If this is Thursday it must be postcards, 416

Girl in the Moon, 1907 reprint

Today’s postcard is one that Q sent in 1997.  On his way to grad school in Madison, Wisconsin he stopped in Milwaukee and visited the Miller Valley Cultural Center that included tours and information about the Miller Brewing Company and had a gift shop where he found this postcard.  The card has the number J17071CC at the lower right corner on the reverse.  It was printed and distributed by the Miller Brewing Company. 

The card shows the famous 1907 “Girl in the Moon” advertisement for Miller High Life Beer.   She was featured in Miller ads and on bottles and cans from 1907 to the present with a hiatus during the late 1980s and 1990s.  She returned in 2005 with a minor makeover she looks as she did in 1943.  There are several different poses, some with the profile such as the one above, some with a full face, some standing, and some sitting.  Promotional items with the 1907 version are coveted as collector’s pieces. 

It is not known for sure who inspired the moon maiden but it is thought that she was a daughter, granddaughter or possibly a goddaughter of the Miller family.  One account names her as Loretta Miller Kopmeier the daughter of Carl Miller and granddaughter of Frederick Miller, the founder of the Miller Brewing Company.  She visited the brewery with her father when she was about 12 or 13 years old.  Her father sat her down and she dramatically held up her hand.  That incident became the inspiration for her father and she became the model for the Girl in the Moon.  Besides the girl the design shows her amid the clouds and stars in a spacious sky.  Loretta was born in 1892 and would have been closer to 15 in 1907; however, the brewery was founded in 1903 so the design could have been from a year or two earlier than the original ad campaign.  Q’s comment on the back of the card “Here’s a souvenir from my tour of Milwaukee’s cultural center, also known as ‘Miller Valley.’  Entertaining but sentimental story.”  Loretta Miller Kopmeier died in 1990 and is buried in Milwaukee.

Trays, plates, glasses and cups with logos such as this may have been fairly popular in the early 1900s as we also have a couple items from local breweries, Rainier and Olympia, with “Gibson Girls” on them that were collected by members of the Landaas and Lee families. The artwork is in the Art Nouveau style that was popular between about 1880 to the beginning of World War I (1914).  There are charming illustrations in children’s books dating from that era that also feature the same style of artwork.

For additional information, see:

www.nytimes.com/2005/09/09/business/media/...
https://www.beer-steins.com/miller/steins2.html
https://adland.tv/content/girl-moon-miller-high-life
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_Brewing_Company
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widen+Kennedy
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/18503374/loretta-kopmeier

Q . . .

photo:  SM

As we who remain
Walk slowly up the hill
We see the red cardinal
Sitting on a stone

photo:  LM

Our sadness is still
Our quiet tears fall

photo:  LM

As we contemplate
The life we miss
Our hearts do not accept
The missing voice

Our sadness is new
Our sorrow tender

The echo of your voice
The sound of your laugh
The look in your eyes
The delight of new things

Our sadness is tempered
Our hope is renewed

As we see the light afar
We hope for the day ahead
You are in the breeze
You are in the sky

The veil is thin
Time disappears

photo:  LM

The children build their Cairns
Of stones, flat and rounded
The deer move through the trees
The red fox runs by

We are not alone
We are watched over

You are not alone
You are watched over

photo:  SMF

The blue stone is in your pocket
The clover flowers
The softness of sorrow
Is tempered by that surety

All is well
All is well

photo:  LM

Memorial Day 2015

No words necessary except, Thank you . . .

 

World War I

World War II

World War II

World War II

World Wars I & II

Spanish American War

World War I

Civil War

Somebody had a birthday!

Somebody had a birthday!


Today was a very special day for one little girl.  She turned one year old and had a real birthday party with balloons, food, cupcakes, games, songs, and presents. 

 

Happy Birthday little Miss . . .

Christmas is a good time for proposals . . .

A cousin mentioned recently that her daughter had become engaged at Christmas and it reminded me of the year that Bopa proposed to me also at Christmas.  He was such a clever man and had a wicked sense of humor.  I think my children probably know the story but I don’t think my grandchildren do so I thought I would share it for them.

All those many years ago Bopa and I had been seeing each other for about two years and we had been talking very seriously about marriage that autumn before Christmas.  As you might guess I was expecting something special and rather small for my Christmas gift from him.  But, no, my gift from Bopa was a Jackson Pollock jigsaw puzzle. 

Puzzle box

I do like and enjoy puzzles but this was a bit of a disappointment.  Bopa was watching me and his eyes were twinkling in a very mischeivious way. 

“Aren’t you going to put the puzzle together?”  He asked innocently.

He made me put it together mostly by myself with just a little help from him and although it was a 350 piece puzzle not 1,000 pieces it still took some time to do because as you can see from the picture above Jackson Pollock is not known for painting anything except splashes and drips, no real design as a guide.  I was probably grumbling and mumbling as I worked on it but I do like puzzles quickly becoming wrapped up in the task and forgetting to be cranky.  When the puzzle was all put together Bopa instructed me to turn it over.  That was also not easy to do because the pieces tended to fall out and that meant additional putting together time.

On the reverse side of the puzzle was a message telling me where to look for my “real” present.  By this time I think Bopa was almost laughing out loud.  After much searching I found a tiny white box tied on the Christmas tree way inside the branches and hard to find, of course.  And yes, it did have what was to become his traditional signature mark of a knotted red avalanche cord tied around the box.  When I opened the box there was a beautiful engagement ring.  He had chosen the stone first and then gone to a local jewelery artist to have a ring custom designed and made.  The ring was sitting there so prettily but it had a fairly long string attached to it.

“What is that string for?”  I asked him.

“Well, the ring is yours,” he smiled, “but there is a string attached as you noticed.  The string means you have to marry me to keep the ring.”  His eyes were twinkling again because he knew I really wanted that pretty ring and hopefully wanted him too and would say yes.

He later said he was glad I persevered and didn’t give up because marriage is or can be hard work.  He was trying to show me that really good things do not always come easily and that the end result (reward) was worth the effort.  It was indeed.  We had a long marriage full of love, laughter and companionship.  As you can see the lesson stuck with me as I kept the puzzle all these years and still remember the event with fondness but also a bit of frustration.

I was going to try and put it together again and flip it over so the message could be read but after looking at the pieces I noticed that the writing on the reverse seems to have faded over time.  Unfortunately it is no longer legible.  But I do still have and wear the ring--

At the time, and even now, I think, it is customary to give a diamond but I did not want a diamond so the stone he chose was a moonstone.  The original wedding band is yellow gold designed and made by the same jeweler. Many years later he did give me a diamond solitaire for Christmas.  He said I was his sun, moon and stars and each of the three rings represented one of those things.  He was not only clever but romantic as well. 

Veteran's Day thank you

Uncle J, Grandpa Mac, and Bopa

Last year I posted a tribute and since this is for a day of remembrance it seemed appropriate to do it again.  Yesterday was Veteran’s Day (Armistice Day), a day to remember the men and women who served and serve in the military to say “Thank you” and to let them know how much the rest of us appreciate their service in behalf of all of us. 

Bopa served in WWII as did one of his brothers their father served in WWI and their mother’s father served in the Spanish American War.  Bopa's youngest brother also served in the military but I do not think it was during war time as he was considerably younger.

Great-grandpa Col. John Q. Cannon

Bopa was a quiet, brave and uncomplaining man.  During his years of military service he was almost always wet, cold, muddy, and hungry.  I imagine he was scared part of the time too.  There were and are a lot of soldiers like this.  Nowadays soldiers most likely add the desert is too hot and their fears include things like IEDs that didn’t even exist during WWII and before.  But they do their jobs anyway.  The memory of the sorry conditions didn’t matter though, Bopa always said he thought the military was a good experience for any young man and he was forever patriotic putting the flag out on display for all the holidays and standing for the National Anthem with his hand on his heart in his latter years. 

Thank you all so very much, we love you.

Veteran's Day tribute

When he was in 4th grade my grandson, Iain, wrote this Veteran's Day report about his grandpa. Since today is Veteran's Day I thought it was a good opportunity to share it on the blog. Bopa was very patriotic and liked to fly the flag on holidays like today. He used all sorts of fancy knots to secure the flag, however, and I don't know how to make them let alone get up on the ladder and hang the flag. Our flag is one that we requested from our Senator and it flew over the White House. Very special to all of us. Thank you to all the Veterans!

Bopa aka Farfar in his World War II uniform

This is my Grandpa Tony. He was in the United States Army in World War Two. He served from 1943 to 1946. He went to Holland and Germany. He was the Communications Chief for his group*. He made the radios and telephones work. Sometimes he ran the movie projector so the soldiers could watch movies. Most of the time he had to sleep in barns or barracks in a sleeping bag, on top of straw. He slept on an army stretcher to keep out of the mud. He was always cold and wet. Once while he was sleeping, an airplane shot the roof off of the barn he was in. He didn’t get hurt because he was covered with hay. That was a scary experience for him. He didn’t get wounded while he was a soldier.



The antiaircraft artillery battalion’s job was to protect the soldiers from being shot at by airplanes. They moved from place to place protecting different groups of soldiers. In Holland they guarded a radar station. In Germany they guarded American soldiers who were destroying steel factories that the Germans were using to make weapons. They also guarded a bridge near Berlin on the border between the British and Russian territories. The Allied planes had special secret codes they had to give to my grandpa’s group if they wanted to fly by safely. One day a plane didn’t give the code, so they shot it down. It was an American lieutenant. He got out of his plane safely but he was very angry. He thought he was too important to have to learn the codes. Another day they saw one of the first jet airplanes. It flew by so fast they didn’t get a chance to shoot at it.

Lucerne, Switzerland

After the war ended, it took a long time to send all the soldiers home. My grandpa visited many places while he was waiting to go home. While he was in Paris, he heard the news that Hiroshima, Japan had been bombed with an atomic bomb. The soldiers could take college classes while they waited to go home, too. My grandpa went to Switzerland and took classes at the University of Fribourg. He went hiking in the Alps. My grandpa said the Army food was “pretty good” but the people in the towns didn’t have a lot of food to eat. In Switzerland he had to eat a lot of mushrooms. Now he doesn’t like mushrooms. I liked listening to my grandpa’s stories and seeing his pictures.

Three McKay veterans: my grandpa is on the right. His brother John is a World War Two veteran, too. His father, my great-grandpa Morgan McKay, was a World War One veteran.


John Q. Cannon

As an added bonus we also have a fairly rare picture of Bopa's grandfather, Col. John Q. Cannon, in his Rough Rider uniform. He fought in the Spanish American War and knew Teddy Roosevelt.

.....................................................................................................................

Note:

* This was the 379th Antiaircraft Artillery Battalion.