Week 28 - Parents

I am the daughter of Bertha Melaine Reppel and Eli Fount Gates. Both of my parents were born in Arizona.

My mother Bertha Melaine Reppel was the daughter of Bertha McDowell and Robert Leo Reppel. My grandmother, Bertha McDowell Reppel was born in Greenland, Colorado in 1906. My grandfather, Robert Leo Reppel was born in Mussig, France in 1900. They met it in Gunnison, Colorado where they were both students at Western State College.

Mom was named after her Grandmothers. Her maternal grandmother was Bertha Knowles McDowell a native of Colorado. Her paternal grandmother was Melanie Breitel Reppel, an Alsatian born in the village of Saint-Hippolyte.

According to her birth certificate, Mom was the third generation Bertha, but except for official documents she has always been called Melaine. Melaine is a beautiful and unusual name. You may notice that her name is spelled differently than her grandmothers. Perhaps Papa Reppel couldn't spell, or perhaps Melanie spoken in his Alsatian accented English sounded like Melaine.

My maternal grandparents were married in 1926 and soon after left Colorado by train. The money ran out in Arizona. They settled in Phoenix and soon had enough money to buy land. My mother's childhood home was on McDowell road and 34th street in what was then called Creighton. She attended local schools, but being a child of the depression, my grandparents would leave their home and move to where ever work was available. So her education also included schools in Tombstone and Miami. Her family moved to Mexico for a year, although Mom stayed in Arizona that year. She graduated from North Phoenix High School. In 1947 she attended the University of Denver for a year before returning to Phoenix and returning to school at Arizona State College (now ASU). My mother has written extensively about her childhood. When time permits, I will incorporate her life story as an attachment to this post.

My father Eli Fount Gates was the son of Maude Gertrude Powell and Herbert Ellis Gates. My grandmother, Maude was born in Collinsville, Illinois in 1904. Maude moved to Arizona in 1922 to attend Tempe Normal School.

My grandfather, Herb was born in Atascosa County, Texas in a small ranching community. His family moved to Kyrene, Arizona in 1918. The met when Maude took a teaching job for Kyrene Elementary School. They were married in December 1924.

My dad, born in Chandler, Arizona in Feb, 1926 was named after his paternal Grandfather, Eli Fountain Gates, who was known as Fount.

My father was educated in Arizona. He graduated from Kyrene Elementary school in 1940. He graduated from Tempe High School in 1944. He attended Colorado Agriculture and Mechanical College (now CSU) from 1 year before returning home to work on the family dairy farm.

My dad with the help of my sister Shirley has written about his family and early childhood. I will link his story as an attachment to this post.

My parents met at the Tempe Wesley Foundation - a program at the Tempe Methodist Church for Christian collage age adults. After a short courtship, my parent fell in love.

On May 28th, 1948 they were married at the Creighton Methodist Church in Phoenix, Arizona.

My parents had a lot in common. They were the eldest of three children in their respective families. They were both members of the Methodist church. They had both spent a year attending college in Colorado before returning to Arizona. Both of their mothers were well educated working women.

My father was very supportive of my mother's desire to become a school teacher. After giving birth to 4 children, she returned to school and obtained her B.S. in elementary education from ASU. She later obtained her M.S. After many years teaching in the Roosevelt School District she became a school administrator and worked as the vice principal for many years before taking early retirement. In her spare time she also was a 4-H leader and sang in her church choir.

My father worked on the family dairy farm. My uncle Bill was in charge of the animals and my dad was in charge of the mechanical equipment. Somewhere along the line Daddy became interested in "Junk". Much of the unused desert land surrounding the dairy slowly and surely became covered by junk car and trucks. He bought himself a baler and the cars would be crushed into square bales and then sold. After the family dairy business was sold, the junk yard business evolved into Gila Recycling.

Dad also had a few other small business ventures. He started a Napa auto parts store and a generator and alternator rebuilding business. Besides his business ventures, he served on the Kyrene School board for 16 years, was a 4-H leader and the Democratic precinct committee chairman for many years.

After 26 years of marriage my parents divorced. They were able to be civil and respectful of each other after the divorce and that says alot. Like most parents, mine weren't perfect. We had some ups and downs and the years just prior to their divorce were particularly hard for me as I was approaching adulthood. One thing was also certain, my parents loved me and would support me no matter what.

My folks both remarried. Mom married Andrew "Andy" Corrao. Dad married Alma Cowen Morgan and became a step father to her daughter Carla Morgan. They welcomed the arrival of a son Patrick Thomas in 1977 although they were a bit surprised when they first learned of his conception.

My dad is now gone from this world. In 2005 he left his earthly body behind and went to join his maker. Alma and Carla have both joined him. I still miss them all.

My mom is going strong - She may outlive me. She recenty had this five generation picture taken.

Week 27 - Cars and Transport

My family lived out in the country. A car was essential a link to society. My parents were Ford people. So most of the cars that spent time in our driveway were Fords.

The first car I remember was a green 56 Ford sedan. I hunted the Internet looking for a picture that came close to the family car. This was the closest I could find. Sometime in the early 1960s, my family bought a new car, a Ford station wagon that mom used to drive back and forth to work and to haul all us kids around. I have no clue what the color of it was, perhaps a light blue. In any case, the green sedan became my Dad's car.

Living in Phoenix, summer time temperatures get mighty hot. My parents took the station wagon into Phoenix and had an after market air conditioning unit installed. It sat under the dash in the middle of the front. It wasn't near as efficient as today's factory installed air conditioning. I believe most of the cars my parents bought after that came with factory installed air conditioning.

The farm was just under a mile from our house. The Gates' boys were expected to work on the farm from a fairly young age; my brother "Gatesy" and my cousin Herbie drove tractors in the fields and ran the farm equipment necessary to harvest the alfalfa and make hay. I can still picture them picking up the bales of hay and loading them onto a wagon.  When his legs were just long enough to reach the pedals, my brother was given an old pick-up to drive back and forth to the "ranch". Technically we wasn't old enough to drive on the public roads; but the road between our house and the farm was dirt with little traffic. My mom was very happy about it, but Daddy had the final saw on Gatesy's truck.

When my oldest sister Elaine got her driver's license, she was given the old 56 Ford Sedan to drive. When she was a senior in high school, she and my sister Shirley drove the car back and forth to school. One day they were turning a corner and the passengers door flew open. This was in the days before seat belts. We were lucky that Shirley didn't fall out. Later on Dad bought a used car for Elaine, it was a blue Ford Fairlane. One day Elaine had a small fender bender with the car. Dad replaced the front panel with one from a wrecked red Fairlane. The car stayed two toned for many years.

When I got my drivers license many years later, the two toned Fairlane became my car. The first day I drove it to school, I was pulled over by a police officer. As I pulled out my temporary driver's license, the office made a comment about my driving skills - or perhaps the lack there of.

My boyfriend Van was embarrassed to be seen in the car. One Christmas he took it Fairlaine to Earl Scheib's and had it repainted in a metallic blue for $ 99.95.

When I graduated from high school my parents bought me a brand new 1972 Chevy Malibu. It was the prettiest copper exterior and cream colored interior. I loved that car. Unfortunately I totaled the car while I was in Monterrey, California. The car and I took a slight tumble down an embankment.

I was young and stupid. My parents had paid for the insurance. The didn't pay for collision, only liability. This taught me 2 very valuable lessions - the value of good insurance and the value of a good vehicle. I was without a vehicle of my own for several years.

In 1975 I was stationed at Fort Meade, Maryland. My husband and I were living in an apartment in Glen Burnie, MD. Bruce was working on the base, I was working offsite at an annex located near the Baltimore-Washington airport. Since we only had 1 car, Bruce took the car to the base and I caught a ride to work with two office mates who lived near by. It worked out well until they were discharges and I had to find another ride.

So I started riding with another office mate. One snowy winter morning, I must have been a few minutes late. I waited outside in the cold for the longest time and my ride didn't show. When I called to find out what was the story, he said he came by and I wasn't there so he left.  I was so pissed and I realized that I coudn't count on other people to get me to work. So from then on Bruce would drive me to work and then head south to the base. When I finished work, I would catch the bus from the annex to the base where I would meet up with Bruce for the drive home.