Noun 1. plutocrat – someone who exercises power by virtue of wealth have, rich person, wealthy person – a person who possesses great material wealth. (from Free online dictionary) Our family is made up of just folks. There’s a joke in our family that whenever we feel we’ve stumbled into some unexpected wonderful situation that…
At our weekly Sunday brunch we looked at nuts my niece and her children had gathered on our place. My great grandfather was a premier nut grower and grafted new varieties. I wondered if these nuts were Hickons (a cross between hickory and pecan). My niece said: “I think these are just pecans–pecans are, I…
If you have a rich family history. If you have an Elder who holds the history of your locale and region. Don’t let it slip through your fingers. Don’t let that lore die when they do. It’s history. And, as my father likes to say, “History belongs to everyone.” With great generosity he continues to…
Rebecca Pincas and her family hosted a gathering at the Edwardsville Library to share the labors of several yeras of hard and dedicated work. The subject: “The early history of Melville andi ts people.” Several of the old families were represented in the audience, who later became participants in the discussion of the history that…
Evergreen Heights, the place founded by E. A. Riehl and our homeplace still…where he communed with nature and forged paths to become one of the 8 premiere horticulturalist in the world at that time. E. A. Riehl was a pillar of the community, though known not to suffer fools gladly. The lane which ends in…
You may be finished with your holiday baking. You may be sated from all your holiday eating. Or, you may be bored in this week of the dead in these days between Christmas Day and New Year in which my birthday happens to fall. Or, you may even be collecting yourself for next year. You…
When my brother, Gary Thompson, was 13 years old, he took a step into manhood. My father, Erwin A. Thompson, remembers the event like this. —JGR Gary always liked the out of doors. Fishing, hunting, and trapping were things that he enjoyed and liked to spend his time at. We used to trap rabbits in…
My father, in winter hybernating mode, is going through boxes of papers under his desk. Pop writes: “Finding this long-lost piece of literature is the pay for digging into the past. I do not know how old Alice was when she wrote this, but she was married in 1943, at age 27. She signed it…
Pop’s a cover boy! He’s made the front page of the ACTIVE LIVING section of THE TELEGRAPH. (When I was growing up, known as “The Alton Evening Telegraph”–but it now comes out in the morning.) To read the cover story “Clearing the Years: Brush-clearing helps 92-year-old reclaim youthful outlook” it says on the cover. Inside…