Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Until this very day, I have seen the hand of God guiding me and bringing me from this place to this place to this place.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: Welcome to Golden Tidbits, the podcast where we explore the rich lives of everyday people, but with a unique twist. Each of our guests brings at least 70 years of life experience, with most having over 75. Together, we'll journey through their childhoods, friendships, education, and family dynamics. We'll travel down memory lane, twist through nostalgia, and arrive at a bygone era. Not all of these stories will be seen through rose colored glasses, but they're always real, honest, and deeply human. Something we could all use a little bit more of in our modern times. I'm your host, Molly Bdez. Dive into today's episode.
[00:01:04] Speaker A: Hi, Molly.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: Hi. You are Tom Thomas. I am Tommy.
[00:01:09] Speaker A: Tom.
[00:01:09] Speaker B: Tommy.
[00:01:10] Speaker A: Well, my real name is Thomas.
My paternal grandfather's name was Thomas.
[00:01:17] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:01:18] Speaker A: And my middle name is Irwin, which is my maternal grandparents name.
[00:01:23] Speaker B: Earl Winn.
[00:01:24] Speaker A: Erwin. E rwin. E w I n. Okay.
[00:01:26] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:01:27] Speaker A: Yes.
No one ever thought of me as whirlwind. I don't think.
[00:01:38] Speaker B: That'S so funny.
[00:01:41] Speaker A: And early on, I was known as Tommy.
[00:01:45] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:01:45] Speaker A: And I was known as Tommy all the way through school.
In fact, when I see my old school chums now, those that are still alive, they all refer to me as Tommy.
[00:01:56] Speaker B: Right.
[00:01:57] Speaker A: And I really enjoy that. It tickles me.
[00:01:59] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:02:00] Speaker A: But I've never identified myself to anybody since I've left school as Tommy Martin.
[00:02:07] Speaker B: Right.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: I'm Tom Martin.
[00:02:09] Speaker B: Right.
[00:02:09] Speaker A: And I don't mind the name Thomas, but I don't prefer it. It's just Tom. Yeah.
[00:02:17] Speaker B: Tom. Yeah. I've always known you as Pastor Tom and Tom. But I just. I kind of wondered what, you know, mom called you and stuff like that.
[00:02:25] Speaker A: Tommy.
[00:02:26] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay. So where would you say you grew up?
[00:02:30] Speaker A: Well, the absolute majority of my time as a kid and growing up was in Deadwood, South Dakota.
[00:02:38] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:38] Speaker A: However, I was born in California.
[00:02:40] Speaker B: Oh, you were?
[00:02:41] Speaker A: I was.
[00:02:42] Speaker B: You're a California transplant?
[00:02:44] Speaker A: I didn't know, but only because of the war.
[00:02:48] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:02:49] Speaker A: Now, when I say the war at my age, I'm talking about World War two, right? Yes.
[00:02:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:02:55] Speaker A: My parents lived in Leed, and my father worked for the homestead mine, and when the war started, the mine shut down.
[00:03:08] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:03:09] Speaker A: And so he needed to find something to do. My maternal grandparents lived in Wilmington, California, and my grandfather worked as a ship on the ship docks, and so there were many jobs available because young men were being gathered up. My father initially was too old for the draft.
[00:03:35] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:03:35] Speaker A: So they moved out there.
And we lived in San Pedro, California. And that's where I was born, in San Pedro.
And then when the war was over, actually, before the war was over, but not by much, my father was drafted because there was a great concern the plan was to invade Japan.
That was the known plan. The behind the door plan was, of course, the atomic bomb.
But the plan to invade Japan would have required an enormous number of troops.
And the projections of loss were just horrible. The idea was horrible.
So he was drafted and left on a train to go to New Jersey for basic training from.
[00:04:36] Speaker B: From California.
[00:04:36] Speaker A: California. And on the way across, before they got to New Jersey, the bomb was dropped and the war was over.
[00:04:48] Speaker B: So he never even really went to basic training.
[00:04:50] Speaker A: No.
[00:04:51] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:04:51] Speaker A: However, he was considered to be and given full rights as a veteran.
[00:04:56] Speaker B: Wow. Isn't that bananas?
[00:04:58] Speaker A: It is just nuts.
[00:04:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:05:00] Speaker A: So he had a nice train ride.
[00:05:01] Speaker B: Right.
[00:05:02] Speaker A: And didn't serve a day in the army. Really?
[00:05:04] Speaker B: I bet that was really uncomfortable for him.
[00:05:06] Speaker A: Well, it was.
He never made an issue out of it at all.
You know, I don't believe he ever belonged to the VFW or any of those service related things.
It was never even spoken of.
[00:05:26] Speaker B: Right.
[00:05:28] Speaker A: And I think that's how he wanted it.
[00:05:30] Speaker B: Right. I think I would have felt uncomfortable, you know what I mean? With all these people who had sacrificed so much, and then all I ended up doing was riding on a train. That would make me feel a little uncomfortable, too.
[00:05:40] Speaker A: Indeed, when I found out the details of the story, I quite enjoyed saying, well, you know what the cause of the war ending was? When the Japanese heard that Al Martin had been.
[00:05:55] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Drafted.
[00:05:58] Speaker B: That's hilarious. Oh, my goodness.
[00:06:00] Speaker A: They said, that's enough for us.
[00:06:03] Speaker B: That's enough. We're gonna give up. Oh, my word.
[00:06:05] Speaker A: Yes.
So that was my very small child's head. Yeah.
[00:06:11] Speaker B: Daddy was gonna come and solve it.
[00:06:13] Speaker A: Worked out.
[00:06:13] Speaker B: They were scared.
[00:06:14] Speaker A: But anyway, you know, as sad as it is to think of all the loss and the terrible things that happened, I'm very, very grateful that my father did not have to do that.
[00:06:23] Speaker B: Right, right. Because. And then, you know, he was there for your family. Right. I mean, that's. That's. Yeah.
Now, I have forgotten to ask you how many years of life experience you currently have.
[00:06:35] Speaker A: How old I am? Yeah. Oh, okay.
I'm calling it.
[00:06:41] Speaker B: I'm calling it that now. I'm calling it years of life experience.
[00:06:44] Speaker A: Okay.
That's very kind of you.
I have 80 and a half years.
[00:06:50] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:06:51] Speaker A: Of experience.
[00:06:52] Speaker B: And my math is not great. What year does that mean you were born then?
[00:06:55] Speaker A: 19. 43.
[00:06:56] Speaker B: 43. Okay. Okay. You're about three years older than my father, so.
[00:07:01] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:07:02] Speaker B: Okay. So now we know you were born in California, and then. So when did you get to come home then?
[00:07:07] Speaker A: Sure. When the war was over and things kind of. Kind of leveled out a little bit, my parents decided that, and this might have been more. My father, he was a Leed boy. He was born and raised in Leed.
My mother and her family came to Leed from Nebraska.
My father, my grandfather, her dad was carpenter by trade.
[00:07:37] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:07:38] Speaker A: And of course, in the thirties, things got difficult in Nebraska because there was a drought and the dust bowl area, so the homestake was always functioning. The economy in the lead northern hills area was always flourishing because the mine was there, so he could come and work there, and he worked as a carpenter as well. So when the war was over, then my parents moved back in 1947, and we initially moved to Leed.
And then it became possible for my father to purchase a service station in Deadwood. Oh. So for a year or so, he would drive back and forth, and then they found a house in Deadwood that they could afford, and so we moved to Deadwood. So my years of school and my, most of my growing up time was all in Deadwood.
[00:08:43] Speaker B: So you were. I mean, you were only about four when you came from California. So do you really have much memory of living there?
[00:08:49] Speaker A: I do.
[00:08:50] Speaker B: Oh, okay.
[00:08:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:08:52] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:52] Speaker A: It's amazing. I remember it very well and remember our neighbors, and so it's.
[00:09:01] Speaker B: Yeah. So it's fond for you to think back on that.
[00:09:03] Speaker A: Yeah, it is.
[00:09:04] Speaker B: Was. Do you remember being happy or scared about moving?
[00:09:09] Speaker A: No. You just did what your parents said.
[00:09:10] Speaker B: Yeah. And it wasn't something you worried about?
[00:09:13] Speaker A: Not a bit. They would. They would take care of whatever might go wrong, make it right.
[00:09:18] Speaker B: Yeah, sure. Yeah. So are there other children in the, your family?
[00:09:22] Speaker A: Sure. I had one brother.
[00:09:24] Speaker B: Okay. And is he older or younger?
[00:09:26] Speaker A: He was older. Eight years older than I. Oh, quite a gap.
[00:09:29] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay.
[00:09:30] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:09:30] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. I'm fascinated by how many people came to this area and over into even Wyoming from Nebraska, you know, and learned about the Nebraska school over by Rocky Point and all these things in Nebraska. There was a lot of people that came, and it would be all in that same kind of.
[00:09:48] Speaker A: Maybe.
[00:09:49] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. So that. That's really kind of fascinating.
So one of the things that I like to say is truly, you know, there's no place like home I remember especially. Cause, you know, I grew up out in the country, that feeling of being gone for a long day and getting close to home, and it's like, you know, the road and the feeling of it and stuff, you know. I was wondering if you could explain to me your childhood home. You know, maybe the driveway up to the house and what that was like.
[00:10:16] Speaker A: Sure. We were the houses at the top of the last house, up on a street referred to as Lincoln Avenue in Deadwood.
It was the main street that took all the way to Mount Moriah Cemetery, where Wild Bill and the other characters are buried.
[00:10:37] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:10:38] Speaker A: So it was a relatively. It was relatively busy street, particularly in the summer.
And we lived clear at the top, last house up.
[00:10:48] Speaker B: And it's pretty steep, isn't it?
[00:10:50] Speaker A: It is steep, yeah.
[00:10:52] Speaker B: Because, I mean, from where I remember, it's up there a minute.
[00:10:55] Speaker A: Yeah. Oh, yes. Yeah. Long ways up.
[00:10:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:10:58] Speaker A: I remember coming down the hill in a vehicle down the hill and sliding and slipping and basically never bumped a thing, but, yeah. Anyway. And it was a. It had been. It was originally a barn. I'm sure by the time we moved into it, it had been converted from a barn, but it had the traditional look of a barn.
[00:11:23] Speaker B: Sure.
[00:11:24] Speaker A: And there are old, old pictures taken of that side of the hill in Deadwood when there were no. No buildings at all on that hillside except for one.
And as near as I could tell, that one was probably our house. But it was definitely a barn in those days, right? Yeah.
[00:11:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:11:48] Speaker A: Then because of the close access to the cemetery, it became like a playground for me.
[00:11:58] Speaker B: Right.
[00:11:59] Speaker A: As a child.
[00:12:00] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah.
[00:12:03] Speaker A: And something that I find enormously interesting.
I spent a lot of time hiking up on the hill and over and around and clear at the top of the hill behind our house, way up at the top, was a place called White Rocks.
If you go to Deadwood today, you can just look up there and see it.
It's an outcropping of relatively white rocks, light colored rocks. And I spent, oh, I don't know how many hours up exploring around that country up there and around on the back of white rocks. From where we lived, you could see way out to the north, huh? Well, I could look out past bare Butte and deer's ears and Castle rock. I could see all those things you see.
[00:12:57] Speaker B: Right.
[00:12:58] Speaker A: Of course. Much. The air was much clearer in those days.
And I would sit up there, Molly, by the hour, eat my lunch that my mother had prepared for me, and ponder this strange territory to the north of the black hills there, wondering to myself, I could see no sign of life. I couldn't see a tree. I thought, do people actually live out in that part of the world? If they do, what do they do?
How do they get any shade? There's no trees.
[00:13:35] Speaker B: I try not to laugh over your talking, but I know where this is going.
[00:13:39] Speaker A: Yes.
And of course, where I lived all my life, practically up to then, was you could reach out and touch a tree practically everywhere you went.
So no trees.
Of course, to make a long story short, it turned out that I was to live more than half of my.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Life in Newell, South Dakota, where there's not many trees.
[00:14:10] Speaker A: Exactly right.
[00:14:11] Speaker B: People have made some trees happen.
[00:14:13] Speaker A: But yeah, yeah. That strange, weird, abandoned, not civilized, no doubt about it.
Country that I pondered so long I've ended up living here.
[00:14:28] Speaker B: You manifested it, I think. You just.
[00:14:32] Speaker A: Isn't that amazing?
[00:14:33] Speaker B: That is amazing. That's fascinating. You don't have to worry about sliding down hills, though, in the snow.
[00:14:38] Speaker A: Not in knoll. No, no, no.
In fact, as a pastor, I talk. God talk.
And so from the time I was a little boy until this very day, I have seen the hand of God guiding me and bringing me from this place to this place to this place. This person, this person, this person, these people, then these people, and then these people, and then this place, and then finally here.
[00:15:07] Speaker B: Right.
[00:15:08] Speaker A: And here I sit talking to Molly.
[00:15:10] Speaker B: Yeah. And it just kind of guided you along to this place with no trees.
[00:15:18] Speaker A: Wilderness. That's fabulous.
[00:15:21] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh.
Love the show. You can get extended episodes when you subscribe to our premium episodes, go to our website, goldentidbits dot castos.com. that's goldentidbits dot castos castos.com. to learn more or subscribe right in Apple podcasts. Okay, well, so tell me more about this barn house. Okay, so there were two siblings. Did you have your own bedroom then, or how many bedrooms were there?
[00:15:56] Speaker A: We did have. Barry and I both had a bedroom. Okay. Which was a good thing, because there was enough age difference between us that brotherly love wasn't an issue.
[00:16:10] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:16:11] Speaker A: You know, I was a bothersome thing to him.
[00:16:15] Speaker B: I would imagine my mother would force.
[00:16:16] Speaker A: The issue from time to time, and.
[00:16:20] Speaker B: As mothers do.
[00:16:21] Speaker A: Yes. And he did not like that.
[00:16:24] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:16:25] Speaker A: And so the end result of that was we really didn't become close until the last maybe year or so of his life.
He.
Oh, it's a sad story.
He was a brilliant fellow, just as. Oh, smart as a whip and talented, handsome, good looking guy, musically talented and athletic talented. And he.
He ended up with a drinking problem growing up in Deadwood. It's hard to describe.
Alcohol was just a normal factor in our lives.
It seemed to us that everybody drank.
[00:17:21] Speaker B: Yeah. And this is what everybody does all the time, everywhere.
[00:17:23] Speaker A: Yes. And we, you know, there was a bar.
Practically every other door on Main street was a bar. And there were houses of prostitution, of course, which to most people inappropriately so. Oh, that's awful.
To us it was normal.
[00:17:42] Speaker B: Right.
[00:17:43] Speaker A: So there was a certain.
There was a certain aspect, a very peculiar aspect of growing up in Deadwood that was really unique. It was enormously unique.
Served some folks really well, some folks that just wrecked them. And my brother was one of the once one of the wrecks, although he maintained for a long time he went in the Marine Corps, became very successful in the Marine Corps and anyway, but eventually, eventually his health situation was it had deteriorated because of the alcohol and he couldn't survive any longer. But we lived.
The two bedrooms that Barry and I had were upstairs in the house and they were a long ways out. We were way up high. And so some said, well, did you ever sneak out the window?
No, never thought. Never crossed my mind. Because it was 30ft to the ground.
[00:18:52] Speaker B: You know, that would have been a broken something.
[00:18:54] Speaker A: Something, yeah.
[00:18:56] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:18:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
Yeah. And so, you know, we were very. We were very fortunate. Our parents were lovely, lovely people, hardworking.
My dad was an enormously popular man. He has a great personality and good businessman. But his love of people probably led him to be a little too, in terms of the business end of the station, a little too lax. Sure.
In other words, when I. When he.
When he died, his accounts receivable would have allowed him and my mother to live quite comfortably. But of course, if someone said, al, I can't pay my bill this month, he would just simply say, that's just fine. Right, pay when you can.
And then that just, you know, added up and added up like that. But still, he was in the community. He was very highly thought of and very beloved. Quite a delightful man.
He drank also my uncle, his brother drank.
Like I said, everybody we knew, that's what people did. Just as normal as anything could possibly be. I would go into. By the time I was 13, I could go in the bars downtown and order a drink of alcohol.
[00:20:40] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:20:40] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:20:41] Speaker B: Wow. That's fascinating.
[00:20:42] Speaker A: Yeah. Tommy, are you sure you're 21?
[00:20:47] Speaker B: And did you say you were?
[00:20:48] Speaker A: Oh, yes. Absolutely.
[00:20:49] Speaker B: Absolutely am.
[00:20:50] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:20:52] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. Wow.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: But that's what it was like growing up there.
[00:20:57] Speaker B: Yeah. And I.
I'm fascinated. I don't really want to go down a rabbit hole about alcoholism, but I'm just fascinated. It's so many people I know and lives ruined over it.
I currently know.
It's not an old problem or a new problem. It's the same problem.
[00:21:14] Speaker A: Nobody survives it.
You have two choices. You either quit or it kills you. One or the other.
And I was blessed again, hand of God, as far as I'm concerned, because I was nothing special.
It was just his will for my life. At a point in time, I just quit drinking.
I did not become a teetotaler, however, congregation knows and most of my friends know that I enjoy a glass of wine, but I wasn't sober for many, many, many years, completely.
And a point came, and I just thought, I'm not gonna do this anymore, right? And so I didn't. I didn't. Never felt the need to take a drink in all my life. I just did it because I liked doing it, right? So when the time came for me to quit, I just quit.
[00:22:17] Speaker B: Right?
[00:22:18] Speaker A: No struggle.
[00:22:19] Speaker B: That's fascinating. I mean, because nothing, many cannot do that.
[00:22:22] Speaker A: I know that. I'm very well aware of that, and I'm very, very grateful that that was a gift that I received early, early on. And one of the great regrets of my life is I guess I've always had an attractive personality to a lot of people.
Even when I was young, young, young in school, my schoolteachers would say, can you stay up to school? I want to talk to you about something. Well, they didn't want to talk to me about me.
They wanted my advice. You can imagine this.
They wanted my advice about something in their life.
See, and that's.
Anyway, I attracted people.
And, of course, I drank and partied and did bad things and drove way too fast and all kinds of craziness and no need to go into details about it, but really unpleasant things. And so people wanted to do it with me, right? We had parties, legendary parties. Unfortunately.
[00:23:45] Speaker B: Unfortunately, yeah.
[00:23:48] Speaker A: At the time, grand. And Jolius, you know, what a grand time. They were horrible, right?
And several of them didn't walk away as I had. And they're all dead now.
And it just. It grieves me, because I realize that I was an instigator in getting that started for them. And I provided for them because I always bought the booze. I always had the booze wherever we went. I could set up a bar out of the trumpet with my car, you know?
And so everybody had plenty to drink. And when they came to my house for a party, they drank and they drank and they drank and they drank.
And before they left. I would always say to you, say to them, wouldn't you like another drink?
[00:24:50] Speaker B: Being a good host?
[00:24:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
And so, you know, now I look back on that and I realize, and I feel very badly about that. I'm so grateful.
I was going to be a history teacher, without a doubt.
I had my focus on history, being a teacher in school.
My history teacher didn't have me teach classes, but my general science teacher did when was a freshman in high school.
And I liked it.
[00:25:30] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:25:30] Speaker A: I thought that was just dandy, right? See? So I knew I wanted to be a teacher, not a science teacher, but history. So that was my direction, my focus. My teachers were, oh, yeah, good, that's going to be a teacher. So when the time came and I said, I'm going to be a preacher, there was, oh, what's a proper term for it? I suppose great. Suspicion, doubt, wonderment, shock, awe. Even my own mother said, what are you up to now?
[00:26:13] Speaker B: No.
Oh, mothers. They are.
Oh, she knew her Tommy.
[00:26:22] Speaker A: She did indeed. In fact, the first sermon she heard me preach later on, she said to me, before you started to preach, I thought, I'm going to get under the pew. I'm just going to get into the pew because he's going to do something.
[00:26:39] Speaker B: Oh, your mom. Oh, that's wonderful.
Oh my goodness.
[00:26:45] Speaker A: Oh, golly.
[00:26:48] Speaker B: If you find value in this show, you can support by leaving a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favorite podcast player. Even better, you can tell a friend. Well, so tell me then, what was your mother's role in the household?
[00:27:02] Speaker A: Well, she was the bookkeeper for the station, so they were in a partnership in that sense. That was, that was her end of the working effort.
She got up every morning about 04:00 and took care of the books from the day before and got everything arranged to start the new day. So my father could just take that and go to the station and open up and watch over bury and myself. Although, you know, the eight years difference very. Was more in line with my father's ideas and I was much more like my mother, you see. I guess that was just almost inevitable, but, and so her focus was on me and she, she was a very good mother. We were in church every Sunday morning without fail. Church was at eleven. We were there at 1015.
We were not going to be one moment late.
So we sat in the empty sanctuary for 30 minutes, you know, before anybody else would come, would come. But.
So she definitely pointed me in that direction.
She wanted me to know, wanted me to know what it was about.
[00:28:31] Speaker B: But was suspicious when you.
[00:28:33] Speaker A: Oh, I don't think it ever crossed her mind that I was gonna be a preacher.
[00:28:39] Speaker B: Right.
[00:28:40] Speaker A: You know, it was just a total shock to her.
[00:28:42] Speaker B: But it probably didn't cross your mind either.
[00:28:43] Speaker A: My mind? Yeah.
[00:28:45] Speaker B: No, you were gonna be a history teacher, and you just went to a different type of history teaching.
[00:28:49] Speaker A: Yeah, that's exactly right. Yes. My pastor, whom I had a very close relationship with, I enjoyed him very much. He was the one. He said, have you thought about being a pastor?
Must be joking, right?
[00:29:07] Speaker B: See, you're looking around. Is there somebody behind me?
[00:29:10] Speaker A: Who is he talking to? Can't be me. But he recognized something in me and could get a direction for it that I hadn't had.
You know, I knew what I was capable of doing, and I knew the way I could draw people and the way people responded to me.
But of course, I had never thought of using that in a positive way.
[00:29:40] Speaker B: You were a good host?
[00:29:41] Speaker A: Oh, yes. Very good host.
Yes. Bad boy.
[00:29:45] Speaker B: So it was either that or party planning, really?
[00:29:48] Speaker A: Yes.
Yes.
[00:29:50] Speaker B: Oh, my gosh. So when you guys came back then and your dad bought the station, that's what he did then? I mean, he didn't go back to the mine or anything like that?
[00:30:00] Speaker A: No. He opened the station at 06:00 a.m. and closed it at 10:00 p.m.
wow.
[00:30:06] Speaker B: Did he work most of that whole time?
[00:30:08] Speaker A: Every moment of it. Wow. Yeah.
[00:30:11] Speaker B: So what did that mean for your family life and connections?
[00:30:15] Speaker A: And if we wanted to see him, we went to the station.
[00:30:18] Speaker B: Right.
[00:30:19] Speaker A: Because he came home.
He left in the morning before I was up and about, and he came home at night after I had gone to bed.
[00:30:27] Speaker B: Right.
[00:30:29] Speaker A: And so then, at a point that didn't last for the whole 40 years of the station's existence as Martin Sinclair, but I. At a point, then he became successful enough that he could hire help, so gradually he was able to put those responsibilities more and more on his help so he didn't have to be there all those hours, but he did that for a number of years.
[00:30:58] Speaker B: Right, right.
[00:30:59] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:59] Speaker B: I think that probably would have impacted you and your brother as well in terms of on Dainto, you know, because I think a mother, two sons, is a little different, you know, so. So did, um. Was that was the station like, could you walk there or, like, ride a bike or was it a little farther?
[00:31:18] Speaker A: It was. It was very walkable. Although, of course, the walk there was a piece of cake.
[00:31:24] Speaker B: You had to be careful. And you didn't skid on down.
[00:31:26] Speaker A: Yeah. The walk back, of course, was up a steep hill. Yeah. And of course, that. That allows me to tell you that I walked. And if you're not familiar with. With the geography of Deadwood, won't mean much to you. But I walked from our house, which is, like I said, at the top of Lincoln Avenue to the school downtown and back every day. Back home for lunch, back to the school after lunch, back home after school got out. Wow. Yes.
And so walking became a part of my life, and it would still be today, except I have not taken care of myself and I'm not able to walk very well anymore. But I just loved to walk. And then my hikes on the hills behind our house, up and down and up and down and around and around. Walking was a.
It was something that I. That I really enjoyed. But the station, when you come down Lincoln Avenue and get down into the. Into the. Under the main drive through town, the station was just right there.
It wasn't very far. I suppose a total of about 12347 blocks. Eight blocks. So.
[00:33:00] Speaker B: So it was. I mean, it was close enough to your home that it was kind of an extension in terms of. You could just be right over there.
[00:33:05] Speaker A: Yeah. And then I wanted to be there more and more and more as I got older, you know, because that was the cool hangout. I mean, it was. It was a service station, but unlike anything you've ever seen.
That's the way we were.
[00:33:20] Speaker B: Is it still there? Is the building still there?
[00:33:22] Speaker A: The building is still there, as a matter of fact.
[00:33:24] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:33:25] Speaker A: And since he sold it, it has been a variety of things.
It was a service station for a while, and then it got sold and they tried this, and then it got sold and they tried that.
But that building is still there, essentially in the exact same situation, condition that it was when we had our service station there.
[00:33:50] Speaker B: Right. I think I know maybe which one. I'm going to have to. I'm going to have to check it out the next time in Deadwood. I'm really curious about this now, if.
[00:33:57] Speaker A: You know where the hospital is.
[00:33:59] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:34:01] Speaker A: Well, it's not St. Joseph's Hospital anymore, but if you come in from the other end of Deadwood, from the lead end of road down into Deadwood, then when you go past the hospital, the street just goes on straight for a while, and then there's a curve there, and right on that corner is Martin Sinclair.
[00:34:22] Speaker B: Huh. That's fascinating.
[00:34:24] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:34:27] Speaker B: If you find value in the show, you can give your support by leaving a one time donation to help cover the cost of hosting and equipment. Find the link on our website at goldentidbits dot castos.com. that's goldentidbits dot castos, castos.com or in the show notes.
I didn't ask you. I want to know, what kind of utilities did your home have? Did you have. I mean, obviously, Deadwood was a town, and so you had water and stuff, but what was that situation like?
[00:35:01] Speaker A: Sure. Well, we were very blessed. You know, my parents, obviously were not very many years from no utilities at all. And those things began to come during their lifetime.
But in deadwood, we had natural gas, we had indoor water, indoor plumbing facilities, bathroom facilities, of course, full electricity. And so we didn't lack for anything.
[00:35:38] Speaker B: Right. So even heating your home, you use natural gas to do that. Wow, that was pretty bougie for those times.
[00:35:44] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah, it was.
We were truly blessed.
And I should tell you this about my mother's influence on my life.
I can honestly say that I have never taken a puff on a cigarette in my life, not one time.
And there's a reason for that. When I was a little boy, I suppose I must have been six, maybe five or six.
And my mother smoked constantly. My father smoked constantly. When my brother got older, he smoked constantly.
But one day, my mother lighted up a cigarette, and she said, tommy, come here. I want to show you something. And she took a white linen handkerchief out and inhaled on her cigarette and held that handkerchief over her mouth, one layer of it, of course, and then exhaled.
And then she told. She showed me the handkerchief, and on the side that was up against her mouth was this brown stain.
And, of course, cigarettes in those days were straight away. I mean, there was no attempt to take anything away from the full force of what you were doing.
And she said, every time I take cigarette, every time I have a cigarette, every time I inhale that smoke, that's what goes in my lungs now, I thought, well, in retrospect, I've thought about that so many times, I thought, I, wow, what an incredible thing. In those days when it was just as normal and as natural, we didn't hear anything about, oh, it's dangerous, you know, or you need to be careful when you smoke. People just full on smoked. It was as natural and as normal as anything could be. And besides that, in Deadwood, it was drinking.
[00:37:47] Speaker B: Right. But everybody smoked, and indoors and all.
[00:37:52] Speaker A: Oh, absolutely. In your car, everywhere you went, somebody smoked, right? Yes. And I took that to heart. Now, she told me a lot of things I shouldn't do.
Tons of things don't do this. Don't do this.
[00:38:11] Speaker B: Well, thank goodness that was one that worked.
[00:38:14] Speaker A: But that one. Grace of God. No other reason, Melly.
[00:38:18] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:19] Speaker A: Grace of goddess. Tuck. Just.
[00:38:23] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:23] Speaker A: And it was in there, and I could not. I never did even begin to do it right.
[00:38:29] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:38:30] Speaker A: Oh, was I grateful for that. You know, the. The church attendance, her promptness with that.
You know, there were many other things, of course, but that smoking thing was, I think, the primary thing that makes me so happy that I had the mother. I did.
And that she told me that and showed me that. She could have told me that, and it wouldn't have meant much.
[00:38:58] Speaker B: Right. But you seeing it was.
[00:39:00] Speaker A: What? Yeah, that awful brown stain. I thought, good grief.
[00:39:07] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:09] Speaker A: No, that was it.
[00:39:11] Speaker B: Mm hmm.
[00:39:11] Speaker A: The kids are curious, you know?
[00:39:13] Speaker B: Right. And if everybody's doing it, and like you said, and it's so normalized, and it just, you know, there's no downside. Right. And then you saw the downside in the handkerchief.
[00:39:23] Speaker A: Yeah. Yeah. Mom's doing it, dad's doing it. Your brother's doing it. Your friends are all doing it. Their parents are all doing it.
But I never did.
[00:39:32] Speaker B: Wow.
Thank you for joining me on this journey through time with today's guest. I hope this story touched you as much as it did me. I'd love to hear how this episode resonated with you. If a particular story or memory struck a chord or if it reminded you of your own experiences, please send in your thoughts or stories. Find us on the web at goldentidbits dot castos.com. or you can send us a message on our fan page at Fanliste, and we might share your story in a future episode. Your voice is an important part of the Golden Tidbits community, and together we can keep these timeless stories alive. Don't forget to subscribe, leave a review, and share this podcast with anyone who loves a good story. Until next time, I'm Molly B. And I can't wait to share more golden tidbits with you.
