Cast of Characters

I thought I would like to talk about the individuals who made up my neighborhood on Wheeler Road. Wheeler Road started in Townsend, MA and ended at Robbins Farm.
The Ekola's - Willard and Hortense (Tess) had two children Walter and Norma. Norma was the oldest girl on the street and was our babysitter. The Ekola's built a new house on the land next door to their farm house.
The James family brought the Ekola farmhouse and they had three children who were all older than me. Peggy was in High school with her sister Judy? in 9 or 10 grade. Georgie was a little older than me. They lived there only a few years. One winter Georgie was sliding on a toboggan behind our house and he hit a jump and landed on our pond. He walked home but he broke his back. When a new family moved in they had very young children and didn't socialize with the rest of the street
Next house was orginally the Hyvarinens (Otto and ??? -Elma Aho's parents) but it was purchased by Tom and Lois Walker. They had three kids (Pam, Tom, and Scott) who were 10 to 15 years younger than me.
The next two houses were my family and the parents of Willard Ekola. Matti Ekola was a chicken farmer with his wife and they lived right across from our house.
My house consisted of my father (Robert) and my mother (Edna) and my sister (Donna - 3 years older than me) my brother Bobby (11 months older than me) and eventually another brother (Jeff - 11 years younger than me).
The next house was my mother's sister and her husband. Aunt Lil and Uncle Norman Flinkstrom had six children (Charlie, Sally, Carl, Joanie, Kenny and Nancy) and Aunt Lil was my favorite aunt (more will be posted later).
The Jacobson's were next (Carl "Jake" and Ann) and they had a daughter Karla.
The Johnson's and the Hazard's lived across from each other. Roy and May Johnson had two sons Lee and Wayne. Phillip and Rosemary Hazard had 4 children. (Michael, Karen, Peter and Brenda).
Next house was the second Johnson family (no relation) and Cliff and Lillian had five children. (Gerry, Bruce, Eileen, Dennis and Kevin).
The Horan's were up the road a bit with Al and Pauline and they had two children Dwight and Debbie.
The last house on the street belonged to the Stones (Mr. and Mrs. Robbins lived at the end of the road but didn't have much to do with the other people on the street.) Harry and Bernice Stone had three older children who no longer lived with them (Kenny, Don and Shirley) and Roger and Dennis grew up on Wheeler Road.
I was closest in age to Dennis Stone (my age) and Wayne Johnson and my cousin Carl. So many of my adventures ended up with them. However, the neighborhood was very close and the older children took care of the younger children. I will get back to individual post about most of these neighborhood friends as well as their parents.

L to R Bruce Johnson, Roger Stone, Bobby Hay, David Hay,Charlie Flinkstrom and Cookie.