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stock it with milk cows etc.  Coal was the source of fuel for most people.  There were 
thirteen children in his family.  One of them, your great, grandmother’s brother, was 
killed in World War 1.  Another brother died shortly thereafter from being gassed during 
this war.
She was married with two children at the time of this war.  My sister Audrey, was  
born on July 9, 1914 and I was born on February 29, 1916.  She was 22 years old when I  
was born.  She had met my father, Samuel Joseph Shoen, while working in the Woolworth store 
in nearby Bismarck, North Dakota.  He was from Minnesota and working with a harvesting  
crew that traveled from place to place as the crops matured.  He came into the store with  
a friend and saw my mother.  Right away he told his friend that she was the girl he was  
going to marry.  She was eighteen years old at the time.  He was twenty-four.  They were 
married shortly thereafter.  Her father warned her that her prospective husband only owned 
the shirt on his back.
A local banker was also a suitor.  I met him years later when traveling through  
Bismarck. I needed to cash a $2,000.00 check and went to his bank to do this.  Because  
of the size of the check he had to approve the transaction.  He recognized the name Shoen 
and took me into his office and told me about my mother and her family.
 
You never knew my father.  He died in 1955 from too much hard work.  Supporting a  
family of seven children is those days was hard on the body.
 
In 1925 I was in fourth grade.  Because I was born on February 29, my parents had 
entered me into the first grade the previous autumn.  Therefore I was always a few months 
younger than my classmates.  Because my birthday is in February school was in progress. 
Your birthday occurs during summer vacation.  I do not know if this is good or bad.
Shirt sleeves to shirtsleeves in two generations.

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