Growing Up in Williamsport, Ohio

Walking to Williamsport’s Commercial Area (Uptown in other words)
 
One advantage of living in a small town in the 40s and 50s was that we could walk everywhere. Mama would let Betty and me walk down to the alley and back, past Bertha and Sam Jones’ house. They probably got a kick out of seeing us on our little walks. Sam often sat on his screened in back porch and always spoke to us. They were single brother and sister retired teachers. Sam had “dropsy”. Bertha had a little car that she tooled around in. 
 
The post office was located across the alley from the Christian Church at that time. It was small and looked like a little western jail with Claude Crabill behind the bars to hand out our mail. He had a wooden leg, probably from his military service. The mail came in twice a day, so my mother let Betty and me venture uptown to pick up ours and the Jones’s mail. My mother never went walking uptown so we were thrilled to be out on our own.
 
My mother also sent us to the grocery store, sometimes more than once a day if she forgot something. We hated that but we loved seeing Archie and Bernice Rawlinson at the IGA store. Archie was a trickster and he and Bernice were always joking and laughing about something. The same was true for The Red and White Store. “Bus” Whitten and Ray and Rose Horch were equally fun.
 
I was in the Hardware Store many times for small household repair items. Of course, they were all in small drawers behind the counter and had to be taken out and displayed by Ray Ulm. Ray was quiet and seemed shy. He looked like the male in the “American Gothic” painting by Grant Wood. That is not meant to be pejorative.
 
Harold “Red” Fry owned the drugstore. Betty and I often stopped there on our way to school to buy pencils, tablets and cough drops. All of these merchants were kind and pleasant people.
 
As shocking as this seems, what is now the post office in Williamsport was a movie theatre. The fact is, Williamsport had pretty much everything that big towns have. I saw “Bambi” there after it came out. 
 
My sister Jean, who was always the first to get new-fangled things, also got lice there. And she gave them to us. We had long hair and smelled like kerosene for weeks. Mama combed our hair with a fine-tooth comb until our scalps hurt. My mother was ruthless with a comb! She pulled our pigtails so tight, it’s a wonder our eyes didn’t pop out.

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