I turn 60 today.

I turn 60 years old today – July 6, 2017. I am the 5^th of the 7 Piette kids. I am almost exactly 2 years younger than my next oldest sister, six years younger than my next oldest sister, 7 ½ years younger than my next oldest brother and 8 ½ years younger than the oldest in the family. I am 4 years older than my younger sister and almost 6 years older than my younger brother.

So this is going to be about me. I am not generally comfortable writing about myself, but what the heck. I made it to 60, and I suppose that is something.

I was born on a Saturday, at 11:30 in the morning. A big boy for the time, seven pounds something. (I need to find the birth certificate or my baby book) They took me home to 714 S Pierce Ave in Appleton – the home where I grew up, and we only sold in 2015, 60 years after my folks bought the house. Roots.

My father worked for Kimberly Clark his whole career, and my mother stayed at home with all the kids. All. Those. Kids. I can’t imagine what it might have been like growing up in a small family. As a matter of fact, one of my earliest memories is when the whole family was driving around town. (that was one of our fun activities. Driving around town and singing. Songs like “There is a tavern in the town”, “Tie a yellow ribbon”, and “Blood upon the Risers”). One of the older kids look at me and said, “Dan, you’re the baby of the family.” I was, understandably upset (I was not yet four!) and replied “I’m only the baby until mom has another one!” Everyone laughed. (A bit of pronunciation here. We all called our mother “Mum”, but I can remember her distinctly telling me that when I write it down, I need to write “Mom”. Her wish…)

Starting School

We were (and are) a very tight family. We never had more than one car (our father car-pooled) and none of the kids has their own car until they left the house. Usually long after that, as well. That meant a lot of riding together. Another early memory for me was going to pick up sister Abbie from Kindergarten. So, she would have been five, and I would have been three. Hard to believe that was 57 years ago. Hard to believe that school is still around (Jefferson) and if still being used.

Jefferson Elementary School

Jefferson

I went to Jefferson for kindergarten as well. Here I am going to school:

I walked to school, as did all my siblings. It was about a half mile walk. But it was a half mile walk alone. Along a busy street. And I was five years old. We were taught responsibility early.

I generally enjoyed school, but kindergarten was tough. I loved being with my mother and never wanted to leave her. Here’s another early memory. I was still sleeping in my folk’s bedroom, in a crib. (How old could I have been? I just don’t know. The memory is clear, the circumstances fuzzy). Every night my mother would say to me, “Good night little horse” and I would reply “Good night sweet horse”. They my father would say “Good night, little horse” and I would reply “Good night, dumb horse.” And he would laugh and laugh. Man! Oedipal, anyone?

Grade School

St Mary’s was the local parish, where I was baptized, my father was baptized, and his father was baptized. They also had a grade school that covered grades 1 -> 8. I went there for three. All my elder sibs went the whole 8 years. I, however, had a speech impediment.

I lisped. And your mind works in funny ways. I never thought I lisped, and was never self-conscious about it at all. I can remember talking once with my buddy Rick Hauch (my best friend) and remarking that there are two kinds of thick. Thick like a tree that is very big around. And thick like when you don’t feel well. It was all very logical to me. He didn’t correct me or seem to think it was odd in any way. Another time, I was watching TV with my two older sisters. An ad came on TV for a new Chevy SS. They asked me what car that was, and I replied “It’s an SS” Which I imagine came out as “Eth eth”. They chuckled, and asked me to say it again. I said, “It’s an SS!” they asked me a third time. And I got annoyed at the repetition, but I still didn’t think I was being mocked. “IT’S AN SS” I shouted. Man, I thought they must be slow.

So I was back to Jefferson, the same school where I went to kindergarten, for the fourth grade. And speech class. There were a couple of us in speech class, and I LOVED my speech teacher. They took us out of regular class for a couple of hours a week. I don’t really remember exactly what I did, but I remember a couple of very specific things.

The first is that I swallowed wrong. Ha! I’ll be you didn’t know there was a right and wrong way to swallow, but evidently there is. Can you swallow with your mouth open? That is the right way to swallow (with your tongue) If you need to close your mouth (press your lips together)  to swallow, you are doing it wrong. So I had to learn how to swallow right.

The second thing I learned was that I have a very long tongue. (maybe from not using it to swallow when I was younger?) I know this because the school system brought me, and my folks over to Morgan, which is where the (what we call now) “special needs” kids when to school. But it was also where anything exceptional (like long tongues) were discussed.

I don’t know everything that was discussed in that meeting – I think I was kicked out for a while, but I have a distinct memory of the administrator telling my folks that my tongue was too long, and they recommended surgery to make it shorter. Luckily, cooler heads prevailed, and no tongue cutting happened. At least that I recall.

The speech therapy stopped at the end of fifth grade – not sure if I would have just grown out of it, but there you have it.

Sixth grade was a big transition grade for me. I started the year as a mostly happy-go-lucky kid. My mother died in January of that year, and I ended the year (and Jefferson) rather introverted.

Trains

As a kid, we spent every summer in Louisiana with my maternal grandparent and innumerous aunts, uncles, and cousins. I believe that my mother really enjoyed these trips. I found them less pleasurable. But the trip down and back was always fun. Usually, my mother would travel with whichever of us little kids were alive and take the train down. We got on a Chicago & NorthWesten train from Appleton to Chicago, change stations in Chicago (I even remember sitting on the floor of one of those big old Yellow Cabs because we had so many people to transport) to the Illinois Central Union Station to take the Panama Limited all the way to New Orleans. We would have a sleeper car, and there is nothing better than lying in a bunk in a train and falling asleep to the clacking of the rails.

The Panama Limited

But one year, my sister Abbie attended summer school and threw the schedule off. Mel and Mark went down on their own first, then Chas and I went down together, and finally our mother, Abbie, and the two little kids.

I was 5, Chas was 14. As I said, we were more responsible back then. We didn’t get a roomette, just seats (it was a long trip). I can remember getting mad at Chas during one of the meals (they had Jell-O with peas in it. I didn’t like peas) and I walked all the way back to our seats alone. Chas let me go (not sure how he could have stopped me) and that was that!

We were picked up in New Orleans by Aunt Abbie and Uncle T, who then drove us to Franklin. I was very homesick until our mother came down. 

High School

I’ll skip forward to High School – Jr High was a three year period without much interest or regret. I was in orchestra (I started playing violin in fifth grade), did really well in math, science, and most everything but Spanish (which turned out to be ironic).

High School was in many ways a burden to get through. While I had a handful of great teachers (Thank you Mr Fanning and Mr Scribner!) and a great debate coach (rest in peace Mr XXX) by and large the teachers were just OK. I made National Honor Society as a junior, something that thrilled my father to no end. My debate partner and I took second place in the state tournament (we was robbed!) and I loved writing for the school newspaper. (Barb, if you’re reading this, I am sorry that I didn’t use an editor.)

That is "Tally Tower" in the middle of the image

(That is the Tally Tower in the middle of this image, where we put the paper together. I had a key, and a lot of free time. I spent many hours there)

As a summer job in high school I worked at St Mary’s Cemetery. Some famous residents there included my mother, my namesake, and Joe McCarthy. It was a good job at minimum wage. The next youngest person there was the sexton, who was 68. Needless to say, we didn’t work too hard. I think that is where I got my work ethic.

My official High School Graduation photo.

My unofficial graduation photo. That was in the paper. I don’t think I was paying attention to Kimberly Taylor as she gave her graduation speech. I think it had something to do with this not being an end, but a beginning

UW Madison

Moving on to Madison was one the great liberating events of my life. Being responsible for your own bad self is critical in anyone’s development, and I was ready for this move.

I lived in the Lakeshore Dorm, Tripp Hall – one of the old ones. My good friend Rick Hauch lived in High House, which I suppose it was.

My window was the second floor window

My first year at Madison we had four of the seven Piette kids living there – brother Mark, sisters Mel and Abbie, and me. We had the best time. It is reassuring to have so much family so close. Abbie left the following year, but Mel and Mark overlapped my time in Madison almost exactly. Mark and Mel had both arrived a year earlier thank I had (Mark had taken time out for the army, Mel got an undergrad degree at UW-M, or at least had a couple of years there)

I loved the University of Wisconsin. I loved the city of Madison. It was a great five years (which see). I enjoyed all my classes, I enjoyed the homework, I enjoyed the tests (Well yes. Yes, I did.) I was on the Dean’s List every semester I was a full time student. I graduated with honors (UW doesn’t distinguish which honors) and I was both sorry to go and ready to go.

My father help pay for school, but mostly I “Co-op’ed” which would probably be called “interning” today.

I started my first work in a mine in Marcona, Peru.

A Summer Intern at Hierro Peru

Engineering is really an applied science. So what you learn in school is really the start of what you need to know to do your job.

While I loved school, I knew that I wanted to get some field work under my belt as soon as possible. To that end I applied to many mining companies for summer jobs after my freshman year.

Not too many companies are eager to take on a kid with no real experience, so I did not get any job offers.

One of the other students, however, (Cesar Moreno) had a father who worked at Hierro Peru (formerly Marcona Mining Company, now Shougang Hierro Peru) in Marcona, Peru. He said that he would be able to get me a job as a summer intern working in that iron mine:

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I was just crazy enough to agree to this job.

When I told my father that I wanted to work the summer in Peru, where I would work six days a week and get paid next to nothing, and completely deplete my college fund, he asked me only one question: "Do you think this is a good idea?" I said yes, and then I was off.

I lived in the town of San Juan:


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with the family of my friend, in their house:

From UW Madison Mining Engineer

Though "with" them is sort of debatable. It turned out that his father (Humberto Moreno) had cancer, and had to get treatment in Lima. As Lima was about 500 km away, with no regular air traffic, I spent most of the summer alone - well, alone with a maid and a yard boy. It was a strange thing for a kid from Appleton.

But I did work six days a week, and was paid a dollar a day. Here I am on one of the P&H shovels:

From UW Madison Mining Engineer

You can tell that HS&E weren't really too high on the Hierro Peru priority lists.

I did have a hard hat, though.