March Droppings

DROPPINGS FROM THE BARNICLES

Volume VII, Number 3, March, 2008
THE END OF A GENERATION
Aunt Alma died this past week and with her my Dad’s generation. Alma was married to Uncle Al, Dad’s younger brother. Grandpa Robert Barnicle was born on March 13th 1861 in the village of Arreton on the Isle of White. Alma died on St. Patrick’s Day, 148 years and four days later. I tell Grandpa’s story in www.BarnicleFarms.com > WHAT A LIFE … > Chapter I, pages 21-23. It is a good story. I won’t repeat it but has to do with my last name and my first name also.
Grandpa was orphaned and apprenticed to a saddle maker who he didn’t like. He ran away and at 18 he signed onto a French cargo ship on which he crewed for the next 12 years. He jumped ship in New York and was hitchhiking around the world when he met Grandma Mae in Dubuque, Iowa. They were married on March 31st, 1891 and moved to St. Louis in 1892 where he opened a saddle and harness business and raised nine children.
Robert was baptized Anglican and became a Catholic when he married Mae but his religion was anchored in the works of Charles Dickens. He must have read most of Dickens’ 30 novels and 28 short stories in the years he sailed the world. He was a big man but a very gentle man. Dad told me he never remembered him even raising his voice to one of his children. Every night Grandpa would sit in the hallway between the two dorm rooms (five girls in the room to the right and four boys in the room to the left) on the third floor of their house on Julian Avenue and read Dickens to his kids until they fell asleep. All nine have Dickens names. Dad is named Edwin after Edwin Drood from the book The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Although I have gone all my life under my second name, I’m a junior, hence an Edwin. My sister is named after our aunt Dorrit. Dickens wrote a book called Little Dorrit.
I read Great Expectations, my first Dickens novel, in high school,. I remember Pip’s story as if I heard it yesterday. Ten Dickens novels later I am now reading Our Mutual Friend. It takes time but it’s worth the effort. Listen to his description of Reginald Wilfer, a poor clerk:
“So poor a clerk, though having a limited salary and an unlimited family, that he had never yet attained the modest object of his ambitioned: which was, to wear a complete new suit of clothes, hat and boots included, at one time. His black hat was brown before he could afford a coat, his pantaloons were white at the seams and knees before he could buy a pair of boots, his boots had worn out before he could treat himself to new pantaloons, and by the time he worked himself around to the hat again, that shining modern article roofed an ancient ruin of various periods.”
WHAT IS YOUR NAME AND WHAT IS YOUR STORY?
Howard Zinn’s book, A PEOPLES HISTORY OF THE UNITED STATES tells the story of our great country not from academic research or from the proclamations of our politicians or from the books and diaries of our generals and captains of industry. Rather, Zinn wrote his book based on information he gathered from soldiers in the trenches, workers in the factories and the stories passed on from generation to generation in neighborhood community gatherings. It is a wonderful book which should be read by everyone who cares about our country. While reading Zinn’s book I came to a deeper appreciation for my book WHAT A LIFE, WITH MY WIFE, AND MY NEIGHBORS TOO and these monthly DROPPINGS FROM THE BARNICLES. This is the kind of material Zinn uses for his people’s history.
The Internet has opened the door to anyone to write their name and their story in the people’s history. I send these DROPPINGS to my blog (see below) for comments from the world.
Aunt Alma was buried in a quiet ceremony. The family is planning a memorial for Alma and with her passing the generation of Barnicles we now remember in blessing. I hope this DROPPING will be around for future Barnicles to read so their memory stays alive.
Maybe someone will suggest we read a passage from Dickens as part of our memorial.