Hidalgo: The Beginning, or I Am Born (23)

Hidalgo: The Beginning, or I Am Born


PREFACE


Hello. Allow me to introduce myself. I am the second best known writer from Hidalgo, Illinois (POP. 100). Which means you won’t be seeing me hawking my book on the Today Show any time soon. (My “book” is incomplete, similar to my high school geometry grade.)

And who is Hidalgo’s best-known writer? It’s probably on the tip of your tongue, isn’t it? No? Give up? His name was Winfred (or “Winnie”, as I like to call him) Van Atta, author of Shock Treatment, which was made into a movie that Mr. Van Atta later sniffed at: “It ran the gamut of emotion from A to B”. This line was stolen from Dorothy Parker of course.

Incidentally, Van Atta’s family name was Vanatta. He thought this was too plain for an Author so he changed it to Van Atta. And of course he became world famous. You have heard of him, haven’t you?

What say we have a little quiz? Class, name three of his other novels. How about just one? I’m sure Van Atta won some prizes. He made a famous Oscar speech; he got the nod for his screenplay (category: based on work from another source which means only the title was used) of his novel, Shock Treatment. He gave an emotional speech: “You really, really like me!”

Come to think of it that was Sally Field. I’m sure Van Atta won some awards, probably the William Faulkner Ole Miss Award for Best Regional Novel Featuring Weird People That In Real Life You Would Drive Hundreds of Miles Just to Avoid Running into Them.

Actually, I think one of his books was nominated for The Edgar Award, which is named for Edgar Allan Poe who wrote all those very popular Vincent Price movies (The Pit and the Pendulum, The House of the Seven Gables, and Lassie, Come Home.) Poe’s Oscar speech was also a humdinger. I’m sorry I don’t have the space to quote it, but it was for the best murder mystery based on material (calico) stolen from another source.

As soon as my book is finished (working title: My Life on the Prairie: The Early Years, 1910-1950), I plan to write the movie version. I’m sure it will fit the best screenplay or story or long-winded tale adapted from another source category. It will probably be a shoo-in for the Oscar. My speech will begin: “I’m proud to represent Hidalgo; I’m only sorry my old friend, Winfred Van Atta, another Hidalgo boy, is not able to be here. I know he would have been proud…” I’m sure there won’t be a dry eye in Hidalgo.

It is now time to move on to:

CHAPTER ONE (in which the hero manages to get born without going to a hospital, or calling anybody on a cell phone)

“Who said we were going to call him Denny”? Dad said about 4:42 AM, local time.

It was a very cold morning when Dad inquired about the baby’s name. It had been the coldest winter since records were first kept by the folks who invented handwriting (the Good Sumerians). This was odd as the date was March 25, when it was technically spring, on that day in 1945 when I was born. I don’t remember much about it. I’m the baby of the family, if a sixty -year old person can be called a baby.

Although all of us seven children-I have four brothers and two sisters-- are still at large, it is unclear to us exactly what happened that night .The mystery of the baby’s name was solved, eventually, but it was still a long day’s journey into the night and the predawn hours before things broke loose.

It had not been an easy birth. The baby didn’t come out right; he had to be assisted into the world with the doctor’s tools. (Many years later when the baby was supposedly grown up he heard on TV that the sort of birth he had experienced was traumatic; that a child never got over it, that it marked him for life, etc. “It was almost enough to make you give up TV”, he said.) And the birth was at home, like that of the other six children born to this family. Still everything was all right with mother and child except for the confusion over the baby’s name.

Brothers Jack and Jim were the only children still living at home at the time. Jack was nearly ten; Jim had just turned twelve. When the boys heard that a baby was coming, they decided to continue living at home, at least until they had jobs. Jim’s birthday in fact had occurred only five days before the birth of the boy whose name, according to Dad was not Denny, “for crying out loud”.

Jack, who is our star witness and principal supporting player in this drama, says that they (the Brothers Dunne) were sent to town just when the situation was getting interesting. . Being sent to town meant going to Hidalgo, a place where things tended to fold up early. So we’ll assume this was early in the evening, well before bedtime. This was in the dark ages, 1945, B. T (Before Television).

What did the boys do to occupy themselves until it was time to go home? I had thought about making this story into a reality show and having Jack and Jim return to Hidalgo to reconstruct the scene for us. They could have easily played themselves, although their appearance has changed somewhat after sixty years (they are a little taller).

I thought maybe the three of us might work up a little video to go with the script, which would show how things went on that important day. But I decided to go with my usual method of research, which shuns legwork in favor of making stuff up.

As to what the boys did, there weren’t that many options available; the nightlife of Hidalgo consisted of three or four grocery stores. They probably dropped in at Reba’s (sometimes pronounced “Reebie’s”) Meeker’s Grocery. Reba’s sign also said “Home Cooked Meals”, but not many people took her up on that as they could, well, get that kind of grub at home.

I like to think the boys each had the Pepsi and Planter’s Peanuts combo. The peanuts were not necessarily eaten on the side; the preferred method was to pour a few peanuts into the Pepsi bottle and then drink a little pop and chomp on a few peanuts at the same time. Very tasty.

You say you’ve never heard of Pepsi-soaked peanuts? Try them sometime—they’re delicious. Still with Pepsi at a nickel a bottle, the boys wouldn’t have gone overboard by drinking themselves into a sugar-salt coma.

Clarence’s Pool Hall may have been open, but the boys were a little young for billiards. So they probably drank pop and discussed why they were went sent to town.

“Mom’s having a baby, that’s why”, Jack said.

Jim responded: “There’s more to it than that. You’re just too young to know about it, that’s all.”

This remark infuriated Jack who was already wound up; he had been waiting for weeks for Mom to have this baby, which was supposed to be a girl named Judy Kay. That a girl’s name had been chosen led to unforeseen consequences. Namely, that there was way too much time spent on girl rather than boy names. (This is just speculation on my part, though I was considered to be a remarkable child, I took no notes at the time, preferring to spend my early hours mastering the art of burping.)

After an exciting evening in Hidalgo the Brothers Dunne walked home—a two-block journey-- in silence, as Jack instructed Jim to never speak to him again. (Jim was not necessarily crushed by this idea: “Fine with me, Buddy!”) The brothers early on practically invented sibling rivalry, but they both were very kind to me even beyond my “cute period”, which only lasted about two weeks.

I doubt that they called Dad for a ride home. I almost wish they had; I’m sure his response would have been interesting, but not necessarily suitable for home viewing. Although he normally used phrases that sounded like he was swearing, they were really harmless. A favorite exclamation was something that sounded like “Galnt dang it!” short for maybe, Gal Dang It. Anyway on his particular evening, I’m sure he was not in a mood to be bothered. Besides, kids weren’t carted here and there in 1945, not in Hidalgo, particularly.

At the same time the family was waiting for the birth of a child, another drama was taking place. Sister Betty was making plans to be married, which she did the day after I was born. Years later I congratulated Betty on her excellent timing in getting out of the house before it was time to take care of Baby. It was just a coincidence, but it makes a better story to say that Betty knew when to light out for the territory.

So it wasn’t a restful night for anybody, particularly for Jack who woke up every hour wondering if his sibling had been born. The event finally occurred around 4:00 AM. Jack was so excited he burst out into the streets of Hidalgo and began knocking on people’s doors to let them know about his baby brother. This was much appreciated of course.

Jack caused such a commotion that lights came on all over town, which led some people to believe that the War had ended. One neighbor lady explained it to her spouse, who was modeling his red flannel underwear on the street in downtown Hidalgo. “Oh, it’s only the little Dunne boy gone crazy telling everybody about his new baby brother.”

Her husband was disappointed: “Damn! I was hoping Hitler had been shot, or something”. Eventually, everyone went back to bed.

After Jack’s early morning excursion to take the good news to Hidalgo, he somehow managed to have a chat with Dr. Massie, who had a few questions for him. Why Dr. Massie decided to interview a not quite ten year old boy in the early morning hours has never been satisfactorily explained. Apparently no adults were around to grill. Mom and Dad were with the baby, no doubt stunned after having six children already; they were probably wondering if they would ever get all their offspring raised. (They were quite right to be concerned, as I lived with them for over thirty years.)

Dr. Massie was a fairly young man who was somewhat excited himself. He got a shock after the birth when Dad asked him how much he owed him. The fee was $45, a considerable amount of change at the time. For Dad, the hard times of the Depression and World War II had eased somewhat, so he quickly pulled out his billfold and handed over the cash. Dr. Massie was so overcome—he was used to people paying him in produce and promises—he said, “You mean you’re going to pay it all now?”

It is my theory that Dr. Massie was so stunned by collecting $45 in cash that he plain forgot to ask the parents a few questions including the name of the just born.

On his way out of the house he realized that his work was not quite finished; he stopped in the kitchen where Jack was fixing himself a little breakfast, a fried egg sandwich. (It had been a long time since the Pepsi-Planters snack of the previous night.)

Jack was happy to accommodate the good doctor. He was proud to have his baby brother; it made him feel kind of important to be finally included in the process. Jack was the youngest, and was always getting left out—he was sick and tired of it.

The only problem was he didn’t quite have his facts straight. He proudly (and innocently) reeled off the baby’s name as “Denny Kenneth”: Jack was close, according to the authorities (Mom and Dad); the name was Danny Kenneth, or Danny K., which Mom later said was her choice.

The birth certificate managed to get all three names wrong, even the last name by omitting the “e” in Dunne. Thus it read “Denny Kenneth Dunn”. Still no harm was done.

No harm except Dad wanted to know, “Who said we were going to call him Denny”? When this storm broke, Jack was in another part of the forest (under his bed upstairs), and Jim wisely played innocent. It all blew over.

Sixty years later, though, some family members still call me Denny, or Den. I kind of like it, actually.[1]
[1] No wonder the boy became a writer: he was plagued with an identity crisis from the beginning. This has probably accounted for his tendency to try on different hats. In his cowboy days, which lasted until about age fourteen, he pretended to be Roy Rogers. Later in his so-called maturity he liked to pretend to be somebody else for a day. Currently he is Hidalgo’s second best known writer.