The things we keep...

Screen Porch Door

It was made in 1921 of Seasoned Georgia Pine
And it hung there in the door frame and withstood the test of time
With a heavy spring to slam it shut, and a knob of crystal glass
Patched and painted through the years, they made 'em built to last

And it saw Roosevelt and Truman, Eisenhower and JFK
The ice man in the summer, and the mailman twice a day
Coon skin caps and hula hoops and measles quarantines
And June bugs on the lamp post on the corner of the street

Gliding on the porch swing on a lazy summer's eve
Waving to the nighbors out to catch the evening breeze
And every time the kids ran out, they'd slam that screen porch door
And that's about the only time my Father ever swore

And he saw Roosevelt...

I asked my Dad if he would leave that screen porch door to me
I'll hang it in the living room for everyone to see
And they'll all think I'm crazy, and never understand
The magic of those summer nights we'll never see again

and we saw Roosevelt..

By Jerry Rasmussen

In the days before air conditioning, the front porch was the center of family life in the summer. And, because porches were built on the front of the house (rather than decks that are always on the back of the house these days,) you could sit and watch the street and meet the neighbors out "to catch the evening breeze." We had a big screened porch that wrapped around the side of the house, with a porch swing that hung from the ceiling. There were many signs of approaching spring in our house. About the time that my tennis shoes disappeared under the bed for the summer, we'd put up the porch swing and summer would officially arrive. Never mind if it was only May. It was summer at our house.

My Father was a firm believer in "waste not, want not," and it was a rare day when something had been repaired so many times that he finally had to throw it away. The screens that were on the porch were the same ones that were on the porch when I was ushered into the world in 1935, yelling my head off in the back bedroom. Those screens are still on the porch, here in 2002. My father painted the screens black to keep them from rusting, and over the years the holes between the wires became smaller and smaller to the point where the porch took on a mysterious, shadowed existence. But, you could still see through the screens, and people still go for walks in the evening. In the 40' and 50's, people didn't have air conditioned cars to go for an evening ride. Going for a walk in the evening, you could not only catch an evening breeze, you could "shoot the breeze" with neighbors. If they weren't out sitting on their porch, they'd be sitting in lawn chairs on the front lawn. We knew all the neighborhood news, almost before it happened.

The threshold from the screen porch to the front lawn was our screen porch door. My Father put an industrial-strength spring on the door, so if you didn't hold it as you went out, it made a magnificent, banging announcement when it closed. No need for a doorbell. When we ran out the door as kids (I don't ever remember walking out the door) the door would give a loud Slam! and my Father would yell out even louder, "I TOLD you kids not to let that door slam!" And then he'd get in to a real good mutter. We never learned, of course, and as grandchlidren and great grandchilden took over for us, my Father had new generations to beller at. He didn't really swear out loud, although only he and the Lord knew what he was muttering under his breath.

I remember all of this when I look at the old, chipped "knob of crystal glass that I salvaged when my nephew finally retired the door when he bought the house in the mid 90's. That door saw everything. And I remember it all

Thanks for inventing the front porch, Kendall...

Jerry