The Peeping Tom
ОМСК The Slovak men were known for their enormous strength in Slovakia and later, with their sons, in America. In Slovakia, great-grandpa would be called into the local bar whenever a fight broke out among the men at a dance. In the U.S., my grandfather once turned upside down a man who had teased him about having new pants at work. On the second day, he turned him upside down and threw him out of the shops, but everyone else got stuck in the door together trying to run out. Grandpa John also moved a locomotive with an iron bar. And his brothers were just as strong. Uncle Tom! I remember him a little as I tagged along as a teenager with my father to visit Uncle Tom's farm. Aunt Lilian was ill, with his wife, and dying. Nothing grand about their place or manners, just pleasant, hard-working western Pennsylvanians. My grandpa John and his 4 brothers were brought up in the local Presbyterian church that was made up of almost all Slovaks. John was always deeply interested in religion and theology. Self-taught, he relished spending hours discussing the Bible with others from church and his parents. His father, Andrej, recounted many times his experience in Slovakia when, during a snowstorm, his load of logs fell off in a mountain pass and pinned him down, unable to get out. Suddenly, a man showed up and pulled the logs off and helped Andrej reload, but when Andrej turned to thank him, there was no one there, no footprints either.My grandpa John imbibed very seriously the deep spirituality of his parents and the Slovak community in the area that went to church. However, the rest of his brothers hated church, the hard pews, the endless 2-hour sermons, and stiff Sunday costumes. Uncle Harold would say, 'The people at church would really get into it, absorbing every word,' and the preacher indeed was good, later becoming well known in the states.As the other brothers grew up, they left off church and bought a local bar, much to their parents' horror. The boys were good guys, really, but a little wild too. Once they went to an adult 'peep show' in Erie, Pa. These were the days when Thomas Edison offered the world little boxes in a tent, where you could see a short reel, in this case, something rather lurid. Well, a professional boxer also had turned up for the shows, and the men, in short, got into a brawl. Uncle Tom punched him so hard that it knocked the boxer out cold for 30 minutes. Uncle Tom thought that he had killed the man. So after that, Uncle Tom said that he would never hit a man again.
ОМСК The Slovak men were known for their enormous strength in Slovakia and later, with their sons, in America. In Slovakia, great-grandpa would be called into the local bar whenever a fight broke out among the men at a dance. In the U.S., my grandfather once turned upside down a man who had teased him about having new pants at work. On the second day, he turned him upside down and threw him out of the shops, but everyone else got stuck in the door together trying to run out. Grandpa John also moved a locomotive with an iron bar. And his brothers were just as strong. Uncle Tom! I remember him a little as I tagged along as a teenager with my father to visit Uncle Tom's farm. Aunt Lilian was ill, with his wife, and dying. Nothing grand about their place or manners, just pleasant, hard-working western Pennsylvanians. My grandpa John and his 4 brothers were brought up in the local Presbyterian church that was made up of almost all Slovaks. John was always deeply interested in religion and theology. Self-taught, he relished spending hours discussing the Bible with others from church and his parents. His father, Andrej, recounted many times his experience in Slovakia when, during a snowstorm, his load of logs fell off in a mountain pass and pinned him down, unable to get out. Suddenly, a man showed up and pulled the logs off and helped Andrej reload, but when Andrej turned to thank him, there was no one there, no footprints either.My grandpa John imbibed very seriously the deep spirituality of his parents and the Slovak community in the area that went to church. However, the rest of his brothers hated church, the hard pews, the endless 2-hour sermons, and stiff Sunday costumes. Uncle Harold would say, 'The people at church would really get into it, absorbing every word,' and the preacher indeed was good, later becoming well known in the states.As the other brothers grew up, they left off church and bought a local bar, much to their parents' horror. The boys were good guys, really, but a little wild too. Once they went to an adult 'peep show' in Erie, Pa. These were the days when Thomas Edison offered the world little boxes in a tent, where you could see a short reel, in this case, something rather lurid. Well, a professional boxer also had turned up for the shows, and the men, in short, got into a brawl. Uncle Tom punched him so hard that it knocked the boxer out cold for 30 minutes. Uncle Tom thought that he had killed the man. So after that, Uncle Tom said that he would never hit a man again.