Bud’s early years: 1923 to 1930

I remember watching a circus parade in front of our house.  I was a little boy, of course, but my older sisters brought me out on the side of the street to watch a man riding an elephant.  My sister Carol was only a year older.  My cousin Sig lived with us then.  His mother died of influenza in the epidemic, as did my older sister Ruth Carol.  Childhood was such a mixed bunch of memories.  I remember my mother cooking and cleaning our house.  She had very little patience with me when I tracked in much or sand.  The lot across the street had weeds and bugs and wildflowers.  I picked them for mother.  She was young and beautiful and my dad worked for Kalispell Grocery, taking orders for stores to keep them stocked.  He traveled from Kalispell to Libby, Polson, Columbia Falls and Hot Springs.  He bought a place on Bitterroot Lake where he built a little cabin for us to visit in the summer.  What a great childhood with my older sisters Helen and Corinne.  Trouble is, they were so much older they moved away before I got to high school.