At about age four we moved to a house located four and one- half miles north of Warner. The coal mine was also moved. It was behind our house which was situated on the highway. It had a rather high front porch and I discovered that under the porch was a lot of dirt with no grass. I had a toy steam shovel and spent many happy hours under the porch digging with my steam shovel, making appropriate noises with my mouth. I also drove toy cars and trucks around. Jimmy was old enough by then to play with me under the porch too and we had some battles and arguments over who got to play with what. Naturally, being the older, I thought I should be the boss and regulate our play activities. Jimmy in his red haired temperament would raise cain and loudly protest any slight, real or imagined and I could never understand why our parents were not always sympathetic to my plight. It seemed that even strangers would take his part in our squabbles. Of course, having raised children of my own, I now understand.

One time I did something that made me bitterly ashamed. I loved to go down into the pit out behind the house where the men were working. They would make over me and make little jobs for me to do. They would even let me try to swing the big sledge hammer they used in driving stakes into the exposed vein of coal to break it up for loading onto trucks. Once, forgetting my previous bad experience at the Trojan, I slipped away and went down there without permission. I was duly chastised and Mother determined that I would not get away again. Mother had been working hard all day washing and doing house cleaning chores and was tired and feeling bad. I was fussing to get to go down into the pit again and when I realized it was not going to happen, in a fit of temper, I gave a big shove to the open oven door. (We had come up in the world, we had a gas stove and electric lights there, albeit still an outdoor toilet.) Unfortunately the results were much worse than I had planned. Mother had set a big container of milk on the door of the oven in order for the cream to rise. Milk flew into the oven and all over the floor of the kitchen making a huge mess after all her hard work cleaning. Mother just resignedly began cleaning up again all the while quietly sobbing and I felt like the worst heel in the world. I still feel ashamed about that incident.

Another time, I was picking on Jimmy and generally being a spoiled brat in the front room and creating a big row. On the floor there was a pinball game I had been given by Uncle Forrest (I think) for Christmas. It had little metal pins in it and you would use a spring loaded plunger to shoot a steel ball out a chute where it would rebound off the pins until it came to the bottom on settled into a hole with a number for a score. Mother, justifiably, jerked me up by the hand and proceeded to whale away at me with a belt. I was dancing around trying to avoid the belt, screaming bloody murder all the while. It sounded like a scene in a Sinbad comedy routine, but at that time, it was serious business for me. I was trying to avoid grievous bodily harm. All the time, Mother was punctuating each swing of the belt with strong comments about teaching me not to do this and that. After the tumult had died down, my foot began to hurt but I felt that it was in my best interest not to speak about it at that time---or about anything else for that matter. The next day my foot had gotten sore and swollen. I did not associate the soreness with the incident of the previous day but Mother and Dad examined it and found a little puncture wound and put some medicine on it, another terrible ordeal. In those days, medicine was not deemed effective if it was not unpleasant. Medicines to be taken internally were to taste horrible and medicines applied locally to sore spots burned and stung like the dickens. Eventually, the sore seemed to heal. A week or two later, I developed a sore on the top of my foot. Dad got me down, with much yelling on my part, and dug out one of those little metal pins out of my pinball game. I really enjoyed it, however, when Dad had to do similar work on one of my brothers. After all, it was for their own good, the lancing of boils and such.

Dad had a German Shepherd dog named Pal since before he and mother were married. He and Pal were true buddies. One episode that mother loved to tell was about a time before I arrived on the scene. It was during the depression when money was very tight and meat was so expensive that they rarely got to serve it at a meal. Mother, Dad, Uncle Walt, and Aunt Jo were eagerly anticipating partaking of a large roast. Mother had just removed it from the oven and set it on the open table to cool. It must have been hot summertime because they were sitting in the yard. All of a sudden they heard a noise and rushed into the kitchen to discover Pal, roast in his jaws, dashing from the house. It's a wonder that he survived after that but Dad would not hear of anyone harming his dog. Pal liked to ride on the fender of the car when Dad was driving out in the field. He would jump off to chase a rabbit. There was a very sad time for Dad while we lived at Warner. Pal, who was getting rather old by then, got hit by a car on the highway. We were informed by a highway patrolman who discovered him. I went with dad to recover his body. We buried him in a grave in the field north of the house. I could sense how sad and miserable Dad was to lose a cherished friend. I think about old Pal to this day whenever I have occasion to drive that highway and look to see if I can still see where he was buried.

Dad used to love to go fishing down on the Canadian river near Briartown with his friends, including Forney Defore. Forney was a big husky man with a round belly who was very strong. In those days when tools and machinery were massive sculptures in steel, Forney had to be admonished to use care because he was known to break things that an ordinary man wouldn't think of. He worked at the coal mine with Dad and Uncle Walter. They would trotline and some of them would noodle for catfish. To noodle was a rather scary process. They would wade in the river next to the bank feeling around for holes. Sometimes there would be a big flathead in the hole. If they felt one, they would reach into the mouth and grab the gill with a tight grip. Then it was a wrestling match to get the big fish out and not get pulled under. I remember one time when we were all sitting around the house with Aunt Jo and others present and Mother told about a nightmare she had where Dad and Forney were chopping wood and Dad got hit with an axe in a vital place. That was so real it had a lasting impression on me. The others were all laughing at some of the more ridiculous aspects of Mother's narrative but I was filled with dread. It had never occurred to me that I might lose one of my parents. Later I expressed that fear to mother and she reassured that she and Dad were here for the duration and nothing would happen to either of them.

At Warner was where I discovered the printed word. Mother had been working with me, teaching me the letters of the alphabet. She also showed me my name by writing it out. One day when Dad was reading the newspaper and I was sitting nearby imitating him by pretending to read a piece of the paper, I happened to notice the word "don't". The first three letters were my name! I took the paper over to Dad, showing him how I had found my name in print, and he excitedly called Mother into the room, exclaiming that I was learning how to read. This little bit of praise caused me to redouble my efforts, pouring over printed matter to find bits that I could recognize. Mother took advantage of this and by the time I started to school at age five, I had been through two beginning readers and could read them.

I had some sort of surgery while we lived there. It was on my groin area and mother can't remember what it was for but I think it was for an undescended testicle. I remember that I was given a shot in that area. I was wheeled into the operating room where a nurse with a mask over her face tried to reassure me then proceeded to put a thing with tubes over my face. I was convinced that she was trying to smother me with some foul smelling stuff and struggled with all my might. It took several of them to hold me down until I went to sleep, convinced as I was that I was about to die. Imagine my astonishment after awakening that I was still of this world! After I was taken home, I remember Dad saying "An apple a day will keep the doctor away." and scraping an apple with a spoon to get the soft pulpy meat into a mushy compound that tasted good to me. I certainly wanted to keep the doctor away after that terrible ordeal. I liked Dr. Oldham though. Since he had a mask on, I don't think I realized that he was the mastermind behind that dastardly deed in the operating room.

I got to go along whenever anyone in the family went to the doctor. I liked waiting in the waiting room. I think Dr. Oldham was at least part Indian as in later years I learned he had been involved in Indian affairs of some sort. In his waiting room, he had a series of stylistic paintings by the famous A C Blue Eagle. Those paintings really stirred my imaginations with stylistic eagles in the sky and moons that looked like shields with feathers dangling from the sides. This is from a childhood memory and I may have some of the details wrong but those original paintings made a lasting impression on me. They represented a wonderland of strong men on graceful horses. I guess it was my first exposure to real art. (Note: since then, I've learned that Dr. Oldam was very active in Indian affairs.)

One time Grandpa and Grandma Towry came to stay with us for a while. It was just before Grandpa suffered from the illness that ended his life. He may have already experienced the onset by that time but was still enjoying a relative strength of good health. One day we decided to walk the four plus miles into Warner to pick up the mail and get a newspaper. Always before, when visiting them at Tahlequah, I had been told to be very quiet and thoughtful so as not to get on Grandpa's nerves. He didn't pay much attention to us kids. This day I was to learn about the real Grandpa John J. Towery and what a jolly good-natured man he was. All along the road he would talk with me. Sometimes as we walked he would sing and dance a little jig beside the highway. That day I came to appreciate my Grandpa for the wonderful man he was. He made me feel like he was somebody special. I remember another time he came and preached at our little church in Porum. During the Warner days, mother would faithfully load up Jimmy and I every Sunday and drive to church at Porum where we would be with familiar friends for worship. We were too poor and small to have a regular preacher so it was regarded as a treat when some minister or lay minister would come to preach and lead singing for us. I remember one time the old grey Ford broke down on one of those trips. Some nice man stopped and helped get us on our way as was common in those days when cars were frequently disabled on the road.

I traveled over that little weeded narrow two laned highway between Muskogee and Porum so many times that I came to know it by heart. It has plenty of curves and small bridges and one steep hill just north of Warner past where we lived. That hill dipped down into the Dirty Creek bottom. I remember one time a bad flood came. We drove to that hill and there was water as far as you could see. We then drove south past Briartown, south of Porum, to the Canadian river and there was even more water there. I later heard that it was a major disaster for people living along the Arkansas River at Gore and Webber Falls and those towns were largely destroyed. Even now, when I drive on that road, old memories come flooding back. In later years, the highway between Warner and Porum was widened and straightened in some places so it is not now exactly the same.

Uncle Forrest came to visit one day. He brought what was to become a trusted friend and faithful family member. It was a little white puppy with big orangey yellow spots. Short haired, he was. Mother said I could pick his name. I had a book I had enjoyed having read to me about a dog called Robin so I decided that was to be our dog's name. He even looked rather like the dog in the book. I think he was half collie and half bulldog. He didn't look like either. He didn't look like any breed of dog I have seen. He was medium in size after he was grown and had a slightly larger chest in proportion to his hind quarters so maybe that was a little of the bulldog coming out. There was no collie evident except in the coloration. He came along shortly before old Pal died so there was a replacement. He was loved by and loved every one in the family. He lived until after I went away to college.

A lot of visitors, family and others came and went and I remember the good times and laughter and telling of tales that accompanied these visitations. Aunt Virginia came for a while once and I especially enjoyed her visit. Oddly, I can't remember Ronny during that visit but I know he must have been along and we must have played cars under the porch. Aunt Ginny, as she was called, was Dad's youngest sister and was filled with fun and boisterous good nature as were all the Burdett brothers and sisters. When they were together, every one would talk loudly, interrupting anyone else by talking even more loudly to give another variation on what ever humorous tale was being told. Uncle Charles and Uncle Jap(Jasper) had moved with their wives to find good jobs in California near Los Angeles so we didn't see them so often.

We only lived at Warner for slightly less than a year when we moved into town at Porum. That was a memorable time of my life because of the above mentioned happenings and more. War was about to break out in Europe, if it already hadn't. The demand for coal for the war effort, which the U.S. was not in yet, had already been anticipated by a wealthy former officer and mining engineer, Col. Leavell. Uncle Raleigh had become a financial manager for Col. Leavell's various mining and construction affairs around the country. He decided there was enough coal in the Porum area to go into it in a big way to supply our country's anticipated needs for industry gearing up for the war to come. He provided the major investment with Uncle Raleigh retaining some shares. Incidentally, Uncle Raleigh's preferred name was his first name, Charles, and he used Charles R. Towry as his name. The family grew up calling him Raleigh and Mother and we kids continued it throughout his life. There was a flurry of activity when Dad was gone a lot, prospecting for coal, even over into Arkansas. Next, Dad was really busy buying land and mineral rights on the land near Porum. He was so trusted in that area that many of the people would deal with him only. He had learned how to do abstract work, go to the court house and investigate deeds to determine if the title was clear of any legal encumbrances and to write legal documents which saved the expense of lawyers in many instances. Many of the people with whom he had dealings became so trusting of Dad that in their future land and other legal dealings, they would call on him for assistance and advice even though it didn't involve Dad's or the Coal Mine's affairs. Dad was scrupulously honest and honorable in all his affairs and preferred to be cheated himself rather than do something even slightly shady. His anger would really flare when he would on rare occasions discover he had been taken advantage of. He had loaned money, even in hard times to people who had no visible prospects of repaying it. I, in later years, accompanied him on some of his unsuccessful visits to friends living in other towns in an attempt to recover some of the lost money. He was always pleasant and never angry with them. Some were evidently not good managers and were always short on cash. Dad was a very sympathetic and caring man and had difficulty turning down any one who seemed to be in need.

We moved to Porum in anticipation of Dad having a major role in a big mining operation and he soon was drawing a high salary for those days. He was to become a very important man in Porum and in Muskogee County.