Individual Details

Minneapolis Tribune, Neighbors Section, Saturday, November 17, 19--
CITY LIFE WAS MIGHTY RURAL 65 YEARS AGO/LeRoy E. Anderson
We lived in a small frame house 65 years ago, finished downstairs and with two bedrroms up that were plastered but had no woodwork. We had gas lights and a big chandelier that hung over the dining-room table. We were lucky, we had running water -- a faucet over the sink with a slop bucket. No sewer.
There was a three-holer out near the alley that was my dad's pride and joy. He was a carpenter. When he built the biffy he anchored it somehow, so when the gangs of young toughs came down the alley on Halloween he would
sit in the kitchen and laugh at them as they tried to tip it over.
The family next door had horses and cows and chickens in a barn, and there were more barns and chickens down the alley. Across the street lived a family named Benson. We saved our potato peelings for their cow, and sometimes my sister and I were sent over there for milk.
By the way, this wasn't out in the country, it was a 3936-37th Av. S.
There was something going on most of the time, like when crews came and put in a sidewalk. I remember running my wagon up and down it when they were done.
Then there were the "Sewer Pappies" --kids called the men who put in sewer pipes Sewer Pappies. You wouldn't believe how much work they did by hand! They would start in the first six feet or so with pick and shovel, throwing the dirt up on the bank. Then they dug the next layer, which was tossed up a few feet onto a platform where other men threw it on the bank. Then when they had to go down deeper they had to drive in planks to keep the dirt from caving in on them. A group of men with mallets worked at that all day: first one took a swipe at the top of the plank, then the next guy took a crack at it, and so on.
Another man worked in a little shed and all he did day after day was to make and repair the mallets.
When they got down deep they had a steam engine to pull up buckets of sand from the ditch.
Teamsters hauled away the surplus dirt. You should have heard those teamsters holler! Some of them didn't really need the reins. Their horses seemed to understand everything they said.
That new sidewalk... I can't seem to forget it. My new coaster wagon...you'd sit on one knee and pump your other leg to get moving. One summer I had a permanent sore on my ankle from hitting the back axle. We would take tin cans, nail them to the front of the wagon and then put candles in for headlights.
We got tired of wagons, finally, and then one kid made a scooter from a roller skate and we were in business again. Then we started making racing cars --- a frame of used lumber and some wheels. There always was plenty of
stuff available for construction. Fruit and vegetables came in wooden boxes that grocers just threw out in the back of their stores or burned. Orange crates, sure, but the apple boxes were the best. As for the wheels, all you had to do was go down the alley and look for some old baby buggy and you were in business.
All around the neighborhood there were empty lots. There was always some place to play. There were very few cars, although now and then you would see a truck. They were slow moving and had hard solid tires.
One day in front of Simmons school, 38th and Minnehaha Av., a meat truck got stuck between some ties in the middle of the street. (Minnehaha was just a dirt road then.) A streetcar hitched on a big chain to the truck's front axle and backed up. The wheels and front axle pulled right off the truck! I went home then and don't know how they got it out.
When I got a little bigger they started giving me some chores. Down to the cellar, get a few spuds; down again to get some carrots that were packed in sand. Carry out the slop bucket, bring in enough wood to fill the wood box. In the winter carry in coal and carry ashes out. Then when winter really got going, you had to sift the hard coal ashes. Pick out the coals that weren't burned through and carry them in to be used to bank the fire at night.
Pa would buy wood from a sawmill. The wood was delivered in a square box-shaped wagon that had two big back wheels. The driver sat on a long plank near the horses. The wagon dumped! The wood was sawed off the logs
when they made lumber. It had bark on one side. If Pa was working and prosperous it came in stove-length pieces. If not, it came in 5-foot lengths and if I wasn't busy there was always the sawbuck.
One thing was certain, Ma was always home or we knew where she was. I can't recall any of my friends whose mas worked.
There was an old man who would come down the alley driving a skinny nag, ringing a bell and calling, "Any Rags, Any Paper?" Any kid worth his salt would have a stack of paper and rags. Old whiskey quart bottles were worth a dime. Some of the boys would have old iron to sell. The man on the wagon ould look it over, shake his head and refuse to buy it saying, "Railroad iron, no good."
There was always someone coming by in wagons. The coal man in winter, the ice man, fruit and vegetable peddlers, the Larkin coffee man, the milkman, the grocery delivery man... One time a fish man came by. He had a tremendous voice and hollered "Fresh Fish! Crappie, Sunfish, Bullheads as Big as a Platter!"
When I started school at Simmons there were a lot of children from newcomer families. Every now and then a big fat woman would come to our school, and it would be bath day. Some of those kids in the coldest part of the winter had their underwear sewed tight, and some had an evil- smelling bag on a string around their neck. The old woman would sit in the room while we took a shower. She inspected us as we finished washing. She had a big stiff brush, and if you weren't clean she sure made you clean.
Pa sold our house one day and bought another, and we moved three blocks. The house had sewer, furnace, hot water and ELECTRIC LIGHTS! I can remember flushing the toilet and snapping the light switches.
(LeRoy E. Anderson, of south Minneapolis, is a retired printer who wrote this reminiscence while recovering from major surgery.)

Birth	28 Sep 1909	Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota
Marriage	14 Dec 1936	New Richland, Waseca, Minnesota, Lutheran - Sonja Elizabeth Carlson
Death	9 Nov 1986	Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota
Burial	11 Nov 1986	Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota, Lakewood Cemetery
Christen		Minneapolis, Hennepin, Minnesota

Spouse	Sonja Elizabeth Carlson
Child	Mark Peter Anderson
Child	Lance Birger Anderson
Child	Mary Ellen Anderson

Father	Birger Samuel Anderson (1876 - )
Mother	Barbro Emelia Hind Petruson (1884 - )
Sibling	Alice Anderson (1908 - )
Sibling	Marion Eleanor Anderson