The Bishops were frequent visitors to the Koftans' Old Brick House, as some 1920s-1930s photos later will show. Buzz and Lena were lifelong friends, and their family were probably the closest to Laurence and Fern when Grandpa and Grandma Koftan lived Up West on the Peters' homestead north of Newport. My Ellingson cousins also knew them well from summers spent with our grandparents. The closeness of the families started early, as evidenced by this photo of Mervin Feddersen and Ella Larson in the back, Jim/Buzz Brown and Lena Bishop in the front. I don't know if Mervin and Ella were a dating couple. I presume so simply because of Buzz and Lena in the front, though Ella was to marry Joe Koftan, Laurence's youngest brother. It's a nice sepia photo, all four all dressed up.
As I told Betty Brown Christensen when I sent her a sympathy card recently at the death of her husband, Elmer, I had a whole scrapbook page devoted to Buzz and Lena and their family, the pictures here. Mom/Velma stayed in touch with the Bishop girls to her end, Christmas cards and such, and Buzz and Lena always stopped when they were near Center, just as we usually visited the Browns when we were Up West. They were always very active and great fun, as I remember.
The lower photo of Lena and her three oldest daughters at a picnic makes me think it is Up West at Mariaville, or, rather, that small park with the pond and school merry-go-round a few miles south of the Peters' homestead. The hats and cars suggest the 1920s.
The next photo is in nice contrast to the first, Lena and Ella again, with Grandma Bishop and Grandma Koftan.
Here is the handsome, happy Bishop family, clearly while Buzz was in the Navy in World War II, i.e., in the 1940s.
I don't think Betty (in the middle of the back row then) will mind if I put her family update she wrote me in June: "Right now Joe and Naomi are busy haying. Naomi does not help in hayfield but keeps up the place and gets meals. Jean is on the go all the time. She loves to quilt, also play bridge. She lost her husband Dick two years ago. We were all lucky to get wonderful husbands and keep them for so long. [Her husband, Elmer, was 86 when he died earlier this year.] Norma the younger one was married 50 yrs in 2005. Clea the youngest girl died in 1990. Larry the youngest boy lives at Fremont. Dick lives at Mora MN, works in a grocery store cutting meat. Divorced. . . . Bob the oldest son . . . lives at Aurora CO. He had five children. He married Shirley Hasch, daughter of Art & Mildred Hasch, who lived south of the Koftan place. . . . Bob retired from Air Force, worked as insurance adjuster for a number of years, then as mechanic at some motor co. in Aurora." [He returns several times a year to cut trees on the property owned by his wife.] I'm sure the Ellingsons will appreciate having that summary to go with the photo. She had much more news, especially of her own family, grandchildren and great grandchildren.
Finally these two photos of Buzz and Lena at their 50th anniversary celebration, two treasured people.
