I was born in Tishimingo County, Mississippi, October 9, 1886. In my early childhood, the home where I lived had a high porch and I used to crawl under that with a big Newfoundland dog and go to sleep. And I had a very tall swing on a pine tree limb that I swung in.
When I was five my folks emigrated to central Texas to join my grandfather and uncles who had emigrated from Mississippi earlier. They had become quite well-to-do farming cotton, and they had persuaded Father to come out. He had been burned out of business a couple of times, I think and was working as a bookkeeper for a merchant– not a very good salary, and so we went out to Texas, but when we got there, the land was high and we couldn’t buy it. We stayed there for about a year. Father went down to central south Texas and acquired some cheap school land and brought the family down thinking we would grow cotton, too. Well, we had to break up new sod and we didn’t have too big an acreage the first year, only a mill or two; cotton was about nine to ten cents a pound, I think. The next year we put in more acreage and the boll weevils struck and cotton went down to about five cents a pound, but off of about fifty acres we gather only one 500-pound bale, so during my youth, we didn’t know what money or clothes were, hardly; but the land was bountiful in berries and fruit and we had lots of vegetables and chickens, ducks, and turkeys, and milk cows, so we lived off the fat of the land as far as eating was concerned.
Well, when I was about nine I broke sod with a walking-turning plow and a yoke of oxen; and my mother taught us. I had never been to school; my older brothers had been to school, as they were six and seven years older than I. I only had about four months of school out of the year later on, but I guess I was eager and intelligent and I learned fast. Well, when I was about eighteen or so, the school wasn’t able to get a teacher; and Father suggested I take an examination for a teacher’s certificate, so I taught about three short terms of country school. Then I went out to San Antonio, Texas, to business college, boarded with my uncle. While I was there, a northern development company bought up a lot of the land around home and subdivided it into five and ten-acre lots and brought settlers in from I think almost every state in the Union. Well, Father wrote me to come home and help him. We went into the real estate business. We gathered up the owners and contracted for the sale of the land and sold it to this company. (And my life’s been more or less uneventful.)
This development company brought the Rice family in from Idaho; but they stayed only a year or two, and they were dissatisfied, moved back to St. Anthony. Everything went dead—the First World War came on and that raised prices; cotton and rice were the main crops there–cotton went way up to forty, forty-five cents a pound. The farmers were waiting; they were “gonna get fifty cents” for their cotton, and they left it out on the earth. Sometimes they had poles under it and sometimes they just left it on the ground and it became damaged and caused up to fifty pounds a mill tare. And the rice farmers were holding their rice for it had already gone way up—but they were like the cotton farmers, they had to have a certain price. Well, before it got there, it began to drop, and it dropped fast. The cotton farmers sold their cotton so they could get it off their hands for about ten cents a pound. And the rice farmers who’d been getting around nine dollars a barrel for their rice got only about three or three-and-a-half.
We stopped farming cotton after the boll weevils struck; just corn and peanuts and sorghum–we made lots of sorghum molasses. As I said before, we had chickens and ducks, turkeys, hogs, milk cows, and we also had wild turkeys and squirrels which we killed occasionally and deer. When the panic came along—it started in about 1918—and the Rice folks had gone back to Idaho and they kept writing us about the situation there—things were prosperous in Idaho—and they wanted us to come up, which we finally did. (About 1924, because his daughter, Sylvia, was a tiny child.) Well, the depression we’d suffered in Texas finally hit Idaho when we did. I got a job in one of the stores in St. Anthony and in a little while it failed and I got a job with another store in Ashton; and was just ready to move the family up to Ashton when my wife told me that another merchant in St. Anthony wanted to see me, and he gave me a job. He had been quite wealthy and he bought up a lot of land besides the store; but he wasn’t a very good storekeeper and he did an extensive credit business and was about to go broke. I think he overheard me make some slighting remark about his business and he fired me—he couldn’t afford to keep me anyway. Then I did what jobs I could find—farm jobs in the fall harvest for about $3, $3.50 a day and dinner; but that was only for a short period. Oh, I got with the Raleigh group and sold their products for a while to make a few dollars here and there—times were awfully hard. That’s when the children were going to school. During that time, the government had the CCC Camps, and I was in them for a while and then I came out and Frost went in, served awhile, and came out, and then Burton served. The boys had to miss school while they were in the CCC’s, but Eileen and Sylvia graduated from high school, and Sylvia wanted to take secretarial so she could take a job. Lysla had a sister in Salt Lake and she was contemplating arranging for Sylvia to live there and help with the housework for her board.
Editor’s note: The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men from relief families, ages 18–25. A part of the New Deal of President Franklin D. Roosevelt, it provided unskilled manual labor jobs related to the conservation and development of natural resources in rural lands owned by federal, state, and local governments. The CCC was designed to provide employment for young men in relief families who had difficulty finding jobs during the Great Depression while at the same time implementing a general natural resource conservation program in every state and territory. (source: Wikipedia)
Well, I listened to her talk and I said, “That isn’t too satisfactory an arrangement. The chances are that she’d be imposed upon and asked to do more than she should. I’ll go down to Pocatello and see if I can’t get her in the college and see if I can get transferred on WPA ( you don’t know what that was, but it was public work the government had) down there.” So I did, and we moved to Pocatello, and Sylvia went to school there and she got parttime work at school and night work at the movies. I was on WPA, but we didn’t work a full day–I don’t remember why– but when merchants would advertise a sale—a shoe sale especially—I’d go down and apply for a job; and I got on to two or three jobs and earned a little extra that way so we finally came through. (Editor’s note: The Works Progress Administration, renamed during 1939 as the Work Projects Administration; WPA, was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects. (source: Wikipedia)
Burton was the last to serve in the CCC’s; when he came out he eventually got on at Kraft’s which was a pretty good job then and I guess it still is. Burton took a turn selling Hoover vacuums and I was instrumental in getting him some sales as the merchants I worked for were interested in cleaning and so through that contact he made several sales, but times were awfully hard and people didn’t make much money. But then, like I said, Burton and Sylvia got on at Krafts. I got WPA work outside, and we did lots of the stones along the bank of the Portneuf River. Then some boys came along and they wanted teachers. They took us down to Logan for a month’s training, and I came back and did teaching at night–mainly preparing the foreigners for their citizenship examination.
And then times began to get better and I got a job with the city in the parks. Then I came to the brewery, and they were unloading a case of barley. They wanted help with that, so I dug in there. The brewmaster liked my work so well that he asked me to stay on at the brewery which I did until the Second World War broke out. Then I went out and worked at the gun plant and helped while we were building some of that. Then I went into one of the warehouses and worked there.
Lysla and I had already separated, and I finally married Vera (Vera Ward Cole, a widow; Frost is buried beside her.). She owned a little home down on South 11. I was working and I had finished out on the desert and was working out at West Vaco (later FMC); and we started looking around at old houses that were for sale and quite cheap—you could buy then, some for as little as $500—and we’d put down $100 and then I’d work it over and we’d rent it. Then we bought another and did it the same way until, finally, we had seven rentals. They paid out and were affording quite a good income.
In the meantime, we bought this lot here on Wayne for about $300, and after we began to get more on our feet, we built here. The work was contracted, but we found the plans. We looked and looked at every building that was going up, and we looked in magazines, and so finally I saw this house and it just struck me. Originally, it went only as far as the kitchen cabinets, but after we’d lived here for a while, we decided that wasn’t enough, and so we added the dining area. (The house was at 503 Wayne, in Pocatello, ID.)
As to the kind of games I used to play as a child, well, my father lived out in the new country, and I didn’t learn to play baseball. At school we used to have bases and a roller ball and homemade bats we played with. Another game we had—we’d get sticks and dig little holes: one in the center and several around, and we would put the sticks in the holes, batter a can, and put it into the center, and then throw it out and have one fellow try to put it back in, and we’d try to keep it from getting back in the center hole. He’d take our stick out, and if we weren’t careful, he’d stick his stick in our hole, and we’d have to take over the can. Kids now don’t know anything about self-reliance. They have their balls and bats and stuff.
I suppose I was closest to my brother, Ollie. He was six years older than me, and Ky was seven years older. There was one more boy between us who died in infancy; and so I was the fourth boy. After me, came a girl (you know, as I think about it, as I was at the club playing cards, my hands were on the card table and my partner opposite said, “You have such pretty hands.” Well, when I was young, I used to disparage my hands as I thought they were too small for a man; and I thought that it was because my mother had wanted a girl so bad.) After Dora Belle, came my brother, Jamie (this is the brother for whom I received a flag from the Reserves at his funeral). I’m very emotional and the least little emotion starts my tears!
When I was younger, Mother made our clothes and we used to wear knee pants made out of jeans, and chambray shirts; and I guess she made our underwear, too, and the long nightgowns made out of _______. Mother thought we shouldn’t sunburn, so she made bonnets for Ky and myself; but I guess she didn’t make one for Ollie as he worked with the neighbors out in the fields. When we settled in south Texas, we were 20 miles from the railroad and we went to the store about once a month to buy whatever we didn’t make on the farm, which was sugar, coffee, flour, and salt, and that was practically all. Well, Father, I guess because I wanted to go, and for company, would take me with him. Well, it was a long, hard day’s trip to town and then we’d camp in the cottonseed places (where they ginned and stored the cottonseed) and put out camping in there. Well, Father began to get tired of the long trips, and when I was about twelve or thirteen, he would send me to town by myself; and from then on I did all of the shopping myself—all of the buying for the house, the dry goods that Mother made up. Sometimes we’d take the steers, and that’d take all day. I went with Father when we took the steers, but I didn’t go alone. I went with the horses. Usually, I’d get to town by mid-afternoon and come home the next day.
During this time or following this time, Father got me a job in a store in town. The owner also owned a bank and some other properties and had a manager for the store. He and I really got along well, but for some reason, he quit; and because the business was slow I guess, he turned it over to me. He had two girls by a first wife living with their grandmother in a home right next door to the store, and he lived clear out in the country. Finally, he moved to the town and built a house and moved all of his family in. The boys in town were interested in the girls, and the girls were interested in the boys, but the father didn’t approve — silly of him. Well, one day he came in (he also wanted one of the girls to help in the store). He said, “When the boys come into the store and start to bother the girls, you come and tell me, and I’ll get them to stop.” Well, I told him that I’d fall out with those boys who were my friends, and he said he wouldn’t let them know who had told him, but I knew they’d know, and so I quit. I found out that the man that I’d first worked for had opened a store in a town near the coast, and he wanted to take a month’s vacation to go down to the coast to visit his mother. So he asked me to take over the store; which I did.
My family were Baptists. I went to church and Sunday school. I won a prize—a Bible—for reciting the most scriptures. I tried to trace my family to the first families to come to the U.S., but couldn’t. My father’s family came from South Carolina to Mississippi; and my mother’s folks came from North Carolina to Alabama and then to Mississippi.
Your grandma (Lysla Drake Rice) worked in the development company’s office, and I met her when I went to take the mail; and I’d give her rides home, as her folks lived about half-a-mile before my house. We’d sit in the buggy in front of the house and talk. I don’t know, I guess she did the most of it. Then the development company went out of business, and our real estate business failed. There was an opening for a postmaster in a little town, and Lysla and I took the test and passed it, and were Postmaster for a while in Provident City, Texas. We were just barely existing, and I was still doing some real estate, and decided to move into this small town on the railroad and do some more real estate, and did pretty well. Well, like I say, it’d seem that just the time you’d think you were getting along, the conditions would drop. All my life has been hard times, even after I came to Idaho. But after I married Vera (Vera Ward Cole, second wife), things began to get better.
When I was about 10 or 12, I had aspirations of being a writer, but all I did were the compositions in school. I enjoyed the business college, and my mind was very sharp. While I was there, they put me to assisting those under me in accounting, and so I taught beginning accounting for a while.
But things have turned out well, and the kids seem to be doing well. Burton’s doing well, your parents have done well, and so have Eileen and Frost (His children). In my reading, I came across the name Eileen, and she was the first, and I gave her that name. When the first boy came along, well, my grandfather, father, and Ky’s names were all the same (Hezekiah Rice) and I thought I’d start a dynasty of my own, but when Frost heard of it, he didn’t like the idea. Lysla named Burton and Sylvia.
I didn’t learn how to play pinochle until we (Frost and Vera) got involved with the Golden Age Club, which was after I retired. When the AARP organized, I began to play bridge, also. The Golden Age Club danced and played cards, too. I have taken many trips sponsored by the AARP (American Association of Retired People).
We didn’t really have pets—just a few farm dogs for guarding and rounding up the cows. I read a lot. We had a few books, and Mother had a whole collection of Harper’s Bazaar magazines, and I fetched them out and read them. Mother would give me books for Christmas. I read fiction; I probably should have read more of the others. You know, I never graduated from high school, but I have noticed in later life that I have a better vocabulary than most college students.
Thompson (Frost’s maternal grandfather) maybe came on Mayflower or in the Walter Raleigh Co. Thompson died when Dora Williams Thompson was not quite three years old, about 1857 or 1858. The family moved to Texas in 1892.
Excerpt from a letter written December 18, 1933 by Dora Williams Thompson to Sylvia (Clinkscales) Wilker.
“My husband’s name (your grandfather) was Hezekiah Rice, the same as his father and your Uncle Ki. Your grandfather’s parents were born and raised in South Carolina. His mother’s name was Mary Norris. His father was one of 12 brothers and they all had a sister. The original Clinkscales came over from Scotland. I don’t know how far back or why they came, maybe they just wanted to wander. My parents and grandparents were born and reared in North Carolina. Their ancestors may have come over in the Mayflower for all I know. History says that N.C. was settled by the English. Walter Rawleigh had something to do with emigration so my family was of English descent, except my Great Grandfather Brown (mother’s grandfather) came from Ireland when he was a boy; his father settled in Virginia, but great grandfather went to North Carolina and reared his family of 12 children (We are proud of our Irish blood).
“My Grandmother, Mother’s mother’s, maiden name was Howell. Her father, one brother, and her cousin were Baptist preachers. Her cousin R.B.C. Howell wrote several books founded mostly on theology. I have one of his books. My mother’s name was Lucinda Brown. She was one of ten children as was my father. (Large families were common in that day.)
“My name was Dora Williams Thompson. I don’t know much about my father’s family as he died when I wasn’t quite three years old. Mother then went back to her father’s to live, then he moved to Alabama and I have never seen any of the Thompson family since. So I was mostly reared in Alabama. “ _______ (unreadable) I lived in Alabama until my mother married again (when I was in my 16th year) to A.H. Luker. _______ (unreadable) I married Jan. 1, 1879 and lived in Mississippi until we came to Texas in 1892. Now I am 78 years old.”
— Excerpt from a letter written December 18, 1933 by Dora Williams Thompson to Sylvia (Clinkscales) Wilker.
(She also mentioned in the letter that A.H. Luker owned a farm and ran a wood yard on the Mississippi River.)
Editor’s notes: Frost and Vera lived in the house on Wayne for the rest of their lives. Vera went first, in 1974. Frost lived until February 16, 1985, at age 98. After Vera died, he would have various young women live in his house for a while, hired as a housekeeper, chauffeur, and caretaker. At the time of his death, his grandson, David Wilker, was living in his basement and helping him. David found him after he had passed. Frost was quite independent. When he could no longer drive around town, he purchased a three-wheel bicycle with a basket between the two hind wheels and tooled around town. He was a familiar sight. He stayed in good health until his passing.
I remember Grandpa as being very loving, always wanting kisses when we saw him. He and Vera were so cute together. Many years, they’d go to the Golden Age Halloween party when I was a child. She always came up with the cutest outfits: cheerleader, Indian squaw, etc., and they’d come by our house to show off their costumes before the dance. In Frost’s later years, mom (Sylvia) and I took him out to dinner several times a year, and he seemed to enjoy that. We really loved the fact that his house was right across the street from Alameda Park, and so we could park in his driveway for the big July 24 celebration, which was held at Alameda Park for many years. Grandpa always dressed in suits.
