Our 3-town life in 1956
March 18, 2010 (Thursday)
Towns I lived in after Houston. Previous blogs have discussed Marshall, Waco, Fort Worth, Lampasas, and back to Fort Worth, where I had hoped to work at night and attend classes during the day. But it was not working out. In 1956, when I should have been graduating, I was working in an automobile assembly plant and had completed only two semesters of seminary. Wanda decided to go back to teaching school, so that we could complete the seminary education and get back in the ministry. She found a job as Elementary Public School Music Teacher (all grades) at Azle, northwest of Fort Worth. We found a house to rent, and that summer we moved to the community of Briar, halfway between Azle and Boyd.
The job I had in Arlington was still a day job in the fall of 1956. I had been hoping the second shift would resume so that I could attend classes in the daytime and continue to work at night, as before. That did not happen, but my supervisors at work and I held out hope that it could be done soon, so I kept my job and delayed re-entering the seminary until mid-term. Our two boys required a baby sitter because Wanda was working. I had to be in Arlington, 55 miles away, by 6:20 a.m. each day, so we had to get up no later than 3:30 a.m., get the boys ready, and take them to the babysitter’s home. Needless to say, that schedule was hard on everyone. The school allowed Wanda to ride the school bus to and from her school, and I took the car to work. For a while, I carpooled with another employee from the area. That helped some, because the car was in constant need of repairs.
That was our schedule for six or seven months, as we waited for the second shift to resume. It was to become obvious that such was not to be, so I resigned my job with GM and enrolled in seminary for the second semester which began in January, 1957. I found a part-time job at a granary/feed store on Lancaster Avenue in Fort Worth and finally resumed my education. I would stay in school until graduation in May, 1959.
More about Briar tomorrow.