The Origin of Homeplace
As many of you know by now, the past week or so, I’ve been seeking photos and memories to write a Bill Holland (aka billybuc) Writing Challenge article about my Childhood. I’ve done that. …
Along the way in that pursuit, I’ve given a lot of thought to the childhood of my father as well as my own… they are closely related, of course. I had a very normal childhood. He did not. The reason I’m writing about it here is that the farm he grew up on came to be known in the family as the “Homeplace” - from whence came the title of my first novel ("Back to the Homeplace" - see preceding blog post), and the title of this blog supporting “The Homeplace Saga” series of stories. These now number in the hundreds, including four novels, two novellas, a short story collection plus the hundreds of online short stories we’ve talked about in this Blog.
There are at least two family photos taken in front of the farmhouse of the “Homeplace” of my Dad’s family. One is in the thirties, the one used here is from 1923. It is one of the last photos of his Mother - she died on the operating table, something went wrong during what was to be a simple procedure.
As you can see, Pop was left with seven children to raise, which he did… with them all pitching in to make it work. The oldest son, Willard, aka “Toots,” was old enough to help with the farmwork, taking some burden off of Pop. In fact, Toots continued to farm the Homeplace into mid-century. Irene, LVene and Pauline (all teenaged themselves) essentially raised the children, with the strong support of Pop, doing what he could do. My Dad is the little boy in the middle, in front, 8 year old Pete (real given name Leverne). There were also younger sisters, Maxine and Betty (Bethene), as well. Pete wanted to be a farmer, so I know he helped out with the farm as much as he could as soon as he could. Pop, however, did insist that little Pete get his education and have as normal a childhood and adolescent experience as possible, which he did, under the circumstances (stories that can be shared later, perhaps).
The Bevins family anchored my fictional stories of “The Homeplace Saga” just as the Smith family anchored the stories of my father’s life and mine based from the Homeplace in our real lives.
If you have not yet read "Back to the Homeplace" in print or in Kindle edition, I encourage you to do so.
