Bill and I were married March 3, 1934 during the depression years. I was teaching rural school at the time. It was a school that my father attended as a small boy. My salary was $65.00 a month. That included janitor work.

During our first year of marriage, we lived with Bill's Aunt Emma and Uncle Bill Fischer. During the summer Bill worked for his grandparents as a farm hand for $15.00 a month. In the spring we moved into a farm house near the jog, eight miles south of Lincoln on Highway 77. Bill did farm work for Harvey Danrow. He also helped with feeding and care of cattle and sheep.

By this time we had our first daughter, Shirley. Jack our son was born on this place, also, After two years, Bill changed jobs for more money and more work. He went to work for Ralph Stephens near Rokeby. He farmed as well as feeding cattle and sheep. There we lived in a little three room house. We had electricity for the first time. Soon we had a radio, then an electric iron. We were really living in luxury. While living there, Marilyn was born. With three children, we needed more room and more money.

Bill went to Lincoln and got a job with Wendelin Baking Company selling bakery products from house to house. It was hard for him at first. He had to memorize sales talks. They don't do that any more. We then moved into an old house just south of the bakery on Fifteenth Street. Soon we had Fred. He was our first baby born in a hospital. Bill was working at the time. I walked to the St. Elizabeth Hospital for the event. At that time, the bakery was giving ten dollars to each father of a new baby as a bonus.

After a few years, there was an opening at Skyline Dairy for a milk delivery man. Ervin Henning, a friend of Bill's who had to go into the Army, talked Bill into taking his milk route. Ervin was one that never came back. Bill stayed with Skyline Dairy for twenty-seven years. They then merged with the Roberts Dairy. He was with the Roberts Dairy for three years, then retired. Bill now does lawn motor repair and works part time at the Town Pump.

Soon after Bill started working at Skyline Dairy, the house we were living in was to be sold. We found a house at Ninth and High Street which we bought. We enjoyed living here. Lots of room for the children to play, very little traffic and a park across the street. We even raised chickens and had cats and dogs. After living there five months, we had a fire. It burned out the upstairs and damaged all the downstairs except our bedroom. Although our personal belongings were not insured, the house was. We had it rebuilt with a finished basement and added a bathroom; after a lot of hard work, we had a much better house. Two months after the fire, Judy was born. We lived here for ten years; then the mill needed more ground to build on. They gave us enough for our house and four acres to buy a new three bedroom house at 2341 South 33rd, where, after twenty-two years, we are still living. The children are married and we have fifteen grandchildren.

Shirley and Jack graduated from Lincoln High School. Marilyn, Fred and Judy graduated from Lincoln Southeast.

Shirley married Glen Stone who attended and graduated as a mechanical engineer from the University of Nebraska. They had four of their five children during that time. They now live near St. Louis. Leon, the eldest is attending college in Kirksville, Missouri; Kathy, after graduating from high school, married Kelly Coan. Jay graduated from high school in 1976; Jeff will graduate in 1977, and the youngest, Mark, will graduate in 1979.

Jack served four years with the United States Navy. After his discharge, he attended Milford Trade School, studying electronics. During this time, he married Jean Bostelman from Deshler. Upon graduating, he and Jean went to Florida. Jack worked at the Space Center, then called Cape Canaveral. Jack now lives in Dallas, Texas and has his own business. He represents different manufacturers, selling their products. Jack and Jean have one son, Daniel Jack.

Marilyn married James Noonan; they live in Lincoln. Jim has worked for the Burlington Railroad since he was a teenager. A few years ago, Marilyn decided that she wanted to be a nurse. She took a one-year course designed to train young mothers. She graduated as a Licensed Practical Nurse. She worked at Bryan Memorial Hospital for a couple of years. She now works as an assistant in a doctors office. Marilyn and Jim have four children: Michael, Kelly, Karrie and Becky. Michael will graduate from Southeast this June.

After graduating from Southeast High School, Fred enlisted in the Navy for four years. After his discharge, he started selling Kirby Vacuum Cleaners. He later worked for the National Cash Register Company selling cash registers. After his marriage to Sondra Wallace, he went back to selling Kirby Vacuum Cleaners. He now owns the Kirby franchise in Lincoln and the surrounding area. Fred and Sondra have three children: Heidi, Rachelle and Blaine. Fred lives in Lincoln.
Judy went to the University of Nebraska one year. She then married Wayne Thalkin and moved to r.Athens, Ohio where she continued her schooling. She graduated from Ohio University and began teaching, Wayne was transferred to California. Since the requirements are higher in California, for teaching, she has continued her education. Judy is now a director in a Day Care Pre-school. She hopes to teach after her children are older. She has Laura, age six, and Steven, age three.

I met Harold Schlichtemeier at the Kramer Hall through Drama Club. Our first date was the night of my graduation from Crete High School We were married August 30, 1935 at the Kramer Lutheran Church Parsonage at 1:00 p.m. Myrna Daiton and Ernest Thalman stood up for us. We went to Kansas on our honeymoon trip to visit with Harold's aunt and uncle. Harold had a 1929 Chevy Coupe for a car.

During the winter, we lived with Harold's folks and March 11 moved to a farm one mile north, three miles east of Kramer Church. We lived there for twenty years. That first spring, Grandpa Schlichtemeier gave us a team of horses and Harold bought one team, so we had four horses to start farming. Granddaddy Hollman gave us a cow with a calf and Grandpa Schlichtemeier gave us two milk cows. We bought some machinery from the people that lived on the farm before us and paid them $100.00, and borrowed the rest of our machinery from Grandpa Schlichtemeier; he also gave us some hens and bought for us 30 chicks. Harold and I borrowed money to buy a woodburning cook stove and bedroom set. We bought eight chairs for .50 cents each, and a kitchen table for $1.00. Grandma Schlichtemeier gave us a round oak table for the dining room and a leather couch she didn't want.

During the first years, we would milk cows for a week and sold it for .90¢, and of course we bought a week's worth of groceries. Eggs were 8¢ to 15¢ a dozen---coffee, 12-13¢ a lb,

Harold and I first saw mountains in 1947 when we went with some neighbors on a trip in their new 1947 Studebaker; and in 1949, we went to Yellowstone Park for seven days, the trip costing less than $200.00 for lodging and gas.

Elaine was born in the year 1938 in Crete at Aunt Gertrude's house, and Ruth was born in 1942 in the house on this farm. Elaine started school in District 16 until the third grade and then both girls started parochial school. They were confirmed and attended Crete High School.

In January, 1956, we moved to a farm one-half mile west and gave $500.00 cash rent for 160 acres. Elaine attended Lincoln School of Commerce Secretarial School and worked for State Farm Insurance Company.

She married Leon Keller, June, 1957, and they have four children and live on a farm north of Crete .

Ruth worked for Sack Lumber Co. while going to high school and the summer after, then for Dana F. Cole and Co., a C.P.A. firm in Lincoln. She attended school in Minneapolis, Minnesota and began working for Dr. Robert Grant, a pediatrician in Lincoln. She married Lawrence Ourecky of Wilber in 1961 and they live near Wilber on a farm. Ruth and Lawrence have two children.

January, 1974, Harold and I had a farm sale and bought a home with two lots in Crete, our present residence. I'm working for Crete Schools in the cafeteria and Dad works part-time at the Co-Op Elevator in Kramer. We are presently driving a 1973 Chevy and gas is .59¢ a gallon.

I was born January 15, 1920, near Kramer and graduated from Crete High School in 1938. I met Clarence Freye of Martell. He was a graduate of the Central Rural High School in 1939 and was in the Navy from September, 1942 to December, 1945---a World War II veteran. We were married December 15, 1945, in the church parsonage at 4:00 in the afternoon. Jack Hollman and Judy stood up for us. We had supper at Mom and Dad's in Martell; Clarence's folks and sister were there. We went to Pla-Mor Ballroom that night with Jack and Judy and we had our honeymoon in Lincoln at the Capital Hotel for two or three days.

Clarence and I lived for ten months at the telephone office which we managed. October 1, 1946, we moved to Emil Betten's farm south of Centerville Station, where Roger was born six weeks later. Roger was the first boy born at this farm fifty years after Emil Betten was born. During this time, Clarence owned his own truck and did trucking and farmed with his dad. Then, in the spring of 1948, he started working as a farm hand for Emil Betten, starting at a salary of $225.00 a month plus rent. This spring Carol was born and we traded the truck for a car. Lynn was also born while living on this farm. Roger and Carol started school at Centerville and also went into Martell after they had divided grades between the school. Then about their fourth and fifth grade years, they went to the Central High School where the school added on more rooms, a kitchen and gym in 1956; this made the school K-12.

In November of 1960, Clarence started working for the Nuclear Power Plant "Shelton Station" for Consumers Public Power, later called Nebraska Public Power. In December of 1960, we bought a house in Martell, two houses south of the Methodist Church.

In the fall of 1963, I started working part-time in the kitchen at Central. Clarence, Lynn and I were janitors at the school. The following year I went full-time. me school has dissolved at Central and all children will attend Crete. As of this writing, in the fall of 1976, I will work at Crete. Lynn has gone into Crete school since the fourth grade and will, I hope, graduate from the new school in 1978.

In 1972, Clarence quit Nebraska Public Power and went to full-time farming, buying his parents farm the following year.

Roger graduated from Central Rural High School in 1965 and from Milford Trade School in 1971. He is a Vietnam veteran serving from April 1966 to 1969, spending one year in Saigon. Roger married Nancy Fisk, September 9, 1972. Nancy is a graduate of Syracuse High School. They have one daughter. Roger works for Crete Mills and they live near Martell.

Carol graduated from Central High School in 1966 and received her Medical Technologist Degree from Lincoln General Hospital in 1972. Carol married Gerald Dunbar, November 22, 1969. Gerald graduated from Taylor High School in 1964. He served in the Vietnam War from March, 1967 to 1969; he graduated from the University of Nebraska Agricultural School in 1972. Carol and Gerald have one child, born 1976, and Tim Sekyra who came to live with them in July of 1975. Lynn is presently attending Crete High School.

Leon, better known as Buck, married Virginia Buhrman and they had four children. Buck was diagnosed as a diabetic in January of 1951. In January, 1954, they moved to York, Nebraska where they opened a sales and service store known as "HOLLMAN'S T.V. AND SERVICE". Buck passed away May 10, 1971.

Dexter, the oldest, is presently in the Marines and is not married. Jacalyn, better known as Jacque, married Lawrence William Stuchlik of Wahoo, Nebraska and they have two children. Jacque and Larry live in Wahoo. Larry works at the Telephone Company and farms. Dixie married Jerry Apitz of McCool Junction, Nebraska. She is a R.P.N. at York Hospital and Jerry works at Norris Public Power District. Julie is at home and Virginia is now working as an accountant in a C.P.A. office in York, Nebraska.

Gerald, known to his family as Jim, was born in Olive Branch Precinct, Kramer, Nebraska on October 17, 1927. He attended Sprague-Martell High School. In January 1945, he joined the Navy during World War II and was discharged July 13, 1946. After the service, he went to DeForrest Training School for electronics in Chicago for over 80 weeks. He went into television service business in Kearney in 1953. Gerald married Rosalee, July 12, 1954 in Grand Island, Nebraska. Rosalee was born in Kearney and graduated from Kearney High School in 1950. She married Raymond Max Dubbs and they had a son, Daniel Raymond, born September 12, 1951, in Kearney. In 1953, they were divorced.

Gerald and Rosalee had three children: Gregory Kent, 1955; David Lee, 1956; and Laurie Denise, 1957. In 1962, they moved to Boulder, Colorado. Daniel graduated from Fairview High in 1970 at Boulder, and in August of 1972 married Dyana Theiss. They had a son in 1974 and were divorced in 1975. In October, 1960, Gregory had heart surgery in Denver at the Children’s Hospital. He graduated from Fairview High School in Boulder in 1973. In 1975 he started the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley. David graduated from Fairview High School in 1975, and Laurie also graduated from Fairview High School in 1976.

Elmer grew up in Martell, Nebraska and later served in the U.S. Army from 1951-1954. The time from May, 1951 to May, 1952 was spent in Korea with the Second Infantry Division.

Elmer married Emma Schoonover on October 15, 1952 and they lived in Martell, Nebraska most of their lives. They had four children: Debra Lee, 1955, who married Clyde Reddish and lives in Lincoln and has two children; Steven Lynn, 1959; Kristy Sue, 1962; and Todd Alan, 1966.