Hi Bill
I have been thinking about our father this morning for some
reason. As you know, he was a remarkable man who struggled through his younger
years, and worked hard to provide a good life for Mom and us boys. Below are
some of my thoughts about him. If you want to add your thoughts about him
please do so.
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| Me and Dad - Our property is on the left |
Our father, James Hallman has been gone now for about 48
years. However, I still think of him often and I am grateful that he was part
of my life. He was an incredible person (and father) who had a big influence on
me during those seemingly fleeting years while I was a young boy and then while
growing through my teenage and college years. He died suddenly one day in 1969.
He had walked back from our mailbox at the end of our long driveway after retrieving
our mail and my Aunt Helen’s mail (she lived next door to us). He walked into Aunt
Helen’s house and handed her mail to her and then just fell dead on the floor. He
was 54 years old when he died. Needless to say, that was a tragic day for our
family and friends.
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| Dad building an addition to our house |
However, we have a long legacy of memories of him that our
family cherishes and embellishes. I still think about him frequently and miss
him very much. He was quite a man, who lived through many difficult times
during his 54 years on the planet. His father (Emerson Hallman) died when Dad
was very young and his mother, Lila Brantner Hallman, had her own problems to
deal with and was not able to take care of him. Therefore, he lived in an
orphanage at a very tender age, when orphanages were not very nurturing
institutions. I’m not sure where the orphanage was located, but I believe it
was somewhere around Saxton PA. Luckily, his uncle, William S. Hallman (WS) and
WS’s wife, Mable, who lived in Altoona PA, eventually took him into their home
and raised him through his junior high and high school years. They treated him
with caring affection and provided a safe and secure home for him to grow up
in. During his time growing up with WS and Mable, he experienced what it was
like to be part of a loving family with a mother and father figure to depend
upon. He flourished in junior high and high school, both as a student and as an
athlete. He was an awarding-winning pole vaulter and a very proficient boxer
while in high school. He was not very tall, maybe 5’7’’ or so, but he was very
muscular and very smart. (BTW: WS was my great uncle, but I always knew him as
my grandfather, and he was a wonderful grandfather, indeed. Unfortunately,
Mable died when I was only one year old so I never got to know her.)
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| HS Pole Vaulter |
Dad met our mother, Marie Newton, while in high school and
they were an item from the get go. They were married shortly after high school
and they rented an inexpensive row house in Altoona, PA. Our father worked at
several different jobs that did not provide a living wage after high school. However,
he eventually landed a job with the Pennsylvania Railroad shops in Altoona,
which did provide a living wage. Working for the railroad also deferred him
from serving in the military, during World War Two and the Korean War. Meanwhile, you were born in 1941 and then I arrived in 1949.
I don’t remember the circumstances, but somehow our parents
moved in with our grandfather (WS) 1950 or so, shortly after Mable died. Grandpap
had a beautiful large brick home with plenty of bedrooms, and a spacious living
room, dining room, kitchen, sun room, and a full basement, and large attic that
I loved to play in with my friends as I grew older. We lived with our
Grandfather until the summer before I began second grade, and I remember that
it was a wonderful time for both me and you, Bill. I also attended kindergarten
and first grade near that neighborhood.
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| Jimmy and Marie |
Our parents were certainly not wealthy, but living with
Grandpap helped them save a little money. Dad landed a slightly better-paying
job at the Hollidaysburg Pennsylvania Railroad Reclamation Plant (or something
like that), where he used a cutting torch to cut apart scrapped railroad cars
in an outside scrapyard. It was a very difficult and dangerous job, and he
suffered from several serious injuries over the years. He also endured
breathing toxic fumes and chemicals in addition to many burns from the cutting
torches. However, he did what he had to do to support our family.
He didn’t make big money, but it was enough for him to
eventually buy a few acres of land on route 220 between Altoona and
Duncansville near the Alto Reste Cemetery. That property had been part of a
large apple orchard and the apple trees were still there on the neglected, wildly
over grown, weed infested property. Our Uncle John and Aunt Helen purchased an
identical acreage next door between our land and the Alto Reste Cemetery.
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| James, Brother Bill, Marie, and Dopey Little Clarkie |
Our father somehow cleared our acreage pretty much by himself
although he and Uncle John helped each other sometimes. However it was a
horrendous job that Dad gladly endured during weekends, after work, and on
holidays and vacations when he did not have to work his job. I remember playing
on that wilderness property while he was working there. It was a lot of fun for
me, but he and Mom had to keep me under control while he worked on clearing
that land. He pretty much tamed that land all by himself, but it took some
time. That property also had a dilapidated small cabin on it,
which he slowly renovated and our family eventually began living in it. Over the
course of many years he added two additions to that structure and transformed it into a beautiful large home for our family.
It was amazing how many different kinds of skills Dad had
(or developed) over the years. He did electrical wiring, roofing, plumbing,
carpentry, cabinet making, landscaping, tree trimming and removal, concrete
laying, mechanical car and tractor repairs, etc. I watched him do much of that
work, but I was mostly too young to help him or even to learn much about those
skills for many years.
In addition to the skills I mentioned, he had lots of other skills
and interests. He was a very talented artist. He grew up drawing all kinds of
comical caricatures and also painted landscapes and even portraits in water
color and oil. He and Mom also played pinnacle regularly with some of their
long-time friends. He was also an active member of a Masonic Lodge in Altoona.
Unfortunately, Dad also coped with numerous health
conditions over the years. He suffered from a long-time heart condition, and
endured a few serious heart attacks. He also suffering severe headaches and
eventually discovered that he had a cerebral hemorrhage and underwent major
brain surgery at a hospital somewhere in Ohio. However, even while suffering
major health problems, he would not stop working. Eventually, he was forced to
retire on disability from his job. However, he just couldn’t sit around
resting. He had to be doing something and he endured his health problems for
many years while continuing to work on enhancing our house and property.
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| James Hallman 1915 - 1969 |
He was a remarkable man of many talents, which included
being a wonderful husband and father. I spent many hours watching him work on many different tasks, and he made and effort to explain what he was doing and why he was doing it. As I got older I realized how much I learned from him and how wonderful those times with him were. He also had a wonderful sense of humor
and loved to laugh. As you know, our Mom was never the same after Dad died.
She, you and I (and our Grandfather) were devastated, and I can still feel that pain after all
those years. I miss him and I think of him often. However, I know that he is
still alive in our memories. He will always be with us.
Sincerely,
Clark
