January 30, 1963: The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 30, 1963

Cloudy,  I did a big wash and hung some outside. Gerald and Roger went back to Albany for an apartment.  David and Clifton went to Grand Gorge with Gerald's car.   We didn’t hear anything from Doug so he must have gone to Great Lakes Naval Training Station.  Gerald and Roger (Cohn) found a place to live in Latham. 

Comment:  Doug apparently left for the Navy for four years without Twittering, emailing, Facebooking, cell phoning, Blackberrying or even pay-phoning.  Probably did not have access to a phone or the deal was if they did not hear from him, he was gone.  A far cry from today's instantaneous communication.  

Below, Doug and David in a home-made cart with casters. This must be in the early fifities.   They used to push each other all over with this.  Kinda yesterday's version of skateboards or Big Wheels.

 In the background, a 1934 Ford that my father bought From Pinder's in Grand Gorge.  It sat there wrecked for a long time.  It was parked on the dirt road in front of the house and for some reason, ran away down the hill and crashed into a massive tree in the corner of the lot below the barn.  It was totaled and we kids played in it all the time pretending to drive. 

 In the background is the "cross road" that leads to Conesville.  All the empty hay fields and pastures are now grown up with trees.  The lot directly beyond the car is "The Spring Lot" that I've blogged about.  See below.  I remember shooting at deer crossing the spring lot from the front porch of the house with a Savage bolt-action 30-30 with 150 grain bullets.

The foundation to the right of the car is where the two-story "wagon house" stood before we tore it down before it collapsed and,  is where we re-assembled the "chicken house" as a garage.

Take a listen  to "The Spring Lot" by clicking this link....Hubbard Music Mountain: The Spring Lot by Gerry Hubbard, David Hubbard Per...:

The Spring Lot

The “Spring Lot” was three acres out southeast across the road
Beyond the “crik” with minnows, frogs, the barnyard with its loads
Some years we’d plant Sudan Grass, tall, billows, green, in waves
In other years, we planted corn. Between the rows, dark caves


Lairs, from which we’d “hide n’ seek” and hunt for dangerous game
The rustling winds and dank dark earth held fears we couldn’t name
The lot was close and in full view of folks from our front porch
And through the trembling grass or corn, light flickered, as a torch


One day I lay beside the spring in warm and tender sun
And overturned a rock to watch the insects’ frantic run
I pondered their perceptions in a world I couldn’t see
And wondered if their eyes and minds could see that it was “ME”


The “ME” who made the calls about their right to live or die
I thought that this was how we were when looked at through God’s eyes
And then I saw wild strawberries, a sweet and acrid taste
And left that rock turned over, the insects to their fate


I often think if there be gods, they must be like a child
Playing in a “Spring Lot” while we skitter, scared and wild
They’ll never know the why, the what, the wonder of our days
'Cause all they see are strawberries and blithely move away....

The Spring Lot

The “Spring Lot” was three acres out southeast across the road
Beyond the “crik” with minnows, frogs, the barnyard with its loads
Some years we’d plant Sudan Grass, tall, billows, green, in waves
In other years, we planted corn. Between the rows, dark caves

Lairs, from which we’d “hide n’ seek” and hunt for dangerous game
The rustling winds and dank dark earth held fears we couldn’t name
The lot was close and in full view of folks from our front porch
And through the trembling grass or corn, light flickered, as a torch

One day I lay beside the spring in warm and tender sun
And overturned a rock to watch the insects’ frantic run
I pondered their perceptions in a world I couldn’t see
And wondered if their eyes and minds could see that it was “ME”

The “ME” who made the calls about their right to live or die
I thought that this was how we were when looked at through God’s eyes
And then I saw wild strawberries, a sweet and acrid taste
And left that rock turned over, the insects to their fate

I often think if there be gods, they must be like a child
Playing in a “Spring Lot” while we skitter, scared and wild
They’ll never know the why, the what, the wonder of our days
'Cause all they see are strawberries and blithely move away....

January 29, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 29, 1963

Tues  Bright and fair in am cloudy middle of the afternoon -5 to about 20.  Doug met Navy man at the school at 2 P.M. took bus from Oneonta to Albany and stayed all night.  Clifton and I went to Cobleskill by Jefferson and 2 lbs off Churchills. Stopped at Mothers a minute and got car license.  Gerald and and Roger Cohn went to Albany looking for an apartment.

Comment:  Not sure what "2 lbs off Churchills" means.  I and Roger Cohn would start going to SUNY @ Albany to get our 4-year bachelor's degrees.  We were both looking for jobs and I got mine first as a grill man at the now defunct Carroll's Fifteen Cent Hamburger joint near Latham circle.  

When I think about it now, I'm still kinda surprised how hard I had to work, cooking 30 hamburgers at a time, then adding all the stuff, then passing them on for wrapping.  It was hotter than hell in the grill area and the work was just constant as we tried to keep the cooked inventory at a minimum but at the same time quickly meet the demands of the customers for almost instant service when they came in.

The raw hamburgers were in big boxes in stacks of six with waxed paper between each patty. With lots of practice, (after working one shift),  the grill men were able to grab the wax paper by the corner and snap and flip the patty onto the grill in one quick motion, kinda like throwing a frisebee,  and quickly fill the grill with 30 patties.  We would then add 30 split open buns to the other side of the grill to start them toasting, flip the burgers, take the toasted open buns off and place them on a big sheet,  top them with the 30 patties, shoot mustard and ketchup on them from a gun-like device, top them with a pickle, put the top bun on and shove them to a wrapper.

It was constant motion and when we were busy, we did not stop for almost the entire six hour shift.  The busyness was the bad part but there was a good part also.

If there was unsold inventory at closing time, the official policy was to trash it.   Employees could not eat it on site, but unofficially we could divert it on the way to the trash bin. 

When there was not enough inventory to take home the manager, knowing most of the employee's  situations, would usually suggest that I cook up a dozen or so cheeseburgers and a few bags of fries "just in case of a last minute rush" and then Roger and I were supplied for awhile.  Nothing else was ever mentioned about the unsold inventory that had to be disposed of....

January 28, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 28, 1963

Mon Cloudy -3 to 8 above snow squalls and windy till middle of afternoon.  There  was bright sunshine but still windy and cold and drifting snow. No school because roads drifted, boys went to Grand Gorge in the P.M. to get medicine for Dougs cold.  I did some ironing, men spent most of the day getting cars and tractors started and garage shoveled out.  Miserable day.  LaVerne and Roberta here at night a few minutes, took our chain saw to use at the plant. (Timberland Charcoal, Stamford, NY.)

Comment:  LaVerne was the manager of of the charcoal plant and helped me get a job driving tractor trailer for Joe Gallo (an investor in the plant) delivering the charcoal to retail outlets through out New York State, I took some runs into northern Pennsylvania to pick up product from a sister plant there.  I also hauled bark out of the Mechanicville, NY paper mills  I got 8 cents a mile and had to unload the damned stuff and not matter how hard I tried to stay clean, I was black as coal with charcoal dust embedded in every pore after unloading.  The dust was so fine that it would seep through the stitchings on the containers.   I chronicled some of those incidents in a previous blog post:  Click this link to listen:  Hubbard Music Mountain: Truck Driving, By Gerry Hubbard, Performed By Davi...:

January 27, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 27, 1963

Sun about 10” new cloudy windy and snow 18 and squalls in afternoon.  Wayne took us to church picked up Bev, Donna H, Donna Brown and Janette.  Had church and Sunday School at parsonage as heater in church didn’t work at night.  Clifton picked us up after Sunday School.  Boys all went out after dinner.  David and Doug got stuck over the cross road and had to go get trucks to pull them out.  Gerald came back from Mary Anns about 5:30. David stayed at LaVerne’s all night to go with Roberta with mail.

Comment: Another snowy day on the hill.  Not sure who Donna H, Bev, and Janette are.  Below are pictures of 1951 Chevy and 1951 Ford parked facing downhill so if they would not start with the battery,  we could "roll-start" them down the hill.  The Ford had a manual transmission and after popping the clutch, would turn the engine over easily and start.  The Chevy had an automatic and would have to get up to about 18 miles per hour before we pulled it into low.  Because of this, we had to wait till it got to the last, steepest part of the hill before we tried to start it and if it did not start, we were stuck with the car at the bottom of the hill on the level and had to jump start it with the Ford.  This meant walking back up the hill, finding the jumper cables, driving back with the Ford, starting the Chevy, then getting both cars back up the hill ready to go somewhere, probably leaving late for where ever we were heading.

January 26, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 26, 1963

Sat Mostly sunny 18 in am. I washed in am,  hung a line full outside and really dried good.  Didn’t do much in the PM had a headache.  The girls went sleigh riding with Awana at night.  Clifton  and I went to Evelyn's and Clifford's for a few minutes and picked up girls at parsonage.  It started to snow in evening and continued all night.  Gerald called from Mary Ann's and said he wouldn't be home.  Sold 3 cows to Bartholomew's, they picked them up at night.

Comment:  Probably stayed overnight in Gloversville because of the snow.  Rt30A was a nightmare in the winter with heavy drifting snow.  Evelyn and Clifford Taylor lived in Franklington, NY and Clifford ran a general store there for several years.  The picture is of Evelyn and Clifford with Glenn and Barry Taylor in front of the Elmer Hubbard home.  Glenn died of kidney failure when he was 21.  Here is a SongPoemStory about my last ride with him:  Click To Hear:  Hubbard Music Mountain: Last Ride With Glenn Taylor, Gerry Hubbard:

Glen Taylor was a gorgeous kid.  I’ve got a picture where
He’s standing with my brother Doug with big curls in his hair.
He grew up warm and kind and fun and I’m still pissed off today, that He died of kidney failure cause his family couldn't pay.

He drove a Karmen Ghia in the last year of his life,
He was in his early twenties and about to take a wife.
I must have been on army leave when he took me for a ride
In that hot foreign convertible and we both damn nearly died.

We were driving on the fire roads in the hills behind Earl’s lake
When he said “I’ve never seen a curve this baby couldn’t take.
He drove that narrow gravel road at 80 miles per
Then spun the wheel and tapped the brakes and broad slid thru the curve.

Then the dust and gravel flew, tag alders slapped the side
As he hit the gas & straightened out and kept on that wild ride.
He looked at me and flashed a grin, the devil in his eye,
And slyly chuckled as he said, “You think you want to try?”

His last words were “I’ve had it.” his brother Barry said,
As his family and his fiancé were gathered round his bed.
I think if he had had the chance to be with us today,
He’d be lot like Uncle Earle, I remember him that way.

As I remember all these folks in corny line and verse
“Being a lot like Uncle Earle?” You could do a whole lot worse.
So there you have it, it’s all done, a great kid’s come and gone,
That gorgeous child with the great big curl, dead at 21.

January 25, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 25, 1963

Fri Sunny 10 below in the am 10 to 0 at night.  Wayne didn’t have to go to school David and Clifton went to Middleburg after Chimmney Sweep for the big Chimmney which was full.  They cleaned that in the P.M. The water came out of water pipe over kitchen and that had to be fixed. Gerald came home at night.  Clifton,  the girls and I went to LaVerne's and Roberta's at night.

Comment:  Again a frigid day with water leaking from the pipes that froze and were fixed a couple of days ago.  Now the chimney is plugged and probably the wood stoves would not work or would fill the house with smoke.  I must have come home from Cobleskill Ag & Tech and it must be just about graduation time.  This is the chimney in the Hubbard Hill House and it ain't pretty.  The chimney is supported by a 2x12 cantilevered support that's resting on a large hand-hewn beam on the 2nd story floor.  The picture below is a view to the attic where the hot water heater was and probably where the leaking water pipe is.

January 24, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 24, 1963

Thurs Mostly sunny, windy and very cold:   -7 all day,  -12 early in a.m.  Wayne drove to school, only 1/2 day for him.  We didn’t go to prayer meeting because it was so cold.  I finished Carol's dress in evening.  David went to Sandy's for supper.

Comment:  Another frigid day with wind chills probably to minus 30.  Could probably feel cold drafts from most windows and doors.  Probably had to wear several layers to keep warm.  To keep warm in bed, we would fill quart canning jars with hot water, wrap them in newspaper and put them in the beds to cuddle up to.  We never seemed to have rubber hot water bottles.  I remember sleeping in the attic and the snow would be covering the blankets in the morning.  Here is a SongPoemStory I wrote about winter mornings:
Take a listen by clicking this link... Hubbard Music Mountain: Winter Mornings, Gerry Hubbard:

Winter Mornings

Winter Mornings

We boys slept in the attic on that Catskill Mountain Farm
And though the rain and snow blew in it seemed to cause no harm
We’d get up winter mornings, shake the snow off of our beds
Then grab our clothes and run downstairs where that old wood stove was fed

We’d dress as fast as young kids could, we pulled on several layers
And “Sword Of The Lord” from the radio blared out those Baptist prayers
Mom would bake some pancakes, fry up some ham and eggs
Then we brushed our teeth in the kitchen sink from the brushes hung on pegs

The only running water from the hand pump by the sink
We used to wash ourselves and cook and fill the pail to drink
We finally put a bathroom in when I was seventeen
But with ceiling low, you had to squat to get remotely clean

When younger, all us kids would group around the kitchen stove
And huddle with the oven open, as scents of wood smoke wove
All through the house and smells of ham and pancakes filled the air
I close my eyes, recall it all, it’s like I’m standing there

Marilyn fell flat-palmed one time upon that sizzling iron
And burned her hands with blisters while the rest of us looked on
She couldn’t balance, put her hands down several times at least
Till Mother finally grabbed her and salved her hands with grease

Those winter mornings come to me in Ohio winter’s cold
And seem to keep their clarity even as I grow more old
And the fireplace that burns with gas in our modern family room
Seems not as warm as that old stove on that run-down family farm.

January 23, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 23, 1963

Wed Warmer, cloudy, snow starting in the afternoon and contiuned part of night.  6 in evening,  very cold wind came in -12 and windy.  Drifting snow.  I worked on Carols dress in the P.M and evening.  Clifton went to Stamford with Bob Laux in am to see about a job.  I wrote to Marilyn.

Comment:  Wow, minus 12 and very windy.  Sure would hate to take out the manure in that weather.  Barn would have been freezing, tractor and manure spreader would have been parked in the dairy portion so the tractor would start.  The cattle body heat would raise the temp in the dairy portion to about freezing if the doors were kept closed.  The hay mow would have been frigid when we went up to throw down the hay bales.  Probably would have had to jump or roll start the cars and/or trucks.  All in all, probably a pretty miserable day on the farm.  

January 22, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 22, 1963

Tues Cold windy 0 in am 20 in pm.  Doug took our car to Oneonta and took train from there to Albany for a physical and tests for the Navy. They told him a specialist would need to look at his eye.  David, Clifton and I went to Cobleskill and  Mothers for dinner, she had been about sick with cold.

Comment:  Doug's eye was hurt when he and I were hunting woodchucks from my Dad's 1938 Buick.  The car in the picture is a '38 Buick and the rifle is very similar to the one we used:  A pump action with tube magazine.  I drove straight into a tree at about 35 miles per hour while trying to clear the jammed loading tube.  Doug hit his head severely on the metal dash of the car and permanently  injured his eye.  He was ten years old and I was fourteen.  Here is a SongPoemStory I wrote about it.  

Hunting Woodchucks 
Hubbard Music Mountain: Doug I Hunting Woodchucks Talking Blues Gerry Hu...: 

Doug  I Hunting Woodchucks

Doug and I took Dad’s old car out hunting one spring day
To hunt woodchucks with a .22 on the road toward Conesville way
Me fourteen and Doug was ten in a Buick ‘38
An old pump action .22 with the feed tube not quite straight

No air bags, seat belts, padded dash, soft steering wheels back then
Just a metal box and rigid steel, cast iron and plated tin
We started over the “cross” road, the day was bright and still
Turned right by Raymond Goodfellows then on down Fancher’s hill

Doug was fooling with the gun trying to load some shells
As we came up to Bob Cammer’s place, that farm he kept so well
As I looked over toward the gun and turned my head to see
I drove that damned old Buick straight into a big Oak tree

The horn popped out and hit my face, the steering wheel jammed my chest
And Doug bounced off that metal dash, then all just came to rest
Smoke and steam poured from the hood, the motor screaming, rough
Then I reached down and found the key and turned that damned thing off

Alton Brand was driving by and stopped and pulled us out
He said, “ It was the damndest thing I’d seen or thought about.”
“That car was going down the road as straight as straight can be
“It didn’t brake or make a curve, just drove into that tree”

The State Police came out that night to make out their report
Dad had to say I stole that car to keep us out of court
The trooper took me to the porch and said his terse, brusque talk
“The next time you go hunting things, I think you’d better walk”

So at age 14 I’d wrecked a car and hurt my brother’s eyes
And I guess the thing I think about as years and months fly by
Malaria, bike accidents, close calls in cars and trucks
Living long and getting old takes lots and lots of luck.

January 21, 1963: The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 21, 1963

Monday, Partly Cloudy 0 to 10 above  and very windy.  I washed in the am and ironed in the pm.  Paul bought a cow and 2 calves.  Doug and David went to Oneonta and Doug signed up for the Navy.

Comment:  I think the Paul must be Paul Ellis who started working Uncle Earle's farm about a mile west of our farm.  This farm was owned by Elmer Hubbard then Earl Hubbard. Here is a picture of Elmer Hubbard feeding chickens with a view to the east and the dirt road leading to our place.  Also a picture of the house that was used by the family and also for "boarders" from "the city" who would come up and stay for a vacation.  Like many of the farm youths in that area, Doug joined the military to get off the farm as I and Marilyn also did.  I in the Army and Marilyn in the Marines.

January 20, 1963 The Fances Hubbard Diaries

January 20, 1963

Some cloudiness 40 Showered  all day turned cold at night.  Mary Ann, Gerald, LaVerne and Roberta were here for dinner.  Earl and Lillian and Bob were here in afternoon and evening.  David went to Sandy’s at Margretville.

January 19, 1963: The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 19, 1963
I baked in the am and cleaned the house all through the P.M. Had letter from Marilyn. The men cut a load of wood in the am. Went to awana at night rode home with Madalyn Blakesley.

 Awana (derived from the first letters of Approved workmen are not ashamed as taken from 2 Timothy 2:15) is an international evangelical nonprofit organization founded in 1950, headquartered in Streamwood, Illinois. The mission of Awana is to help "churches and parents worldwide raise children and youth to know, love and serveChrist."^[1] Awana is a non-denominational program and licenses its curricula to any church willing to pay for and use the Awana materials consistent with its principles. In addition to its programs for children, Awana has prison ministries.

January 18, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries,

January 18, 1963

Fri Partly Cloudy in am but 40 warm and very little wind.  I washed clothes and hung outside they dried good.  The men finished Davids car, then he and Doug went to Cobleskill in P.M. to return some parts.  Carol and Wayne went to game at night on bus.  Doug and David went out.  Lavilla asked us over to play 42 but I was sort of sick had headache all day and didn’t feel like going.

Comment:  42, also known as Texas 42, is a trick-taking game played with a standard set of double-six dominoes. 42 is often referred to as the "national game of Texas", and continues to be very popular in much of the state.^[1] Tournaments are held in many towns,^[1] and the State Championship tournament is held in Hallettsville the first Saturday of March each year.^[2]

This is about the only game that my mother would play and she loved it.  Probably because it is also the answer to life, the universe and everything.  

In The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, advanced alien beings create a supercomputer, called Deep Thought, to figure out the answer to the so-called Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything. After calculating for 7.5-million years, Deep Thought determined the answer was the number 42.

January 17, 1963 The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 17, 1963

Cloudy and warm 30’s windy in a.m.  Men fixed the garage and worked on David's car.  I wrote to Marilyn.   Went to all day missionary meeting at Lavilla's.  David and Doug went to Cobleskill  about 3:30 after parts for Davids car.  Girls and I went to Leonards (Reynolds?) to prayer meeting.  LaVerne and Roberta were here while we were gone.

Comment:  I think David's car was a 1957 Plymouth Fury similar to the car below.  I remember seeing this car on a winter morning after David had come home from somewhere.    It was in the winter and the roads were very slippery.  That morning the rear of the car sagged very low to the ground.  David had put a concrete guard rail post in the trunk so he could get up the hills out of North Blenheim and the hills up around Earle's pond.

January 16, 1963: The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 16, 1963

Wed Partly Cloudy and Cold -8 to 12 above.  I worked on Sues dress  Clifton,  Doug and David put stove up in garage and boys went to Middleburg after wire and wall board for garage.  Gerald called at night and said he and Mary Ann would be here Sunday for dinner,  David took our car and went to Roxbury.  

Comment:  Wow, another cold day.  I can remember  getting up in the morning in that old house when it was -8 degrees.  I think David was going to Roxbury to see a girl.  
The garage was reconstructed from the old second  barn and chicken house that used to stand behind the big red barn.  This  picture is dated from probably 10 years earlier in 1953.    All five boys and Dad are working on the garage.  From left to right:  LaVerne, David standing behind Wayne, Doug, Gerald, Clifton J.  . 

January 15, 1963: The Frances Hubbard Diaries

January 15, 1963

Tues  Partly cloudy cold 15 high Clifton and I went to Cobleskill and to mothers for dinner.  Survey guys were here in the a.m. about surveying the mountain. Snow squalls at night.

Comment:  New York State was in the process of buying the Hubbard Hill mountain through condemnation proceedings so Dad did not have a choice.  Cannot remember what he was paid for it.  The state had placed a fire tower on the mountain in the late forties and the mountain was quite an attraction for local folks and the "boarders".  One of the problems I remember was that people would walk or drive up through the lot behind the house and would leave the gates open so the cows would get out.  Their vehicles would also leave deep ruts in the field.  Following are some tower pictures and a link to my previous blog about the mountain and tower.

http://gerryhubbard.blogspot.com/2005/03/hubbard-hill-fire-tower_21.html

Swinging In The Barn

I was working around the west end of the barn one day.  It must have been about 1952.  Wayne was about six years old.

Something caused a disturbance and I remember Wayne walking down the road in front of the barn saying over and over “I think I’m going crazy” and he was obviously very distressed.

When we asked him what happened, he said that he had been swinging on the ropes in the barn and on one swing, he had crashed his head into one of the upright beams in the barn.

We used to take the hay ropes and tie them off on one of rafters, then stand on one of the large horizontal beams,  probably about 15 feet high, swing off the beam, arc up then drop into a pile of hay in the mow or stacked on the barn floor.

I remember Wayne being very pale and disoriented for quite a while.  I’ve often wondered if this accident contributed to the rather tortured life he seemed to lead.

Tar Baby

I must have been around three of four years old when I decided to leave Aunt Madeline & Clarence’s and walk home up the hills by Earl’s pond.  They lived in an old converted one-room school house.  Herman Huber lived there after the war.
 
I remember it was a very warm and sunny day and I’m not sure why I was there, probably to get me out of the families hair while they were doing something.

Anyway, the road leading up the hill in front of the house had been recently paved with large stones and asphalt.   The stones used were anywhere from about an inch to 2 inches in diameter which left ample room between the stones for the tar to collect.

I remember walking about halfway up the hill, then sitting down on the road and sticking my fingers into the warm tar and then pulling them out.  I did this for awhile, thoroughly coating my hands, clothes & arms, I even remember tasting it.  Overall I remember it as a quite pleasant experience.  The sun was warm and the hot tar comforting somehow.

Not sure how long I was there before Uncle Earl came driving up the hill.  He stopped and I remember his smiling face as he talked to me.  I remember riding in his car, a green coupe,  and then I remember my mother greeting us laughingly as we arrived at the house.  She was with several other women, the Hubbard aunts, I suppose.  I remember her cleaning me up with a cloth doused in kerosene but little else about the day.
Comment by Susan Hubbard Ciccci:

Gerry,  I’m just getting to read all of your postings.  I remember playing in the tar too, on the hill by the old butternut tree.  The tar would bubble up and the road would be loaded with all of these various sized tar bubbles, and we used to pop them with our fingers, shoes, the tires of the bike.  On time, Danny, Marilyn and Roland were visits from CA., and I think David and Craig were there, as well as John, Chris, Dougie and Jeff, Wayne’s kids: all of the cousins that age, and they got in the tar = DANNY especially, and when they came back to the house, all happy and having a wonderful time – we the family, didn’t think much about the tar being on his shoes and hands, but Roland had a FIT.  But being as experienced as we all were from the hill, kerosene took care of the matter.  J Susan