Walking to School

Son Steve writes...

As anyone reading this will probably know the Hamlin family moved from Tomahawk, WI to Eudora, KS in August of 1972. This happened to coincide with me beginning kindergarten.

If you have ever been to Kansas in August you know that it is the hottest month of the year and for some reason the most humid. Temperatures regularly top 100 degrees at this time of year in Kansas, which makes this tale especially amazing.

Our house in Eudora was exactly 1 mile from the grade school that I attended. Each morning mom would get me ready for school and armed with a small bottle of water off we went to trek the mile to the school. Now I won’t say it was up hill both ways or driving snow or any of those old cliché’s but it was Kansas and it was August.

Mom had to walk me to school each day because we didn’t have a second car and dad took the one we had (a station wagon of course) to work in Lawrence. So we really had no choice, I would like to say that were ahead of our time and thinking green and all that but we just didn’t have a second car.

Anyway, off we went to school every day, then mom would turn around and walk home and then being kindergarten she would come back at noon to pick me up. So while I walked 2 miles a day mom walked 4. Did I mention that this was August in Kansas.

Being a 5 year old kid I don’t remember the effect me the heat had on me, but you have to remember we had just moved from Wisconsin a few days earlier. I can’t imagine how uncomfortable mom must have been walking 4 miles a day just to take me to school and back in 100+ degree temperatures. In August it never really cools off, the night time lows rarely get below 90 degrees, so even the mornings were hot and sticky.

I don’t remember how long this situation lasted before we got a car or mom found me a ride but even a week is admirable for a mother to endure to get her kindergartner to school.