The holidays are traditionally a time of reflecting and planning. Reflecting on the year just passed as well as planning for the upcoming year. My thoughts, though, with all this down time, always tend to drift back to my parents.
My dad (Cody Nedimyer) was born in Altoona in 1923 - his ancestors moved to this country from Bavaria in the early 1800s and settled in St. Lawrence PA. Mom (Joan Maloney) came from a large Irish Catholic family and also was born in Blair County in 1926. They were married in 1950.
We grew up in a working class neighborhood of Altoona called Fairview. Our house was cater-corner to the Fairview Cemetery and down the hill from the largest hospital in Altoona (The Altoona Hospital) . The houses were dirt cheap - probably with valuations in the 5-7K range (I am sure that my family will correct me if I am way off on any of the history in this article). Even though this was a lower-income area, most of the property owners took decent care of their properties.
We were a paycheck-to-paycheck family. My father came back from World War II and spent the majority of his working life (30+ years) working as a Railroad Car Repairman in Blair County, first for the Pennsylvania Railroad and then, after mergers and nationalization of the US railroad system, with Penn Central and Conrail. I think the highest annual salary my father made was in the ballpark of $21,000. The work was physical work, performed outside in raw Central Pennsylvania winters and the heat of summer. If work was missed for any reason (for example, the flu), Dad didn't get paid.
When IBM Gaithersburg tendered me an offer in June, 1984, it was for $24,500. Dad was practically floored! After I accepted the offer but before I packed up and moved for MD, Dad took me up to the Newburg Fire Hall to have a beer with his peeps. I remember him saying to Uncle John Maloney (one of his favorite drinking buddies and my mom's fraternal twin), that "Joey was going to be making the big money at IBM". I think I physically cringed, but I know that was a proud moment for him.
Dad was also an excellent musician and was named the Dance Band Leader at Altoona High School where he graduated in 1941. He had major chops with the tenor sax and clarinet, could sight read, and would also occasionally dabble on the piano. To pick up some additional money, a couple of nights a week, after work or on weekends, he would hit the road with a couple of other buddies in a 3-4 piece unit that would play Big Band and Swing music at small clubs or VFWs in the area.
Mom was also high school educated and raised the kids. Internally within the family, she was no-nonsense with an unyielding will. You could not win an argument with Mom (particularly those issues with which the Catholic Church had established a position). Her doghouse was legendary and if you ended up in it, you would know it and you would make damn sure you didn't end up there again.
Externally, if someone outside of the family crossed one of us in any way, Mom could bring some serious fury. I think the technical term is that she had our backs.
When the babies of the family (Laurey and me) were around 11 or so, and were able to tend to ourselves for a couple of hours after school, Mom took a part-time job at a company called Modern Communication on 16th Street in Altoona. This company provided a telephone answering service for local businesses. I recall the hours were 12:30 - 5:00 or so. Mom never learned to drive a car and walked to work (and mostly everywhere else) and then would get picked up after work by Dad or Joni.
My parent's marriage was not perfect. I don't believe they were ever very happy - with their relationship with each other or with their lots in life. But I can, to this day, remember so many acts of kindness from both of them. The two things that they both unquestionably had in common (and in spades) were their work ethic and their selflessness.
Dad's work ethic spoke for itself - doing physical work with little job satisfaction, for 50 weeks a year well into your late 50s. (I can only imagine how easy it could have been for Dad to turn the alarm clock off at 4:30 AM on those January mornings and go back to sleep.) With Mom, the house was always clean, clothes were washed by hand (until very late in her life), home cooked meals were always there on time, and children were well-tended to.
With such meager incomes, I am still not quite sure how they were able to put 5 kids through private schools and 3 through college - other than that they simply sacrificed for us.
Mom passed away of malignant lymphoma when I was 18 (two weeks before I left for college) and Dad passed on in 1991 (when I was 29). There is not a day goes by that I don't think of them or miss them.
My dad (Cody Nedimyer) was born in Altoona in 1923 - his ancestors moved to this country from Bavaria in the early 1800s and settled in St. Lawrence PA. Mom (Joan Maloney) came from a large Irish Catholic family and also was born in Blair County in 1926. They were married in 1950.
We grew up in a working class neighborhood of Altoona called Fairview. Our house was cater-corner to the Fairview Cemetery and down the hill from the largest hospital in Altoona (The Altoona Hospital) . The houses were dirt cheap - probably with valuations in the 5-7K range (I am sure that my family will correct me if I am way off on any of the history in this article). Even though this was a lower-income area, most of the property owners took decent care of their properties.
We were a paycheck-to-paycheck family. My father came back from World War II and spent the majority of his working life (30+ years) working as a Railroad Car Repairman in Blair County, first for the Pennsylvania Railroad and then, after mergers and nationalization of the US railroad system, with Penn Central and Conrail. I think the highest annual salary my father made was in the ballpark of $21,000. The work was physical work, performed outside in raw Central Pennsylvania winters and the heat of summer. If work was missed for any reason (for example, the flu), Dad didn't get paid.
When IBM Gaithersburg tendered me an offer in June, 1984, it was for $24,500. Dad was practically floored! After I accepted the offer but before I packed up and moved for MD, Dad took me up to the Newburg Fire Hall to have a beer with his peeps. I remember him saying to Uncle John Maloney (one of his favorite drinking buddies and my mom's fraternal twin), that "Joey was going to be making the big money at IBM". I think I physically cringed, but I know that was a proud moment for him.
Dad was also an excellent musician and was named the Dance Band Leader at Altoona High School where he graduated in 1941. He had major chops with the tenor sax and clarinet, could sight read, and would also occasionally dabble on the piano. To pick up some additional money, a couple of nights a week, after work or on weekends, he would hit the road with a couple of other buddies in a 3-4 piece unit that would play Big Band and Swing music at small clubs or VFWs in the area.
Mom was also high school educated and raised the kids. Internally within the family, she was no-nonsense with an unyielding will. You could not win an argument with Mom (particularly those issues with which the Catholic Church had established a position). Her doghouse was legendary and if you ended up in it, you would know it and you would make damn sure you didn't end up there again.
Externally, if someone outside of the family crossed one of us in any way, Mom could bring some serious fury. I think the technical term is that she had our backs.
When the babies of the family (Laurey and me) were around 11 or so, and were able to tend to ourselves for a couple of hours after school, Mom took a part-time job at a company called Modern Communication on 16th Street in Altoona. This company provided a telephone answering service for local businesses. I recall the hours were 12:30 - 5:00 or so. Mom never learned to drive a car and walked to work (and mostly everywhere else) and then would get picked up after work by Dad or Joni.
My parent's marriage was not perfect. I don't believe they were ever very happy - with their relationship with each other or with their lots in life. But I can, to this day, remember so many acts of kindness from both of them. The two things that they both unquestionably had in common (and in spades) were their work ethic and their selflessness.
Dad's work ethic spoke for itself - doing physical work with little job satisfaction, for 50 weeks a year well into your late 50s. (I can only imagine how easy it could have been for Dad to turn the alarm clock off at 4:30 AM on those January mornings and go back to sleep.) With Mom, the house was always clean, clothes were washed by hand (until very late in her life), home cooked meals were always there on time, and children were well-tended to.
With such meager incomes, I am still not quite sure how they were able to put 5 kids through private schools and 3 through college - other than that they simply sacrificed for us.
Mom passed away of malignant lymphoma when I was 18 (two weeks before I left for college) and Dad passed on in 1991 (when I was 29). There is not a day goes by that I don't think of them or miss them.
