"Grandma"

Jean talked about his maternal grandmother today (Nancy Matilda Hoenshell, always called Tillie,)

"Grandma raised me. I couldn't talk with Mom, but I could talk with her."

"She was born in 1861, the year the civil war began, and she was four when it ended. Her older brother fought in the war and was wounded, but lived. She grew up on a farm in Indiana.  She was a tomboy.  She was able to harness a team of four horses and  wagon.  Her father said she was 'the best hired hand he ever had'."

His grandmother lived with them in southern California when he was growing up.

"It was amazing what she would do with a chicken. She would go out into the yard, pick the chicken up by its two legs, lay it on a stump of wood, and off came its head.  Then she went into the house, came out with a pot of hot water, dunked the chicken in briefly, and plucked it.
Ten minutes later, the cleaned chicken would by lying on the kitchen sink, all neatly separated and in pieces.
Another ten minutes later, hot dumplings would come off the stove.

"I loved watching her work in the kitchen.  We sure ate good."

"She also made pies, and baked bread.  It was salt-rising bread. It was firm-textured, and sure good."

  "Grandma (Tillie) was a very capable person. She was a midwife, and delivered me and June at her home in Holton, Kansas.  Mom traveled there for the births. She also knew how to sew, and she made my first suit for me, when I was about seven or eight. She sewed it by hand."