Mary Jane of the Lorelands: Her Swagger

Friday, March 14, 2014

Her Swagger

Alyce at Sixteen

There she is in Pete's pants again. This was such a tiny snapshot that I couldn't make it much bigger without having it turn garish. But there she is with her bobbed hair and her swagger. She's standing on the steps of the first building that later would become Klimek's Lodge. Look at the mess.

She still was in high school and probably had less thoughts of marriage than of journalism. She wanted to be a writer, and to this end she worked part time during the school year at the office of The Baudette Region with editor and publisher, Bill Noonan. He told her she was good--really good. She did the column about the school, and a fine job she did of it, too. She learned to type set. She loved the crunch, bling, bang of the linotype. The smell of ink. If the Depression hadn't fallen hard on everyone, she might have stayed. Who knows?

But once the resort was up and running, she had her summer work cut out for her. Winters she had two years of school left to go. The family still managed the Rex Hotel in town. And she loved a good time. George played drums with Charlie Williams's band. She told Mary Jane these stories any chance she got--after everything else had happened: the TB, the marriage, the birth, in what already were to the girl "the olden days." The whole Williams family was musical. Evelyn Williams became her best friend--not as flamboyant as her other friend, Ethel "Pat" Paddock who had a crush on George. "She might have won him, too, if her family hadn't moved. She had it all over me!"

Mary Jane reveled in the stories, wished to have a life just like her mother had, a whirl of parties, flights over the lake with Pete, dancing with George and his equally handsome brother, Harvey, singing with Charlie's banjo, pulling toffee on a Saturday night down in the basement of the Rex Hotel--going outside to wrap it around lamp posts while it cooled.

I know that I don't know and can't know how it really was.