I.. Brinkley's Hill

Bob Zybach: How about this off to the right where we're looking up above where Coote's Mill was? Can you recall what that looked like?

Neil Vanderburg: Well, Coote logged it off. Or Wienert did. This right here was a grass hill.

Bob Zybach: The hill we're on?

Neil Vanderburg: Yeah, right here ahead of us. That's where that cemetery was I was talking about.

Bob Zybach: Okay. And we can't see that right now because of the trees.

Neil Vanderburg: Well, basically we need to go a little further ahead in order to be where we could see the cemetery because it was just over the break of the hill and you see we're not up to the top of the hill yet.

Bob Zybach: Okay.

I. Brinkley's Hill

Bob Zybach: We're on Tampico Road, coming down to Smith's place on the right, just past the crest of the hill.

Neil Vanderburg: Yeah.

Bob Zybach: Can you tell me where the cemetery was and what it looked like?

Neil Vanderburg: The cemetery would have been about 50 feet off the road here. If the old telephone line was there, it was the old telephone line went right over the cemetery, and the cemetery had 1 by 8 fir markers on it painted white. And by the time I came here most of the markers had been rotted off. But the people were still coming and putting flowers on the cemetery on Memorial Day. But I never knew who they were and the names weren't legible on the headstones. They were too weathered. It didn't appear that they were really that old at that time, but as I say the headstones weren't something that was made to last. And it seems to me like there was one baby's grave that had a fence around it. But we're talking 55 years ago, but it just, I remember it that way. But I do remember that this was a grass hill here, no trees on it whatsoever. We used to pick wild strawberries on this hill. Around that cemetery and so forth. It was all grown up to wild strawberries, and of course wild strawberries are pretty small, but the interesting thing, as I look at this place is how big the trees have got that weren't even here. I had my daughter Mary and grandchildren Peter and Anna Stone, and I asked them as we drove through this area, I says, "What do you see here that would be different than what it was when I lived here?" We were over on the other side of the valley here, and they said, well I don't know. And I says, well, these were all grass hills here. Now they've got trees on them big enough to log.

Bob Zybach: When you say across the valley, that's the Berry Creek Valley, on the south side.

Neil Vanderburg: Yeah.

Bob Zybach: That's gonna be, some of these things we've gotta put in here, otherwise it won't come across on the transcript.

Neil Vanderburg: Would you like for me to give you the names of the people that I wrote down for you and show you from here where they approximately where they lived.

Bob Zybach: Sure, yeah, this is a good vantage point.

Bob Zybach: Okay, we're looking from what Jim Hanish called Brinkley's Hill, and we're looking due south down Berry Creek Road. With Berry Creek maybe a quarter of a mile in front of us here.

Neil Vanderburg: Just this side of Berry Creek there was a road went back about a half a mile that went back to Forest Tandy's farm. His farm sat in an 't" in our place and he never did put any gravel on that road so it was always almost impossible for him to get out in the wintertime. But he was a good driver and he'd spin his way out and finally get out of there. He built a house for himself and one for his father-in-law, Mr. White, I don't know his first name. He had a son Charlie; we'll come back to him later. And, of course, his daughter was Mabel Tandy. And Forest Tandy was on the school board, as well as my dad. My dad always made me help Forest if there was anything to do with the school, so I got to be pretty good friends with Forest Tandy, as well as the fact that he had a daughter Edith Tandy and I was pretty sweet on her. But they lived right back, east of the road here, probably a half a mile. And then looking right down here to the bottom of the hill you can see the driveway going in to our house.

Bob Zybach: Now was that road beyond your driveway or this side of the driveway?

Neil Vanderburg: Our house. . . that driveway is right where our driveway was.

Bob Zybach: Okay, but then, the road to the Tandys, is that.

Neil Vanderburg: Oh, it was clear on down past our driveway. It was right down next to the creek. In fact he had a bridge across the creek over here.

Bob Zybach: Uh huh.

Neil Vanderburg: Anyway, if you look at the road again, or the bank, you'll see that there is a rise right there again, so the road went down, went up and then went down to Berry Creek. Where you see those maple trees that's where our house was behind those maple trees. The house now is over here way this side of where the maple trees are. Those maple trees were planted in front of our house.

Bob Zybach: Did you plant those maples?

Neil Vanderburg: No, they were there. They were big trees then. And that's where we lived.

Bob Zybach: Do you recall who lived in the house before you?

Neil Vanderburg: Rafiers.

Bob Zybach: So, the Rafters. And then the Vanderburgs.

Neil Vanderburg: Yeah. But the Rafiers, I doubt if you'll find any records of them because they were renters.

Bob Zybach: Do you know who they were renting from, who owned the house?

Neil Vanderburg: I have no idea. I think you gave a name. . . Anyway, but at that time, you see, our house was on the level with the road. But now they've made a cut about four feet deep there, so we were up above the road when they made that cut. All the mail boxes were on the right hand side here. Right in front of our house. And .

Bob Zybach: Would that be about where that mail box is now?

Neil Vanderburg: A little this side of that, and up on that hill. See, the road went up over the hill. Well then when the County came through and redid this road, it made it a nice deal for us, because of course in those days you don't have any fork lift or anything. We bought our gasoline in 50-gallon barrels. And so we could just back right up to our bank in front of our house, roll the gasoline off, and get the truck out of the road and then roll the 50 gallon barrel onto a sled and take it onto the field.

Bob Zybach: What year was that that they improved that road?

Neil Vanderburg: I would say that was about 1938. And then of course the Coote's lived in the house that's still here on the right hand side.

Bob Zybach: But you called that even the Smith house at that time.

Neil Vanderburg: Yeah. He rented it from Smith. And Bill Coote lived there and his mother-in-law