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Memories of Golde Dicks Markham (1996) Golde Markham Dicks 71/125

The program was already in progress when Mabie and I entered the church. Every­
body turned around and stared at us. They iknew we had crossed that creek to get there but

wondered how we got through it. I didn’t pay attention to the program that night because I
was too worried about the return trip—floating back across that creek.
To this day, I think about that buggy floating across Rose Creek, and I can feel the
swaying motion. I was so afraid that we were going to turn over!

Uncle Webb, Grandma Dicks’s brother, visited1 us quite often and stayed for several
months. One particular summer while he stayed with us, one of our neighbors, Charlie
Pearce’s wife, Thena, took bad sick. Charlie and his wife were pretty old. He is the one who

made Clarence’s burial box.
Mr. Pearce stayed up at night with his sick wife even though he was frail and worn
out. Ma and Pa started going over there every night to take care of Mrs. Pearce and give him
some relief. They left Tribble, Emerald, and me with Uncle Webb.

He’d sit on the front porch in one of the rocking chairs, and we three would sit on the
floor around his chair while he told us scary stories. Once he asked us if we knew the correct
name for a possum and how to spell it. He said when Noah let the animals off the ark after

the forty days and nights of rain, he named the animals as they went out the ark door. He
named the cows, hogs, chickens, bears, and so forth. Remember, there was a male and a
female pair of everything.
Along came this pair of animals, and Noah, couldn’t think of a name, so he was stand­

ing there saying, “Oh, oh, oh,... possum.” So that’s how they got their name.
Uncle Webb itold us scary stories until it was bedtime. The bedroom was where the
bathroom is now, and that’s where Uncle Webb slept. We kids would be so scared that we’d

all pile into the bed with him. He just laughed and didn’t say a word. We—or at least I—felt
safe being in bed with Great Uncle Webb Gillen.
Ma,got so aggravated with Uncle Webb because he had a mustache, and she didn’t

like him drinking out of her cups, glasses, and especially drinking from the water dipper.
On days when we were in school, Uncle Webb took the gun down to Hagen Lake to
kill a pond scoggen—that’s what we called them. Pond scoggens are long-legged birds that

catch fish and eat them. He poured boiling water over the bird in Ma’s only dishpan that she
used to wash her dishes, then he cut that bird up and cooked it in one of her best pots. The
kitchen smelled like fish!

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