March 11, 1945 (Sunday)
- Jill Johnson Tewsley
- Mar 10, 2024
- 6 min read
PAUL AND DICK ARE "IN AND OUT" MOST OF DAY.
A nice day and not
so cold.
Henry and I went to
church but not many
in attendance.
Hank went to Air Port
to-day. Ed Moore came
home with him and
here for lunch and then
Hank took him home.
Paul and Dick were "in
and out" most of day.
Feel terribly sorry for
them as the "broken
home" is having its
reaction at their expense.
This entry hit me a little hard.
Paul and Dick are my uncle and my father.
On March 11, 1945, their mother had been gone for exactly 120 days. Leaving was something she had done before. This time, she made pretty clear, was for good.
It would be another 15,499 days before Dick and Paul would see their mother again.
I don't remember being told that my grandmother (Rosy) had run away. It was just something I always remember knowing. I do remember secretly hoping that Rosy would show up one day, wanting to meet the family she never knew ...wanting to see her boys again.
Rosy never came looking for us. But we did find her.
Almost 43 years after she left, my Uncle Hank (Edna's son) received news of Rosy's whereabouts and shared the information with my father.
When Rosy left on November 11, 1944, my grandfather was thrown into the role of being a single parent. According to the Pew Research Center, in 1960, slightly over 1% of households with minor children were led by single fathers. When my grandfather became a single father in 1944, it was likely fewer than that. My grandpa didn't work on the farm. His job took him away from home during the day and he worried that his boys might get taken away from him. He was fortunate, however, to live nearby his parents and several siblings who showed love and support to Bob and his boys.
Rosy, like Edna, kept a daily journal. The one she was keeping when she ran off was a 5-year diary. On the day she left she wrote: Warm. Paul and I to Grand Rapids today. xxx________.
That same day, my grandfather took over where Rosy left off. He wrote: Rosy skipped out again today, everything awful blue. I didn't sleep at all.
He continued to make entries from that day forward, completing the nearly two and half years Rosy left yet to be written.
The entries in a five-year diary are brief. But as you read what my grandfather recorded, you often feel his grief and sadness. You sense his determination to keep the house in order. You are glad when family is there to help. You are privy to moments of happiness. You are certain of his love for his boys.
January 21, 1945:
Up late, finished ironing. Ma & Helen here this afternoon. Paul and I baked three pies, our first. Pretty good luck.
May 11, 1945
Fair. Hank bought a motor bike. R: gone six months today. Dick to Cascade to write 8th grade exam. Washed tonight.
July 29, 1945
Fair. Boys & I to Lowell to ballgame. To show afterwards. (Three is a family).
While "I love you," were not words often said out loud between my grandfather and his boys it was their love for one another that found Dick and Paul, in 1987, sharing with their father that they had found their mother and asking him if it was okay if they contacted her.
So it was that one evening, late in July of 1987, my Uncle Paul and my father found themselves dialing a phone number for woman living in Montana who was not expecting their call.
I wish I could tell you that it all went well. It went okay.
Plans were made for my father and uncle to travel to Montana. A few days prior to their scheduled departure, Rosy phoned our home. My brother, the only one there at the time, answered the call. She told Marc she wasn't sure if Dick and Paul should come but if they still wanted to visit, they would have to "pretend to be her cousins."
They were frustrated but not deterred. Dick and Paul flew to Montana in August of 1987.
While reserved with her emotions, Rosy seemed glad enough to see her boys again. But she also seemed relieved when they returned home.
My Uncle Paul was sixteen and a senior in high school when his mother took off. Paul was the one who had to tell his father about Rosy's departure. She had ridden with Paul and one his friends to Grand Rapids to "do some shopping" while they had their senior pictures taken. When Paul returned to the car to meet his mother she was not there. She left a note. Paul and his friend drove back to Bowne Center without Rosy.
My dad was in the 8th grade when his mother left. Sometime before she took off, she came into his room late one night and asked if he wanted to move away with her. He wondered if he would have to change schools. When the answer was yes, he said he wanted to stay.
Shortly after she left, Rosy sent my father a dictionary for Christmas. According to an entry in my grandfather's journal, Rosy had written Paul a letter a few weeks earlier. Paul did not receive a Christmas gift. That was the last time she contacted her boys.
After flying to Montana to see his mother in 1987, Paul seemed to have no further need to see her again.
My father made another trip to Montana in 1992 to see Rosy. This time, he took my mother along.
My heart hurts a little when I look at the photos of my father with his mother from this trip. He looks happy to be with her and she, arms folded, looks closed off and uncomfortable.
My brother, Marc, took a trip west sometime after that. He wanted to meet Rosy in person. I think he also wanted to share a thought or two with her. When Marc made his trip, Rosy was in a nursing home. She didn't know he was coming but when Rosy saw him walk across the common room toward her it must have taken her aback a bit. Marc was only a few years older than my dad was when Rosy left. Looking much like my father, she didn't need an introduction. "I know who you are," she told him.
I never met Rosy in person. I wrote to her a couple of times and she wrote back. I was hoping for her to show more interest in who I was. Also, that maybe she would open up and share her regrets. Instead, her replies to my letters felt more out of obligation.
My grandfather filed for divorce from Rosy on June 14, 1947. The cause for the divorce request was listed as "desertion." The divorce was finalized in September, and he married Dorothy Limbaugh one month later on October 4, 1947. My father, his son, served as the best man.
Dorothy was already a mother when she married my grandfather, so he gained a daughter, my Aunt Sherry, in the process. My grandfather and Dorothy remained married until her death twenty years later in 1967.
Rosy died in May of 1993. She resided mainly in Montana and Idaho following her departure from Bowne Center. We are uncertain if she ever officially married Glen Sanborn, the man she left with. But she did take his last name and remained his companion until his death, just shortly before her own. She never had any other children.
Rosy was only 18 when she married my grandfather. She was just 35 when she ran off with another man, abandoning her children. There are many reasons for me to have compassion for Rosy. I also understand how difficult it may have been in 1944 for her to make the choices she did. But I struggle to reconcile the love I have for my father, grandfather and uncle with the decisions Rosy made in 1944, her behavior in 1987, and all the time in between.
On March 11, 1945, when Edna wrote in her journal that she felt “terribly sorry” for her grandsons, Rosy had only been gone for 120 days.
On March 11, 2024, when I read those words of Edna's, I cried. It had been 28,856 days since Rosy had "skipped out."
In a photo album at my parent's house, there is a picture of my dad with his grandmother. It’s one of the only photos we have of them together. My dad is the handsome young guy in the lower left corner of the photo.
Edna’s arms aren't crossed. She looks like someone who would always be at your side.
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