Henry, Ruthalee & Alice

This scene of Henry, Alice Irene and Ruthalee together doing chores would be repeated often during the days following Ruth's death, though the girls were older (4 yrs and 8 yrs) than pictured here.

After Ruth's death, it was difficult for Henry to care for Ruthalee and Alice. The extended family supported as best they could but Henry was a man of the farm and had great interest, but little skill, in raising his daughters. Ruthalee and Alice began to catch colds. Henry was involved in the production rather than the nutrition end of the food supply.

The Roth family lived across the road from the Dakins. Mr. Almon E. Roth was a Law professor at Stanford. The memory that continues about the couple was that Mr. Roth hired his law students during the summer to build their home in the Santa Cruz mountains. He didn't have much use for new work clothes and his ragged appearance evidently got to Mrs. Roth to the point of intervening without permission. One night after Almon had finished, Mrs. Roth took his pants and threw them in the fire, an event that was heard across the road in the Dakin household! Unbeknownst to Mrs. Roth, Mr. Roth had bullets in his pocket which exploded in the fire. Gratefully, no one was on the receiving end. Except perhaps indirectly, as Mrs. Roth bore the burden of that memorable story.

Mrs. Roth was the one who after several months had a talk with Henry. She convinced him that he would not be able to care for his two daughters under the circumstances. Arrangements were made for Ruthalee and Alice to join their grandmother Chamberlain in Sunol. This is one of those events that separates the older generation from the ones that have come since, at least as the older generation likes to make us think. They are loyal to a sense of necessity, a sense that such things had to be done, that it the obvious thing to do and not to be grieved about later as if it were terrible. But if you look around their eyes, the corners of their smiles, they give themselves away. I think it is unspoken, but intentional. We will hear it in the affection and pain of the story in the next posting.

Henry continued on the farm to do what he had known and loved for so long and, really, could not do otherwise. His girls, having the opportunity to live with their loving and protective grandmother, were fortunate beyond measure, though dealt yet another loss. What really was the choice? And if there was really no choice in the matter and everyone was cared for, what great harm was there? It is difficult to argue with logic, even if one's heart moves involuntarily in another direction. And so it was.

We will catch up with Alice and Ruthalee, and their roller coaster ride that traversed the next 3 years, after a few more postings. First, there are several memories to re-capture about Henry as he continues to care for the land at Laurel Glen.