HARD TIMES FOR THE CLARKS

We had been married about 2 years, and decided to move to Hillsboro, Oregon. Before that we had been in Sweet Home, Oregon where Bob started the learning process to be a baker while working with my dad in his bakery. We found out that he could go to work in Portland in an apprentice position in a bakery under the G.I. Bill, and draw a small salary while learning. This sounded good to us, and we decided to take a chance on it. We were so poor that we had no funds in the bank, and had to be very careful to make it from pay day to pay day. Being right after the war, there were no houses or apartments to rent, so we decided to see if we could buy one. We found this little tiny "chicken coop" of a house, so we sold our old car to make the down payment. The seller of the house was going to carry the papers, and told us that our payment would be $145 per month, plus a percentage per annum. Both Bob and I thought that percentage was once a year on the balance. Ha ! It was every month on top of the $145. I can remember crying the first month when I took the payment to the landlord and he advised me that I owed another $40. He was a kind man and waited until we could scrape that $40 together.

Bob was working 30 miles away in Portland and we had no car, so he had to ride the bus to and from work each day. In our house we had an unfinished kitchen with a sink and one cupboard in it. There was no cabinet below the sink. I got some material and hung a skirt around it so that it was not open for all to see. There was linoleum on the front room floor, and a little tin stove in that room. It gave very little heat.

We had lost a full term child our first year while we were in Sweet Home. Now we were expecting another child and this house was certainly not a good place to be. Some friends had an 8 x 10 rug and gave us that to cover the floor. We had an antique electric stove that we had previously purchased, but the house was not wired for 220, so we could not use it. Friends had a 3 burner gas stove that we were using. I was working for the gas company, and when we got enough money to bring in the 220 wire so we could use our electric stove I nearly lost my job with the gas company. They felt I should have been faithful to the gas company.

Pretty soon we were able to scrape together enough to buy an old Hudson car, and were we ever proud. We had only had it a couple of days when we went to pick up our friends Glenn and Liz to take them for a ride. When we were taking them home, some kids crossed the highway and hit us, turning the car over on its side. I was hysterical because I was so afraid I would lose this baby too. Liz was also pregnant and had a bad bump on the head. I had a broken arm, but was OK otherwise. Now we are again without a car.

In January our beautiful little daughter Linda was born and only a week or less after that, the bakery that Bob was working for laid him off. business dropped suddenly after Christmas and they didn't feel they needed him. Times were tough ! Bob's Dad had an old oil heater stored in a shed at their house and brought it over for us to have some good heat to keep the baby warm.

Eventually Bob did find some work and we were able to save enough to buy a refrigerator to keep Linda's milk cold. I had no washing machine so each day would fill up the wash tub and with a scrub board would do the daily diapers and hang them out on the line to dry. After about 3 months of that my sweet aunt Agnes came over one day and was shocked to see me washing on a scrub board. She said she had an old ringer washer in storage and would get it out and give it to me. What a blessing that was !

Not too long after that Bob went back into the Navy because the Korean War was on, and he felt he would be drafted. He had been in the Navy Air and wanted to get back into that. Things went some better after that for this family. We knew what it was to be poor, and always appreciated what we had when things got better for us.