's reaction 84 years ago when a train pulled into the Milton depot with his mail order purchase.

A house.

Mr. Sizer, the previous owner of my property, ordered the dwelling in which I now reside from the pages of a catalog. We know this from wood pieces cut out of our dining room wall during remodeling. The wall boards are stamped with the equivalent of a shipping address, “From Montgomery Ward & Co., Davenport, Ia. to Roy L. Sizer, Milton, Wisconsin.” Other pieces were stamped with descriptions and part numbers for easy assembly.

This discovery sent me on a flurry of research. Kit houses or as Ward called them, “ready-cut houses,” were not uncommon. According to the book, “Houses By Mail,” over 100,000 were built in the United States between 1908 and 1940, the majority from Sears. Montgomery Ward's share, under their brand name Wardway Homes, was approximately 25,000.

So while our house is unusual, it's certainly not rare. A major selling point was the price. According to historians, Montgomery Ward advertising promised that the typical homebuyer would save about one-third the cost compared to traditional construction. And it was obvious that Mr. Sizer was cost-conscious from the first time we entered this house. Touring the basement, it was pointed out that the floor boards had been used for framing the foundation.

Another plus for buyers was the convenience. You could place one order with Ward and get everything including the kitchen sink. From screens and shades to roofing, wiring and refrigerators, you could literally get every single thing you needed except masonry materials.

Though I have viewed several Wardway Homes catalogs online, I have yet to find our exact house, possibly because it was customized. One home that does bear a resemblance, particularly in floor plan, is a 1930 catalog model called “The Maywood” - a steal at $2295 or monthly payments of $45.

But it appears that the bargain price was still too much for Mr. Sizer's successors (he sold the home later in the 1930's). The property abstract lists Montgomery Ward & Company as the owner of the house for a brief period in 1940. That entry was always a head-scratcher, but the discovery of our home's origins solved the mystery.

You see, Ward not only sold you a complete house, but offered financing as well. I dug up the abstract and sure enough, this house had a Montgomery Ward mortgage, which was apparently assumed by later owners. The probable explanation for Ward's brief ownership is a foreclosure. Regardless, Ward didn't keep the house for long and may have rid themselves of it cheaply because the couple that bought it in 1940 paid cash.

Fifty-two years later, that couple's estate sold it to us. And though this old dwelling has its quirks and non-standard oddities, I am thankful that Mr. Sizer built, and later owners maintained, a solid house that my family calls home.

And I sometimes muse about two train cars full of building materials chugging into town, and how quickly a young boy might have run from the station to announce its arrival.

The 141 Acre Classroom

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 6-8-2014) 

People are often surprised when they find out that I grew up on a dairy farm. Apparently, I just don't seem the agricultural type.

And at times during my childhood, I certainly didn't want to be. A small family farm was a 24/7/365 proposition. Dairy cattle don't take vacations. And when you're a sole proprietor like my father, you can't afford to hire someone to do the milking and the chores for a week. My father's yearly vacation was generally a single day, when someone else milked the cows and he accompanied my uncles to Arlington Park to play the ponies.

We farmed 141 acres, and my adolescence included chores like hauling milk pails, stacking hay bales and shoveling feed. Like the dour farmer in Grant Wood's painting, I used a pitchfork...and once managed to spear my toe with it. And then there was manure, lots and lots of manure. We scraped it, shoveled it, spread it, walked through it, and sometimes wore it.

Of course, there was an aroma that accompanied said product, and that was one of the embarrassments of my youth. I still remember one night that I was out with friends after milking the cows, when they informed me that my hair reeked of barn odor. The horror...the horror.

Those were the things I focused on when I was young. What I didn't appreciate at the time, and didn't realize until years later, were the life lessons I was learning from my parents. In retrospect, they were more valuable than anything I picked up in a classroom.

One lesson was teamwork and dedication. Dad and Mom were a strong team. Dad ran the farm, and my mother was the ultimate farm wife and his full partner. He took care of the physical farm work as well as the business and accounting, and she took care of the meals, the kids and the house, as well as jobs like plucking and cleaning chickens and washing and sanitizing milking machines. When the kids had all left the nest, this woman who never had a driver's license learned to work a tractor so she could help in the fields. It was a beautiful relationship. She was the Oates to his Hall, even when they were haulin' oats.

We also learned about providing for your family through hard work and sacrifice. Dad toiled and labored every day, even when he was sick and hurting. Combing through his tax forms after he died, I was shocked at how little that work actually paid him. He had to be frugal, yet we never wanted for anything. And somehow, he saved and invested so wisely that my mother, widowed at 58, has not had to work a single day in the 29 years since his death.

Dad knew farming was tough, and he could see that the future of family farms was not bright. So he encouraged my brother and I to not follow in his footsteps, and we complied with his wishes. Thus, we are the first Lyke generation in at least two centuries – and possibly more – to not make our living providing food. If he had his own wish, it would have been a generation earlier. Dad wanted to go to college and study ag science. But despite being class valedictorian, a snafu with required high school courses cost him the college scholarship he had earned and desperately needed. He made sure that would not happen with his children; he saved and paid for our college education.

Our farming life is far, far back in the rear view mirror now, but I think about it often. I sometimes wish I could revisit those years and relive them with the wisdom of age. I would whine less, work more, ask a lot. And be much, much more grateful for the examples being set for me. 

It Runs In Your Genes

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 5-18-2014)

Had things gone differently in 1362, this column might have been written by Jim von Heinsberg.

I like to dabble in my family's history and genealogy. There is something fascinating about knowing what ultimately led to your existence. Thanks to the miracle of the Internet, this information now is much easier to find. Maybe web browsing lacks the romanticism of rummaging through courthouse files or graveyards – both of which I have done – but sites like Ancestry.com or a well-worded Google search can pan more gold with a fraction of the effort.

Recently, when I was searching for some background on my great-grandfather, I stumbled upon something totally unexpected – a photo of my father's tombstone on a website called FindAGrave.com. Most of my Rock County ancestors and relatives were cataloged as well, complete with family information. Do your own search and you might be surprised at what you find.

The Lyke family's presence in Rock County dates back to 1856. Prior to that, we were in New York for the better part of a century-and-a-half, in a part of the state settled by a large contingent of Germans from the Palatinate region.

When I was vacationing out east a few years ago, I made a side trip to New York to search the archives for data on my ancestors. What I found in the files was five different spellings of our last name. My great-great-grandfather, who is responsible for us being in Wisconsin, was most often listed as “John Like.”

The Lyke name has had a crazy history of revisions, from minor letter transpositions to major overhauls. All American roads seem to lead to Johannes Leick as the original Palatine emigrant around 1710. He was followed by several generations that included a John Lyke (the Anglicized version of Johannes' name).

But before Lyke and before Leick, there was Everhard von Lieck, who first showed up witnessing a document in 1362. According to the online entry, “his seal of 1380 shows the lion of Heinsberg...the same design that the brothers Lambert and Everhard von Heinsberg had. From this we can draw the conclusion that he was...the descendant and legal hier (sic) of Everhard who was fiefed with Oberlieck, meanwhile having laid down the name 'von Heinsberg' and named himself 'Lieck' after his residence.”

I like the sound of “von Lieck.” Had I known about that sooner, I might have even adopted it. It conjures up images of epaulets and swords. But wait...a coat of arms, too?

Score!

I found the Leick coat of arms, as well as the earlier Heinsberg, both with the same snazzy medieval lion. I am no longer Jim Lyke, ad salesman and part-time writer...I am armor-clad James von Leick, laying waste to castles. It is much more satisfying than finding out your ancestors were ax murderers or horse thieves. Or in the case of Albert Brooks in “Defending Your Life,” discovering your past life as a lion's lunch.

As soon as I got excited about my noble ancestry, however, I discovered that unlike most of Europe, in Germany you didn't need to be a member of the aristocracy to have a coat of arms. Any burgher could have one. Nein!

Genealogy research can also create questions rather than answer them.

On my mother's side, the story was that her Danish grandfather changed his name from Jacob Rasmussen to Rasmus Jacobson once he came to Wisconsin. Information I found now sheds doubt on that. Rasmus' father was named Jacob Pedersen. According to the Scandinavian naming traditions that were still in place at the time, Jacobson would have been his last name at birth. What we always regarded as fact is now a mystery.

Curious about what mysteries and stories lie in your past? The answers might be a click away. One thing I have concluded from my research: “Heinsbergminded” just doesn't have a ring to it.

The Ultimate Sport

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 4-27-2014)

I recently watched some colleges play the Ultimate sport. Literally.

"Ultimate" is now the official name for what my friends and I used to call "Frisbee football." Unlike my school days, however, Ultimate is a far cry from the fluid free-for-all we played that at times resembled Calvin and Hobbes’ Calvinball and once included an infamous tackle version played in the parking lot at Milwaukee County Stadium (ouch).

For the uninitiated, Ultimate -- or Ultimate Frisbee, if you prefer -- is played seven on a side on a field that has dimensions similar to that of football. Also like football, you score points by advancing the Frisbee (technically, a disc) into the opponent’s end zone. The football similarities end there, as there is no tackling or running with the disc.

You can only move the disc by passing it to a teammate -- once you have possession, you are limited to pivoting on one foot, like a basketball player who has picked up his dribble. If a pass is incomplete, intercepted or out of bounds, the other team immediately gains possession and moves in the opposite direction. On the college level, the game is generally played up to a certain number of points rather than timed.

It goes far beyond having organized rules, however. There are positions, there are different strategies on offense and defense, and similar to hockey, there are lines that take the field as a group on substitutions. One thing there is not, at least in most college tournaments, is a referee. The players self-officiate.

Ultimate has yet to become an NCAA-sanctioned sport, but it continues to grow on the college level. My son, Rob, is a member of the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point Ultimate team. But just because it’s not an NCAA sport doesn’t mean the team is limited to friendly get-togethers with nearby schools. The team has traveled to tournaments as far away as Georgia and Texas and played against the likes of TCU, Oklahoma, UMass and Kansas State, as well as several Big Ten schools.

As a club sport, the team has a budget that allows them to purchase jerseys and pay for transportation. Beyond that, however, cash is a bit tight. Charter buses and hotel rooms are not in the budget. So like a struggling rock band, the Ultimate players jam themselves into a van and crash wherever they can. When inclement weather recently forced the last-minute relocation of a tournament from Appleton to Fitchburg, one player’s Madison-area grandmother suddenly found herself hostess to 20 young men.

The college clubs generally choose team names separate from the school’s. For example, the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee team is not the Panthers; their name is Black Cat Ultimate. Northern Michigan eschews Wildcats for Riptide. And rather than Pointers, Stevens Point is Homegrown. The fact that Homegrown’s most recent tournament was held at Stoner Prairie Park in Fitchburg gave birth to more pot jokes than a Cheech and Chong album (e.g. "How’s the grass at Stoner Prairie?").

But the athletes are anything but dazed and confused. Ultimate is a sport that involves a LOT of movement. I get tired just watching them play. Conditioning is a must. The Stevens Point team has been known to train by running flights of stairs in campus buildings at night.

The recent Fitchburg tournament was the first one I personally had witnessed. As a spectator sport, it was much more entertaining than I imagined it would be. And apparently, I’m not the only one who thinks so. You see, Ultimate has gone professional. The American Ultimate Disc League (AUDL) fields 17 teams, including a franchise in Madison, the Radicals, who play at Breese Stevens Field. A second league, Major League Ultimate, fields four teams on each coast.

And I’m relatively sure none of them play on concrete prior to Brewers games.

Life lessons, learned in an instant

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 3-23-14)

It was one of those summer evenings years ago when the sun seems to stay up forever. One of those days when teenagers are out looking for something fun to do outside.

I was driving on a quiet country road after picking up a friend. Where we were going now is lost to memory, but this much is not. As I drove, I saw a small dog in the road ahead. It was in my lane, only a couple of feet from the ditch.

The idea seemed so good in my head. I was going to give my friend a momentary shock by pretending I was going to purposely flatten the dog. So I declared, "Two points!" and proceeded to temporarily point my ’71 Cutlass toward the dog.

Of course, I had no intention of actually running over someone’s pet. I figured the dog would quickly scoot off the right side of the road, and I would make a wide berth to the left to make sure I avoided it.

The previous paragraph should give you all the proof you need that teenagers’ brains aren’t always wired properly. When the dog noticed my car approaching, it did not take the shorter route to safety. Instead, it took off toward the house on the opposite side of the road and ran directly in front of my car, which was already veering toward the left. I tried to swerve back to the right to miss it, but was unsuccessful.

I felt absolutely horrible. My friend was livid, accusing me of intentional canicide. I tried to explain to him that it was all a terrible mistake. And it was.

Our assumption was that the dog’s owners lived in the house that the poor little canine was running to. Filled with shame and guilt, I knocked on the door to inform the owners that I had stupidly removed their pet from this world. No one answered, which actually gave me a sense of relief that I did not have to own up to my deed.

I should have stopped by the next day and tried again. If they weren’t home again, I could have left a note in their door. That would have been the right thing to do. But I didn’t do that. And the next day became the next day, became the next week, became the next month, became the next year.

Flash forward about 20 years later. I was riding my bicycle in the countryside on a beautiful day, taking lesser-traveled roads whenever I could. My route took me to that road where, many years ago, I ended the life of someone’s little dog. I recognized the scene as I approached. Thinking about what happened, I still felt the shame. Then I looked toward the house the dog was running to. Next to it was a business sign.

The property was now a pet cemetery.

When I saw the sign, I nearly fell off my bike. It felt like more than a coincidence.

My assumption, of course, was that the dog I ran over was the inspiration for their business. I do not know if this is true. Part of me doesn’t want to know.

Since that day, it has stuck in my mind that often we don’t realize how our actions directly affect the lives of others. All I can do is hope that something good came out of my teenage irresponsibility. Maybe a grieving family decided to offer care and support to others who had suffered the loss of a beloved pet, and helped them find comfort.

It’s a theme that was explored in Mitch Albom’s "The Five People You Meet in Heaven," as the main character learns that there are no random events in life, and all individuals and experiences are connected in some way. It’s a humbling and somewhat frightening thought.

And one worth remembering.

Yesterday Came Suddenly

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 2-23-14)

In yet another reminder that my youth has waved a hankie and shouted "bon voyage," this month marked the 50th anniversary of the Beatles’ arrival in America.

When this subject came up at a recent arts meeting, I realized that I was one of only two people at the table who was alive when this moment in history occurred.

In my defense, I am not old enough to remember the Beatles’ appearances on the "Ed Sullivan Show," but I certainly remember the group still performing together as a band -- for example, seeing them play "Hey Jude" on television.

I watched Beatles cartoons on Saturday mornings and was confused that their cartoon voices didn’t sound like their real voices. (I recently discovered that the fellow who voiced John and George in the cartoons was also the voice of Boris Badenov in "Rocky and Bullwinkle.")

I also remember when the Beatles broke up, the exclamation point occurring when my brother brought home Paul McCartney’s first solo album. Paul was just a lad of 27 when the group splintered. "When I’m Sixty-Four?" For Paul, that was so eight years ago.

Although the group was a household name during my childhood, I probably can thank my three older siblings for the fact that I am a huge Beatles fan. They played plenty of Beatles music in our home, and the joy they derived from it rubbed off on me and never left. By the ripe old age of 6, I was proudly plunking down 66 cents at the Ben Franklin store in Edgerton to buy my own Beatles 45s.

The first single I can recall bringing home was "Hello Goodbye/I Am the Walrus," complete with a cool picture sleeve that absolutely appalled my mother. The reason? The photo revealed that all four members of the group had grown facial hair.

Through my teen years, I continued to collect more and more of the Beatles’ music. Forty years ago, to mark the 10th anniversary of their arrival in America, Chicago radio powerhouse WLS did a special countdown of Beatles music, which I excitedly taped on my cheap GE cassette recorder.

My record collection expanded, from the double album package "Rock and Roll Music" to collectibles like "The White Album" pressed on white vinyl and a "Sgt. Pepper" picture disc.

The poster and individual photos inserted into the sleeve of the "White Album" were proudly taped to my bedroom wall. I even wound up with the original 45 rpm singles of "She Loves You" and "Twist and Shout," released on small independent labels that held the rights to the group’s music prior to their explosion of popularity in the United States.

Many of those records would have value now, if I hadn’t stupidly sold them off to finance the purchase of my first CD player. Sure, I now own the CD releases of all of the Beatles’ official albums so I have the music, but man, what was I thinking? I made the mistake of looking on eBay to see what some of those vinyl treasures are worth now, and nearly got sick to my stomach. Chalk up another one to the mistakes of youth.

As my siblings did with me, I passed my love of the Beatles’ music to my kids. Two of their favorite movies growing up were "Help!" and "Yellow Submarine," which received repeated viewings. One of our family art projects was painting figurines of John and Paul’s animated "Yellow Submarine" characters, one of which ended up adorning my daughter’s college dorm room.

When we are on long drives to distant destinations, Beatles CDs are often the ones all four of us in the car can agree on. It’s a testament to how special they were that 50 years later, their music endures and remains a uniting force between generations.

All you need is love, and some great music.

A Tough Road to Pedal

(Published in the Janesville Messenger, 2-2-14)

Change is inevitable, and everyone has a different way of gauging just how extensively and rapidly things around you are evolving.

In my case, it's based on how I have to adjust my bicycle routes.

In the 22 years I've lived in my current house in Milton, I've seen new streets, new schools, expanded schools, new parks and new subdivisions. I've seen businesses of various sizes come and go. And I've seen Highway 26 evolve from a single two-lane road to a divided four-lane to a freeway that bypasses the city.

But darn it, when they mess with my bike routes, now that's an adjustment.

I have always had four favorite routes – one in each direction – that I use to leave the city and head to distant destinations. My favorite route was always County M southeast to Townline Road, which I then took east toward LaGrange. Once I was on M, it was an immediate shift from city to rural area.

Soon after a big ethanol plant showed up, Highway 59 and County M were completely realigned, resulting in a strange but relatively minor change to my route.

The new Highway 26 Bypass, on the other hand, meant having to completely re-figure both my driving and biking routes in and out of town. Unlike my auto navigation, however, I am actually looking forward to trying the new bike trail that runs alongside the bypass and connects Milton with Janesville and Fort Atkinson. And the realignment of Janesville Street (the former 26) now gives me a straight shot to Townline Road for my ride to LaGrange. What hath God wrought?

So when the talk started about an I-90 interchange at County M west of Milton along with a city annexation of 1,200 acres for an industrial park, my first thought was about how that part of my bike ride to Indianford would be affected. Now, when I get a few blocks past Milton West Elementary School, I am riding past cornfields. This proposal would extend the city about three miles west. Tractors and fields would be replaced with semi trailers and buildings.

Sure, I could easily just change my route and avoid it. But there's something about this development that goes beyond altering a peaceful bike ride in the country. It would be a sudden and drastic change to Milton. If my map-reading skills are accurate, it would double the city's east-west width.

From a personal standpoint, it also encroaches closer to what I always considered our neighborhood growing up, the rural area that sent kids like me to tiny Consolidated School. The western edge of the proposed development is near an area the old-timers called Sandy Sink. It also reaches within a half-mile or so of Threshermen's Park, home to the annual Rock River Thresheree. Antique tractors, meet tractor trailers.

A billion dollars of development, 24 million dollars of tax revenue, and the promise of jobs, jobs, jobs sounds very appealing. But what scares me is that the project seems so massive, especially if it is done all at once as the developers intend. And what if they build it and nobody comes? Not to sound pessimistic, but it would not be unprecedented. You may recall that an enthusiastic home builder envisioned 1,000 new homes along Highway 26 between Milton and Janesville by now. The project stalled after only 12 were built.

The decision to put in the interchange and convert this much farmland is a big step, perhaps a defining moment in the history of the city. Will it be a huge economic boon? Or a massive change to the town's identity? Or both?

We may know soon whether Milton and its adjoining townships go down this road or not. My quiet two wheels may be replaced by many sets of eighteen. On the surface, it seems like it may be a tough road to pedal.