Early to my birth
Wilburn "Tennessee" Ryder was born in a mining camp near Copper Hill, Tennessee, November 19, 1906, the oldest of nine brothers and sisters. His father worked in the copper mines in Copenhagen Tennessee. He helped his mother raise other brothers and sisters while his father worked. With the passage of time and employment it was difficult to find during the depression. Wilburn jumped onto the freight wagons to get from the place to find what he could ever do. He ended up in Jefferson City-Tennessee and worked in zinc mines. While he was dating Mary Margaret Jones. At that time, Maria was in college, and her father was in school. Mother Mary took care of the house on George Street, where Jones lived after selling the farm and moving to the city.
Wilburn and Mary met for a while, and over time they fell in love. Wilburn brave Mary engagement ring and soon after they decided to marry. Wilburn found a better job by paying more in Morristown to move. Wilburn sold Singer Sewing Machines and handled it pretty well. He also sold the piano to help. It was not long that Mary was with the child, and her collage days were over. A few months later a boy weighing 9.3 pounds entered this world. They called him John Hoyt Ryder. John was for my grandfather in Jefferson. Hoyt was for my father Wilburn Hoyt Ryder. While still a child, Wilburn went to New York to work, helping to build subways, tunnels and bridges there. Some time later, he sent for Maria to come and bring me too. While I was in my crib, I drank the milk, and the bottle slipped from my grass and fell to the floor. The bottle fell to the floor with a loud crash and broke, letting the milk go everywhere. Being a bit of a brave devil, I managed to climb the bars on my bed and lift my leg a little higher. Continuing the struggle, I managed to climb to the top and fall right over the broken glass. Then I had to shout or sacrifice very loudly, because mom and dad ran. They saw me lying in a pool of blood, and my head split. It must have scared them, because they quickly took me to the hospital and there I got 18 stitches on the back of my head. There is still a lot of fear today to prove that it was a true story. My grandmother was very pleased that we were in New York, and my mother brought me back to Tennessee.
On my mother, my grandmother was John Paul Jones, and my grandmother was Maud Jones. They owned a house where I grew up in Jefferson, Tennessee. They had a large farm located two miles from the city, and for many years my grandfather taught school in a one-room schoolhouse. He was educated at Carson Newman College in the city. He also cultivated the land with my grandmother and two children, Mary and Ralph, my mother and uncle. As it became difficult in 29 crash tests, he sold the farm and moved to the city. He bought several acres in the city and built a house.
Early years
After learning to walk like a child and up time for school. John and his life these years. I do not remember much before I started walking. Besides the fact that I didn’t like squash, everything was quiet. Yuggggg, I still don't like squash even today. My grandmother, Maud, took a 12-year-old girl that her family said they could not afford it. Her name was Sarah, and she was my best friend. In fact, she put her life on the line for me. I crossed the street in front of our house, and the car flew along the road. Sarah was sure that they would kill me, and she ran like a flash of lightning and pushed me out of the way. She was unlucky, and the car hit her and ran down her legs. For the rest of her life, Sarah had scars and was lame to live. What else can a friend do? Sarah was a true friend until the day Jesus took her in.
Well, you need to know and feel the same warm place around the place where I had to run, play, learn and be confident in my dream. I was at a wonderful age with the world to take. For me we had a big barn, a barn, a chicken and two big fields. There were cherry trees, pear trees, apples and a big strawberry patch. Yes, we had roses and blackberry cubes with thorns that could pierce to the bones, which he sometimes looked. I had to go to the barn to the attic, to the trees, and even to the top of the chicken house. We hung up the tobacco in the barn, and it was great because I had tobacco sticks to use for my faithful horse when I was riding everywhere. The branch I broke, and made six of my shooters, came in handy when I stalked the bad guys. It was a hard time during the big depression, and my grandmother made my shirts out of the bags that the chicken entered.
Bread was nine cents, and the film was worth ten cents. Salmon patties were the main course with corn bread. We did not have running water, electricity, an internal bathroom, a refrigerator, a car or a horse, but we did it well. We had a tank on the back porch with a manual crank, a wood-burning stove with a tank on its side to warm up the washing-up water and me, the way to the extension, an ice box so that everything was cold and two strong legs move forward. We had a warm morning stove in the living room, into which we inserted coal to heat the house, ha ha warms the house. If you weren't in the living room or next to a wood-burning stove in the kitchen, you'd better wear winter. I had the task to get the coal to the house and the wood to the kitchen. When large blocks of coal became low, we filled brown bags of coal dust to feed the stove. After filling several dozen sacks of coal dust, we would be completely black with coal dust.
In three years. When I was three years old in a neighbor's house, Moore on the back porch, I really got hungry for all in the house. The men hunted this morning and left their guns on the back porch when they took off their hunting clothes. Well, being a little boy with great curiosity about shotguns, as soon as I saw them. They were too heavy to pick up, so I just played with them, getting up, and suddenly BAROOOOOOM and a big hole appeared now in the ceiling on the back porch. Moore’s whole family, mother and Sarah thought the worst that little Johnny would be in a pool of blood. When they ran after me and stopped the bleeding, they heard: "I just touched the gun, and he went to BANG and persuaded my hand when she jumped." This back porch still has a hole in the ceiling.
Aunt Pearl worked at WPA and helped people during the Great Depression. The Civil Protection Corps (CCC) was an assistance program for young people from unemployed families, created on March 21, 1933 by US President Franklin D. Roosevelt, and many in Jefferson worked with CCC. They built roads, state parks, control soil erosion, build telephone and power lines. CCC had camps where young people lived and worked. The new course ended with World War II. As Roosevelt himself said in December 1943, Doctor New Deal gave way to Doctor to win the war.
My grandmother rented rooms upstairs for the Cherokee Dam office building and dined every day for work. She and Sarah fixed sandwiches, a piece of fruit or cake and put coffee in a thermos flask in a bag for them. They took care of breakfast for them before they went to work and arranged dinner for them at dinner. The workers built a bathroom on the back porch, and the city just ran down our street. The man was wonderful. Now that it was cold and raining, I didn’t have to go to the cottage around the chicken, about 150 feet from the back of the house. We even have a 30 gallon hot water tank, and now I have a shower on the back porch in my bathroom. Before that, men came to the hairdresser to get a shower, and there were twenty-five cents. I have never done this. We had a large galvanized dishwasher, which we put in the kitchen. We started a wood-burning stove to heat the water in the water tank on the side of the stove. Hot water was immersed and placed in a bath with water from a cistern. The curtain is folded between the kitchen and the dining room. Now it was bath time, on Saturday evening, to get ready for the Sunday school and church in the morning. On Saturday afternoon, we kill and pull out one or two chickens and put them in an ice box for a Sunday lunch. Sunday dinner was usually fried chicken, mashed potatoes, corn, green beans, greens, beets and biscuits and / or corn bread. Then it was a pie or pie to round it. Uncle Arch and Aunt Pearl arrived on Sunday, and Clifford and Juanita came many times. After lunch, which will last at least an hour, everyone will go to the living room, where the card table will be set, and cards of the rook, rommy or author are distributed.
December 7, 1941 is the Japanese Pearl Harbor bomb, and I remember this day as if it were yesterday. It was dusk, and the wallet was walking along George Street, shouting: “Additional Extra Pearl Harbor was bombed,” “Read all about it,” “Additional Extra Pearl Harbor was bombed.” So pretty surrounded by me, like a soft breeze, touched my skin, and it was a terrible creepy feeling that evening. President Roosevelt came out on the radio when everyone gathered and sat quietly, paying close attention to every word that emanated from this noise, which was heard from a huge radio. It was not easy for me to sleep that night, and my prayer simply did not calm down, as usual. My mind ran a hundred miles an hour, trying to figure out why someone would do this to us. At that time I was five. Four days later, Hitler declared war on the United States. My neighbors and my relatives were called in or joined in order to protect my country and me. Every evening we sat around this big radio and listened to news about what was happening with the war. All caves are some and some caves are all. My uncle Grafton died at sea in the Pacific. Many of our neighbors lost loved ones, and it was a very sad time.
Oak Ridge was built in 1942 north-west of Knoxville with the goal of creating an atomic bomb. Uncle Vincent was an army photographer and was assigned to Oak Ridge. He was like the Godfather, and his wife, Aunt Alma, was in college with my mother. Aunt Alma’s family is just two blocks from our house. We visited Uncle Vincent and Aunt Alma several times. It took a month to get a pass to enter this top-secret base, and the army launched a bus to enter the gate. All were searched, and people with guns went with the bus along with you, and you had to go to the address on the pass. Every time you leave the address on the pass, you must have an escort of one of the people on your aisle. This base was built overnight, and all the huts were plywood on a concrete platform and tents. The roads were gravel and red mud. When the war ended, Uncle Vincent sang me many patches and things that he used when in the army. He seemed as proud as I was.
Well, Mom had to go to work to help us eat food so she could become secretary in Tennessee Coal and Iron right here in Jefferson. They mined zinc, which was used to electroplate tin, buckets and the like. This will keep iron from rusting and prolong the life of many products. The mine inspector took her away and returned home from work every day. She had a typewriter at home, and she would also work a lot at home.
Grammar School years and times. Grammar 1-6 We didn’t have what we call preschool education today, we just started learning when you were 6 years old. We did not have free lunches or a school bus if you were in the city. It did not take long to find out that you have two whipping if you are late with a break. One of the teachers and one when I returned home. The break was 20 minutes in the morning and afternoon. There you have to play on Jim's swing, jungle, have fun, shoot marbles or make friends with your buddies. We have always solved the problems of the world during a break, or at least thought that we have the exact answer to any problem that our world has encountered. Most of us carried our own lunch in a brown paper bag, and those who had 15 cents to buy lunch in the dining room ate there. We used to eat outside, without rain. All the wax paper or wrappers were raised on the way back to our bedroom when the bell rang. Many of us wore shirts from stern bags and overalls or blue jeans. Blue jeans are sold for $ 2.00- $ 3.00. Soft drinks were 5 cents, and round steak (baloni) was a big deal on light bread with mustard or mayonnaise. Of course, we had a piece of fruit to clean it. It was a lunch. Oh, sometimes we switched to peanut butter, jelly or peanut butter and banana.
When the last bell rang, I went home and tried to avoid a couple of hooligans who lived a few blocks from our house. I learned that I was a good runner and for the most part did not have to confront them. When he was forced sometimes, he became bloody, but I got into my licks in most cases. I still do not understand why some people like to use others. I think they felt deceived, or they were abused by someone or their parents.
These were great times, and after my homework was completed, I played outside until dark, and then sat in front of the radio about five feet high and two feet wide and deep. The lone ranger and the Red Rider were my programs. I traveled many miles with them and, of course, took care of the bad guys. The big thing that adults talked about was war, the great Second World War. In World War II there was a rationing of almost everything. We had cards for each family member. Everyone was allocated so much sugar, gasoline, shoes, and you call it. I was a little six year old boy, but I remember collecting newspapers, metal objects, aluminum foil, strings and other things. Almost everything was needed for use in the creation of military items for fighters and women. We had to be very careful with what we used. If our shoes got holes in the bottoms, we insert cardboard into them, and when we can afford it, we will have half-salt. People had to limit their travel because you were limited to your gasoline brands. I had to go everywhere because we didn’t have a car, so we didn’t have gasoline brands. Even butter and margarine were rationed.
Sugar was almost impossible to get at that time. Many things were scarce because they were needed to supply the military — gas, oil, metal, meat, and other products. For example, some products were scarce because they were imported from countries with which we were at war, or because they had to be bought on board from abroad. The diet convinced that no one was hungry. Each was given a diet. Each book had a bunch of rations. Groceries and other business people could post what your rations could buy this week. You decide how to spend your stamps. Each had a Victory garden to grow their own vegetables to supplement the products they could buy with their own brands. They were built everywhere, where you could plant something. Some people planned things on window sills and on the roof in pots. Everything mattered for war effort. We had Junk Rallies to get flat irons, rakes, bird cages, electric irons, stoves, light bulbs, bed rails, pianos, washing machines, rubber products, agricultural equipment, lawn mowers, etc. This trash helped make guns , tanks, ships for our fighters. I had a small carriage that I drove through the neighborhood to get to the place for the pickup. Of course, I was not alone, many other children of my age did the same, and it made us feel that we were helping the war effort. Saccharin tablets have been used for sweetening and use in beverages. The book is scheduled to be completed this year, wishing the Good Lord, and the creek does not rise. This will be announced in my blog.
