Growing Up in Williamsport, Ohio

A Little Bit of Genealogy and a Little Bit of Halloween
 
When I was growing up, my younger sister Betty and I never went Trick or Treating. We stayed at home and passed out the treats. We grew small kernel, white popcorn in our garden. We popped it and put it into little bags that we had gotten from Archie Rawlinson’s IGA Store.
 
The popcorn was from seeds grown by my grandparents in Cordell, Kentucky. Isaac and Frances Fyffe Skaggs lived on Route 32 in a big white house. It had a truck patch in front of it where he grew sweet potatoes that he said were as big as his arm. He was a big man so they must have been pretty big. He grew popcorn there too. He actually died in the barn on his property while sorting corn seeds for the next year’s planting.
 
Anyway, my Dad enjoyed all of the hoopla of Halloween and helped greet the revelers at the door. One year, one of the tricksters pushed past my Dad and came into our living room. He was wearing a mask and shocked us, including my Dad. When he removed his mask, it turned out to be “Shorty” Hooks who worked with him. We all laughed with a sigh of relief. He had pulled one over on my Dad! Those of you who knew my Dad can hear him laughing about it now.
 
In those days, we got our windows soaped with Bon Ami every year. And my brother Bob was out with his friends turning the townspeoples' out houses over and denying it the day after.

©Marilyn Francis Ferguson 2020
Photography/graphics by Michele Ferguson Schuck