The Little Girl

In no way did I have a normal childhood, that is, if there is such a thing as normal.

I would like to give you a little history of the Union Hotel. The hotel is one of the oldest buildings in Everett. A man named Michael Barndollar erected a stone building, which became the Union Hotel. That makes the hotel over two hundred years old. In this hotel, Mr. Barndollar ran a store and a tavern as well as being his residence for many years. The hotel served as a livery stable, a jail, and a variety of stores. As of 2002, the hotel is serving as a restaurant and bar and rooming house.

Looking at the hotel, one could see numerous changes to the structure inside and out. One interesting fact about the Union Hotel is that during the Civil War the hotel housed union officers. It has been told that confederate prisoners were kept in the basement in small cement cells. On one occasion that I do remember well, we had visited the hotel one afternoon. Dad gave my brother and I a tour and part of the tour included the basement. There was a small door at the end of the stag bar, where only men could drink. You had to bend over to get through because it was so low. Anyway, there were several reasons why it was kept locked. We looked around quickly and were told not to ever try to go in there. We could get in and not find the way out and it was very dark in there. Dad said the only lights were lanterns that were lit by union soldiers during the war. When the war ended the door was locked for good!

At this point, I would like to give you a little background about myself, and my family. My father, Allen Conley Whetstone, Jr., was the son of a business owner and my mother, Hazel, was the daughter of a coal miner. Unfortunately, I never got to meet him. He was William Giffin. While checking on a dynamite blast, it went off and he was killed at a very young age. This left my grandmother, Julia Giffin, with three young children to raise alone.

My fathers mother, Sylvia Merle Dudley and her husband, my grandfather, Allen Conley Whetstone, Sr., owned and operated the Union Hotel in Everett, Pennsylvania. I had visited them many times.

When my mother and father fell in love, they wanted to marry before mother graduated from high school. My grandmother said they could marry, but not live together until mother graduated from high school. (Can you imagine that happening today?) In those days children had a lot more respect for authority.

My mother was a great basketball player. She was the captain of her team. I remember once, I visited the high school and in the hallway there was a large glass case and in it there was a trophy with my mother''s name on it. It made me feel so proud of her that I would even take my friends to see it. Mother also played the drums in the school band. That was very unusual for a girl back in the 30''s.

When World War II started my father was drafted into the Marines. He went to Okinawa and spent a lot of time there. When we got older he shared some of his experiences with my brother and me. One of the men he was with in the Marines was a cartoonist. Dad would get him to draw us Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse with our names on them. We really looked forward to the mail.

While Dad was gone my mother had her hands full taking care of my brother, Allen and myself. Food was very scarce in those days, not much meat. I remember mother had little red buttons she would give the butcher for meat. I can still remember we ate a lot of potatoes - mashed, riced, fried, and scalloped.

Eventually Dad came home from World War II around 1946. I remember he walked in the front door, put his suitcase down, and gave us all hugs and kisses.

About this time my grandparents who owned and ran the Union Hotel, decided it was about time to retire and move to sunny Florida. My dad turned out to be the logical choice to take over the hotel business. He did have an older brother, Jack, who had a newspaper career and a sister, Betty, who was married to a successful businessman. It would have been a big adjustment for either of them to move to the small town of Everett. So my father, my mother, my brother, Allen, and myself packed up all of our things and moved downtown to live in the Union Hotel. I was 7 years old when we moved in.

The hotel had been redone and was very nice. All the furniture seemed big. Most of the dressers had marble tops with big mirrors, all dark wood headboards and white, really white, chenille bedspreads.

Only a few of the bedrooms had bathrooms. On each of the 3 floors was a community bath and shower. In our family living quarters we had our own bath. The sink was all marble and the tub was very high on curved legs. I had to step on a small stool to climb in to take my bath each evening. We had big, beautiful wooden sliding doors to divide our bedroom from our parent''s room. The baseboards were very wide and there were matching crown molding next to all the ceilings. When Allen and I finished our baths, we would sit in our parent''s room next to the fireplace and listen to the radio. At that time there wasn''t any TV invented yet. We would listen to the Lone Ranger and Gene Autrey. It was always a series so each week we really looked forward to these stories.

Outside our parent''s room was a large porch that overlooked Main Street. Allen and I always had a good view of all of Everett''s parades. It seemed like there was a parade for everything.

Before my grandmother moved to Miami, I remember staying the night with her. It had snowed very hard for days. The small town was covered like a big white blanket. It had just gotten dark outside. My grandmother said, "Do you hear sleigh bells?" and took my hand and led me over to the big window in her bedroom that overlooked Main Street. There, down below, was a horse drawn sleigh with big bells. I will never forget that beautiful sight and how close I felt to my grandma.

I always loved visiting my grandmother at the Union Hotel. On one of my visits, my grandmother gave me a tour of her rose gardens. There were two parts to the garden. One was right outside the kitchen. It had a narrow brick path and on both sides were beautiful f