The Red Flannel Rag

supper from down the hill,” she told me. “Sometimes Aunt Millie asked my daddy to

come down to her house to eat, but she couldn't afford to feed all us kids."

After two years of trying to keep his household together with the help of his

young daughters, Grandpa John went down the road about a half mile to Mike and Cass

Lam's house. He knew they had a daughter in her late twenties who was still single. Her

name was Ivy Lam. Mom said, "My daddy asked if he could marry Ivy so she could cook

for him and help with the younger children. Mike and Cass said yes."

Mom always emphasized that it was not a marriage for love. "My daddy just

needed a cook and a housekeeper,” she told me. “Ivy spoke Pennsylvania Dutch, and

she was mean to me. She made me sit on the hill above the chicken lot for hours every

summer day to make sure the chicken hawks didn’t get her chickens. Ivy told me the

chickens were important for the survival of our family. I didn’t believe her then with the

hot summer sun beating down on my head, but now I remember Ivy dragging me by the

hand as she walked about five miles to Doug Brenneman’s store with eggs and

homemade butter. Sometimes she grabbed a live chicken and carried it by the legs to

the store. She traded the chicken, eggs, and butter for staples such as sugar, salt, and

flour.”

Four short years after Grandma Mary’s death, Grandpa John died of a heart

attack at age forty- nine. Uncle Shirley told me, “He was butchering for somebody over

in Linville and cut his hand really bad. He took thirty aspirin during that day for the

pain and lost so much blood his heart stopped.”

According to Aunt Goldie and Mom, Grandma Mary was often the victim of her

own mother, Ellie Lam, who was thought to be an evil witch. Ellie never liked Grandpa

John, and she constantly cast spells on her always-pregnant daughter. Aunt Goldie told

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