Yesterday, Gus and Lillie (my paternal grandparents) had a squabble about quitting the horse-trading business and moving to Montana to homestead. Lillie, determined to get her boys (my dad and his brother--ages eight and five) away from the influence of the Mecums, won the argument by threatening to take the boys and go whether or not Gus went with them. She also reminded Gus that her family wasn't the only criminal element influencing the boys. Gus's brother Ed, a drunken bully, had shot to death a colored man seven years before, for no other reason than that he was black, married to a light skinned woman who looked white. Gus had actually named his son (my dad) for this murderer. After the killing, "Uncle Ed" disappeared and was never heard from again, despite all the work done by my older sisters in their genealogy search.

Today, Gus and Lillie will arrive in Montana (at one point, near Wolf Point, fording the Missouri River, which at the time was a nearly free-flowing stream, with all their animals and wagons) to begin setting up their homestead in McCone County.

How did we (my sisters and I) ever turn out "normal?" Amazing!

I've committed to speak at a "Take Back the Night" event for the local domestic violence group in Butte (MT) on April 25th. So, I'm accelerating work on "Chasing Ghosts." I have one major section to get into draft form before I start editing (back at the beginning.) This section is Part IV, with the major characters being my grandmother Lillie, her husband Gus, and my dad, Ed. It's going well so far.

Beautiful day today; feels much like spring.

After five years in Canadian prisons adorned with a diabolical twenty-eight pound shackle called the Oregon Boot on one leg, Bert and Charley are sent back to the US to serve time for the breakout (3 years for Charley, 5 for Bert.) Bert is rearrested for more crime, finally disappears. Charley goes straight, gets married. Ten years later, after working as a baker, he lands a job with a Miller Rubber company in Chicago selling condoms door to door, and at the back door of pharmacies.

At the time, advertising and selling condoms (indeed all birth control) was illegal, but local law enforcement looked the other way unless the product was sent through the U.S. mail, making it a federal offense. Charley made a veritable fortune throughout the Great Depression, as much as $1500 per month. He was VERY careful, and was never in trouble with the law over his livlihood. His job ended with World War II, when--since more than 70% of the soldiers in World War I had contracted STDs--the government started issuing condoms in the soldiers' kit bags and the laws were changed.

Charley's story is not yet finished; not by a long shot. We still have Lola, his niece, about to re-enter his life.

We had a short (five-day) vacation in Nevada. I'm so ready for spring.

Yesterday Charley and Bert escaped into Canada and began a chain of burglaries in Winnipeg, Manitoba. They were confronted after only four or five days of larceny, and fostered a running gun battle with Canadian constables through the streets of Winnipeg. "Gun battle" is a misnomer, since the Mecums had the only guns, two each. The constables, by law, were armed only with truncheons--"billy clubs"--and rocks they picked up along the way. They pursued the Mecums for at least a mile, all the while being fired upon an estimated 35 times. Civilians joined in the chase and the Mecums were swarmed and subdued (again with the billy clubs, well laid on.) Later, after his bruises and broken bones healed, Bert claimed they had deliberately missed with their shots, since "they really didn't want to hurt anybody."

After the incident, public outcry forced the police commissioner to arm the constables, and from that time on--August, 1911--the Winnipeg police constables have carried sidearms (thanks to my two great uncles!) What a story! It gets better every day.