Easter in Dayton, Ohio, 31 March 1929

I was sad to learn that I would be leaving Miss Goodrow's First Grade because our father had found employment with an exclusive furniture store in Dayton, Ohio.  Our mother was happy to hear the news from our father, that we would be moving from our apartment on Harding St, in Detroit, Michigan to Dayton, Ohio. She explained the geography of the move by showing us a map of Dayton, Ohio, and Dover, Kentucky,  with the Ohio River in between.  Our mother was not so excited about Dayton, Ohio - she confessed that she had never been to Dayton,Ohio - but it was the closeness to Dover, Kentucky, that gave her such happiness. Just a half day drive, she said, from Dayton to Dover, our mother's childhood home - a large successful farm where her father grew beautiful burley tobacco.

And so we moved to Dayton, where we shared our living quarters with the O'Malleys, our father's furniture store friend and coworker from Detroit, and his wife, Catherine. Our new home was a beautiful side by side duplex that had a nice cement porch just right for playing board games like Uncle Wiggley, my favorite story book family.  Uncle Wiggley was how we came to know the little girl who lived on the other side of our duplex. Uncle Wiggley was her board game and she invited me to play it with her.  She went to a special school for crippled children but I loved playing the Uncle Wiggley game with her when she came home from her special school every weekend.

" The O'Malleys have Our bedroom," that's what my sister, Marion told me as we watched the movers bring bed and dresser and other O'Malley things into the other bedroom. I did wonder where our parents would put us. And then a large mattress, fastened into a neat roll with metal clamps was sat down in the sun room right off the living room where we were given lessons in rolling up and unrolling the mattress, along with the sheets and pillows stuck inside. Marion said we were orphans and spent the rest of the day glaring at the O'Malleys whenever they looked toward us.

Then, in a few days, when all of our belongings were put in their proper place, our mother announced that we would be enrolling in our new school; and so we walked with our mother the six or seven blocks up hill (Dayton was very hilly) to a large, sandy colored building - my mother told us it was very magnificent for a school building - where we met with the Principal of the school who, after talking with our mother, escorted us to our school rooms - Miss Mann's First Grade Room, and Mrs.Darling's Second Grade Room. Our mother kissed us good-bye and said she would come for us when school was out and we would walk home together, until we knew the way. I missed Miss Goodrow, especially since I didn't really like Miss Mann,with her straight boyish bob hair cut and pin striped black suit, nothing like Miss Goodrow with her curly strawberry blond hair and frilly dresses with high heel pumps that tapped the floor when she walked around the room.  And so we learned the way to and from school; up hill to school and down hill to our home, a matter of six or seven winding blocks, among beautiful houses  and backyards.  There were no fences allowed in our neighborhood so no scenery was hidden from our view, unlike the yards in Detroit where we had lived until then.

We discovered after a while that we would be having an Easter vacation, Easter being early that year, still in March! There were just a few weeks until Easter Eve and the Easter Rabbit, a story I refused to give up even though my sister Marion ruled out any such a story. My only recourse, didn't I see him?  Didn't I watch while he placed his beautiful blue and red and orange - my favorite color - eggs in our baskets?  And then little duck eggs and chocolate bunnies all from a huge basket on his back? He was a stand up rabbit, bigger than other rabbits because he was born an Easter Rabbit and had to be big enough to carry his gifts to all of us. I knew all this; but my sister was not even listening to me, and so the BIG LIE was born. Early Easter morning, we raced to our baskets sitting side by side on the mantle. Beautiful baskets filled to overflowing, with little farm scenes standing among the chocolate rabbits and marshmallow chicks and thousands of jelly beans strewn crazily everywhere even when there was no more room in the basket. As our mother and father and the O'Malleys watched I announced my Big Lie. I told them I had seen the Easter Rabbit.  I wasn't prepared for their interest. I just thought that seeing the Rabbit was enough. They wanted to know what the Rabbit was wearing! The illustration in my Little Black Sambo book flashed in front of my lying eyes! I mixed up the colors so the Easter Rabbit wouldn't have to wear someone else's clothes (I felt kindly about that). But, then, they - the awful O'Malley's - asked me to tell them again, all about the outfit that the Rabbit was dressed in as he filled our Easter baskets. And so my BIG LIE became bigger because I knew that They Knew. Nevertheless, I once more told the story hoping they hadn't remembered the original description of the Easter Rabbit's clothing. My sister Marion seemed impressed with my story even though she didn't believe it. And that is how it all happened on our first and only Easter in Dayton, Ohio, 31 March, 1929.