Rose was a wonderful person. She always worked so hard and was so devoted to her kid's & grand- children. They were her life and that's what she lived for. She didn't have an easy life by any means. She raised 4 of her kid's by herself with the help of Grandma Phillips when she & my Uncle Sonny were divorced. Rose and the kid's lived in Burnside Ill. at the switch office with my Grandma & Grandpa Phillips in a 1 bedroom house with no running water or indoor bathroom. There was a frontroom where Grandma worked at the board taking calls which is what she did for a living. There was a small dining area where the stove & refrigerator was at and off the dining area/kitchen was the 1 cemented bedroom. All 11 of us lived in the switch office for a period of time. Grandma put in a garden every summer so she could feed all of us. My mom & dad and Bobby and I also lived there. Grandma helped take care of us 6 kid's plus tried to work. She did everything she could to help Aunt Rose. By looking at the photo's in Rose's Memorial you can see how poor we all were. I was old enough to remember those day's when I was a kid and so does Rose's oldest son Ed. I remember getting in the refrigerator to get something to make a sand- wich with and there was only mustard and onions so John and I made us a mustard and onion sandwich and went and sat by Fred Hall's grocery store and had a picnic. I remember having to go outside to use the outhouse in the cold weather. We had to use a bucket and go inside when it was too cold to make the trip outside. Trick or treaters used to push the outhouse over and that was an awful mess. Ed, John, Judy & Janet were like brother's and sister's to us then cousin's. We had alot of fun together as kid's. Grandma Phillips confided in me that she went to bed hungry and cried herself to sleep because there were too many people to feed and not enough food to go around. Grandpa Phillips worked but never did con- tribute all that much money towards helping Grandma. He was a week-end drunk and that too made life very difficult on all of us. I know that my mom worked at Ross's manufacturer in Keokuk and my dad worked in the timber at that time but I don't re-call where Rose was working. Times were beyond hard. Grandma cooked fried potato's, wilted lettuce, soup beans, and tried to make it stretch as far as she could. It breaks my heart to know that poor Grandma went to bed hungry when she was the one putting in the gardens and working hard to make ends meet for so many people. It wasn't right and that's why when she went into the nursing home I told myself that I was going to step up to the plate and be there for her just like she was for all of us when we had nowhere to go. Had it not been for Grandma I don't know what we all would have done. Grandma also owned the house across from Fred Hall's grocery store too. I remember us kid's went bare foot alot and one time Fred Hall deliberately stepped on our feet and we went home and told Rose and she went up there and had a chat with him. We were considered the town trash because of Grandpa's week-end drinking etc. Bobby, Ed, & John were called "THE OUTLAWS FROM BURNSIDE"! Ha!Ha! Ed used to say those were the good old day's! Ha!Ha! We were very poor but happy. As long as we had each other we didn't care about what some of the people of Burnside thought. Us kid's used to take old brooms and pretend that they were our horse's and we would ride through the ditches after a big rain and play together all day long. The boy's used to take us girl's dolls and cut their hair off and run our buggies through water holes and ruin them. I remember there was an old water pump where Grandma got her water to do her dishes, laundry, and for baths. We had to take a bath in an old round tub. My mom would get corn out of Grandma's garden and fry it for her breakfast. She loved it! She also loved the nice big red tomato's. I can remember mom getting up and having a cup of coffee and a camel [non filter] cigarette. That was the brand my parents and Grandpa smoked. There was a coal stove in the front room of the switch- office for heat. We had an old coal shed off the back of the switch office where Grandpa kept their coal. I remember the boy's toasting their bread on the stove and stinking the place up real bad. Then they'd put butter & sugar on their toast. I got a hold of the scissors one time and cut Judy and Janet's hair and Aunt Rose was not any too happy with me over that! It's funny because the last time that I went to see her right before she passed away I happened to have a picture of me with Judy & Janet from Burnside in my purse and I showed it to her and reminded her of what I did and she got a big kick out of it and laughed. My sister Shirley was with me. Aunt Rose was glad to see me & Shirley that night. She was looking out of her window to see who we were as we pulled up. She showed us her house and sat at her bar in her kitchen and visited with us until we left. We didn't want to stay too long because she was headed over to Brenda's to watch a good movie with her and her kid's. Rose talked about Grandma but was very emotional because she had been let go from the V.F.W because the new owner's wanted someone younger to tend bar so they let her go which totally crushed her. We had stopped by the V.F.W on our way to Rose's because we thought she'd be working on a Saturday night. I went in to see if she was working and the gal at the bar told me No she wasn't working. So, when Rose told us what had happened I just couldn't believe it because HANDS DOWN Rose was the best waitress and bar tender around and had worked there for a good 20 years if not longer. She was about in tears as she explained everything to us girl's and I felt so sorry for her. She had an ulcer on her one of her legs and had to wear a special shoe to work in and someone had to come in and help wrap her foot and etc. Her dog died too, plus she lost Grandma by a terrible fall at the hospital, and then she lost her sister Norma. So, Aunt Rose went through alot in a very short period of time. I sure do miss her and Aunt Norma not to mention Grandma Phillips. xoxo