Category: history

July Adventure

… in northern parts of CA and NV

It all began when Marcus (that would be the writer) got the brilliant idea to go and see where Brian goes when he goes “in the field” way up in Northeast California and Northwest Nevada around a town called Cedarville, CA.

Brian welcomed that idea and responded as follows in an email on June 20;

Planning for July 4th wkd. If you want to see field sites, probably the best thing to do is for y’all to meet us up in that area, which is ~3 hrs north of here. Doesn’t make sense for you to come here first then go there. As long as we’re up there, we might want to do it right. There is a spa with a natural hot springs near Cedarville, which is a surprisingly hip village in vermillion red Modoc Co.

http://www.svhotsprings.com/main.html

Not outrageously expensive (similar to Calistoga) but there’s a 2-day minimum stay on holiday weekends. A proposed itinierary:

Sat – Meet for late lunch in NE Calif.; men go to field sites, ladies do tourism; check into spa;
Sun – men do field sites near spa; ladies do spa & tourism; Basque dinner in Altruas;
Mon – check out of spa; drive to Reno; hit last site on the way; ladies tour in Gerlach, Nev. (home of Burning Man); arrive Reno late afternoon;

Let me know what you think.
Doc B

On Jun 22, 2011, at 10:24 , Marcus Rector wrote:

Google sez it is nearly a 7 hour drive, so don’t plan anything rigorous for the old folks right away. If we leave about 7 we should get there in time for a LLL (leisurely late lunch).
I’m psyched.
dad

Continue reading “July Adventure” →

Reynolds Price 1933 – 2011

Reynolds Price 1933 - 2011

Above is from the back of the book jacket for the 25th Anniversary edition of A Long and Happy Life. I present it as a good picture of Reynolds before he was confined to a wheelchair as the result of cancer treatment when steroids and a lack of exercise puffed him up well beyond what he would have preferred. Unfortunately his obits, including an excellent one in the NY Times by William Grimes, are going with post-cancer shots.
Continue reading “Reynolds Price 1933 – 2011” →

Sausage!

This is an entirely fictional account of an on-the-farm pig slaughter in 1950. It’s based on my own experience processing hogs from hoof to terrine, stories from the Rector family, as well as additional miscellaneous accounts of home pork processing that used to be the norm in the rural US.

All black and white pictures were taken in New Jersey in 1944, provided to me by John Chobrda, who says that they’re from “John Kubinski’s farm that was located just between Hightstown and Allentown on what is now The Assinpink WMA, the farm was near where Lake Assinpink is now. The man in the plaid shirt was Joe Nekarda who lived near the American Czecho-Slovak Farmers Club on Rt 130.” The pictures illustrate what farm processing was really like, minus the effort of the women cooking and canning and brining and smoking and processing for several days after. I’m thankful for permission to use these to accompany this story which has little to do with the pictures’ actual origin except to point out, again, how common the practice had been before WWII initiated a global food chain that attempted to replace this multi-millennial old ritual.

The characters are all made up but may have been named for one or more actual people that I may or may not have ever met. It pretends to have taken place in the southern Ohio hills, near Logan, from the point of view of a 12 year old boy.

–ER

I woke up that morning, after Thanksgiving dinner, ’cause they started sharpening the knives. I was in the upstairs attic on a cot under a giant quilt my Grandma made, but I could see my breath above me, catching the light from the window to my right.

When I pulled back the quilt it was cold. I looked over at Wenn on his cot, but he was still asleep. I put on the sweater I’d thrown to the floor last night before getting in bed and walked over to the window to see.

Uncle Sonny sat on the grindstone, pedaling while he held the knife against it, throwing sparks. Charlie was just back from the Army, and he stood over a table in a green tee shirt and suspenders wiping a blade back and forth on a steel he held like a sword. Behind him was the great big kettle belching smoke and steam and a tri-pod of big poles straddling it.

I went over and shook my brother Wenn’s shoulder. “They’re getting ready.” He curled and buried himself deeper under his quilt.
Continue reading “Sausage!” →

TROPHY TOUR

So I’m reading the Chronicle at lunch and it announces a Giants World Series Trophy Tour. Season ticket holders have been able to make appointments to have their picture taken with the Trophy since the season ended, but not a whiff for “just fans” like me.

“For more than 52 years, our dedicated fans have supported us through thick and thin,” said Giants Managing General Partner and CEO Bill Neukom. “The trophy belongs to them as much as it belongs to us and we want to extend the World Champions celebration throughout Giants country and to thank our fans.”

It says a press conference with Mayor Newsom, Bill Neukom and Giants President Larry Baer would be held at city hall at 11:30, and the trophy would be on view to the public in the South Sun Court from 1pm to 3pm. I looked at the clock; 12:45. What am I waiting for? I got on my scooter, bound for City Hall.

The Trophy Tour truck in front of City Hall

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Ode to Bus

He loved his wife.
He loved his children,
his grandchildren, and
his great-grandchildren.
He loved his church.
He loved his camp.
He loved his country.
He loved to play cards and
won his share of nickels.
He was never late for dinner.
He always ordered the same thing and
he always tipped a dollar.
He always struck the same pose
for pictures but
he never struck a pose
for people.
He loved his sports;
from Bob Feller and
the Big Red Machine
to the surprising summer of ’90.
And of course he loved his Buckeyes
— all of them —
and he raised a grove
of his own.
He drove 35 on 22
and 55 on 71 but
he loved the rolling roads
through the small towns best.

He didn’t say much,
mum but never
mysterious.
Mark Twain once said
it’s better to keep your mouth shut
and be thought a fool than to open it
and remove any doubt.
But Bus was nobody’s fool,
and didn’t suffer them gladly.
His way was simple and sound;
he was always glad to see you
but the rest he left up to Liz.
He was old-school taciturn
and some would say
hard to know
but he is and always will be
easy to remember.

Some Rector History in Photos

Cousin Terril – Frank’s oldest – sent some scanned Rector history photos. Here they are, captioned as best I can, relative to me.

You can download the photos from this site.
If I’ve messed up any names, or if you can add details, let me know and I can make revisions. If you have pictures, send them to me and I’ll put ‘em up.
Marc

mark-libby

Grandma Libby and Grandpa Mark – Marcus Clay Rector, my namesake (along with my maternal grandfather John Levi Herron).

w_libby_mark

Grandma and Grandpa again Continue reading “Some Rector History in Photos” →

Merry Christmas from Eric

Christmas BaubleI know it’s a little early for holiday cheer, but I wanted the RectorSite faithful to know that I have just re-registered the rectorsite.com domain for another three years. It seems that this experiment in family communication has proved successful in many ways, as it now encompasses over two hundred articles posted, as well as countless hundred images — many of which might have landed in your email box! Instead this web log (the phrase that spawned the word ‘blog’) of family stories serves as an archive of what might have been fleeting messages, as well as a way to collectively announce and discuss many topics of interest to our interesting extended family.

FYI: In case you’ve ever tried to “Google” a RectorSite article, you were probably frustrated because I have checked a setting in this WordPress software that discourages all search engines from indexing the contents. Likewise, you must be a registered and logged-in user to post a comment about an article, and new users must be “approved” by the administrator (me) after registering before they can post comments, or more importantly post articles. The intention is for this to remain “within the family” although I try to be as generous in defining “family” as I can, extending it to in-laws as well as some friends who share an interest in what we talk about.

It has been heartening to see how many of the family members have chosen to contribute articles over the last three years, although my dad Marc wins the Top Scribe award by a long shot. Still, we have excellent posts from our less frequent contributors, and I hope they are able to offer us a few more slices of their life in the future.

It’s also important — especially for those contributors — to note that I have upgraded the software that runs the site to it’s latest “bleeding edge” version, which has significant changes in its structure that will be notices as soon as you log in to the site. Never fear, take a deep breath, and take a little time to scan the new layout. All of the links you need are there, but they may be in a different spot. Please comment to this article with feedback on the new version.

Thanks again for participating in this effort, even if it has just been to read and enjoy.

Happy Holidays to all,

–Eric

My Life in a Box

In March 2005, the idea was conceived that each professional staff member (there are 12) put together a 3 dimensional shadow box to represent important happenings in his/her life. About a month later at IKEA were small shadow boxes perfect for our task.

box_1.jpg

The boxes were purchased and handed out as “here’s a summer project,go for it”. When the staff came back together in September, nary a box had been attempted much less completed. The idea languished until March of this year when the staff began to plan for our annual Spring Break retreat. We decided to spend a day working along side each other putting the boxes together.
Continue reading “My Life in a Box” →