RE: FAMILY GENEALOGY
DATE: NOVEMBER 27, 1989
Interview With Ethel Lerohl
I interviewed Ethel Lerohl, my father's second oldest sister, regarding our family. The following are her recollections:
Ethel is 89 this year, born in 1900, the second of the seven girls of Will and Mary Donohue. She was born in 1900 in Melrose, grew up in Melrose, commensurate with her family moving into St. Cloud she started college. She described her dad as having her enrolled at the University of Minnesota because her sister, Madeline, had gone to the University of Minnesota. However, Ethel did not want to leave home and, therefore, went to St. Cloud State and lived at their home on Fifth Avenue in St. Cloud. She graduated from college, taught first in Princeton, Minnesota. She then taught in East Las Vegas, New Mexico, for a year. She came back after that year and taught in Bovey, MN, where she met and married her husband, Andy Lerohl. an immigrant from Norway. He was a superintendent in the iron mines.
Ethel remembers her grandmother, Mary Graham, as being blind and diabetic, who lived with them when she was a little girl. She remembers her grandmother teaching her the Gaelic language. She also remembers reading to her grandmother. Her grandmother never talked about Ireland, at least as to where they all came from as Ethel recalled. Ethel said oftentimes her grandmother would take her downtown, her grandmother was blind. Ethel would lead her. As a little girl she was very proud to be able to go downtown in the company of this blind lady. They had a good time and were good friends.
Ethel talked a lot about Aunt Ellen. Ellen would be the wife of Patrick Graham, Ethel's great-uncle, the brother of her grandfather, Thomas Graham. Aunt Ellen had a farm a mile and a half west of Melrose. This farm was later taken over by Jim Graham, now dead, whose wife, Ruth Graham, survives and lives in Melrose, as does their daughter, Mary Ellen Gebeke. The Ellen Graham farm was a very happy place. They all loved Auntie Ellen. Auntie Ellen used to do a lot of cooking, was an excellent cook, and provided them with lots of cookies.
She described how they would walk out to the farm the mile and a half and walk back. She described one time that she was going there with her sisters and her mother and Mrs. Zins. As they were walking back, they saw a man hiding in a culvert or sitting in a culvert and they said it was Jack the Hugger. This was some character in Melrose who would hug kids. They were all shouting back to their mother to look out, it's Jack the Hugger, and the man says, "Yes, I'm Jack the Hugger but I'm not going to hug you."
In the years they lived in Melrose, they did not have a car, nor did they have horses or a buggy. She said everyone walked; no one had a car. She joked, in fact, saying Dr. Huber was the first one to get a car. He was a friend of her dad's. As soon as he had the car, he drove over to give the kids a ride. Ethel said they loved the ride but she puked in the car. She felt real bad. Her dad never drove, but once, she said when he did, this was later on in St. Cloud, he hit another car and damaged it. That was enough. In fact, when they got the car their dad hired a man to teach Ethel and Howard how to drive it. He never chose to drive, saying the kids liked to drive and that was good enough.
In the times they lived in Melrose, they simply did not have a car. They did their walking, if they went out to one of their cousins' farms, Uncle Arthur's, farther out than Auntie Ellen's. Uncle Arthur was one of her mom's brothers. He would send in a horse and buggy to pick them up. She stated when her dad went to St. Cloud he would go by rail. If they went to the Cities, they would go by rail. She said her mother often went into St. Cloud to shop at Fandel's or would go down to Minneapolis to shop at Dayton's. It, of course, was a big deal to go to Minneapolis. It was fun.
I asked her whether or not they considered themselves well to do as they lived in Melrose. She said when her dad started practicing law, her grandfather, Thomas Graham, was supposed to have told them, "you'll never make a dime in Melrose". She says they believed they did well, they lived in a large house, her mother always had a maid both in Melrose and in St. Cloud, and their house was well fixed in town. She said they, of course, never knew but assumed that they were well to do. She said when they moved into St. Cloud they still considered themselves well to do and there was no real change. Will Donohue did fairly well when living in St. Cloud.
Ethel was not as descriptive of her mother. Mary Ann Donohue was a very matriarchal type, who had a pile of friends, had a close family system, was very close to the Graham Clan. She held a lawn party every year at her home in St. Cloud for all the Grahams to gather. She was a social figure in St. Cloud of that time. She is attributed with having started the "Poor Claire Tea," a social institution of the city that continues to the present. This is a fundraiser for the Poor Claire Nuns who have a Monastery in Sauk Rapids, which adjoins St Cloud. She was very definite, close to all of her extended family, and was well-loved by her family.
My mother tells a story, which was verified by Ethel, that Grandma (Mary Ann Donohue) really dominated her maids. She had one maid who she always sent to mass on Sundays. One Easter Saturday the work was getting to the point that it was possible for the maid to take a break. She told the maid she should now go and get to confession for Easter Sunday mass. She said either Howard or Mary could drive her up to the church so she could go to confession. The maid got perplexed and finally said she wouldn't do it. She then exclained, "Mrs. Donohue, I have always gone to mass when you told me, but enough is enough. I am not a Catholic. Going to confession is asking too much!."
Ethel did not have much recollection of her uncles. She recalls her great uncle Michael Graham who came to her father's funeral drunk. They put him in the bathroom. He was a good farmer who had retired and lived in Melrose. She recalls an Arthur Graham. This was a shirt-tail cousin, not an uncle. He was a nice guy but his wife ran around all the time. She had stories about him but she couldn't recall them at the time. She said Pat Graham, the husband of Auntie Ellen, was an excellent farmer. Jim Graham , his son took over the farm. She said her uncle, Arthur, was a farmer. She said Aunt Annie, his wife, ran the farm with him. His sons Tim and Bill followed on the farm. Arthur and Annie were Mayme Flahaven's parents. She noted how Mayme and Leo just took off and got married. Uncle Arthur didn't want them to get married. One of the other sons was treated the same way so he simply took off and got married. She stated the one person on Uncle Arthur's farm was the child Aunt Annie adopted. She didn't know what happened to him. Ethel noted that her uncle Will had a child out of wedlock. He left the mother standing at the altar. This was Mary Ann Graham Donohue's brother, Will Graham. She recalled an incident of the boy later confronting Will with his fatherhood. She didn't remember her mother's brother, Michael. She only had contact with Will and Arthur. She didn't remember John, she didn't remember either of the Toms or anything about them, they all predeceased her birth and she just never saw Michael or knew of him. She, of course, knew all the sisters. She is in contact with an Alfred Hadley, the son of Beatrice Hadley. He lives in Los Angeles. She is going to try and get his address for me. She told me that Johanna and Jessep in San Diego were divorced. She said she remembers being out there and even after they were divorced Jessep always came over and ate. He always ate with his hat on. She thought he was just a no-good bum. He lived off Aunt Jo. She figured Aunt Jo was probably on welfare. That is how she lived.