Robert Tadlock looks back

Robert Tadlock looks back.

Donated by Terry Tadlock

In 1931 my parents Glen Tadlock and Reba Forth Tadlock (Pictured left) sold their sawmill on Horse Creek on the border of Jefferson co and Wayne co Illinois. My grandmother Emma Baker Tadlock died of a stroke and we moved in with grandpa Delmer Tadlock. Prior my dads brother Charles lived with Delmer but his wife could not stand her father in law and when Delmer told her to cook him some supper she told him to do it himself and did not care if the old bastard starved. So out with Charles and in with my family. I would stay there in that house in Garden Hill Township till I got married and got my own farm home. Mom and dad would live there till they died. My sister Nadena with my parents and my granddad lived a normal self sufficient life; would not know the country was in a depression. A garden provided much of-our food. Peas, beans, carrots, cucumbers (most made into pickles), tomatoes, squash, and beets were available during the summer and were canned for use during the winter. Leaf lettuce, spinach, and radishes from the garden were used during the summer. Young ears of field corn were picked for “roasting ears” during the summer. A large potato patch supplied white and sweet potatoes throughout the year.

We of course were life stock farmers. Often we would have over a hundred pigs to feed at a time. When a sow would have a litter of pigs the piglets would be brought into the house placed behind the heating stove dried off and returned to the sow. Farmers need a team of mules to work a farm. To supplement our income Delmer and dad invested a thousand dollars for a stud horse and five hundred for a jack. Delmer and dad put bills up around the area announcing the Tadlock stud service. The jack (male) was named ole doc but it turns it out he was worn out. Farmers would pay to get their mares (female horse) to be serviced by Ole Doc to create a mule. Ole Doc could not always be counted on. One time a farmer brought in a mare in heat but it was a off day for ole Doc. The mare kicked and bite ole doc because he would not do his thing. Ole doc ran a way and we had to chase him down a half mile a way. Delmer gave the quy his money back and told him to get that mare out of here.

Grade school days
Farm kids have chores to do feed the hogs feed the chickens bring the cows up for milking. These chores had to be done before going to the one room school house. The Lone Star was four miles away so rather then me and my sister walking to school our dad had us ride ponies. Dad made a deal with the school teacher if dad built a shed on the school grounds for the ponies with feed and water we could keep them there while we were in class. Everybody else walked to school. Nadena and I rode ponies all eight years of grade school. No one else in Wayne co. can claim the same experience. School is school so holidays like Halloween and Christmas stick out in my head. Every Halloween the boys in school would soap the classroom windows and the teachers car windows. but the teacher was wise to us and would have everything cleaned up before we got to school that next day. At Christmas time we had to do a play with all of us having to remember our lines; the parents in the audience beaming with pride when we said our piece.

Flying lessons dating and oh yeah high school.
"Well Bob ( I was 17 at the time) Mrs. Thompson my English teacher said" do you know anything about an airplane that flew low over the school yesterday?" I with my fingers crossed behind my back replied" Cant say that I do." I loved small airplanes and everything to do with airplanes. Charles Lindberg was my hero and inspiration. When I was 17 I forged my fathers name on a permission slip to take flying lessons. Mom knew about it; dad was in the dark. I soloed at the Flora airport in clay co. This Tadlock; did not want to be a farmer: 'I wanted to own and operate a small airport.'
Airplanes caught my eye but so did this beautiful shy girl Mary Lou Hoover. Brush creek cuts through this part of Wayne co and Mary Lou lived on one side and i lived a few miles across the other side. I knew of her family because her dad was a school teacher and a notary public. Mr. Hoover help some farm familes do their taxs including ours. The first date was in our junior year of high school. I could not take her flying then because a student pilot license allows no passengers. So i did the next best thing and buzzed close over house several times to give her a thrill. Her parents never said anything about me flying so close over their house. I thought this is the girl I want to marry and her parents are great too. High school goes fast when you are in love next thing I know its 1948 and our friends our signing our annuals. One friend of mine penned' Good luck Tailspin Tadlock 'They hung a moniker upon me.
Robert married Mary Lou Hoover in 1949 worked on a farm one year and then joined the air force and got out of Wayne co.

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