Heraclitus made change the main feature of the universe: "You cannot step into the same river twice." That went on in Center all through my life there, of course. Here are some more photos in proof.
Here I am in our yard west of the house with my first dog I can truly remember as a pet, Zippy, an Oriental terrier we bought at the Knox County Fair. (The female dog when I was about two was pictured earlier in a set of station photos.) Some trees newly planted in the yard, and Dad has just been putting in the privet hedge, not done yet. Left to right are the Crosley Brothers Garage (the only building still there), Joe Ballard's smelly, noisy blacksmith shop over my head, the Ballard residence, and at the right the one-time two-story hotel transformed into our big crackerbox town hall where we played basketball until our new gymn was built in the 1950s, watched movies in the winter, saw plays, had dances and other social activities. I enlarged the picture so that the tethered dark cattle grazing in the big lot south of the hall can be seen, two near my head, another to the left. Summer thunderstorms flooded that lot, turning it into a shallow lake where we splashed and sailed homemade boats. That lot also served as a parking area for summertime outdoor movies either on a screen hung on the hall or, later, a wooden screen raised on two telephone poles. Dad sometimes flooded it in winter for an ice-skating rink. We also played fox and geese and ball games there. Today there is no emptiness. It is filled in, with overflow from McManigal's and two residences where the hall stood. Joe's son, Ora, a county judge, built a new home where his dad's blacksmith shop had stood.
But before that, notice the changes around Grandma Fern Koftan below, measurable by the tree and hedge. The Pulse farm house from north of town had been moved in next door, thoroughly cleaned and renovated by the townspeople, and it became the superintendent's house, Peases the first and longest occupants. It's early spring; Grandma's strong-scented gardenia corsage was for Mother's Day, according to another set of photos.
Already it should be obvious we were only a half block east off Main Street and had a clear view of the busiest part of downtown (besides the post office, courthouse, and bank), as shown here, some occasion when I did not want my picture taken with my Ellingson cousins, Mike, Penny, and Denny. Dad's shop and filling station are left of me, the outhouse by my ear, his Texaco sign by the telephone pole. On Main Street are Becker's Pool Hall, Mary's Cafe, and Freddie's Store, all now gone. Joe Ellingson held court on the bench in front of his wife's popular cafe with its jukebox and piano as added attractions. I was usually not allowed to go into the pool hall except to get Dad or ask him for a nickel or dime. He was as good at billiards as other sports, but he also spent time at Mary's for pop, her excellent pies, or a root beer soda. I was hit on my bike by a speeding car in front of Freddie's, luckily getting only road burns as I bounced off the side of it after it struck my front wheel. The corner water fountain was popular for water fights until adults yelled at us. And we balanced ourselves on the pipe railing over the ditch (coming out of Denny's head). The plank over the ditch left of Denny's head attests to the high waters of thunderstorms; we had a set of planks out front too (hard to shovel snow off). Like the big hall lot when it flooded, the ditches were prime playground running full of summer rain and sometimes the flooding Coolee Creek from the southeast.
Where the old hall stood now looks like this:
The superintendent's house has become one of the most decorated, neatly kept places in town by Vern and Charlotte McManigal, who have a garage and an open shed for boat storage at the south end of the big former hall lot. I don't have a picture of their place or ours next door because our house has stood derelict, unoccupied for several years now.
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