Vegter-Tschetter Heritage

John and Fannie

(Fannie's recollection, continued) But the boys had their names in already in Illinois, so when war was declared, we said, we better go back to Illinois again. So another move. I had pretty nice furniture, but sold it to the same people we bought it from. We took the stove along, and the washing machine, too. We came to Worth, Illinois. Uncle Ko lived in a house right on Main Street, and that was for sale, so we went after it and bought. The boys started looking for jobs, and Pa got a job in the Ford plant. But it was his wish to get back on the farm. We put an add in the Prairie Farmer, and a man came to the door. He was from Kenosha, Wisconsin, and wanted us on a farm there. But we had to sell the house first, and that took a while. Bill was called up for service, went right away, but came back a couple days later, discharged for a hernia. He wanted to be in the army, so he had an operation, and as soon as it was healed, he went back, and they put him in the Marines. Pete would come home from work, and first thing he would ask if anything came for him. Bill and a friend from church went away together. We had to bring him some place. The boy's folks were there, too, and the mother said to her son, "Now you can make something of yourselves." It didn't seem to bother her that she might never see her son again. I shed tears. At last Pete got the call, too. He jumped sky high. But after a week or so, he wrote that he wished he could crawl home if he could get out that way. We went to see Pete yet before he went across. Ron was only about 2 weeks old. We had tire and gas rationing, so we went to Chicago and made reservations on a bus with a 2 week old baby. I should have left him by Aunt Hilda. So we left at 11 o'clock that night on the bus. We had to go to Youngstown, Ohio, and we arrived the next day. We had to take the army truck to get to Pete's camp. He didn't know we were coming. He was out in the field. And he came running to the place we were waiting for him around 6 o'clock. He tried to get a pass to take us to that town in Pennsylvania. They would not give him any, so he got one from another soldier and did not get caught. He took us to the service club and found out that someone had a room for us in the night. He stayed till midnight and went back to camp. We didn't get too much sleep as the baby Ron wasn't too good riding from 11 o'clock at night till 6 o'clock the next evening. How I made it, I don't know. I sure would not try it again. But we wanted to see Pete before he had to go across. Had dirty diapers to clean that night. I washed them and hung them outside, but they were still wet the next morning. I did not know that you could buy those throw away diapers at that time. So in the morning, I took them along wet and stayed by Pete all day. At 6 o'clock we left him to go back to Youngstown, Ohio. He wanted to go along, but they would not let him. I can still see his face as we left. I think he must have thought, "Maybe I'll never see my folks again." It was awful hard for us, too. Pete did sneak home for 1 or 2 days. Good thing he didn't get caught. He would have landed in jail. He came with the train.

[On our farm] we milked quite a few cows, so that the landlord (Doc Werner, who was a doctor but lost his license doing something illegal) was making pretty good with us. He was always going to write out a paper, but never did. He was a miserable guy. We had the money that we paid him, but nothing to show for it. He promised that we would get heifers. He would give us $100 a month to live on. He got the milk check and paid the bills; we just worked for him. So Pa got so tired of that that Pa told him off once. The guy would cry, but it stayed the same. So Pa said, "Let's go to Delavan, Wisconsin, and see if there are any farms for rent." We landed by the minister, Rev. Lamberts, as we didn't know anybody. He said, "I'll send you to my elder. He would know more than I do." The elder knew of a farm for rent and sent us to Bart Vander Veen, also from the Christian Reformed Church. He took us to the man that had that farm. When I saw the farm, I said, "We aren't going to get that. That's too nice." He wanted to quit farming and he saw the boys, Hank and Harry. So he came over by Kenosha and looked things over to see what we had for machinery and calves. One day we got a letter that said he would rent us the farm. I went with Pa to the bank to [borrow] money, and he signed for it. We were happy to get away from that other landlord. The gas station man said to Pa, "You're the only man that worked for Doc Werner that could pay their bills." Doc Werner tried that last minute to rent another farm to us, and said we could run it the way we wanted it. But Pa told him, "Never would I work for you again." He had a few of our bonds, but had to give them back to us, as they were useless to him.