Pictured Above: Home in Marine, IL
The year 1904 was the year of the World’s Fair in Sf. Louis. It was to be the most wonderful of anything that would come to pass in that day and time. Though we were not rich, my father made plans for some of us to go. My brother Will and sister Ruth and I were the ones who got to go. Later on my father and brother Eli went.
We left Des Arc, our nearest railroad station, about the middle of August. I had never been on a train before and had never seen a large city. I was sixteen at that time. My father had a second cousin named Backman. She had two daughters and a son who had visited us at the farm, so we felt free to “put up” with them while at the fair. They must have been “put out” at three green country cousins, but they treated us real nice.
We would put in the days at the fair and sleep there at night. I can’t begin to describe my feelings when I first laid eyes on the big city. It was late evening when we arrived and a million lights were on, with street car noise and horses clop-clop (there were no auto’s to speak of). It was too wonderful for words and yet there was fear, for how were we to ever emerge out of such and immense crowd alive. Cousin Pearl knew just what to do (though I couldn’t see how), and soon we were climbing stairs to their home.
We went to the fair (it is now Forest Park) four days and saw so much it is hard to remember. The Ferris Wheel I’ll never forget or the Scenic Railway. The Ferris Wheel was 250 feet high and held over a thousand at a ride. The coaches were built all around the wheel but were always right side up, just how, I’m sure I do not know. At the top they stopped a few minutes to let you see far out over the city, and it was a wonderful view. You could see for miles, and the houses and people all looked very small. My brother went up with me on the Ferris Wheel, but Ruth didn’t care to go and waited for us with Cousin Pearl.
Then we went on the Scenic Railway, which was a small train of cars that went down at terrific speed for what seemed like a hundred feet or more and thro what seemed to be caverns and tunnels all lighted up (but this was all man made). It looked like a fairyland, round and round thro tunnels for several minutes and suddenly we were out on top again, only for a minute and then down again to go over the same procedure. I would have given anything to have gotten off, but we got two trips for our ticket, so I held my breath as we shot down into the tunnels again.
After we’d seen all we cared to of the fair, we went to Marine, Illinois, a small town only thirly miles from St. Louis. We had a number of relatives there, as this is where my parents were born and where the old Brooks home was. One of my uncles (Dan) lived on the farm about two miles out from Marine. It was very interesting to me to be able to see the place where my paternal grandparents had lived as they both passed away before I was born.
I have always felt I missed a lot in life never knowing any of my grandparents. We had two aunts living in Marine then, my father’s sisters, Aunt Susie Williamson and Aunt Maggie Tabor. Aunt Mag was a widow and had one Son George. He was a big tease and made life quite miserable for my sister, who was very large.
We had another uncle who lived on a farm, Uncle Millard and Aunt Mary. They had no children of their own, but had two adopted children, Miles, a boy, and Vera, a girl my age. I had a good time with her.
One day my Uncle Don drove to Highland with a team of horses and wagon. He took a load of wheat, I believe, and asked Vera and me to go along. Uncle Don’s and Uncle Millard’s farms joined each other. What a good time we had. It was slow traveling and took two hours or more to go the ten miles to Highland. Uncle took us into an ice cream parlor, and we both ordered chocolate ice cream, so he did too. He didn’t like his, so to get even he bought brick cheese for our lunch. It is not quite as strong as limburger but was terrible to me. It tickled my uncle terribly because I couldn’t eat it.
One day Uncle Don drove us to Marine in a cart pulled by a mule. As we entered the town a small boy took a look at us and said, “Great big woman and little skinny mule”. My uncle was a big tease too, and so Ruth never heard the last of that.
We were gone from home about two weeks and had a most wonderful time. In October, my father and brother Eli went to the Fair.
Before we left Marine I began having fever and my sister was very worried about me, I had no more than gotten home till I came down with a chill and typhoid fever developed. I lingered with fever for five weeks and had to miss the first month of school. By this time I was going steady with my “Beau” Leander Henson and he visited me many times during my illness. I remember one time he hunted thro the woods from where they lived to our house (it was thro woods most of the way), and he bro’t me a squirrel. My mother made soup of it for I was not allowed any solid food.
