Coming of age In the 30’s and 40’s was a difficult time. Prohibition, depression, poverty and the threat of a world wide war was a formidable venue to thrust upon one generation. Between the desolation caused by the Dustbowl and the epidemic of Infantile Paralysis along with Diptheria and Rheumatic Fever, we were a nation under siege. Remembering that penicillin did not surface until mid 1940’s, near the close of World War Two. We survived because we believed in our God, our country, our flag and ourselves ! Small wonder the fates worshipped at our feet but we were too practical and honest in those days to pay them much attention. Through the years my mother had this standard answer to any complaints visited upon her. It was, “I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.” This obvious reference to conditions of the era affected my outlook for a lifetime as once again her secular 8th grade education proved the power of common sense. I now gift you with her closing line that echoes still, “this too shall pass.”
Sincerely, Claire B.
Claire V. Bogdanos 