Sweet and Sour Pie: A Wisconsin Boyhood

Beans for Breakfast

3 l Beans for Breakfast Let’s find a church that looks like it’s paid for,” Dad said. “An old one without a mortgage.” Tuesday, August 15, 1950, was our second day in Manitowoc, Wisconsin. Mom, Dad, our beagle, Rip, and I were scouting the town in our Studebaker Champion; Dad drove while Mom paged through the phone book and plotted our position on a map. Our mission that morning was to locate a Methodist church, the A&P, and a store that sold bed frames. I was seven and shared the back seat with Rip. As we cruised up one street and down another, Mom and Dad were having a good time, pointing out taverns with interesting names: the Stop and Go Inn, Leof’s Spa, the Wonder Bar, the Foam Tavern, the Gay Bar, and the Tip Top Tap. “Sure are a lot of them,” Dad said. 4 BeansforBreakfast Mom opened the Yellow Pages to “Taverns” and started to count, pursing her lips and running a pencil down the long list. “There are eighty-five, to be precise,” she said. She flipped back to “Churches” and counted again. “And twenty-three churches.” “It’s the eternal struggle,” Dad said. Mom laughed, and I was surprised that she and Dad were in such high spirits, because the past twenty-four hours had been rough on them. The movers had arrived the day before, a couple of hours after we did. The marine engineering company Dad worked for had transferred him to Manitowoc from Lorain, Ohio, a steel mill and shipyard city on Lake Erie. They had hired an outfit called Budget Boys to do the moving, and we soon found out how the Budget Boys got their name: they filled our house with boxes but didn’t unpack them. As soon as the van was empty, the driver demanded Dad’s signature on the moving contract and started the engine. When Dad protested , the driver pointed to some fine print, let in his clutch, and hit the road. “Buncha cheapskates,” Dad muttered, meaning the Budget Boys, his employer, or maybe both. All we could do was go back in the house and start rummaging . In Ohio, Mom had labeled each box with its destination in Manitowoc—living room, kitchen, master bedroom, dining room. But the Budget Boys hadn’t read Mom’s labels, so practically every box and piece of furniture had to be moved again from one room to another. Luckily for us, in their rush to get going the Boys left a furniture dolly behind. We claimed it as a spoil of war and used it for years. Dad started trundling boxes back and forth, upstairs and down. After an hour or so he called from upstairs. “Charlotte, is our bed frame in the living room? It should be in a long narrow box. Look for Davy’s, too.” 5 Mom dug around in the maze of cartons and furniture. “I see the mattresses and springs, but no frames,” she said. “Oh, for cripes sake,” Dad said. “They must have left them in Lorain. We’ll have to buy new ones tomorrow. Now I’m definitely going to keep this dolly.” It was getting dark and pretty cold for August. Dad and Mom lugged the mattresses upstairs. While Dad started a coal fire in the big furnace in the basement, Mom found a wool blanket and a war surplus GI sleeping bag, and we went to bed without supper. I spent the night in the sleeping bag and it was kind of fun, like camping indoors. Mom and Dad tried to cover themselves with the blanket, which was barely big enough for two. Mom lay awake most of the night, shivering and staring at the ceiling. She finally dropped off about four in the morning, but when the first hint of dawn filtered into the bedroom, she woke up, turned on her side, and recoiled in horror. A large bat was hanging on the wall about four feet away. “Dammit, there’s a bat!” she yelled. “Dave, wake up, there’s a bat on the wall!” She pulled the blanket away from Dad and tried to hide under it. Wrenched from a deep sleep, Dad rolled off the mattress and landed on his back. He staggered to his feet and hitched up the baggy undershorts he had slept in. Mom kept on complaining from...