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Relatively Speaking

(Written November 1997)

Before my story unfolds any further, I want to write about my maternal grandparents Anna and Joseph Voegele (pronounced "Vay-glee"). They were both dead and gone by the time I was 11 years old, but I remember them well and with love and affection.

When we were children we had the great good fortune to have our maternal grandparents living right next door to us. In more ways than one it was a godsend to have them living there. You see, in our house there was only one bathroom for a family of eight. More times than I care to remember, one of my siblings or I made a mad dash for the house next door where there were two bathrooms and only two people.

Grandparents' house (left), our house (right)

We called this grandmother "Mother", never Grandma. She called each and every one of her grandchildren " Dearie". I suspect she couldn’t keep track of all our names.

This was our "well-to-do" set of grandparents. My grandfather was a successful businessman. He owned and operated a bottling plant; that is, he made carbonated soft drinks. Back East we called it "pop". Here in the West it is called "soda". He had his own secret formula from which he made every flavor of soda pop imaginable, and sold it throughout Western New York State. My all time favorite was Birch Beer – similar to coke but so much better tasting. I have never seen it here on the West Coast. Another popular flavor he made was Orange Crush. That really was delicious too. Nowadays, I always think of my grandfather when the local traffic reports out here announce that there is the usual congestion at the "Orange Crush" – that place in Orange County where the 22, the 5, and the 57 freeways come together.

Of course my grandfather was making all this stuff long before the days of Coca-Cola, Pepsi, 7UP, and the other popular drinks of today. In fact, in the 1890s he was approached by the inventor of Coca-Cola himself, a young man, practically penniless, who was looking for someone to help him get started with his new concoction (Coca-Cola). My grandfather proclaimed it tasted awful and would never sell, and he turned the young man away. Oh Grandpa, how could you have done this to us?!

Anyway, despite this horrendous misjudgment, my grandfather (and his two sons after him) managed to stay in business at the same location on West Main Street in Lancaster, NY for 76 years. Then the business, which had been gradually declining thanks to Coca-Cola and all those other popular drinks, was dealt its final deathblow when Urban Renewal came to town. The Voegele Bottling Works ceased to exist in 1968.

This set of grandparents traveled all over the country in the 1890s and early 1900s prior to World War I. They always traveled by train. Their favorite destinations were the states of Washington and California – both places a long, long way from their home in Buffalo, NY. I have been told that they made these many trips to the West Coast in an unsuccessful effort to find some trace of my grandfather’s Uncle John who disappeared when he went out there during the Gold Rush of the 1850s.

When I was a little girl, my grandfather kept me spellbound telling me stories about California. I had never seen a palm tree, a cactus, a mountain, a desert, or an ocean. And flowers and warm weather all winter long! How I longed to see this wonderful place for myself. My grandfather promised to take me there some day. But he died in 1934 when I was only 8 years old. I had to wait another 20 years before I saw California. I finally went there in 1954 on my honeymoon – which was more fun, after all, than going with my grandpa.

Three years after my grandfather’s death, my grandmother also died after a rather short illness. So in 1937 my mother, as one of the four heirs to the estate and an ongoing partner in the bottling business, became my "well-to-do" parent. Life was indeed comfortable for my family from then on and there was always enough money to meet our needs and, in due time, to put me through college. However, one of the most important things my mother did with her newly acquired wealth was to add another bedroom to our house – and, of course, most important of all – another bathroom!