Palmer Family History
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Betty and Bill Niedringhaus Are Married In Bed, April 1942
Aunt Betty told me this story in a series of e-mails in May and June 2003, while I was home on maternity leave after Janet was born. Minor revisions were supplied in October 2004 by Aunt Betty and her son Bill, and I've done a bit of editing just to tidy things up.Aunt Betty is my grandmother Margaret (Peg or Mima) Niedringhaus Palmer’s sister-in-law, and Bill (her late husband) was Mima’s younger brother. Other relatives who appear in the story are their brother Jack Niedringhaus; Anna Marie (Mimi) Munhall Niedringhaus, Mima’s mother; Barbara Niedringhaus, Jack’s wife; Ev, my grandfather Everett Palmer; and Cath and Norm, Mima’s cousin Cathy and her husband. My Uncle Chip (aka Everett Palmer III) makes a brief appearance in utero.
After the war, Betty and Bill lived in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where Betty made the plants and flowers for some of the dioramas in the Carnegie Museum. They have two children, Lee and Bill and four grandchildren.
Sara Palmer Gillies
October 30, 2004
When Bill and I were married, it was April, '42 – wartime. The apt. we found in Louisville, KY, was old and as I sat down on the old wooden steps one day when I got locked out, I ran a splinter into my ankle. Went to hotel doctor and he dressed it but didn't clean it well so it became infected.
I hobbled around with Bill, buying what we needed. He was a 2nd Lt. (We were really poor – but we didn't care.) At first we canceled the wedding but we wanted so to be married before he left (almost any day). Mimi, Peg, Barb. N., my mother (always overly protective as I was an only chick), some St. Louis cousins had arrived but no friends or other relatives. We called the minister from his country home "to please marry us" and when he agreed, we got married – everyone standing around my bed. I was propped up wearing a pink negligee, Bill's orchid, a pink candy ribbon in my hair, dogwood around the room produced from the roadside by Barb and Peg – me with a 104 temp, nicely pink cheeked, and a swollen arm from a protective shot in the arm (allergy dev.) and a huge swollen ankle (I could no longer walk). I had been given one of the first sulfa shots. Bill was in uniform, sitting beside me and on the other bed was the minister. Phone in between. We were nearly thru the service when the phone rang. Jack was calling from Baltimore. Bill picked it up and laid it on its side. You could hear an impatient Jack who didn't like being ignored (why should he?) and who eventually began to swear – long and loud. Bill used to tell it like this:
Minister: Do you take this woman...
Jack: HELLO! HELLO!
Minister: ... to be your wife...
Jack: I CAN HEAR NOISES, WHO'S THERE? WHO'S THERE?!
Minister: ... to have and to hold ...
Jack: WHY DOESN'T SOMEONE ANSWER THE DAMN PHONE!
The whole thing got quite exciting as the minister hurried to finish. The first thing my new husband said was "Hello, Jack."
Bill's first husbandly duty was to carry me to the bathroom after Mother took everyone to dinner so Bill and I were "together at last" – at least to hug. When they came back M. claimed her room and I didn't see Bill until the next AM.
Well, mother and I slept, I guess, and early in the morning I, with 104 fever, was sent to hosp. Both Bill and Mother were in the ambulance. I was there for perhaps two weeks when the fever started down; leg still intact and improving. (At first doctor said it might have to be removed.) Sulfa had just been discovered and cured me (tho I was allergic to it). Bill used to tell a wonderful tale of this whole hospital experience. Mother was always trying to stick too closely to me.
Finally we went home to our apt. (of which we were enormously proud) in Bill's Chevy and were together at last. We actually had a few more weeks in Louisville before he was sent to Columbus, GA and, of course, I followed. We had a room in the mayor's home. We wouldn't be there long. I do remember writing Thank You notes and being home any minute when he might come in (which was rare). We were "alone together" in a strange city.
Soon we were off to Ft. Bragg, NC in Southern Pines where Peg and Ev were stationed and they took us in immediately. They were so good to us. Those were the happiest days of all, Sara. Cath and Norm were there too. P and E were just wonderful to us and when Bill learned he was headed for Trenton and overseas, he couldn't tell me over the phone, but the town soon heard. Alerted it was leaving time, Peg siphoned gas for her car and we hurried to find Bill's train just as it was pulling out. We ran along beside the train (Chip in Peg's tummy), yelling and sending kisses. And Bill was on the small train platform! No, we weren't supposed to be there. Security was different in those days.
We met one last time in Trenton – all of us camp followers found each other before the final overseas call. Bill did get in quite a few times and even the last night came for a few special hours. Then he was gone for 2 1/2 years – across the ocean and thru North Africa and Italy. There was a long wait but he lived thru it tho he always had an aching back (which grew much worse in later years) from being thrown from a tank and down an embankment in Tunisia.
Well, those were our wedding days but we were grateful for them.
And, in a later note:
Yes, I think we suspected that siphoning gas was a no-no for pregnancy but we got carried away at the time. Your Mima is a very fine person. You are fortunate to have her.
No, no stealing someone else's gas nor did Peg and Barb. steal the flowers for the wedding. They were along the roads and in those day one could pick them. I have forgotten the circumstances of where the gas came from but probably Ev's car or mine. Of course, it was rationed.
This page last modified Saturday, April 30, 2005