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I drove out Section Line Road, east of Dodgeville, the other day and glanced to my left to look at the house brother Patrick and I were born and raised in back in the 1940s. Our grandfather, John R. Holt, owned the farm before our parents (Guerdon and Ruby Reilly) bought it from him. I knew that the house was going ot be torn down, but looking at it with the second floor almost all gone made me quite sad. Pat, being born in 1945 and me in 1946, had spent nearly 20 years in that house before we quit farming and rented it out and later selling it. We were purebred Hampshire hog raisers and showed them at almost every fair around imaginable, plus some "really BIG shows" (as Ed Sullivan, back in my day, would put it). We swept the Wisconsin State Fair when I was about 14 - that means we won the Grand Championships with both boars and sows. That year, due to the extreme heat in August, we lost our best sow on the way to Milwaukee to show at the state fair. There weren't as many "watering holes"on the way to Milwaukee as there are now! I was a pretty good showman in my day, but could never out-show my good friend, the late Jack Weier - who rented our farm after we stopped farming. We also milked some 25 Holstein cows that also brought in some income from Grade A milk production.
But, this house was also quite a retreat for many a Dodgeville school system student. Note the room to the left in the photo. That was our Recreation Room (The Rec Room) that held a small bar for grown up parties, but it also housed a bumper pool table, a ping pong table, a record player (45s and long play) and a fireplace. We had many a party in that room even with kids from other schools (Iowa-Grant, Mineral Point, Hollandale, etc) attending. We danced in that room and played games plus just plain had a lot of fun. It wasn't uncommon during the summer vacation months for 10-15 kids to be at our house on any given night and sometimes day. It wasn't uncommon for us to walk (I know that's a four lettered dirty word these days) from downtown Dodgeville to our place several times during an evening. Sometimes my last walk of the night would get me home just in time to milk the cows that morning! We also had a lot of kids who volunteered to be "hired hands" just to be at the farm, take part in our great meals and sometimes go on trips or outing with us (no pay). We held many a family gathering there and on New Year's Eve I would watch my parents and another couple play poker until midnight or after. When I was old enough, I was asked to join in the card playing. That was another highlight for me at a young age! From the kitchen our mother would prepare fantastic meals. We had this friend who probably weighed in at 350-400 lbs. He always bragged that nobody was ever able to fill him up. Our mother did by making a chocolate torte that, after eating a big meal of pork chops, Southern fried chicken, vegetables, potatoes, salad and homemade bread, he finally had to get up from the table with some of that torte still on his plate!
In 1962 brother Patrick was one of the co-captains of the basketball team (he also played football and baseball). Dodgeville coaching legend John "Weenie" Wilson told him it was his job to make sure the basketball team got together and practiced at least 3-4 times a week. Well, our dad had put about a 25 foot cement slab outside of our garage and placed a basketball hoop there. I think it was at least 6 times a week those guys would congregate at our outside court to practice. Some of the time only nine would be able to make it, so I was the 10th man! Well, that all led to that group of guys being WIAA State Basketball Runners-up in 1963 when they lost the state title game to Manitowoc (it was all one class then). Of course it helped that we had that "rec room" at our place because after practice the guys could congregate and play pool and ping pong - both of which I rarely lost to any of them!
A lot of kids passed through our house and our "rec room", some have already passed away, but many still share some of the memories I have talked about. Since this is the start of a new year - 2013 - I just felt I needed to reminisce a little. Hope this didn't bore too many people.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!