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R. O., the fourth child of Jacob Schlichenmayer and Christina Breitling, grew up on the Schlichenmayer home place in 1903. "Sport" was frequently involved in the usual boy games including his favorite baseball. They played on several different diamonds; one was near the present Ruben Meyer place, another was on his brother Bill's place, a third was at the Daffer place north of Stratton. As he grew older another summer occupation was helping his Uncle Fred Schlichenmayer on a threshing crew that traveled throughout the settlement area. Anna the second child of Martin and Lydia (Schmidke) Weiss also grew up on the family farm and went to school just "down over" the hill. School included the usual "3 R's" that was made more enjoyable when they had "cyphering " contests. During recess and dinner time the girls played baseball, basketball and a winter sport called "Fox and Goose". Another pastime included playing "Jacks" but they used stones instead of rubber balls. A favorite family or school outing was to go to the dunes and arrowhead hunt. Another good place to arrowhead hunt was the "blowouts" that grew rapidly during the 1920's and again in the 1950's. After leaving school Anna had her first job away form home working and living at Mr. and Mrs. Harvey Woods. Sport and Anna met at a "crowd"; these were
gatherings held on Sunday nights at different homes where singing, guitar
playing, and the like was enjoyed. Sport was the proud owner of a
blue Chevy Roadster at the time and he still had the same car on their
wedding day of 29 June 1935.
Sport began farming with horses and later added an Oliver tractor which he bought from his brother-in-law Herman Adolf. He later purchased Internationals owning both an "M" and an "H". Sport quit farming with the help of "horse power" when Page of a team called Dick and Page died. Page's death was a very difficult time for two small boys Lee and Ray. The next years were spent raising children through both good and bad times including the "dirty 50's " and the bad grasshopper years in the early 60's. Sport took special pride in his fine Hereford cattle for many years. He also enjoyed his dairy herd, of which he could say that, there wasn't one of them that he couldn't sit down and milk without benefit of stanchion or hobbles. The children began to leave home to marry and raise their own families in 1956 when "Gerry" was married followed by the rest of the children. Sport continued farming and enjoyed his grandchildren until his death on the 20th of May 1977. Anna continues to live in her home where she does many crafts but takes special pride in her quilts. She has made special quilts for all her children and is presently making one for each of her grandchildren as they graduate. |