Micro-Memoir 1969 Concord Arrival

 

Present day view of  corn field looking north along County road 11

                                   This was the field in which I tasted corn.

Part I

It was July 20, 1969 (55 years ago) that I, along with grandparents, moved into Elkhart County. We lived in a mobile home beside the Cable Line Meat Market on county road 26 of Cable line monster legend.

   I set out upon bicycle to find Concord Junior High School as I knew that would be the school I would attend upon school start.

   While riding my bicycle eastward from the Meat Market and having run into other bicyclists of the area, in general introductory conversation, I was told the story of the Cable Line monster and shown the precise tree at the precise corner of legend, intersection of County roads 26 and11. My new conversationalists identified the tree, with the bark-absent image of a man, which one had to use abundant imagination so as to grasp. I did my best to appear convinced of this legend. In fact, I too would use the legend as a means of entertaining new arrivals at the trailer court in which I lived.

   But, my new conversationists, detecting my naivety, asked me to try some corn in the nearby field and tell them what I thought of the flavor. We rested our bikes off the road, stepped into a corn field and I proceeded to grasp an ear and remove the husks. Now, as  kid from  Detroit Michigan, having never been around farm culture, I knew some kind of prank was probably in play but I played along anyway. I was invited to bite into the corn cob and taste the kernels.

Asked what I thought of local farm product, I said, with my best spirit of congeniality, “Tastey.” To which they snickered and then explained that it was field corn grown for animals. Attempting to maintain my self-confident composure, I replied “ Animals around here must have well-developed tastes”.

That was my first experience with folk in Elkhart County.

I ventured on toward discovery of Concord Junior High. Arriving at county road 13, I rolled my bicycle left, as directed by afore mentioned conversationalists, and eventually rolled upon a campus of three buildings. There was the two-story building which I was told housed the principal’s office, the three-story building, closest to intersection of Mishawaka road and county road 13, and the gymnasium building. The windows all along the corridor of the gymnasium building seemed inviting and so I parked my bike on the sidewalk and entered the building. Custodial folk where busy refinishing floors. They allowed me to enter the gym. I was impressed at such a gymnasium. I still remember the thick aroma of a recently refinished wood floor. That wood floor glistened and reflected light from the large rows of windows on either side of the gym and set high adjacent to ceiling.

And then I rode my bike back home, stopping into the meat market to get a Pepsi from the top-load vending machine which sat close to the meat display refrigerators.

I considered it an adventurous day.

Part II

Later that summer, on the first day of school, waiting for the bus to stop and pick me up, another new experience occurred, the area was dense with fog. I waited beside the old Meat Market sign, which, as I remember, had an S and H Green Stamps logo suspended, I heard a quickly paced rhythm of “click-clock, click-clock” approaching. I knew it was not the sound of a bus. I waited, attentive to what might appear out of the thick fog. Emerging from the fog, traveling east, was first the head of a horse, followed by the full body. Then followed a black buggy driven by a fellow dressed in black. I watched as the buggy drove past me and then it vanished as ghostly as it had appeared, the rhythm of the hoofs of the horse fading audibly as well as visually.

Mr. Stickle, bus driver, welcomed me to his bus route, which traveled eastward on CR 26, then turned into Miller’s Rolling Acres, picking up, as best I can remember, Tom Sisk, Jeff Blackburn, Judy Weaver, and others. The bus then continued eastward until CR 13 at which it turned toward the junior high.

My two years, eighth and ninth grades, at that school before moving up to the high school, are very fondly remembered. Too many memories to go into…but for sure, adventurous!