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Entire contents copyright © 2002 by Stephen Farley. All rights reserved.

Who I am…

Born: May 13, 1918
Birthplace: Grand Forks, North Dakota
Came to the Twin Cities in 1951
Died: September 25, 2002

“Right next to the Great Northern railroad track in Fargo, in the dealership there, was a big bright red Ford convertible. First one they ever made. I went in to buy it. The guy asked how old I was and I hemmed and hawed and I think I was 14. He said you aren’t old enough. I had an uncle who owned a hotel in Fargo, so I went to him and I said to him will you buy this car for me, I’ll pay you cash. He said oh sure, and he did. I paid cash for it. I picked up my buddies and away we went. the first place we came was here to Minneapolis. Went to the old Miller park on Nicollet and Lake St where the Minneapolis Millers used to play—the old baseball team. Then we went to St. Paul on Lexington Ave to see the Saints play; then to Kansas City. I had three of my buddies with me and I was footing all the bills. We went to St. Louis, Denver, Los Angeles, and up the West cost, headed back. We get to the border between North Dakota and Montana. And there were the cops there waiting for us. See we were missing school for about a month.

“In June 1951, I went to work in Thule, Greenland, way up in the Northwest corner, 600 miles from the North Pole. Landed with 35 of us and nothing there. We were a skeleton crew that built a temporary missile. We lived in an Atwell tent for the first year with a floor elevated just two feet. I was gone for 6-8 months at a time, and then I would come back to Minneapolis to my family. We had nine children. It was difficult for my wife, but she never complained.”

My favorite place…

Favorite Place: Beard’s Plaisance at Lake Harriet

“This is an open pavilion on Lake Harriet, up on a little hill. We used to live on Vincent. We used to have family picnics there. We would have the best time up on that hill. In the summertime just about every weekend we used to have picnics. It was a lot of fun, particularly when the grandchildren came. And they came in bunches.

“We occasionally still go there, now we just don’t get together that often. We don’t have picnics like we used to.”

photo copyright 2002 by Barry Kleider, www.barryphotography.com