Viewing page 125 of 207

This transcription has been completed. Contact us with corrections.

[[top right]]88[[/top right]]

But Fran wasn't one of the two girls I referred to a moment ago. The first of these two was Nelda Pfohl, a perfectly adorable girl my age whom I met at North High. She was petite and, although I don't remember her as sensationally pretty, she had a sweet, gentle face with lovely dark-brown eyes and hair, and skin like satin. She had a beautifully-soft little body with a lovely figure and perfectly darling little hands and feet. And she was just as sweet to be with as you can possibly imagine. My great regret is that I have no photograph of her. She also wore lovely clothes in perfect taste, which enhanced her appearance even more. I guess I became well acquainted with Nelda in 1917 when I was 15, maybe a year later. She lived in a lower apartment on West Genesee Street about a block east of Cousin Lucia Crouse's, with her parents and older sister. I don't remember what her father did but her parents were extremely friendly people as was the sister. In the apartment above the Pfohls, lived Nelda's uncle , Henry Walters, a prominent lawyer and a member of the New York State Senate. Mr. Walters supported a Cadillac and a chauffeur so he was doing all right. I'm sure the Pfohls were not as prosperous but they were comfortable enough. My friendship with Nelda was relatively brief, perhaps a year or a bit more and them she was sent to Mary Lyons School to finish her schooling before college. We corresponded for a year but it tapered off and gradually Nelda fades away in my memory as Louise Neill fades in. But during our year, I would call on Nelda and we'd just spend the evening sitting and talking together at her home. I guess we'd go to the movies occasionally although I can't recall it. I can't even remember taking her to a dance anywhere although it would seem as though I must have. The only specific events of this nature that I can remember were two auto trips we took in the Walters Cadillac. The first was to Pleasant Point on Lake Ontario, a summer place where the Pfohls went for their vacations although this was just before the season opened. With us went Priscilla Marvel, a friend of Nelda's and Ferdinand Schoeneck, a friend at North High. We took along swimming outfits and went swimming up there and I can remember how embarrassed I was to be unable to swim too well while Ferdinand was a whiz -- I'm a crummy swimmer to this day, never having been able to master the breathing in the crawl. The Walters chauffeur drove us and coming home after dark, Nelda and I sat together in the back seat of the big touring car and much to my surprise after my miserable swimming performance, Nelda seemed happy to nestle into my arms and let me hold her most of the way home. It was one of my life's biggest moments. The other occasion was a trip to Selkirk and I remember we were walking through a field next to the Barnes cottage when Nelda tripped and fell and cut her hand. I knelt beside her and held her and she fainted in my arms, at least she appeared to faint, and to this day, I'm not sure that she really did. It was a happy year with little Nelda and a few years ago, it seems to me I was told that Nelda had married my old friend Bill Dyer -- and she didn't marry young.