HISTORICAL LEWIS (Con'td)
During the next decade we lived more serenly that [sic than] we were ever to do again. In the summer we spent our Sunday afternoons at Crystal Lake, swimming, or skating at the rink, or having a soda with our friends at the pavillion, and drinking from the tin cup at the icy stream that poured from the old iron pipe into the lake. Click images to enlarge Every Saturday and Wednesday night we had the silent movies, at two theaters, the old Opera house where the telephone building is now, and one west of Marker's. They were operated by Woodward and Harrisw. Admission was five and ten cents, and we flocked in droves to see the next installment of the serial, such as the Broken Coin, or the Red Cirecle, or The Iron Claw, The Perils of Pauline, the Mack Sennett comedy with the custard pie throwing, and the western thriller. And we had Mr. Neal Zike to play the piano in the mood of the scene. We could hardly wait for him to stide down the aisle with his music tucked under his arm. He would seat himself, flick on the light, the reel would roll, and he would pound out the right tunes. I can still hear his "galloping horses" theme. In 1914 in an unheard-of country in Europe, a seemingly minor incident triggered a war, and in two years the United States was drawn into World War I. Again our town sent her share of boys to fight the "war to end wars". At the glorious conclusion on November 11, 1918, Armistice Day, we celebrated with as much noise and gusto as the big towns. That same winter came the Spanish Influenze which took a number of our people. We were never to be quite the ame again, and as the years have gone on, we have one by one, lost most of our business houses. The automobile carried us farther and father to buy. The movies, radio and television have brought our entertainment  The Depot - 14 - This became known historically as World War II. These were the years when an odd assortment of scarcities brought us to use various ruses to obtain our share of such things as Jello, pineapple, Karo, marshmallows, and we were issued ration stamps for sugar, meat, groceries, and gasoline and introduced to the 35 miles per hour speed limit. At the close of this war, hastened by dropping atom bombs on two Japanese cities, we rejoiced, but not with the abandon of Armistice Day, for we had become cynical of slogans of a "war to end wars". In fact, we were to be called to fight on far away shores twice more in the next quarter of a century -- to Korea and to Vietnam. Each took our young men, some never to return. Diromg tjese ;ast uears varopis evemts jave talem [;ace. sicj tp cjamge pir ;ofe stu;e cp,ewjat/ After our schoolhouse burned, we rebuilt an attractive one-story facility, landscaped by contributions from the community headed by Crescent Club. The reorganization movement linked us with the Griswold, Grant, and Elliott schools into the Griswold Community School. Our local school has kindergarten through fifth, and there is such shuttling back and forth on buses. One stable event in the school is the Alumni Banquet which gathers in the old grads from 1892 until the present in an annual reunion. Although there are no Lewis High School graduates anymore, old loyalties still bring the graduates together for reminiscing and feasting. The library has had an evolution over the years. Crescent Club started it, and it was in the back of Zike's grocery store. Moving from there to a building on west main street, it was finally disbanded. Crescent and Federated Clubs undertook to reorganize ti and put it in a small room in the Community Building. It outgrew these quarters, adn during the past year moved across the street to one of the remodeled fire engine stalls, all made possible by government revenue sharing funds. An attractive carpeted and curtained library meets the needs of the town. The firemen had also a need for more space for their engines and built a new house east of the old one. They are a modern department with first aid and resuscitation equipment. The Volunteer Fire Department has been called to fight some serious fires over the years. In 1925 Ike Albright's grocery store, situated west of the present postoffice burned. In 1936 the Marker Hardware, on further west, was destroyed. Twelve years later in 1948 half of Main Street, from the filling station on the corner to the grocery store building, went up in flames. In another twelve years in 1960, the schoolhouse burned. The Jameson house house fire with its tragic fatality occurred at the end of the next twelve years in 1970. The Department has been summoned for first aid and emergencies of various kinds. The church ecumenical movement has found an expression here. Some years back the Congregational and the Methodist churches merged into the United Congregational-Methodist Church. Both old buildings were torn down, and a new church erected along the highway in the east part of town. This church, along with the Church of Christ, makes a good church life in Lewis. Lewis takes great pride in three Senior Citizens' four-unit apartment houses built over the past few years. These accommodate a group of older citizens who are independent and happy in their comfortable two-bedroom apartments. Springing up here and there are lovely new homes which add to the desireability of the town as a residence center. Many well kept mobile homes are maintained, too. Our town town has a high employment rate. Atlantic and neighboring towns furnish work for many of our people. The surrounding area is made up of fine farmsteads. Add these to the industrial workers in town, and you have a hard working community.
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Transcribed by Cheryl Siebrass, June, 2024, from Historical Lewis by Pauline Franklin, pp. 14-15.
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