Birth of Marvin, Military Service, Education, and Death of Winnogene

Brother Born
[Kenneth’s youngest brother, Marvin, was born 6 Jan. 1916.]

Kenneth's sister Winnogene holding Baby Marvin Scott

Military Service
World War I was in progress and young men had the option of being drafted or joining some phase of the services. I chose to enlist in the Students Army Training Corp (SATC) and was ordered to report to training quarters at the William Jewell College at Liberty, Missouri. That was quite an experience with Army training under West Point officers.  [Kenneth’s service record indicates he was inducted on October 21, 1918.]

Soldiers in Student Army Training Corps, Milliken Univeristy, Decatur, Illinois, ca 1918

The armistice on November 11, 1918 resulted in the SATC program being discontinued. I received an honorable discharge from the Army a little before Christmas 1918 and returned home.

The following account is from a tape-recorded interview with Kenneth, found in the appendix of his and Mary’s autobiographies:

One time after I had graduated from high school, I went down to William Jewel College in Liberty, Missouri, and I went to that business school down there for almost a year, I guess. This was at the beginning of the World War and they turned that over to some military officers who were training some young men to be officers in the army. That’s what I was taking training for to be a second Lieutenant, I guess it was. They then closed that particular training down and then I went back home. Yes, I was really in the military.

I volunteered to go into the Student Army Training Corps. That was a year before the war ended. It was down to William Jewel College at Liberty, Missouri. They’d get us out and we had uniforms and army rifles we trained with. I remember one time they took us out and made us walk at attention down a muddy road for a mile or so…because somebody in this dormitory, someone had taken a big tall cardboard container for trash and…they’d taken it in the shower and it was up on the third floor and they were having just some mischief with some of the soldiers down on the second floor and they had this all poised up there on the rail, full of water, so that when someone stepped out down ther--one of their friends--they were going to tip this barrel over.  And the one that stepped out was the First Lieutenant, who was our training officer! They just soaked him with water.  So the next morning was when he got us all out, and he didn’t know who did it, but he got us out, and marched us at attention for about a mile or two down through the muddy road so that was a punishment that we remembered a good while. We didn’t want to get into that any more.

Pursuing Education and Career
I resumed my work in the commercial State Bank which continued until the regular assistant cashier, Gerold Smothers, returned from the service.  I worked at the bank until I got through school about one more year in high school. Then Dad sold his bank and moved to Idaho. I was working for a Ford agency and I stayed on.

Chillicothe Business College.   Courtesy www.mainstreetchillicothemo.com

Following the example of my father, I enrolled in the Chillicothe Business College for a business course including bookkeeping, typing, and shorthand.

Thomas Edward Sallee (1841-1917)

Adelia Putnam Sallee (1846-1904), wife of Thomas E. Sallee

For a nominal monthly charge, I had a room and meals at the home of my Grandfather Sallee’s, who owned a feed and coal business. Delivery was made by an employee who drove the big Percheron horse “Bill” hitched to a brightly painted heavy wagon. As a young lad, when I would visit Grandfather Sallee with Mother and Winnogene, I would thrill at the opportunity to ride on the delivery wagon and hear Bill’s shod feet just “clank, clank” on the brick pavement.

Delivery wagon and horse, ca 1990 (Source:  http://kingstonpubliclibrary.org)

In those earlier days, it was necessary that we travel to Chillicothe by train–leaving rather early in the morning and getting off about 25 miles down the road at Darlington to transfer to another train that went east to Chillicothe. Darlington was just a crossing for two railroads and there were no accommodations there except the train station with hard seats.

Train at  Marceline, Missouri , ca 1915 (Source:  http://www.kchistory.org)

As we had to wait there about three hours, Mother would bring along a nice lunch. presently the train going east would arrive and after riding it for about an hour and a half we would arrive at Chillicothe. Later when automobiles were in use, it was only about an hour’s drive from Ridgeway to Chillicothe–but before that the train seemed much better than the other alternative of a team of horses and a buggy requiring a long day’s journey.

This period of attending the Business College provided many opportunities to visit with Grandfather Sallee. He was a rather reserved person but one who had had many varied experiences and had traveled considerably including trips to Yellowstone Park, partly by stage coach. He was a captain in the cavalry during the Civil War and had a handsome sword from that experience. I was fascinated by the heavy gold chain that he always wore in his vest with a large silver watch on one end and the key he used to wind his watch each evening, on the other end.

Pocket watch and chain (Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org)

He wore a full white beard that extended probably eight inches below his chin. Like my Grandfather Scott, he could tell interesting stories of his travels. My grandfathers were good friends but Grandfather Sallee being a Democrat and Grandfather Scott being a Republican–they would have political discussions.

Thomas Edward Sallee

R
Death of Winnogene
I was called home February 27, 1918 by the startling bad news that Winnogene had died. She had been doctored faithfully by an old family doctor, Dr. Williams, for what he thought was an ear ache. Too late it was discovered to be a mastoid infection. Then she was rushed to the nearest hospital–in St. Joseph, Missour–but the infection was so extensive that she couldn’t be saved. My dear mother never fully overcame the great sorrow of losing this beautiful and lovely daughter in her 13 year of age. Winnogene was buried in the cemetery in Ridgeway, Missouri.

Winnogene's headstone