Virginia and Joan Touby

When my dear Aunt Joan passed away, my mother, Virginia, wrote these memories for Aunt Joan's family.  They capture moments in time as the two of them grew from childhood playmates to college roommates to young marrieds with growing families.

Joan and I were playmates from the earliest years...

 

We were the little girls in the family and spent those wonderful, blissful pre-school days in a pretend world.  The dolls, the cats and dog were our family.  Often I was the father (by virtue of age, I suppose), and Joan was the mother.  She was just right in that role.  Of course, that was only when we two played together.  Otherwise Louise and Dorothy had positions of greater authority!

Virginia - unhappily persuaded to be the father dressed in her father's boyhood clothes

Joan, as the mother, dressed our black cat in one of the dolls' pink striped nightgown and made it lie on its back in the doll buggy as she pushed it around the yard.  When the cat could take it no longer, it would leap out of the carriage and streak across the yard in its nightgown.

Virginia, Joan and cat

Joan, Virginia and more cats

Virginia and a patient cat

Virginia and Joan

Then there was the time mother called us to the window to see Joan and our dog Shep seated in the old Chevy truck which daddy had left in the driveway.  Shep was the driver with his paws placed on the steering wheel and Joan sat beside him!  I'm sure Joan could have been an animal trainer.

Shep

Another little girl memory was of the summer our father cleaned out the grain barn and had it rearranged with additional partitions for the various grains to be stored.  This created a wonderful playhouse with rooms.  Daddy agreed to let us play in it until time for the grain harvest.  Joan and I made trip after trip carrying our play furniture out to set up housekeeping.  It was perfect for tea parties with graham crackers and marshmallows and lemonade.  The fun lasted until the wheat and oats had been threshed and we had to clear out and move back into the house.

Things look so big when we are small

You've probably heard this story, but I have to tell it again.  Our huckster driver was a comical little man whose name was Mr. Beebout.  (It's true.  That was his name!)  The huckster wagon - actually a truck - was a veritable little general store on wheels, with sugar, flour, extracts, eggs -- even a crate for cackling chickens hanging on the back of the truck.  Little drawers held thread, pins, and other small household items.  Country women often depended on the huckster who came our way once a week.  He was a friendly, chatty fellow who also told what the neighbors were doing that day.  Often when he turned the corner on our bumpy country roads, the little drawers in the wagon would slide out and he would have to take time to rearrange things at the next stop.  One summer mother and we girls were sitting in the yard shelling peas.  It was too warm in the kitchen with the cookstove going.

Shelling peas in the yard

Mr. Beebout had stopped at our neighbor's house just down the road and seemed to stay an unusually long time.  Mother wondered why he could be at Mrs. Householder's so long.  Joan, just five or six years old, piped up with, "Maybe Mr. Beebout dropped his drawers again!"

Joan and I enjoyed so many things together in High School.  She was in singing groups and I played piano accompaniments.  She often sang with the Busby twins and with Carolyn Kratzer.  She and Aunt Louise sang duets occasionally.

Virginia and Joan in concert

Joan and I attended Christian Endeavor meetings for the young people at Rich Valley Church.  We were baptized at the same time and became members there.

We were enrolled at Ball State College during the World War II years and were roommates during two of those years.  Some of our friends thought it was amazing that sisters could get along well enough with each other to be roommates...we had always been roommates at home.

Joan

Virginia at Ball State

Joan on the steps of the Fine Arts building, Ball State

Virginia, Joan and Dorothy

We traveled on the train to College Camp, Wisconsin one summer to work as waitresses in the camp diningroom.  We played croquet on our lawn with the Coburn boys.  We double-dated occasionally.

A post card from Virginia to her mother

George Williams College Camp, Lake Geneva, WI

Virginia and Arthur playing croquet

 After the war, when Arthur and I were married in 1946, Joan was my only bridesmaid. 

Joan was Virginia's bridesmaid

Soon, Joan and Edver were dating, and two years later were married.  I played the piano and Marianna Riddick sang.

Joan and Edver were married at the Touby home

Marianna Riddick and Virginia

In the spring of 1950 Ed and Joan dropped in for a visit, and as they started to share a bit of news with us, I somehow knew what they were going to say.  I interrupted with excitement, "Are you planning what we're planning?"  Yes, it was true!  We were expecting a baby in November and Ed and Joan in December.

Jane and Charlotte were born just a month apart.  In 1952 Marcia and Nancy were born just six months apart.  And Phil came along in March of the following year.  As the years passed and our families grew, the celebrations at Grandma and Grandpa Touby's house were always so much fun with grandparents, aunts, uncles and cousins all in a wonderful mix.

Joan, Edver, Charlotte and Marcia on Arthur and Virginia's porch

Arthur, Jane, David, Virginia and Nancy

Jane and Charlotte

A birthday at Grandma and Grandpa's house: Joan, Phil and Charlotte

Cousins

Grandma and Grandpa

Grandpa with Marcia on his lap, and Charlotte at his side

Charlotte brings Grandma a present

 Occasionally there were overnight visits at each others' houses.  Joan helped Nancy decide on two little flower vases to buy with her spending money when Jane and Nancy had a "vacation" with Charlotte and Marcia one summer.  Phillip  and Les enjoyed a ride on the pony here on our farm when they were just little guys.

David, Charlotte, Jane, Marcia and Nancy: our porch step, c. Summer 1955

Phil and Les on Prancer at Virginia and Arthur's farm

And Elizabeth remembers so well the good times with Les making roads and villages in Grandma Touby's sandbox.  Les also gained a friend forever when he fed Laddie several pieces of ham from the plate prepared for supper.  He looked at me so sweetly and said, "Your doggy sure do like ham!"  By the time Jon was born we weren't able to get together as often.  But when we did, Jon always tried to keep up with the big kids.

Fast forward a few years and Charlotte and Jane are both enrolled at Ball State where their mothers had attended 25 or so years earlier.  Our paths were taking our families in different directions then.  Grandpa and Grandma had hosted the gatherings as long as they were able.  We would soon be saying good bye to them.  But the Touby sisters still felt a strong bond and made a date to have Christmas together each year.  There were other gatherings as we could arrange them.  One memorable time was our "Touby Women" slumber party at Charlotte's house in Athens, Ohio.  Good food, great conversation, but very little slumbering.  On Sunday morning we all attended church together.  We were so proud of Charlotte as she led the children's group in recognizing Christian symbols pointed out throughout the sanctuary.  Sarah sang in the choir.  After lunch back at the house, Joan led us in forming a circle of love and we sang together "May the Lord, Mighty God, bless and keep you forever."  What a very dear memory to carry home with us.

The Touby Women's weekend at Charlotte's

Louise's 80th birthday: Louise, Dorothy, Joan, Virginia

Louise, Joan, Dorothy, Virginia, 1998

Dorothy's wedding, 1942: Virginia, Dorothy, Louise, Joan

This past Christmas, 2001, was the first we Touby sisters had missed getting together.  Joan's and Louise's frail health, plus the distance and uncertain weather, made planning difficult.  But we were in touch with each other by phone.  What a warm memory we have of Christmas morning when Joan called to wish us a Merry Christmas as Elizabeth answered the phone and we heard her say, "Why, Aunt Joan, how nice to hear your voice."  They talked briefly and then Joan and I had a good conversation.  We were so pleased to have her call.

[In closing her letter to Edver and children, my mother writes...]

I just want to add how very proud Joan was of all of you and your accomplishments.  Her love and spirit of encouragement will be with you always.  Blessings to each one of you.
Lovingly,
Aunt Virginia

In loving memory of Joan Touby Coburn (1925-2002)