My wife (who was then my girlfriend) met my father only once, and that was when he was in the hospital during what turned out to be his final illness. I introduced her to him, and mentioned that she was a musician; she played the hammered dulcimer. I didn't think he would even know what a hammered dulcimer was, but he informed me that he had had an uncle who played one! I was astonished at the coincidence. No one had ever mentioned this before.

This great-uncle of mine died long ago and if I ever met him, I must have been too young to remember. No one in my immediate family was musical at all. My father would barely even open his mouth to sing hymns at church.

However, I did hear that my grandparents on my father's side were renowned clog dancers during their youth and courtship, but they quit going to dances when they began raising a family. They, too, died when I was very young. My father seemed to know very little about their dancing, and he told me even less. But apparently they danced well enough to be in demand as entertainers, but I don't know if they ever got paid for it.

My mother's family owned a parlor pump organ, and some of the kids learned to play it, but my mother never did. I guess there were just too many kids--eleven, to be exact.