Childhood Memories by Ginny Hertzler

I will be writing some of my mother-in-law's memories in my blog. She is married to Truman Hertzler. I will type as she speaks.

As I was growing up I always remembered my grandparents living at the other end of our house. I spent alot of time with them and they were always very kind to me. My grandfather raised dogs to sell and some of the dogs were shipped in boxes that he made and were sent by train to many places, including Maine. He raised big black Newfoundland dogs and English Shepherds. The nation was recovering from The Great Depression and my grandparents experienced a major financial loss. Raising dogs helped with their finances. I also remember him raising rabbits for the use of their fur.


When I was five years old, (1938) he gave me one of his little, cute English Shepherd puppies. He specifically told me this was my dog to care for, but I was to share him with my older brothers, Milford and Ollie, and my sister, Miriam. This dog gave me lots of joy and playtime. I would take this dog with me and walk out the farm lane and wait for my brothers and sister to come home from school, and then we would walk in the lane together.

On one particular day, I think I left early to meet my brothers and sister, and after waiting awhile, I decided to start walking to school with my puppy. I just had a string for a leash. As we were walking on the main highway, the puppy would stop each time a car came and I was so afraid someone would stop and pick us up. But I kept going, thinking that I would soon meet them.

I walked the whole way to school. It would have been almost a mile. I knocked on the school door and when the teacher came and saw I had a puppy, she asked my older brother, Milford, to tie the puppy to a post. The puppy barked so much, disrupting her classes, that she asked Milford to put the puppy in the coal shed, farther away from the school building. I went inside and listened to the school children recite their lessons.

All the children were happy to see the puppy as they left school. He was now black from being in the coal shed. I walked home with my brothers and sister. I don't have any memory of what my mother might have said to me but I was sure glad to be home.