“My first travel recollection is when I was in kindergarten, in Syracuse, N.Y. I was around six years old, and kids under 6 could ride free on city buses. So one day a pal and I boarded a bus in front of the Eastwood School and rode it all the way to downtown, maybe two miles. Once there we played hide-and-seek among the tall buildings. Somehow we got separated. Luckily I knew where I was – I have always had good geographic orientation – and the way home, and walked it all the way.

That summer my mother, sister and I traveled to Norway to see our relatives – both my mother and father had emigrated from Norway, meeting and marrying in Syracuse. After four months there, I forgot my English and spoke only Norwegian – partially as a result of going to a local school in Stavanger with my cousin. Upon my return the public school wanted me to place me for another year in kindergarten. My father rejected this, yanked me out, and sent me to the nearby Catholic school, which properly put me in the first grade.

Another time I caught my foot in a drain pipe, and the fire department had to be called to extricate it. This event appeared as a news item, with my photograph, in our local paper. To this day I don’t know why I did it. (I would love to find that article!)

Again, at age six, I began work as a delivery boy for the Saturday Evening Post. My mother helped, by soliciting a sale to a friend who lived a mile away, on the other side of the city reservoir. I walked it, receiving the nickel that the Post cost at that time.

Lastly, my memories from Woodbine Ave. included the grocery store on the corner, where we could buy chocolate-covered mints for one cent. If we were lucky and bought one with a pink-mint center, we were given our choice of a nickel-candy bar! I still wonder about the value of this!”