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one incident which made such an impression on me that I can see it in my mind's eye to this day. A small group of youngish people were standing talking just outside the Lodge and I could overhear that they were planning a mountain climb the next day and one girl, very pretty and in her early 20s probably was demurring while one of the young men was urging her very strongly to change her mind and go. He wasn't getting anywhere with her and suddenly he stepped up to her and got on his knees before her and from that position, begged her to go. It was this kneeling before her that amazed me -- how anybody could get up the nerve to do such a thing and particularly in front of several other people! I just couldn't get over it and although now, it doesn't seem like anything at all to me, it did make such an impression at the time that I can still see him there supplicating her. 

In September 1911, my father evidently went to a medical convention in Indianapolis unaccompanied. I find a letter from Mother to him dated the 25th at the Claypool Hotel in which is the following: "Please, Sammy, dear, do take care of yourself, don’t take cold, and [[underscore]]don't[[/underscore]] go on any joyrides." The following day, there's a letter to Father from Mother, but this one is addressed to him at the Grand Central Hotel in Indianapolis. In it is a passage showing that my mother had a pretty fair sense of humor: "If I could only hear your voice, I wouldn't care if you were talking about anterior chambers, or divergent strabismus, or even ophthalmoplegia totalis hysterica." In the first of the above letters, I’m a bit puzzled as to what the reference means to not going on any "joyrides."  I can't help suspecting that my father may have occasionally let down a bit when he was away from his direct medical responsibilities at home. and heaven knows, he was certainly entitled to.

The vacation scene now shifts to a new place, Lake Clear Inn, at Lake Clear, N.Y. and quite obviously on Lake Clear. For some unknown reason to me at least, Mr. Wardner, the proprietor of Rustic Lodge, left there and bought or took over somehow, this place on Lake Clear, opening it up under his management in the summer of 1912 and persuading some of his Rustic Lodge clients to follow him, we among them. Lake Clear Inn and its locale did not have the charm and beauty of Rustic Lodge but it had its points including what I can't dignify by any name other than "incipient" golf course and since my father at that time was just becoming quite interested in golf, this just might have been the factor that caused him to select Lake Clear over Upper Saranac.  I minimize the golf course because it occupied an area which had only very recently, from its appearance, been cleared of primeval forest. And not only were the fairways rough and bumpy but also they were liberally sprinkled with outcrops and boulders; moreover, the greens were anything but carpetlike. Nevertheless, the course could be played on and my father did so frequently although