Evening star., 1940-04-28

Await His Return
His Wife, Busy With
Dolly Tasks, Has Little
Time for Brooding
DOWNINGTOWN, Pa, April 27.
(N.A.N.A)-It's a rather large, deep
diamond setting on tall, platinum
prongs that sprout from yellow gold,
companion band to wedding ring of
another generation. Beneath the
diamond is some soil of Chester
County.
And there is a one-room school,
house, with the sun streaming in
its windows, as old as Harmony
Hills history. In corner sit a tow
headed boy and his younger sisters,
with the sun on them as well as on
the Stars and Stripes and an old
lithograph of George Washington.
This seems to tell the replanting
of the wife and children of Grover
Bergdoll.
They all are waiting there on the
260 acres of rolling green or dense
forest, not far from Downingtown,
for the day when pop will come
home after paying off a debt to So
ciety in khaki.
The German girl who married
Bergdoll and is mother of six seems
more the athletic, slender American
girl. There's an accent you can't
miss, of course, and sometimes cart
before -the-horse grammar, but that
makes her only the more charming.
Farmers Life.
She came out of the farmhouse
that goes back to the 170Os onto
porch where timid dog, sleepy
dog and bristly puppy tail-wagged
or barked a welcome She wore
canvas shoes and sports socks and
white slacks; gray sweater, and her
hair was done up in braided circles
over her ears.
There Is the farmer who is Berg
dolls wife. There are hired men to
run tractor for the blowing, and
the seeders and harrowers. They
do the milking. too. for Mrs. Berg
doll was never a milkmaid, though
she'd make fetching one in Shu-
bert musical.
But when it comes to grinding
corn, tending to the chicken and
duck flocks, and growing a large
vegetable tract from hotbeds on up,
Mrs. Bergdoll is the working farm
frau.
Her soft. green eyes are friendly
with reason. In that farming COM
munity of Harmony Hill, she's been
made welcome. Wives of neighbor-
farmers have called on her, and the
word of the teacher is that Mrs.
Bergdoil is popular as a very real,
lovely woman with other members
of the community's parent-teacher
association
Little Time to Brood.
Even if she were geared to it, Mrs.
Bergdoll would have precious little
time to brood. She must keep an
eye on Bubi, sharp-eyed 6-year-
old son who lets the pigs out. She
must be ever watchful over 5-year-
old Bega, her daughter. always in
the chicken coop. And then there's
the baby to care for.
Mrs. Bergdoll has no houseful of
servants. No, only cook who goes
home at night. The cook drives
the other children, Emma, Alfred
and Nina, to school, gets them at
lunch time, brings them home, then
back they go to school.
One comes to the house through
white grape arbor and down the
hill of wiry grass one sees rows of
wide holes. Mrs. Bergdoll. wise in
the ways of the soil, knows only
rugged stuff will grow on that wide
bank. So she's planting an apple
orchard
In the fall she'll put up apple
butter and jam, grape jelly and all
sorts Of vegetables. There are ample
places for storage, in the spring.
house down in guiley at whose
end is a clear wading pool-for the
children.
She's proud that her 80 hens give
her between As and so eggs a day.
And she apologized she couldn't talk
more, but It was the babys feeding
time and, besides, it was her day to
clean the chicken houses.
Children Popular.
Over the hill at the school %
children play during recess. AS
popular as any are Emma, IL: Al
fred, IL, and Nina, 10. Alfred is
terribly studious and a bookworm.
The teacher finds them apt. The
two older children are in the fifth
grade, Mina's in the fourth. Next
year there'll be an added starter
Bubi.
A small radio was on during lunch
recess.
Bergdo1is son was frowning over
composition paper, his pencil mov-
ing Slowly.
A commentators voice, deep and
authoritative, spoke. THE war may
go on for two years or more =
one knows about Germany on
and on, words of war.
Bergdoll's boy. quit writing. His
trown got deeper and blacker
and he turned off the radio.