The War Comes to Plum Street

4. Into the Storm, 1939–1941

4. Into the Storm, 1939–1941 GEMMA CONTINUED TO work hard to keep her grades high during senior year. With the yearbook, work for Mrs. Edwards, and chores at home, she had time for little else. On Saturday nights she went out with Martha or Sarah or double-dated. Martha always had a boyfriend, and she often found dates for Gemma. This was the time when David Locker was Gemma’s primary suitor. Gemma had dated Ed Brenneman and Harry Beard, and when she lost interest in David, she dated Martha’s cousin Farrell Hendricks. His parents thought that Farrell and Gemma were a good match, and urged Gemma to marry him. Gemma decided she wasn’t ready for that step yet. Sarah had taken an interest in Clay Grubbs early in 1939, her freshman year at New Castle High School. Clay was almost four years older than Sarah, and had his own troubles at home. After Clay’s father died in 1930 when Clay was twelve and his brother Orrin was only eight, their mother Erma married a man named Vitatoe in 1933 who kept company with the bottle. The boys’ stepfather made life miserable around the house when he went on drinking binges, and Erma tried vainly to keep their home life on an even keel. Even before their father had died, the boys had gone to stay at the Indiana Soldiers and Sailors Home down at Knightstown because their mother had more than she could handle with a sick husband, a small baby born after Orrin, and another child on the way. Their father, Clay Sr., had been a vet- 74 The War Comes to Plum Street eran of the Great War, so the boys could be taken care of at the home when things got bad enough. As they got older, Clay and Orrin were at home on B Avenue most of the time. Clay found a job working part-time for Western Union. When a wire came into the office next to the interurban station, Clay delivered it on his bicycle. In 1936, when he was a sophomore, Western Union offered him a full-time delivery job. In the middle of the Depression , and with the financial burden that his stepfather presented to the family, Clay jumped at the chance to make a steady wage. He quit school to take the job in the fall of 1936. For almost two years, Clay worked steadily for the telegraph company, but on his evenings and Saturdays he ran around with friends who spent their days in school. In the fall of 1939, he decided to go back to school and quit his job, taking an early morning paper route to make a little spending money. This put him in the same class as Orrin, who took over his job at Western Union part-time, delivering telegrams on his bicycle. Clay joined the circle of friends that included Sarah Wright, and she took an immediate liking to him. Girls did not ask boys to go out, of course, so Sarah made it clear enough to Orrin, whom she knew already, that she wouldn’t mind being asked out. Orrin thought this was a good thing, too, and they began to date, but Sarah’s object was to get closer to Clay. When school started that fall, Sarah was in marching band as usual, and Clay joined as a drummer. Orrin, now working at the telegraph office, had less time to dote on Sarah, and this was the opening that Sarah had hoped for. Clay began to walk Sarah home after band practice and games. Orrin soon discovered that she seemed interested in Clay, and this did not set well. Orrin began shadowing Clay to determine whether he was taking Sarah out. When Clay put on his band uniform and left the house, Orrin would speed to Sarah’s house on Plum Street by a different route and watch to see if Clay went there. Sarah was aware of this, of course. In February, while she was getting ready to don her own uniform and go to a basketball game, she heard the bell ring and asked her mother to see if it was Orrin, and if it was, to tell him that she had already gone. Her mother said, ‘‘Oh, Grubby, she’s gone,’’ but Orrin noticed that Sarah’s uniform was hanging on a door where he could see it. ‘‘Mrs. Wright, you wouldn’t...