J. WAID LENTZ

I was born Dec. 14, 1903 in Johnson County (the Iowa City area) and when I was six years old we moved to Linn County (Mt. Vernon}. I attended a one room country school heated by a wood burning stove. There was no indoor plumbing - we were accustomed to houses out back.

We had one teacher for grades one through eight. One teacher taught all grades and in our school there were 22 to 23 students, with someone in every grade. Everyone recited out loud so the youngest students were exposed to learning of all grades. We had to go to the county superintendent for an examination to pass into high school.

Some of the teachers had just graduated from high school themselves and weren’t much older than the kids. It is surprising we learned as much as we did. The teacher did all the cleaning — sweeping, dusting, everything. Teachers were boarded and roomed in homes with the exception of two that lived just a half mile from their homes.  After Esther and I were married we boarded a teacher and packed her noon lunch.

Our recreation was that we all played games in a group in the school yard — games like merry-go-round. We all walked to school, including the teacher — there were no buses. There were also no hard surface roads. I had a very close friend all through school. We each had a pony and used to race each other up and down the dirt road.

I worked on the farm; even as a kid. There were always chores to do — Dad raised a lot of livestock. We fed probably 100 head of cattle and had a couple of milk cows - my chore was to milk the cows. All the work was done with horses and Dad had as high as 20—some head of good work horses. I remember one of my jobs was to run a com stalk cutter which went up and down the rows and cut the stalks. When we got ready to plow, the chopped up stalks went into the soil and the plow would plow it under. This along with manure that we spread on the fields - sometimes as much as 100 loads — was natural fertilizer that took the place of quite so much commercial fertilizer.

We lived in kind of an old house, but when I was about twelve years old (1915) Dad built a new one that was a show place. We had four bedrooms and a sleeping porch to accommodate our family of Mother, Dad and eight kids. I had five sisters, two brothers. The house was all modem with bathroom, running water, and a gas plant that furnished gas for cooking, etc.

We moved to Mt. Vernon when I was six. I went to Springville High School one year and the last three years to Mt. Vernon. I had no opportunity for college because there was no money, so when I graduated from high school that was the end of my formal education. The rest I had to do on my own.

We had an exceptionally good basketball team my senior year of high school. I played center but in one game I played all three positions: forward, guard and center. We lost only one game during the regular season. We used the college facilities — football field and basketball court. Cornell College had a tournament every year and we won that tournament after which we were invited to play at Iowa City for the State championship. We were put in a class of tournament winners and won that class. The first days’ score was 11 to 8. We played the rest of the tournament and won that class.

We played with only six men and two subs. ‘We played for the championship against Cedar Rapids High which had 4,000 students and we had 110 total in the entire high school. We lost that game with the score something like 18 to 27.

I met Esther in Mt. Vernon while I was still in high school. In fact, I had a few dates with her sister but Esther was more my style so we started going steady and married in 1924.

I When I was still in high school, things started slowing down economically. I was working for Dad but he ran out of money and lost everything he had through no fault of l his. Hogs were down to $3 a hundred, corn was down to 11-cents a bushel, and there was no way you can operate on that kind of income. It would have been 1927 when Dad and Mother lost everything. They moved in with my sister and Dad went to work on the section for North Western Railroad. After he got that job, as soon as they could, they rented a house for themselves; then after he worked on the section for awhile he rented a little farm, accumulated a few cows and was able to raise a few hogs. Dad and Mother came back to where they were able to take care of themselves. There was, of course, no such thing as Social Security.

While I worked for Dad, Esther and I lived in a little tenant house for about a year. We had bought some furniture on contract so we had to do something. Esther got a job at one of the large department stores in Cedar Rapids. We had what we called the Interurban Railroad - just one car — and she rode that to Cedar Rapids every morning to go to work. Her wages were $50 month. Eventually she got into the lingerie department and the commissions were a lot better.

I was still helping Dad all I could but I still had to make payments on the furniture so took advantage of running onto a good friend who told me they were putting on a man at a small factory where he was working. I applied and got the job which paid me $19.80 a week. They discontinued Saturday morning work so my pay-check went down to $17.50. After I worked there about 6 months I realized I wasn’t going to get any place. It was a family set up and no chance for advancement.

I stumbled onto another good friend who worked at the Blue Valley Creamery Company. He told me that they were going to put on a night shift because the creamery business is real heavy from May through September, then it tapers off. I went down and put in my application. It is my belief that when you go to apply for a job you should be fairly neat in appearance. I dressed in a nice gray suit, made application, waited a week and hadn’t heard anything; so I went back to see what was going on. This time the Superintendent decided that maybe I really did want a job so he hired me for $21 a week. This was a godsend compared to what I had been getting. I guess I must have done something right because I think I got three small raises the first year. Dad used a team and wagon to haul our furniture into Cedar Rapids and Esther and I rented a small apartment.

The Creamery superintendent’s name was Thompson and we got to be pretty good friends. When the volume dropped in the fall, he came to me and said he wanted to keep me on. He wondered if I would object to working a semi—day—and—night—shift — depending on when I got through at night I’d come in to work again later the next morning. He also explained that I would finish up the fast—rising of the cream and also do the janitor work. I said, “I don’t care what I do; just so I’m working."

At that time all the cream was delivered in or shipped in by rail. For what came by rail we had a big old horse and we would go to all these stations, pick up whatever cream was there and deliver it back to the plant.

I got a break - one of the men that had been with the plant for several years went into business for himself so that stepped me up. Thompson had me pasteurizing cream for churning and for keeping and improving quality. This eventually led into my being the buttermaker.

At that time the company bought two milk plants and took Thompson to manage the operation for one. That set me up as assistant superintendent. About this time l farmers began forming Co-operatives and operated in that way rather than as independent units. We were running cream routes out in the country but the co—ops naturally took a lot of our volume. Producers wanted to sell to them and left us to go to delivering cream to the co—op.

It became obvious that some changes had to be made and the general superintendent came to me to ask me to move to South Dakota. It would have been a promotion because I’d have been going as manager of that plant. Esther was actually sick over it because we had been to South Dakota and there wasn’t anything about it that we liked. I phoned the general superintendent and told him the situation and that we didn’t feel we could go there and be happy.

Usually if you turn down such a promotion they forget you and you just sit there - I’ll be darned if he didn’t call me in a few days and wanted me to reconsider. I still told him the same thing so then they took the manager that we already had in Cedar Rapids. They transferred him which was kind of a bad move for him because they were firing his brother-in-law who managed the South Dakota plant.

It turned out o.k., however, because they made him district manager over five other plants. Then it came down to who they were going to put in as manager of the Cedar Rapids plant. It was between me and the office manager at that time. Everybody went for me so I was lucky. Esther quit her Cedar Rapids job when I became manager.

As manager of the plant, one of the supervisors came in and we went over the plant which needed to have some work done on it I knew this but we had to have somebody o.k. spending the money. The superintendent o.k.ed the money which meant we had to increase the volume. We were down to about 800,000# of butter at the low point, and I built it back up to 1,500,000# before we came to Osceola.

We changed our operation and had a lot of what we called "independent cream buyers." The Independent men furnished their own equipment and used their own money. They were free to sell the cream they bought to anyone they wanted to. We had a trucker who went clear down into Missouri who brought it to us and we churned it at our plant. Warren "Pink" Edwards in Osceola was one of the independent buyers.

I managed that plant for about seven years. Then I decided that if I could run a plant for Blue Valley I could run one for myself. Curry was one of the owners of the creamery in Osceola and Paul Patsey was another. Patsey was supposed to be running the plant. I bought in on a three-way deal. When we first bought the Creamery we found that Pete Christiansen, former owner, would buy anybody’s and almost any quality cream. On my first trip to Osceola I went over the cream and found out that we didn’t want anything to do with the cream they brought in that day. I told Patsey to send the cans back and tell them we wouldn’t be back.

Along those lines, we had about six or seven other stations in Missouri. The federal inspectors came in and condemned several of the cans others had bought so I called one of the big creameries in Centerville asking if they wanted to buy some cream stations. They wanted to know what we wanted for them and I said, "Just the price of the equipment." I just wanted to get rid of it because they were cracking down and I wanted better quality merchandise.

Patsey left for a short time. He was asked to see if he could straighten out a plant that was slowly going broke, but he couldn’t do anything about it. So he came back to Osceola. At this time WW II had started and he wanted to go into war work so Curry and I bought him out.

Currys and we moved to Osceola at the same time in 1938 and there was only one modern house for rent in town. We all four stayed in this one house until we could find another one. Esther and I ended up with one of Dr. Sell’s houses and lived there for seven years. Eventually we bought the house at 115 East Vine.

Curry’s health went bad so I bought out his share and owned Lentz Dairy all by myself. My back had bothered me and continued to do so as Dr. Stroy told me it would so I sold the butter business and kept the milk and ice cream. I bought the building at 110 South Fillmore. Freezing ice cream required a hardening room which I put in along with a dairy bar and equipment to pasteurize the milk. I had two milk routes, delivering milk house to house. The first year I sold 10,000 gallon of ice cream.

I sold the dairy bar to Jack Fisher who named it Medosweet Dairy. I went to work for the State Department of Agriculture, in Dairy and Food Inspection, checking creameries and ice cream plants. I worked for them for five years.

I was also taking a correspondence course in accounting, planning to set up a tax consultant office. Marie McGee approached me one night at the Country Club and wanted to know if I was going to stay with the work I was in. I said, "No, only until I get my course finished." She said, "Why don’t you go in and talk to Ralph — they are going to put on another man in the bank." I never had thought of going into banking. I did go to talk to him and he said they were having a directors’ meeting and he would let me know. After the meeting he called and said that the board didn’t feel the bank was big enough to put on another man’s salary at that time. I said, "'that’s fine." I had bought a 120 acre farm and was running that by myself, and I already had this other job so I was in no hurry.

In about two weeks I got a phone call from Ralph asking me to meet him at the bank and I did. It turned out that one of the employees was getting the bank’s money and his money mixed up. I was just ready to go to spring conference and I told him I would let him know as soon as I got back. I thought it over and thought, "How silly can I be? This is a political job I’m on and if they change parties I am out of a job" so I told Ralph I’d go to work and I gave the State notice. I started working in the bank Apr. 29, 1954. They started me on general ledger and books then had the bad luck of Don Hickman getting sick — his lungs were full of blood clots and he died in June. That left Ralph all by himself handling all loans and everything so I told him one day that there was no way he could do it all alone "so you might as well begin teaching me how to do some of these things instead of trying to do it all yourself".

They had made me cashier just before Don died. Then I went on eventually to working into loans and the whole operation. From cashier I went to vice president and then to president of the Clarke County State Bank in 1967. I retired in 1970 but I am still on the board.

In 1994 I was given the Osceola Community Service award. I think one of the reasons was a letter from R. K. McGee. It is one of my treasures and I quote from it: "My first thoughts are of the many situations which we faced together through the years. There was always the unwavering quality of honesty and loyalty to stockholders, depositors and community as decisions were made.

"One of Waid’s greatest assets is his ability to meet all types of people on the same level and treat them with respect and dignity. This is true not only of his relations 1 with fellow employees and officers of the bank but with bank customers and his many contacts with all facets of community activity. I agree with remarks I have heard many times from people in this community that Waid Lentz, with his poise and diplomacy, has made the difference in many projects. Waid Lentz loves people and people love   Like other bank employees, Waid has been given many community responsibilities, all of which he has handled with skill and efficiency.

"I also think of the bank’s loss on Waid’s retirement. Many customers who have depended upon Waid’s judgment and counsel will need to transfer their relations to other bank officers. It is my hope that Waid will still be available for consultation and advice as problems may arise in the operation of the bank".

"Through the years as Waid progressed from assistant cashier to president, no task was too difficult, nor were the hours too long but that Waid would give the best he had in accomplishing his goal".

Esther suffered a stroke which didn’t affect her mind but paralyzed her body from neck down. I took care of her in our home for 4 1/2 years) It became too much for me and I had to take her to Osceola Leisure Manor where she lived for two years and eight months. I went every day to feed her lunch and supper and stayed until they put her to bed. She died in January 1986, the same year as Jan Reynoldson and Doyce Miller.

Esther and I had been friends of Warren and Maxine Kimball for more than 30 years. Warren had died and Maxine was alone so it was natural for us to renew our friendship. It has been wonderful to have a compatible friend to spend time and to travel with. In November 1994 she had a stroke and was in the Clarke County Hospital for a short time. A ridiculous, unnecessary accident happened to the ambulance on the way to Younkers Rehabilitation Center in Des Moines. We could all have been killed and she has sustained back injuries that are still painful. She was, however, able to return to her home and with help 24·hours.—a—day she is able to stay in her home. I take Maxine to Creston once a week for therapy. Janie Stickler, Lynn and Helen’s daughter, is her excellent therapist but she has shown Maxine’s grandson Joe what to do and he is very good. It is possible that he can provide some of the therapy and save some trips to Creston.

Looking back over my whole life I feel I have been pretty fortunate. In my years of working I only took one small pay cut. I always advanced. I seemed to be at the right place at the right time and knew the right people. I feel like together we have done a pretty good job of summarizing my life.

Addendum by Fern: What impresses me about Waid’s life is his compassion — how attentive he was to Esther in the years he took care of every detail of her needs before he admitted it was too much for him. He took her to the nursing home, then went there to make sure she was getting the care and food she needed. He says that she could feed herself pretty well, but he felt better being there; and he went every meal time except for breakfasts. He continued to go after her death to visit ones who had become accustomed to seeing him there. Now he is helping his and Esther’s friend, Maxine.

A friend remarked about Esther and Waid who, although they had no children of their own, took genuine, supportive interest in their friends’ children and their activities. "Goodness knows how many Girl Scout cookies and magazine subscriptions they bought at their door."

(We know) that suffering produces
endurance, and endurance produces
character, and character produces hope,
and hope does not disappoint us, because
God’s love has been poured into our hearts
through the Holy Spirit that has been
given to us.
(Rom. 5:3-5 Favorite Bible verses of
Lourie Clark)

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Last Revised April 29, 2012