Jay Clair Buckwalter                              Memoirs

Jay Clair Buckwalter’s Memoirs                                                               July 4, 2024

It was 1949 when my parents sold their dairy farm and moved to a small truck farm in Bareville, PA.  I was two.  Our new house was a large brick house with an apartment attached. Father fixed the barn to house 1000 laying hens. 

Our mother, one of the hardest working people I ever encountered, started a roadside stand to sell eggs and some of the many vegetables she grew in her enormous garden. After it was too dark to work in her garden and the roadside stand was closed for the day, one usually could find her in our kitchen sitting on a low stool surrounded by several baskets of eggs.  One by one mother would clean each egg, weigh it and put it in the appropriate container ready for sale the next day!

I enjoyed growing up in Bareville. I started school at Bareville Elementary in 1953. As I grew more responsible I helped father to gather eggs and feed the chickens every evening.  Occasionally on a Saturday morning we had to “clean out”a chicken pen. This was not a pleasant task.  I did look forward to driving the tractor to spread the manure on our fields. In my younger  years I often found myself playing alone and developed an imaginary friend named Luke.   I really anticipated visits from Ellen’s and Marion’s families as well as Leon’s family and  Kathryn’s family occasionally. Fortunately. I had a bunch of nieces and nephews to play with when they visited. By the time I was old enough to realize I had siblings Evie was off to Florida in V.S.⁶

I did have the good fortune to have Forrest Boyden from Parkesburg come to our house for  two weeks every summer. These visits were through the Fresh Air group. One of the consequences of growing up in the Mennonite church when I was young was that TV wasn't allowed in church members’ homes.So when our long-time renters, George and Elsie, would once or twice a year invite me to share a TV show with them, I would be delighted; even if it was black and white. Church attendance was a central part of my childhood.  We attended every Sunday morning and some evenings including Vacation Bible School for two weeks.  As I matured I became a song leader and a leader in youth group activities.

I  first met Marge Kauffman from Exeland, WI. in 1964. She  had graduated from Eastern Mennonite High School in 1963 and was now living in Merrill. She visited the church I attended and occasionally our youth group activities. When I first asked her out we were both working at Victor Weaver’s at New Holland.  We dated for three years and were married in August 1967. Our first apartment was just off the EMC campus.  It was in a basement apartment for which we paid $42.00 a month. Marge took a job in the kitchen cafeteria at EMC. I studied and worked as a  hospital orderly several hours a week. 

Martin Luthur King was shot in April of 1968 and for the summer Marge and I volunteered at the W Street recreation center in Wash.DC  headed up by Esther and Bob Wert.  Tensions were still running high in the neighborhood surrounding us. We saw many burnt out stores as the odor of tear gas lingered.

I graduated from EMC in 1969.  Marge and I had made the decision to make Wash D.C. our next home.  I was drafted almost before we got to D.C. We made  years of alternate service in 1-W as an anesthesia technician for several anesthesiologists at Children’s Hospital.  I stand in awe of those in the church who paved the way for alternative service!

In January 1971 Marge and I happily welcomed the birth of our daughter, Kimberly, We soon thereafter started talking to some Mennos about  trying communal living with like minded individuals .  We decided to give it a go and rented a large house near where we lived. We shared income and expenditures and a certain amount of similar beliefs! Together we participated in several anti-war demonstrations. As one of my jobs I drove taxi in DC

for 6 months. We were also part of a Friday night supper group which led to the startup of a school of which Herb was one of the early teachers. One of Marge’s contributions was daycare for small children. For a time I worked as Marge’s assistant. She had a license to care for 5 children, plus Kim.

As our critics predicted the strains of living with such a group were soon too much to ignore and as we were yet unencumbered with careers we decided to throw caution to the wind and spend some time living in rural north western Wisconsin near Marge’s family,  We moved  all our worldly possessions in two trips in our Ford Econoline van and arrived at Marge’s brother’s house without job or housing prospects.  Two days later, we found a lovely little house just several miles away.  A temporary  job landed soon. Our rent was about $80.00 a month.

With the pending arrival of our second child, Peter,I became aware that it was time to cut my hair and get a real job! And despite enjoying being close to Marge’s parents we knew we had to relocate to a metro area in  order to make a living!  Marge’s brother and sister lived in the Twin Cities and that is where we started looking for a career that could support our family.

After exploring several job opportunities we decided to accept a position with a fast food company whose expansion looked promising.  As it turned out, the promise of opportunity was true.

After about 2 years we were offered a traveling position based in Columbus, OH. Two years later I was offered a district manager position in Allentown, PA which we accepted,  The job involed the supervision of several stores. Soon we were living in Allentown!

I enjoyed the challenges of this position. I enjoyed recruiting, hiring, and developing employees!

As it turned out I spent over 25 years in such a position. And hence Allentown became the  area where Marge and I raised our children and bought our first house. And it was from Allentown that we bid goodbye to Kimberly and Peter as they made their own paths in the world.

As my career as a district manager came to an end Marge and I decided to relocate to suburban Philadelphia partially because our daughter was living in Philly.  We found a nice house in Havertown, PA. We welcomed two grandchildren : Phoebe in 2006 and Fletcher in 2010! My principle work experience in suburban Philly was running a large snack route for over a decade.

By 2013 we were both retired. We took this opportunity to travel. Over the next several years we enjoyed visiting many cities abroad.  Cities we visited include: Dublin, London, Paris, Milan, Florence, Venice (2x), Beijing, Rome, Naples, Pompei,Amsterdam (2x), Prague, Bern, Zurich, and San Juan.. The Amalfi Coast in Italy was a favorite spot! We newly appreciated that people everywhere are very much alike.

After our first trip abroad we moved to Lancaster, PA.  We enjoyed Lancaster.  We enjoyed  time with my siblings and enjoyed many meals with them. But every thing has a life span and because of some health problems we decided it was time to seek the comfort of living close to one of our children.

So in  2022 we moved near our daughter and family living in Palm Beach Co., FL. We live in a lovely apartment complex by a beautiful lake in Wellington.  We enjoy the lovely weather.  Our daughter and family own five acres which is largely untamed.  Marge and I spend several hours a week working in their yard and gardens. We are delighted to have a new grandson Adam (b. 2012) and participate in his childhood.

The school year that just ended saw our three grandchildren each graduating: Phoebe from high

School, Fletcher from 8th grade, and Adam from 5th grade!