Vivian Evora Cranswick - Online Memorial Website

My mother’s name was Mary Magdalene, always called “Lena”. Her family came from Sweden with ten of their children in 1902(?) - mother was born right before the journey in 1902, their youngest. One baby had died at one week. Their oldest son had gone ahead to Canada to set up a home for them, then sadly died in a fire at that house! This had been told to me by my mother. I know very little about my father as my parents were divorced when I was about two. I did find out later in searching for my citizenship (dual as born in Canada of American parents)that he too was from an immigrant family, I think of Polish and German descent.

My mother was a young pretty and somewhat mischievous girl of 18 when she met my father. She told me that he was so handsome with great charm, and I am sure he was not ever ready for marriage and fatherhood. She almost starved when she was awaiting my birth, he did not provide at all and by the time I was born the marriage was over, he had no interest at all in his daughter, never would have as it turned out. Mother had to give me over to the care of my grandparents as she had to get to work to support herself and me at whatever a young inexperienced uneducated (8th grade) woman could do in 1922, she was then 20. My grandfather was a strict Pentecostal minister. It must have been hard for him, but he and my grandmother loved me and took good care of me until grandmother passed away when I was five. I believe my grandparents gave me a sense of security that has always stood me in good stead. At five I was sent to live with Aunt Esther (mother’s oldest sister),Uncle Nils and older boy and girl cousins (in Minnesota?). While there I have many memories. Being chased by a mother sheep while trying to get a lamb. Getting pecked by chickens gathering eggs. Being constantly teased by adolescent cousin Signe who probably resented my being there. I remember a huge garden party for all neighbors, and stealing coconut from a basement crock, and most of all the long walks to a country school in a neighbor’s field that I had to pass every morning where I lived in fear of a flock of white geese that would chase me. I did well in school though. When I was in the second grade the teacher advanced me to Grade 3 due to my ability. When I was in the second grade I spent much time with my Aunt Hannah and Uncle Edwin who had eight children and I had much fun there. They were very kind to me. I have great memories of their cozy home, bears tracks in the snow in the mornings, at least by the privy Uncle Edwin had a sawmill and I remember living in or by the woods. In the winter he would take us to school in a covered sleigh with a working stove inside.

I remember the smell there in Northern Minnesota, the Great Lakes area, Post Office Roseau. There were wild strawberries in the spring. The bears came around in the winter.  They would leave their tracks in the snow, and of course the outside privies were pretty scary to use. We did not go outside at night, used under the bed potties! Uncle Edwin had a sawmill, which was how he made his living. He also raised chickens and pigs. Uncle Nils, who had a small farm and many chickens, sheep, pigs and some cattle, was not too kind a man, as I remember. He insisted I drink coffee as all Swedish did. I spoke Swedish until I started school, as did all the children of immigrant families.

Then as always, my mother had to work, she worked as a waitress and as a maid.  It was perhaps 1927-28 when she went to work for Elmer Akre who was widowed with three daughters, a 320 acre wheat farm in the community of Reserve, Montana. The Akre girls were Olive - 13, Alice- 12, and Gladys - 11. For the first time my pretty, peppy and gay Mother had a home, and soon a husband. Even though there was twenty-two years of age difference they were happy together until bad times and illness caused problems in the future. My Mother was 28 and was finally able to send for me, and how I did love that big house, my first home. It was Elmer Akre’s pride and joy. He had it built in the early 20’s. The floors were all hardwood, had two large sun porches on the first floor and one sun porch upstairs. These sun porches served a purpose, insulating living and kitchen areas from the extreme cold and heat, the bedrooms upstairs the same. You could also sleep in them a lot of the year due to screens as well as storm windows. The house had an excellent heating system, a coal furnace (coal room in the good basement), as well as a wine room. To keep food cold we had a dumb-waiter (it was called) where you could lower the food - by ropes. It had a large cistern for water use, not drinking, from snow melt and rain. Once a year we smaller persons (I remember Gladys and I) would be lowered when the water was gone, and it was our job to clean the walls and floor of that cistern.  The back bedroom, as it was called, was Elmer Akre’s original homestead. There were odds and ends, and most of all the wall telephone (two short and one long ring for us), a party line where you could listen in on other people’s conversations, a constant nuisance if you would use the telephone.  Upstairs were located two nice finished bedrooms with big closets as well as two huge unfinished rooms on each side of the stairwell. In these two rooms were trunks and stacks of magazines, a constant source of amusement for me. You did have to be careful not to fall down that stairwell as there was no rail around it. In later times, when Mother, Junior and Ronny came back to live, it was a worry due to Junior’s (Don later) sleep-walking often.

My mother was a meticulous housekeeper who gave a great deal of training to us four girls. She was a great cook too. My memories of her telling much of her early life, all with much laughter, how her father was so strict with her, would lock her in at night. Presume he recognized that he had a rather wild teenager on his hands and was not able to cope well with the last of his children. Her response was to run away with my father!

Anyway, I had a great childhood there in windswept Northeastern Montana. I remember lots of fresh air, walking into the coulees, imagining all sorts of life, much of the time as another person. Gladys was my companion much of that time, but we did lots of chores too, like bringing buckets of water - all uphill - great clear water, for drinking and laundry too. We also had the chore of cleaning sweeping the stalls of the barn as Dad had cows. I never wanted to milk the cows, but Gladys did. Olive left right after graduating from Antelope High School (remember, this was the depression) and there were no possible employment opportunities for young women, or for young men either. And of course there was never a chance of higher education either due to the depression, Alice soon left too to go on to California with her friend, Marion Twedt. Olive found work in Portland doing housework for a wealthy family. Alice, I believe, worked at a number of humble jobs which did not include working in someone’s home, too proud. To get back to me, I was eight and in the third grade now, not too grown up to sit in Dad’s lap where he would read to me from his Norwegian newspaper. It wasn’t long before I could read it myself. He was good to me, as I am sure he had been good to his daughters. He had a lovely playhouse built for them, and did I enjoy that! I had a great imagination, particularly loved paper dolls, most of which came from the Sears & Roebuck catalog. I remember one particular very windy day that all my paper dolls blew away through the windows of the playhouse(open), and I mourned them! Those were good secure days. Gladys and I walked to school, a one- room one, it was about two miles, except in winter’s snow when Dad would take us in the sleigh, horse drawn. Outside of that, both Dad and Mother drove the ‘28 ? sedan.

In 1935 little brother Elmer (later Don) was born - times were so hard. In fact the grasshoppers had eaten everything green in sight. Trees died as well. Then the dust bowl days descended on Montana as well as all of the Midwest - the land literally blew away. By 1936 Dad had by now gotten a ‘35 Ford sedan, loaded us up, and we started out for beautiful Oregon, where Olive met us and got Mom and Dad settled in a small house in Progress. Dad finally had to go to work for the Kosmoski’ s (never forgot that name), a bit hard for him, I am sure. Olive saw to it that Gladys found work, also as a maid. I got settled in living with a nice family in the neighborhood of Grant High school and there I enrolled as a sophomore. By this time I was full of self-loathing (later I found this normal for a teenager!), was chubby, had big “boobs”, which I hated. I was short, about 5’2”, but didn’t really mind that. My nice front teeth were indented so that my straight bottom teeth bit over them, which also was an embarrassment to me. Oh boy. I was a bit serious but soon learned that people would say “what are you mad about?”, so I learned to smile a lot. This was not too hard as I was a sociable person and did make friends. I remember having lots of trouble getting in and out of my locker and would have to ask for help. The people I lived with had a young son, about 10, and it was supposed to be my job to help around the house and with the dishes. I was not happy there and I’m sure it showed, so I imagine they were happy that at the end of the school year I went to live with Mother and Dad in Progress. I wasn’t too happy there either as poverty was now our forte. I was fifteen when brother Ron was born (he later changed his name from Delmar!). Poor Mother was not in good health then and had the two small boys, plus I am sure this troublesome teenager (myself). I did spend this year of school at Beaverton High School where I compared myself to all the pretty and popular girls there. I remember once falling as I stepped down from the school bus, skinning my knees pretty bad and being laughed at by all on the bus. Poor Mother, poor Dad, they too had more than they could handle, plus Mr.Kosmoski gave Dad too much to drink too many times, and this was another problem. Little Don and Ron were plagued with earaches so there were many visits to doctors and bills. They even had their ears lanced, which is what doctors did for children with earaches in those days! Poor little things would have to go outside with either cotton, if the wind was up, would have to have scarf over their heads. All this time Mother was not well. I do not know the year, but presume it was about 1938, Dad gave up and went back to Montana and Olive helped Mom and I and the two little boys move into an apartment, upstairs over the theatre, on S.W. Jefferson St., Portland, Oregon. By this time I was going to Lincoln High School which was then downtown on Broadway. I was still miserable as I suffered with some kind of rash on my hands, which was unsightly and itchy.  I Don’t remember how long we lived in that apartment, but Olive rented us a nice small house in Tualatin. 

The Tualatin house was like heaven after that apartment in Portland. Don was then riding his tricycle all over the house, and finally down the basement steps. He didn’t get hurt, but the next day he fell on the floor! and broke his arm! Also, the druggist’s son asked me out, then later cancelled. This was painful for me as I figured it was because I went to that druggist to get medicine for my eczema (or something) hands. Don’t think I have yet to mention wearing white gloves- which were then fashionable - to cover these embarrassing hands. Misery!! Mom eventually gave up and went back to Montana, I believe in 1938. Mom and little boys went back to the big nice house on that farm. Don and Ron thrived there in the sun and wind, but Mother got sicker and sicker. After going to a doctor she was diagnosed with Tuberculosis - as bad as it gets!  At the same time period I had by then moved in with Olive (poor thing) and took the bus into Portland from the beautiful Dun Thorpe area where she lived and worked as I finished Lincoln High School - thanks to sister Olive. My hope had been, always thinking of myself, to get in to nurses training at Good Samaritan Hospital. When they interviewed me for the four year course they would not accept me due to those infected hands. This was a blow.  I had gone through complete allergy tests up at Oregon Health Sciences University, and had lots of allergies. But staying away from all tested stubstances did no good.  In the meantime, Mother needed to go to a tuberculosis sanitarium in Deer Lodge, Montana and there was no one to come to stay and take care of the little boys.  In those days men did not take charge of work and children as they now do! So in the summer of 1939, after High School, I went back to Montana, being sure that my life was now ruined back there. Mother got better and was sent back home once, don’t know for sure when the date was, but it didn’t work and she had to go back. In those days there was no medication for that disease, just rest and lots of fresh air and good fattening food, milk, eggs, etc.  I stayed there, off and on, for four years. I left Montana when Dad got a housekeeper, and went to Portland.  I got a job with the telephone company in Portland, Oregon. Then I had to leave when Dad’s housekeeper would not stay longer. As I remember, I moved back and forth from Portland and Montana several times. I finally ended up in Butte, Montana, at which I was lucky enough to get a job with the telephone company there. World War II had started in December of 1941 and the economy was picking up and jobs were at last opening up now. This was in early 1944.  I then took a bus to Deer Lodge to visit Mother.  The hospital make a decision and removed Mother’s one lung.  Her one lung would not heal.  I took time off to be there but spent my time sitting visiting and laughing with others when my Mother was gasping her last breaths. The doctor did not know that she had a deviated septum and inserted the oxygen tube down that nostril. She died from lack of oxygen.  This has always haunted me. The doctor cried, as did I. Had to call Dad, pick out a coffin, get Mother on the train - oh boy. She was only 44, I was 22. It must have been hard for Dad and the little boys too, but I could only know my pain. There was this awful Lutheran funeral service that rocked me as the minister talked about “sin” and pain. I needed some comforting words at that time. I will never forget the horror of that sermon. Perhaps if I could read it maybe it wouldn’t be so horrible? Anyway, I absolutely refused to stay on the farm to help any longer. Alice, who didn’t want to stay either, had to stay at the farm.  As I got older and had children of my own, I feel so bad. Don was 9, Ron 7, and they lost their mother too. I do think Alice was good to them though, and they loved her. I really do not think they ever thought of young me, who had given four years of my life, to stay with them. That is another thing I have learned, children remember very little of their first five years, if anything, unless it is traumatic. Anyway, I went back to Portland in 1944, lived with Olive and Thor in their new home which they were building and which would have been beautiful when finished. They had a baby daughter then, Carol Ann, who almost died and was hospitalized with Spinal Meningitis. Lots of worries there. She recovered and grew up to become a great joy to them. I went back to work for the telephone company until I could not stand it anymore, then was lucky enough to go to work Civil Service for the 13th Naval District as a payroll clerk. I muddled through. Someone from the EMC Dept. told me of job that was coming through for a young lady like me. The war was ending and I got the job, and it was a good one for a very nice man by the name of Mr. Scoville. Good times at last, and even better to come in the future.

As I write this I realize that I was a very selfish introverted young person. I must have broken my poor Mother’s heart, caused problems for Dad, and for Olive who ultimately had to help me with room and board many times through those tumultuous young years. All my life I have stuck my nose in a book, escaping in that way. I have liked many people, but truly can say I only loved my Mother, and my two little brothers.

Now begins a good part of my life. In 1946 I met Richard Dalton Cranswick at, of all places, Portland General Electric in Portland, Oregon.  He came in to apply for a job as an electrician. Eventually I met his family and liked them very much, particularly his little brother, Hank, his sister Dodie, and his parents, Edith and Martin. I believe Hank was 17, a very handsome boy and one who also liked to read, so did Dodie and the whole family - something we all had in common. His Dad was always willing to talk about politics, his job, etc.. They were good company as they always had lots to talk about, lots of visitors, mostly Edie’s sisters and families. Talk of our wedding came up and they insisted we have a small church wedding, which we did January 1, 1947!  In those days most couples went before a Justice of the Peace, wearing a nice dress, or a suit. Dick and I wore suits, mine was a very good pale green one (got it on sale at Unger’s, I remember). So Dick’s family planned the wedding, my family were all invited to the party later which was held at Grandmother Dipper’s house, all very nice and more than I had wanted. So I, as Dick’s wife, was given a warm reception there, which was appreciated.  I then went back to work at PGE, as did Dick. The company gave us a nice radio record player which we enjoyed for many years.  I worked until May of 1948. Richard Charles (later called Rick) was born June 28, 1948, a beautiful bouncing baby boy 8 lbs. 3 oz., at Good Samaritan Hospital in Portland, and brought home with a good case of a staph infection in his diaper area.  I was still in agony with my stitches and as a result had to boil his diapers (borrowed a large kettle from his grandmother).  I don’t remember for sure, we lived on the second floor of this large apartment complex on S.W. Montgomery Dr.  I believe Dick had to go down to the laundry (probably in the evenings) and do his laundry for while, bring it back up, where I would boil it and rinse, then somehow got the diapers hung back up to dry in the basement).  In those days there were no dryers. The washers had wringers and laundry trays to rinse.  Oh boy.  I am sure Dick did a lot of this work for the first week or two.  Then Rick also had tummy trouble, cried a lot. Grandmother Edie was of help for advice and baby patting, even though we had to go all the way to Clackamas!  After a couple weeks everything smoothed out though and baby Rick thrived and was a joy. All the time we lived there on Montgomery Dr., we were not supposed to live there with a child. So we frantically looked for another more suitable place to live. Within a few months we were lucky enough to find a small two-bedroom house at Kellogg Park, a low-cost housing complex in Milwaukie, Oregon. We were so happy there, it was cozy.

Rick was a delightful child, gave Dick and I great happiness. I particularly remember his locking me out and taunting me with a loaf of bread, pulling out the centers and eating them. Somehow I was able to get that key and unlock the door (don’t remember how).  While at Kellogg Park we were blessed with Mark Scott, born March 12, 1951 at Holladay Park Hospital (no longer exists).  He was supposed to be named Alice Kay had he been a girl!  He too was a beautiful baby and was born at a time when we were in the process of acquiring a lot in Lake Grove, wooded and wonderful.  Dick, with his father’s help and spare time, was building a starter house on Seville St.  Many other young couples with their children also lived on Seville and eventually we had many friends there.  First a little bit about delightful Scott. He had to have his circumcision six months into his life (and I wish we had made the decision not to have that done at all, but at that time all baby boys had to be circumcised, we were told).  From that time and for months later little Scott was afraid of everyone except, his mother and father, and was somewhat wakeful at night.  I remember sitting and patting him, this was hard, as I got so tired and he just wanted to play, not sleep.  Actually he stayed that way for a long time, a few years. He got so he would go to sleep at a normal time but would wake up about 4:00 AM, would crawl in the bed with us until I learned to make the living room a safe place for him to play.  Then he learned to be on his own for another hour so his parents could get that much needed sleep to be ready for the day’s work. As I write this I feel bad about doing this, but at the time I got a bit frantic about getting enough sleep.  Scott was a delightful child and he and Rick had a wonderful childhood playing in that great yard.  Dick had built a wonderful log playhouse where they and many little boys from the neighborhood played and played.  I read much to them in the evenings and they played and sang all the childhood songs on that great record player.  About 1953 Dick got involved with the Clackamas Mounted Posse. He did get a horse earlier.  This move was possibly not the best for our little family as it took him away a great deal in the evenings and weekends.  Also at this time the starter house had to get finished, and we had to hire it done. Then we had a very nice home but only two bedrooms.  Oh boy, complications!  Then I got pregnant with my lovely daughter Susan Clare and she was born June 2, 1954 at St. Vincents Hospital in SW Portland (this hospital was ultimately torn down). What a delight she was as I fully expected another son.  During this period both Olive and Gladys also had daughters born approximately two months before, Judy and Sharon.

I was so delighted with this beautiful brown haired good baby that her brothers called “the Gerber baby”. Unfortunately Dick’s and my marriage was in trouble, I could feel his unhappiness. Here we had this nice home, three wonderful children. I was determined to somehow hang in and try real hard, there was no other choice. Then fate stepped in, Portland General Electric called me, after all those years, to come in and work a two week job!  I accepted, got a neighbor to come to care for the children.  Sue was then one, Scott four, and Rick seven!   I was getting desperate, wondered how it would be on my own with three little ones. I found out, not easy.  I rode back and forth with Dick, he did not speak to me for two weeks!  He had always, like a lot of men in that period, did not approve of his wife working. By then it was 1955.  I have not mentioned that also in that period of my children’s young lives, I learned to drive. This was somewhat due to Dick’s extreme disgust having to drive me to do food shopping.  Both his mother and his sister drove, not me. Thank goodness I learned to drive! We had a nice ‘52 Buick I won’t go into the pain and bitterness that developed during this time. Also, at this period Dick had started building another house on Washington St., supposedly for us. He also could never study to get his journeyman’s license to be an electrician, and eventually went on to something else. My memory deserts me on this very unhappy time. We then, with great trepidation, sold that nice home (I could see what was ahead and felt I would not be able to afford $88.00 a month payments, and also then talk of my many neighbors.) I thought if we moved away from those surroundings Dick would be forced to come back to his family as I was still determined to hang in there for the sake of my children who dearly loved their Dad. But it was too late. Dick already had his priorities, and I was too stubborn and hurt to beg. We were divorced in 1958. This was after we had found that small house, a couple years old, at 3203 SE Loeffelman Rd.. Dick did help fix up what had at one time been a garage into a nice pine paneled bedroom for the boys. I am sure Dick really loved his children. It was me that he could not stand, which hurt me deeply.

Now began a couple of very hard years for me – going back to work after 12 years. Dick did contribute $150 a month. Believe it - that was enough to make the mortgage payment and pay all the utilities! I worked first of all for the Oregon Journal, downtown, rode the bus. That did not pay enough and took too much time on bus travel. Through a friend’s help, I got a job with Rogers Machinery Co. where I had to learn a whole new language of work that I had never done. The job involved much bookkeeping, figuring, and typing, which was so rusty. I worked 2.5 years at this job. Then I took the summer off to be with my children. After that summer, I got a long-lasting job at Automotive Equipment Co. on SE Oregon St. and worked there for six years. This company sold Peterbuilt and Mack trucks. Then the company moved to Swan Island, and I continued to work for them another year and a half.  While I worked at Automotive Equipment Co., Dick’s mother (Edith Ann Dippner) came to baby-sit. Grandma was so good for Rick, Scott, & Sue. She babysat off and on for about 2 years. Aunt Hulda (my Mother’s Sister), from Penticton, British Columbia, came to baby-sit after her husband’s death and stayed six months. She too was a lovely person, with a great personality. I didn’t know that cancer already had its hold on her. She died about a year later.

The boys wanted me to find them another Dad, but I was not so blessed to find someone to love. This was partly because I did not have the vitality to go out dancing on Saturday nights. I did go out a couple of times. I spent much of my time hiding from certain men, who were attracted to me, but me not attracted to them. I decided I definitely was a one-man woman, and it was a waste of my time to be out looking around for another man, in spite of my son’s desire for a Dad!

To get back to our home on Loeffelman Rd., we had seventeen pretty happy years there. School - first Milwaukie Elementary then Milwaukie Jr. High for Rick, Rowe Jr. High for Scott and Sue; Milwaukie High School for Rick & Scott, Rick graduating in 1966 and Scott graduating in 1969. Sue had to go to Rex Putnam High School due to a re-districting, she graduated in 1972. Susan’s kindergarten was at Concord as she spent her fifth year during the day at the Emmons while I worked. Scotts kindergarten year was spent at Oak Grove in a private school as there was none offered at our relocation -in Milwaukie. Rick had a fabulous school year in Lake Grove while in kindergarten. Those were the busy years for me. Working five days of the week, hurrying home, making dinner and preparing chauffeuring to all those extracurricular activities, baseball, football, basketball (not too much of that), then wrestling. For a year even had cheerleading for Sue! Rick and Scott both belonged to fraternities, were fairly popular at High School.   Those were very busy and happy years, I repeat.

My children have been my blessing all of my life. Even though they have each had all sorts of problems, mostly job- wise, also in their marriages, things have worked out for them somewhat satisfactorily. This I am so grateful for. 

It is too bad that I have caused somewhat of a problem throughout my life for my immediate family by being such “a rolling stone”. As I said before - I now realize that I should have stayed in my “white” house in Gladstone, Oregon. At least there would have been enough room to welcome my family when they came to visit. I know Marc and Ty knew much pain at the loss of the “Big White House” that had welcomed them in 1976 and provided them security.  Hopefully life will treat them fairly well. I am very happy for Vanessa, Marc’s wife, and their happy marriage. Ty will find his niche, and Brooke and Jordan will go on and continue to thrive. I know Brooke is very capable and a wonderful mother. Brenna too will grow and change tremendously, she is not yet seven.

These are my ramblings as I sit down in March of my 80th year. I only touched on each life as I could have written a book, not only about me but also  about each one of my loved ones. They will have to write their own books!