Dad then pursued training as a refrigeration technician, the high tech of the day, under the GI Bill. During this time I had my first badger experience. When Dad knew he was going to be going away, he got us an English Shepherd puppy. They are very smart, protective and brave. Tippy was all of that. He had the typical black trunk and tail with white tips on his feet, tail and nose and a white ring around his neck. He also had a white belly and a little bit of brown tones here and there.

My first badger experience: Tippy was our buddy. We played together for hours. He was also very protective of our family. Tommy started school so it was just Tippy and I, playing tug a war with a rope by the gravel road that passed our home. All of a sudden, Tippy dropped the rope and turned, looked up the road and bristled and growled. I looked and here came a full grown badger waddling up the middle of the road. Tippy was off like a shot, darting at the badger and herding it across the road to the neighbor’s garage. The badger growled ferociously and bit and slashed at Tippy but Tippy was just too quick and smart. He would dart at the badger and the badger would try to slash him but when it struck at him Tippy would jump back behind and bite it on the tail. Ouch, this enraged the badger and it finally ran for cover in the neighbor’s open garage and dug into a big pile of large lumps of coal. Then it just peered out and hissed. The neighbor lady saw it all happen and called animal control and my Mom. Because Tippy was there, the badger stayed put. Pretty soon, here came a little, grizzly old man in an old rattily pickup. He got out, got out a long stick with a loop on it, went to the coal pile, pocked around with the stick until that badger looked out at him and hissed, and then he shot it with his pistol. Right there in town. He put the loop over the badger, drug him out and threw him into the back of the pickup and drove away. That’s the way it was done in them thar days. I was really excited. It was the first time I had witnessed a gun being shot and he got that scary ole badger. Yeah Tippy! Wow, what an adventure!

Tommy was in school by then and came home crying one day when Dad was home. Tommy had been beat up by a bully named Neil when he was coming home from school. Now, Dad was a terrific boxer. So good that he made much of his money in the depression, as a 17-19 year old young man, when there were no jobs, going from fair to fair to fight the big guy they would put in a ring and offer money if someone could last 3 rounds and double if they could knock him out. Dad always lasted and usually knocked them out. In the Marine Corps, they had a boxing tournament that started at Ft Pendleton and continued as their ships crossed the sea. According to Wally Noe, who was in his platoon and lived in Caldwell, and all others I met that knew him then, told me that Dad became the heavy weight boxing champion of the Marine Corps, but by default for the final fight. They were supposed to meet in Iwo Jima for the championship round but Dad’s opponent was killed in action there and Dad was on a hospital ship. Needless to say, Dad was not very pleased that his son was beat up by anyone. Dad had been gone and Tommy and I had not been taught to defend ourselves.

Dad got some boxing gloves and taught his 7 and 5 year olds how to fight. He also taught us that brothers stuck up for each other. He told me to go meet Tommy at the edge of the school grounds. He told Tommy that, if Neal attacked him again, to whop him. He told me that if Tommy was having any problems to pitch in. We met and here came Neal, and started to push Tommy down. Neal was a couple of years older and much bigger than Tommy. Tommy punched him hard in the face and stomach but he was too big for Tommy alone, so I executed plan B and knelt behind Neal. Tommy gave him a big push and he fell over my back. Then we were both on him pounding away until Neal got loose and ran away. He never bothered Tommy again. In fact, no one else did from that school. Aaaaarrrr!

Some other Boise adventures: A boy, a school friend of Tommy’s lived in the next block and had a goat and goat cart. He used to give us rides-great fun. We had a chicken coop and Tommy tried to jump off it with some wood wings he we built. Didn’t work! He got many big ouches though. We got our indoor bathroom hooked up and dad finally trusted it enough to get rid of our outhouse. He had a load of sand dumped into the hole. I played on the top of the hill of sand and one day I found a gold Elgin watch, a beauty that Dad used for 20 years. Tommy and I snuck matches to play with and hid them in an old wood pile. They started disappearing but there were some shiny things and rocks and sticks left. We had a pack rat. One day we saw it under the pile of wood, but we had to accept the fact that he had ratted us out and probably kept us from doing something stupid, again.

One day Tommy, Juanita, our cousin, Tommy’s age, and I were playing catch me and I slipped and knocked my left front tooth out on an old wagon bed. Once I stopped hollering, I decided that I liked it because it made me look tough. I even took up a crooked smile like a guy in a movie that I had seen that seemed pretty tough. That tooth did not grow in until a dentist cut out the broken off root when I was about 8 years old.

Mom traded baby sitting with a lady nearby that had chickens. She had a very big red rooster, about my height, that would run at me and peck me. I hollered and the lady gave Tommy a broom to whack it with if it did it again. It did, Tommy whacked it and broke its neck. They had chicken soup.

Mom used a coal fired range in her kitchen and Tommy and I carried in the coal. A big, oil fired stove in the original first room, heated the house.

We liked to go to Grandpa Walter Lee Sanders when the summer green transparent apples were ready. We would take a salt shaker with us and sit in a tree and chow down on green apples. Grandpa always told up it would make us sick, but it never did. We got the trots though, especially if we cracked and ate a bunch of black walnuts as a chaser. The cherries and grapes were good, too. We used to play in the hay loft in the barn and jump off into piles of hay. Grandpa loved corn on the cobb with lots of their home made butter, and so did I. He was always amazed by how much I could eat, especially if I had also been eating green apples.

We used to have many extended family get-togethers with pot luck dinners. Dad’s family, without the gospel were usually likely to have people get mean to each other and not loving like mom’s Wardle Family. The contrast actually helped me years later when I was personally sorting my testimony. It was a blessing to me to see and remember the contrasts.

Usually, at the Wardle picnics they would put boxing gloves on the kids and let them go at it. I was very small, compared to Donny and others my age so I had to learn how to use quickness and some strategies. The gloves usually were tied almost up to my elbows. I liked it even if it was a bit frustrating at times. It helped that my Dad taught me, at about age 8, how to stand sideways and use a quick jab and a hard crossing right. Soon Donny did not like it.