I was born at 5:30 a.m. on May 12th, 1938 at Sacred Heart Hospital in Eugene, Oregon. I heard my first joke three months later.
I lived in Eugene until I was 16 years old. My father and mother divorced when I was five years old. My father remarried in and my sister was killed by a car when I was nine years old.
My first three and my fifth and sixth school years were at Whiteaker elementary. My fourth year was at Lincoln elementary because of overcrowding at Whiteaker. I deeply resented having to leave my friends and go to Lincoln and rebelled in class whenever possible. When directed to answer questions in our workbooks, I simply wrote “no.” I was passed conditionally but had no problem after going back to Whiteaker.
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My father and mother divorced when I was five years old and my fathered remarried a little more than a year later.
My folks farmed me out to a cattle ranch in Eastern Oregon during my 9th summer and my sister to Niles, California to enjoy a few weeks without kids. This was just fine with me because, at that time, I wanted to be a cowboy when I grew up. Once there, I set about learning the necessary skills, such as riding a horse, roping, etc. One fateful afternoon I was riding around looking for things to lasso. (I’d been practicing lassoing the center post in the corral) when I decided to rope the wringer handle of the washing machine on the porch. I got it, but the loop was hanging too loosely so I put the rope coil on the saddle horn and turned the horse around. All of a sudden, something spooked the horse and it took off up a hill. As it did, the coil around the saddle horn tightened up resulting in puling the washing machine through the wall and dragging it along behind us. We reached a fence and the horse turned around heading back toward the ranch house, causing the rope to knock me off. My first thought was “Wow, that didn’t hurt at all — just like in the movies.” The woman of the house came running up to me to see if I was okay, and then screamed. She had spotted my little finger on my left hand badly mangled. I had to endure a sixty mile drive to Bend holding my hand on a hanky where it was amputated.
My sister, Nondys, was killed by a car while walking home from school when i was ten years old.
Other than those significant events, my life was typical for a youngster in Eugene until I was 16. Tension between my father and I grew increasingly worse, perhaps because we were so much alike. The straw that broke the camel’s back came when he forbade me to use the family phone. A teenager couldn’t get by without a phone in those days.
I hadn’t had contact with my mother since I was five years old, but I knew a couple on my paper route who had been good friends with her so I decided to ask them if they knew how to contact her as I wanted to go live with her. They did and telephoned her on the spot. My mother, stepfather and half-sister, Kathleen, drove up that evening. I returned to Coos Bay with them that night. I later learned that my dad, having legal custody of me, had to agree with the move which he did.