Recipes for Living Elvin and Twyla Soll

Elvin tells: I was born in Murray, the youngest of four boys - Duane, Donovan, Irvin, and myself. My three older brothers were in military service: Duane served from 1942 to 1946, and then decided to make it a career. Donovan enlisted in June 1944, was discharged in 1946, and served in the Infantry in Europe. In 1951, Irvin enlisted for three years in the Air Force, and was discharged in two. He had been in radio communications, and was hired as a radio technician at White Sands, New Mexico. The account of their military service is given in more detail in the veterans' book. The Soll men have heart complications, which took our father's life at the age of 65, Duane's at age 61, and Irvin's in 1994.

Twyla and I live in Murray about 1 ½ blocks from where I was born. Dr. Dean delivered me and Dad said he charged $25. That was in October 1934, during the Depression years, and no one had money. Dad had to make payments on the bill, and even they were hard to come by. I was enough younger than my brothers that I was not very old when my older brothers left home. There was four years difference between me and my next oldest brother, Irvin, so I was even too young to associate much with him.

I started to school in kindergarten at Murray and graduated from there. There were only two of us who went all the way through school together - Gilbert Leeps, Wanda Craft's son, and I. We are pretty proud of our Murray School. I was in the 7th or 8th grade when there was an upheaval in the school systems. Until that time, there had been a rural school every two miles. As I recall, there were about 48 in the county. There was a County Superintendent, whose office was in the courthouse, and was their director, so to speak. The first, in 1867, was Jay Jenkins. Miss Ada Tillotson held the position from 1930 to 1948, followed by Ralph Evans and others through the years until 1972. While the rural schools were in existence, 8th grade pupils all had to go to the courthouse for a test to determine whether or not they would be eligible to attend high school. Twyla's sister was caught up in all that. She taught in the rural schools in Clarke County and made the transition to work in Miss Tillotson's office.

I don't remember having any involvement in that issue, but it is not hard to imagine the confusion generally felt when this long established custom was threatened. Rural schools began closing and consolidation became the issue. Murray voted against consolidating with Osceola and resisted having Lorimor or Thayer being consolidated into their system. Even now the Murray school people are determined to offer the finest education to the students and allow no disadvantages because of a smaller enrollment than is the general rule. They offer lots of fun things. For instance, last night they had the prom and their transportation was John Deere tractors. It was quite a sight to see the girls on the tractors in formal dresses.

When I was a freshman in high school, I had a severe case of kidney infection, which affected my heart, so throughout the years since, I've been limited in what I could do. I wouldn't have been able to participate, but in my earlier high school years, the school didn't have a football program. I believe it was 1953 when we first had football in Murray. I managed basketball a year or two, probably as compensation for my not being able to participate.

I graduated from high school in 1952 and about three months later, I got my chauffer's license and started driving a truck for my father. We also farmed together - milked cows, raised hogs, and from then on I got a farm of my own. I was in partnership with Dad for about 25 years.

During those years, Twyla and I met. She grew up on a farm north of Decatur, attended the Leon schools, and graduated from there in 1952. She was acquainted with some Murray people, came up to visit them, and we came to know one another through them. She had taken a commercial course in high school and immediately began working in the auditor's office in the Decatur County Courthouse. Later, she worked at Walt Langfitt's elevator during the harvest season, and in December, after we were married in 1956 she started at Clarke County State Bank and was there until May of 1990.

We rented 160 acres across the road from my parents, and then I got 1/2-interest in another farm that I bought with my brother, and 1/2-interest in another farm. In that one I was in partnership with my mother. Dad's health declined and for the last four years of his life, it wasn't good. They were on the road to visit my brother Irvin in El Paso, Texas, when Dad had a heart attack in Clovis, New Mexico and passed away in 1969. Mother stayed there and they made arrangements to have Dad's body flown back to Iowa, and my brother came back with her.

Twyla and I bought a house and moved into Murray in 1960. I worked at Hawkeye Lumber for Marvin Blanchard for several years, then for Ron Ogan at the time he was selling Wick Homes. We sold about 20, including this one we are sitting in, during the time I worked with him. In 1977, Twyla and I built a new house and still live in it.

For most of the following years, I have been in community service. I was in city government for 34 years, 14 as Murray's mayor and on the council the balance of the time. Laura Adair was our city clerk and we worked well together. She was a good grant writer and I was a promoter. If I remember right, at that time Murray's population was about 750, mostly retired farmers but now younger people are moving in, and they commute to work. Murray has an intense community pride. We have a reputation of being one of friendliest communities newcomers have ever experienced, and everybody is involved in promoting that.

Some things we have going for us are: Several parks within the town. Mallory Park has been there a long time. My grandfather was involved in a tree-planting project there. They went out to a river six or seven miles north of Murray, dug them up, brought them in, and planted them. Wind storms have taken some, but there are still a number of the original ones there. There is a shelter house and playground equipment. In the last few years a cement stage with a cover over it has been added.

Where formerly there was a big building on Main Street, rather than have a vacant space, we made it into a little mini-park. There is a gazebo and several couples have used it for their wedding site. There is a county park across the highway. When highway 34 was rebuilt, there was a small piece of land they didn't need, so rather than let it go to waste, they made a little park.

I should say "someone" we have going for us is the school nurse, Mary Klein. Her mother taught school in Murray many years ago and the town is important to her. She has been an instigator of many projects and involved in the thick of the work. She and others of like mind promoted moving a rural school, Brush College, from five or six miles north of Murray, into town. No one knows when it was built but it was in operation as a school in 1875, and it was still a pretty good building. Wanda Davidson taught school there when it was a country school. After the closing of rural schools, it was used as a voting site.

Moving it became more complicated than the group first thought. The support beams underneath were rotted, the floor had sunk, and had to be propped up. Danny McNeal and Merle Klein must be credited as the rescuers. Replacement beams were not available so they used some from a Baptist Church that was over 100 years old when it was torn down. This had to be done before the school was moved, because the little porch was going to fall off. The chimney had to be torn off because it was too tall to go under light wires. The old shingles had to be replaced, which was done with wooden shingles, like the originals. They installed electricity which the school had not had, but they brought in the old kerosene lamps, old desks, etc. They succeeded in bringing Brush College School into Murray and setting it beside an old log cabin that was built in WPA (Work Projects Administration) days. So we have a little antique complex in downtown Murray.

Jack Beaman operated a business in Murray while he was a state representative. He suggested we try to get toll free calls to Osceola. We got it done and it is still in force today. We tried to arrange free calls from Osceola to Murray but the telephone company wouldn't agree. While Jack was still in office, we applied for and got a $10,000 grant from Prairie Meadows with which we bought the block north of Mallory Park, put in water and sewers, and have eight new homes there.

I wasn't involved when the Murray Development Corporation built the Child Care Center. It is a home, with a walk-out basement, and it is going well. Craig Justice "carried the ball" for that project.

We have competed in a Community Betterment Program, which I have been involved with for about 23 years. Mary Klein is also involved and is one of the most dedicated workers. Murray won a year or two. There are no specific qualifications, just general improvement or beautification of the community. For example, one year they painted buildings in the park, another they planted flowers, another they painted all the fire hydrants - these kinds of things.

Community Betterment is a state program. I came to be one of the judges for the state of Iowa for 18 years, for the state of Kansas three years, and Missouri one year. This came about through working with four or five counties from Wayne to Montgomery, who was involved in a tourism promotion program. A state employee, Lois Hunt of Mt. Ayr, organized the committee. She had a call from Kansas asking her to be an out-of-state judge for their state. A prior commitment made it impossible for her, so she gave them my name.

It was a very interesting opportunity, and I became well acquainted with the whole state of Kansas. We were there for a week and covered the entire state to the Colorado line, the Oklahoma line, and clear around the state of Oklahoma. To qualify, communities could do whatever was their choice to improve the community, competing against others of the same size according to population - 700-1500, 1500-3,000 and then county size. Most of the time I had small communities and there were 15 to 20 communities involved. Some of the projects were pretty creative. In one town of 400 to 500, every home had a flag pole and flew their flags. One had a Christmas project for which they used a plastic water pipe for a center pole, from it they strung fishing lines staked to the ground, and arranged lights along the lines. It was quite striking, they sold it as a fund raiser for the community and it went so well it is now on the market. One town built on their having the widest main street in the United States. It had been used to drive cattle through it.

When I was judging in Kansas we had a little free time so they took us out to the cemetery and showed us the gravestone of a man and woman. The figures were life size and depicted different times of their lives. There was one time the man had two arms and two hands and a later one with one arm and hand because he'd lost them in an accident. The last showed him by himself. He had no money left when that was completed.

I am the Clarke County representative on the Central Iowa tourism committee. That includes 34 counties from Missouri to the Minnesota line. The County pays $400 a year to this organization so we can take part in and have the advantages of it. One tourism attraction of this area is the Mormon trail, which goes through our farm two miles west of Murray. This is virgin pasture and the ruts made by the wagons are visible. South of us was where the Mormons camped in 1846 or 1848 when they first came through on their way from Nauvoo, Illinois, to Salt Lake City, Utah. There is a dug-out in the timber of the farm across from us and there are trails all over that farm. Some of them have eroded so they are now six to eight feet deep, but it is evident they made one big trail and then just kept moving out on each side. Some fellow came in and marked various locations. He discerned the cabins were about 16x16 rooms. The grass has been allowed to grow tall where the walls were, and the positions of doors and fireplaces are evident. Bob Brown of Murray has a big wagon with seats, and he takes people all over the farms, shows them where the privies were, and the big spring where they drove down to fill their water barrels. He lets passengers witch for water.

This was one of the features of the sesquicentennial observed in 1996. There were two organizations that came through with horse-drawn wagons. A year later they went on to Salt Lake City in Utah. I was invited - in fact, I was urged to go on a wagon but I declined. I wish now I had gone. People come from all over the country to see this area. There are bus tours that go through and include Mt. Pisgah, a monument to show where a number of people died on their way to Utah. Brigham Young University has a tour once a year that starts at Garden Grove.

I was one of the instigators for forming the Iowa Mormon Trail Association, and I represent Clarke County on that. We have about 20 members from river to river, from southeast Iowa to Council Bluffs. There are probably 300 who pay their membership dues but do not attend the monthly meetings. Most of the people in the organization are not Mormon and they have trouble believing that people who are not of that affiliation would care about the trail, but they made history and started communities as they went through.

I am still involved in central Iowa Tourism, and attend meetings once or twice a year but since I am employed 40 hours a week, I don't have much time for meetings. In addition, they are pretty expensive by the time you drive half-way across the state for two or three hours of deliberation. It isn't really worth it.

Twyla is still working, also. She worked at HyVee Foods, beginning when the store was nearer the highway. She quit once and went out to the casino, but when Robert, the HyVee director, called her and said, "If you want to come back, I've got three days a week when I could use you," she accepted the offer, went back, and has been there since 2000. She works 24 hours a week - Mondays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays. She recalls, "There have been a lot of changes since I've been there. One was the location. They were building the new store when I was hired. For a couple months I worked in the old store. At that time they had to put the prices on everything and now we have scanners. There was no use of credit cards when I began and now I would say about
50% of our customers use them. There are probably 200-300 people a day that go through the aisle where my register is. I stock cigarettes, candy, and gum, which is the way I began and it's never changed. Robert started me at the same pay as when I quit so I feel very fortunate."

Twyla and I didn't have children but we've had dogs. We had a Sheltie, whose registered name was Molly Mistletoe Merrylon. She was run over, and we bought another Sheltie that was already named "Little Bit" when we got her. She lived to be about 14 and died of old age when we were in Texas visiting Irvin and we buried her there. We love Shelties and have had a tri-colored one, and the other was black and white, equally beautiful. We loved those dogs and weren't going to have another but Twyla's widowed sister, who had no children, developed cancer. They had gotten a full blooded English Shepherd pup, and before she died, she asked if we would take her dog, which of course we did. This was Buddy. We had that dog a few years, then her other sister's son had a dog. He was a farm dog, too, and his name was Max. She didn't want her dog with her son's dog, and when this sister also died of cancer, we took her dog. We had to have him put to sleep because he developed seizures.

We weren't ready for him to die, and when we saw a picture in a paper of a dog at the Animal Rescue League in Des Moines, we adopted her. They called her Franny which I objected to, so we call her Fran. We had to sign papers allowing people from the League to come to our house and see that she had a good home. They didn't ever come but called one evening. She's a house dog, part Lab, bigger than the other one. She weighs 83 pounds. She's gotten to be kind of expensive. We paid $45 for her, and then I had to take her to the veterinarian to have her checked over. She was fine, but we bought some preventive medicine for her - that was $145. Then she developed bladder infection and that was $45, it recurred and that cost another $45. We were told that humans with this problem take cranberry pills, so now we are giving her those twice a day, and they are working fine.

Fran is training us slowly but surely. In order to get to work on time, I get up at 3:00 every morning and at 4:00 I walk a mile before getting ready to go to work and another mile in the afternoon when I get home around 3:00, and she walks with me. Fran knows our hours but doesn't realize I don't need to be up at that hour on weekends. As regularly as clockwork, she jumps on the bed at 3:00 in the morning including Saturdays and Sundays. Max always woke us up but never jumped on the bed. He would pat the bed and whine.

There were several unusual happenings regarding our dogs. We had Max put to sleep on a Saturday and on Monday our clock was an hour off. It is an electric clock that has always kept perfect time. I was sure I was late for work but the other clocks showed the right time and no other electrical gadget in the house was affected. When we got Fran on February 22nd, again that clock changed an hour. It never has since so we concluded somebody either didn't like this or tried to show us they did. One or the other.

Twyla added, "My sister floated through the kitchen one day. I was working at my sink and just caught a glimpse of a pink and blue dress - no feet, no face, and no sound, but somehow I caught a giggle. She had that giggle when she was well, and I think she was there checking on her dog. Another time I was taking the dog outside and she kept looking back, wagging her tail, and I think my sister was there then."

I work as a Security Officer at the casino. I leave for work about 5:00, and get there about 6:00, but the time clock says 6:30 and I'm off at 2:30. I've been there since December 2, 1999, before it was opened, so I've been there the longest and I am probably the oldest in our department. I haven't missed a day's work or been late in all those years. They have about 500 employees, and treat us very well. When Terrible’s came in February about a year ago, they gave us one free meal a day. We have our own break room, where there is a buffet, and they serve breakfast and dinner. I'm not a gambler, but I worked hard to get the casino here. I was on the Development Board at the time we were voting for it. I had to resign from the Board because of conflict of interest. I drove their float in local parades, and have pulled it to Des Moines for their parades. They have since dismantled the float.

Of my family, only Donavan and I are still living. After his discharge, he attended Mortuary School and for ten years was Murray's funeral director. He retired in '94 or '95, and lives in Nevada. When he celebrated his 80th birthday in March this year, he insisted he was 79 until I convinced him otherwise. He and his family now live in Nevada. He has a granddaughter who is a senior in high school. She became interested in his experiences when he was in military and made a CD for her class including his service years and pictures. He has another granddaughter who is in college in Ames.