Ringling Mansion in Sarasota, Florida

That is what Ringling’s Circus is sometimes called, “THE BIG TOP”. Did you know that for many years it’s winter home was on the Island of Venice in Florida by the south intracoastal bridge? January and February they were in the area where I lived.

They came on a train to just off the island. Many residents gathered along the banks to watch them walk the elephants across the intracoastal bridge and the short distance to their barns on the island. As the elephants walked from the train they attached their trunks to the tail of the one ahead of them. It was a sight to behold!

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When I moved from Hollidaysburg, Pennsylvania to Venice, Florida one of the first things I was told was, “At night there are two things in the inland waters of lakes and rivers.” One is alligators, the other one is alligator food. So….if you are in the water at night and you are not an alligator, three guesses to what you are and the first two don’t count.

Because YOU ARE ALLIGATOR FOOD!

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Chapter I: His Pride and Joy

Forty little  “white face”  calves!  That is what was on that big semi truck that just pulled up beside our house in York Center.  What a delightful surprise for this little girl, me. I ran out through the yard to see them up close.  They were so cute, just adorable, even though they were all bawling their heads off.  They were probably hungry, about four months old and had just been weaned from their mother’s milk.  Plus they had just been trucked all the way from Texas.

With these forty little heifers my dad built  his herd of herford brood cows by raising all the new born heifer calves.  My dad’s newly purchased  Fox farm was the perfect home for them.  It wasn’t long until any business men who came to the stone quarry soon found themselves in my dad’s car driving around through the fields where they roamed.  They weren’t afraid of people as long as they stayed in the car so he could slowly drive very close among them.

The steers were sold each year for “prime beef” .  For them to bring top “prime beef” price they had to be sold at a certain body weight.

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My Self Portrait, age 16

THIS WAS SUPER GREAT!  One night each week the neighboring town of West Mansfield invited a local school to hold an amateur contest which was held at the town movie theater.  The year was 1935.  Mrs. Herring, our school music teacher, happily entered her prize high school boys’ octet. As a trio the three Hinze sisters entered.  We had four entries, all high school students.

Always anxious to take front and center stage, I convinced my friend Margaret, both of us eight graders, to enter with me. The big night for our little country school came.  We sang “Breaking in a Pair of Shoes”. Then she sang while I did a soft shoe tap dance pretending that my feet hurt with each step, like  Ooch! Ouch! Ooch!

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