Uncle Len

The recent post about the Statler and the comments about Clifton's Cafeteria reminded me of our Uncle Len; Leonard Earl Seymour and Nana's younger brother. That made him a Great Uncle, but he was always just Uncle Len...

A little history: He was born in October of 1890. I don't know if his birthplace was Duluth or if the family still lived in Tower, Minnesota. I also know that he served in World War I as a spotter in the Balloon Corps of the Army. He would go up in a tethered balloon and observe enemy movements, an altogether dangerous job! After the war...and at what age, I don't know...he became a cook. When I was born, he was a cook on an Army Corps of Engineers dredge. He seemed to work all up and down the west coast, wherever a dredge was needed. He remained with the Army Corps of Engineers till he retired in 1955.

Some early memories: Uncle Len bought the house we first lived in, the one on Pacific Avenue in Manhattan Beach. It was a very simple, quite small, cottage on the sand dunes. It seems as if Uncle Len, who never married, had adopted our family as his. Whenever his ship was in port, he would come and spend some time with us.

Pickled pigs feet. That is one of the things that I think of when I remember Uncle Len. When he arrived, he would open his "Gladstone" (a small piece of luggage) and take out all kinds of marvelous foods, exotic foods! Salamis and braunschweiger, artichoke hearts and pickled pigs feet. These would be spread upon the table and loaves of various types of rye bread would be opened for us to make sandwichs. Of course there were all the spreads to go along with it...horseradish, mustards and other "exotica". The table would look like a delicatessen!

Another item in his Gladstone would be his knives. A cook never went anywhere without his knives! He wouldn't leave them on board the ship for someone to misuse. And his would be carefully wrapped in newspaper, then taken out and put on the counter for the duration of his visit.

I still find it amazing when I think about all of the "stuff" he would pull out of that Gladstone.