Leland J. Kennedy Memoir - University of Illinois Springfield

Q: Yes sir. (chuckles) What part of Germany did your mother's folks come from, do you
know?
A: You know, I don't know that but I'll tell you what I recall. I tried to find it out, look
it up in some of my records the other day, but Horace Calvo, who served some with me,
his wife is a - he met her over in Germany, and she was from that same area, because
one time I got to talking to her and I said, "My grandmother and grandfather came from
Ruett. She said that's where she had come from. Now whatever part that was, I wouldn't
know.
My grandfather's name was Adam Herb Herwick. And my grandmother's name was - she
was Louise Wamsconse, however you spell that, I don't know. When we were younger some
of the kids used to say that. And she lived the longest, she's the only one I knew, Grandma
Herwick. They said that was a German Jew. I remember she talked German. She lived
to be a ripe old age, but she had, as I said, eight girls and one boy, and they're all gone
now. I think the last one - well the last one died about two years ago up in Decatur.
Q: And she lived in Edwardsville?
A: Yes. They lived in Edwardsville. They all lived in Edwardsville. As I said my mother
and father were born in Edwardsville, and their parents, as far as I can ascertain. All four
of my grandparent's children landed in New Orleans, I know three of them did, and I just
figured Grandma Herwick, whom I'm referring to, must have landed there, and they worked
their way up to Edwardsville. Why they stopped in Edwardsville I don't know.
Q: Do you remember visiting with her in Edwardsville?
A: Oh yes yes.
Q: What was a visit like, going to Grandma's place?
A: Oh - quite (chuckles) . . . she'd make coffee cakes and she'd talk German and was
down in lower town and scolded us as usual and - oh, I remember going to Grandma's
a lot. The most memories of my childhood though are really of my dad's sister, Nana we
called her. She lived with us on Washington Avenue. She was - her name was Leone
Kennedy, and she married a John P. Walsh, a farmer, that lived out in Delhi and they were
married in 1913 or 1914, but she died within fourteen years. We used to go out there every
summer. She died in 1927, right after I got out of high school. I went to work for Shell,
I graduated in June and went to work for Shell in July, and she died in August. I remember
those particular things.
We had visited out to Delhi. I remember my - they'd get off the C & A [Chicago and Alton
Railroad] train - well I'm going to talk about the train too - and get off the C & A train,
and if they couldn't meet you - they knew you were coming - you'd just walk, maybe a
mile or mile and a half up to where they lived, it was up from Delhi.
I went for four and a half years of Horace Mann school, but we were Catholics and I guess
- well when I was ten or eleven years old, I went to St. Patrick's School then. It's still
there, Fifth and Central in Alton. I spent my last four years there, I think fifth, sixth,
seventh and eighth.
Q: What do you recall about going to Horace Mann School, the grade school?
A: Well I'll tell you what I recall about that. That was my first school and I recall meeting
a fellow - of course I was six years old. T think I started - in that time they had midterms
you know in the Alton schools. I just went to school in January. I was six years old in
December of 1914, I guess. I was born in 1908. That figures. (chuckles) And I went to