A Plethora of ME!

 I have been scanning.  I found an envelope with a lot of pictures of me.

I is fun to have them so I can put them on the Blog and someone commented that he liked seeing the old pictures.  I am sure there will be more.  I have bunches of albums that were in the basement.  This is my mother holding me soon after I was born.  I was a big baby.  I  still have the booties that I am wearing in this picture and my birth announcement.  8 lbs 4 oz.  Pretty big guy.  And isn't my Mom's handwriting nice.

Here are the booties.  I can't believe my feet were ever that small.


The next picture is the only one that I have of my father.  He left when I was very little.  I have one memory of him at that time.  He came up for a visit with his new wife - at least I think she was his wife.  He took me for a ride in his convertible and then disappeared out of my life until I looked him up when I was in college.

There was no reason to maintain the relationship as I didn't find that we had much in common.  He was still married to his second wife gut he left her and married yet another woman.

He stepped out on her also.  She contacted me after he passed and told me I would be welcome to visit his grave.  I told her that "since he had decided not to have a relationship with me in life that I saw no need to have one with him after he was dead."

Not very nice but that was the way I felt.  He died when we were at the lake for vacation.  I could have gone back for the funeral.  One of my aunts thought I should go back but I chose not to.  Vacation time was too precious and I would not have known anyone at the funeral.

A lot of time and money away from vacation...and at that time vacations were very precious to me.


Now on to some other pictures.

I always liked nature.

First Steps

Found it!

My great - grandfather Nick Simser went to Alaska and the Yukon during the gold rush. I have a gold nugget he brought back.

  My father worked on the Alaskan Highway.  I think this picture was taken for him to take with him on his trip.  I like the picture anyway.

 This is the man who became my father. My mother's father was the finest man I ever knew.  He was a veterinarian and was in charge of the Hog Cholera Research Station (1927 - 1952) where Crystal Violet vaccine was developed.  You can read about it here.  His name was Clarence Gordon Cole but he did not like his name so the article mentions Dr. C. G. Cole. He went by Dig, Doc or P.T. which is what the other Clarence and he called each other.  You can see a picture of the Station here.  I used to go over to watch him perform post-mortem on the dead pigs and there were always little piglets around.

 This picture was taken June 6, 1959 the night of my High School Graduation.  The picture is a double exposure but I love the expression on his face.  I think you can see his niceness and his sense of humor in the photo.

I inherit my hairline from him.  I did not have any brothers and sisters until later but I did have cousins.  The picture below was one of my and my cousins Janet and Loren
Bates.  It was posed for an Iowa State University photographer to illustrate something.  Popcorn parties probably.

Mom remarried when I was 10 years old and we moved to Atlantic, Iowa where I was a Boy Scout thanks to my step-father. The next four pictures are of one of our campfires. On the back of the picture it says I was 11 years old.  I remember the Boy Scouts fondly.  I even went to Boy Scout Camp. We were only there for a year or so and I did not progress very far in Scouts.  It was about this time that I got my glasses.  I had been sitting in the back of the classroom because I was so tall and I could not see the board at the front without squinting or holding my hands up like binoculars to be able to see. 

Another cousin John Dawson lived in Adel.  I think this was when he came to visit us.

I don't remember having a "room" of my own but I could study anywhere.

This is the High School graduation picture.

 College Grasduation

 I taught 4 years at Linn-Mar Schools in Marion and then moved back to Ames. I have a feeling this was taken in 1972 or 3.

1980

In 1981 I was elected and installed as Grand High Priest.  One of the Ames Lodge Brothers had this hat made for me as I was now able to use the title Most Excellent I was dubbed "de Most"  We had a lot of fun. 

Mother and I went to San Antonio to visit friends.  When we got back my sister told us that she was going to add to the family.  In September my nephew Jonathan was born.  He is now a student in Arizona in Tempe.

Some School Pictures

And here I am about 4 years ago. It is a little out of focus so I can live with it