Arthur H. Eyles and Gertrude Freund Eyles

My mother never knew her Heydrick grandparents and remembers her mother's parents only vaguely.  When asked about her memories of them she recalls only that they "were English and seemed very old and smelled."  That seems pretty apt for the memories of a young child when presented before two people who were exactly that--fairly formal, certainly English and as for the smell--well we can only hazard a guess.  Arthur Henry Eyles and his wife, Gertrude, died with in two years of each other; she in 1932 and he in 1934.  My mother was only 10 years old in 1932 and doesn't remember going to her grandmother's funeral.  Their family had no car and her grandparents has been a nursing home in Devon some 30 miles from Bridesburg.  Taking public transportation all the way from Bridesburg out past the Main Line to Devon would have been an all day hurdle and it doesn't seem likely that there would have been frequent visits.  We must assume that there were funerals for the two Eyles and that their daughter, my grandmother, would have attended but no one is alive who remembers this.  Lost, too, are the life stories of my great-grandparents.  Here is the the bare bones of what I know.
(Not great photograph of a framed photograph I have of Arthur and Gertrude in the nursing home in Devon c. 1930.)

Gertrude Eyles and Helen Eyles on the beach, Beach Haven, NJ c. 1898

Arthur Henry Eyles was born in Malmsbury, Gloustershire, England in 1851.  He married Gertrude Freund, who we already know was born at 7 Finsbury Circus, London in 1857.  I know nothing about the Eyles family.  And what we know about the Freunds has already been written.  I am so curious as to what brought these two together we shall never know.   They were married in 1882 in Kensington, London.  In 1884 their eldest son, named for his father was born.  My great-uncle Arthur was quite a character and he will have his own story here shortly.  Uncle Arthur was also a prolific "author" of  his self-titled "Spasmodic Gas Jets" aka his personal recollections of a very eccentric life.  He wrote a bit about his boyhood and I'm glad he did because it is the only source of information about the Eyles family in America.

In 1887 the Eyles family emigrated to America and settled in the western part of Chicago.  Arthur Eyles was an industrial chemist and had something to do (according to my mother's best recollections) with "white lead" also known as lead carbonate which was the classic white pigment for use in oil painting.  My mother thought that her grandfather had invented white lead, but this chemical compound had been used for centuries by artists and so he may have been involved in its use in other applications, but he certainly didn't invent it.  Uncle Arthur is silent on the subject and his Spasmodic Gas Jets reveal almost nothing about his parents.

We know that both Charles Eyles (born 1888) and Helen Eyles (born 1893) were born in Chicago.  I found an interesting notation in Chicago birth records from that era that revealed that twin girls were born to a Gertrude Eyles in the years between Charles and Helen's birth. I didn't make a good record of where I found that information and haven't been able to get back to it.  If these twins were born to our Eyles they did not survive.

The Eyles family moved around a few times in those expansive western Chicago neighorhoods.  Eventually they decamped for the east and landed in Pelham, NY where they stayed a few years.

Here, from Uncle Arthur, is a description of their years in Chicago and the move to Pelham, NY and then to Philadelphia.  He tells it the best that it can be told!  Enjoy!

Gertrude Freund Eyles, c. 1924

Helen Heydric, age three and Arthur Eyles, 1924

The first Chicago residence was on 13^th Place, then just west of Elmira Junction, then just southeast moving four times in that section.  That part of Chicago was mostly prairie, and one story wooden houses.  If you didn’t like your location you looked around for a better one and arranged to have your house moved to the new spot.  Little Johnny Eyles was lost (the children called me “Johnny Bull” because I had just come from England.)  frantic search was made for the little 3 year old English boy.  No trace anywhere.  Then one of the neighbors remembered seeing the little boy watching them move a house.  Search of the house revealed our hero fast asleep in a corner.  Need we pause for station announcements?  I think not.  My brother once made a very fitting comment: “My ma has the biggest hand in Pelham, N.Y.” And she knew where it would do the most good, that part of you that has the least sense and the most feeling.

Eyles Home, SW Chicago, c. 1894

         Ah, the memories as they crowd around my finger waiting to be put down.  Even though my mother had a resonant contralto voice her two sons somehow or other never could carry a tune.  And as she was the organist of a wheezy cottage organ in the small wooden church perched in the midst of the prairie, and also took charge of the musical (?) training of the children, her two young hopefuls were always in the chorus.  Each time there was a rehearsal there would be some sour notes among the children.  Her young sons were tried last; sure enough theirs were the sour notes.

Pelham, NY

         Then at the tender age of 9 our hero and his family migrated to Pelham N.Y. arriving there just 55 years ago this month, amid a very heavy downpour of rain.  The next move was to Mt. Vernon, yet keeping the friendships of Pelham alive by still going back to the Church of the Redeemer, P.E. to church.  And also being apprenticed, for the summer, to the local druggist, one Seth Thomas Lyman, later to become postmaster of Pelham, so considerable of our hero’s love of walking was acquired in those days in going hither and on to get some wanted person to the phone.  It was not the neat “French” type, bit of highly developed mechanism it is today.  No it resembled an overlarge coffee mill, you lifted the receiver, placed it to your ear, then began cranking for dear life.

         Then a voice would say, “What do you want?”  You told her, then waited. None of your instantaneous service as today, no the voice at the other end would say, “I’ll go get her, or him.  Then another wait then you got the person.  The Lyman’s lived up over the store.  A twisty set of stairs led to the apartment.  Mrs. Lyman called down “Arthur, help me down with this wash tub of dirty water.  Our hero did, but—oh, the memory of that “but”—his foot slipped so tub is tilted and a torrent of dirty wash water pours down over our hero, and everything else in its way.

Philadelphia and Environs

         The next move of the Eyles’ was to Ventnor, NJ for the summer.  Then to Phila. In the fall of 1898.  This was the year of the celebration, all over the U.S. of the victory over Spain in liberating the Cubans and the Philippines from the tyrannical hand of Spain.  We arrived in Phila in late Sept. Broad St. Station was then the main station of the PRR.  There were no taxis in those days, but either a two wheeler, called a hansom cab, or a four wheel open carriage, called a barouche, and headed down Chestnut St.  It was the night that Phila. Was to tender Rear Admiral Schley, of the Battle of Manila, a reception at the old Chestnut St. Opera House between 10^th and 11^th.  My father at that time was wearing a pointed goatee, and did not look unlike the Rear Admiral, so that as the barouche turned into Chestnut some enthusiasts thought is was the Admiral, so taking the horse out of the shafts the crowd of men pulled our barouche down Chestnut St. to the alarming amazement of the family.  Upon arrival at the Opera House the mistake was discovered, the horse rehitched, and thus did the Eyles arrive in Phila.

         Our first home was Green’s Hotel at 8^th and Chestnut.  Oh, what pleasant memories are crowding my brain, and waiting to be put down.  Altho this started out merely to introduce you to our staff I find our train is again up a delightfully full valley, so let’s go up it a way and then come back to our main track of thought.

         The suite, a novelty in those days of hotel living, that my mother, father and small sister occupied, was one with a huge cut glass chandelier in it.  As Green’s hotel was an old Colonial hotel, and only a block from Robert Morris’ home on 8^th below Walnut, still occupied by a Robert Morris, a direct descendent of the original financier of the Revolutionary War, Green’s Hotel was the centre of all the social activities.  I do not know which one, but I think it was Dolly Madison who once lived in this same room.

         H. Mahlon Newton, the proprietor in 1898 had two hobbies, one a race horse called Star Pointer, the other a beautiful big angora cat called TIX.  I well remember when a newspaper photographer came to get a picture of Tix my longlegged sister happened to be holding him, so the pose so appealed to the photographer that he snapped it.  I do not know whether that picture is still in the possession of my sister or not.

         For the first few days my father let his two ravenously hungry boys eat in the hotel dining room, but their appetites were a little too big for his pocket book, so they were allowed $1 a day for food.  When you consider that you could get a very well cooked meal, of generous portions in many places in the vicinity for 15 cents, you can see that this left quite a few pennies with which to attend the theaters in the neighborhood, where a good seat in the gallery could be had for 15 cents.  To the Auditorium, at 8^th and Walnut came the leading stars of the day, Richard Mansfield, Henrietta Crosman, Ethel Barrymore, Dewolf Hopper etc.

We soon moved to a spot about 200 yards from where I am writing this narrative, 1834 Race Street.  This was Miss Hill’s boarding house.  In those days you didn’t rent just a room, as I am doing, no your room included three meals.  Our mother, father and Helen had the second story back room, with a big bay window in it. A night or two after we arrived there the three children discovered a nightly game they could play.  At that time the lights on Billy Penn’s hat went out at three minutes to nine.  Promptly at nine they came on again. Each night three noses were pressed against the window pane in that room to see who could shout first, There they are.”

         I have always been thankful for an unwitting mistake my father made.  He was told that there was a Friend’s School down Race Street. So decided that would be a good place to enter the children.  He had been told it was at 16^th and Race.  The four of us marched down the street, but all he saw was a solid brick wall.  But our hero had spied a day or two earlier, some boys playing in a schoolyard at the next corner, so he enrolled all of us in Friend’s Central.  Helen in the Kindergarten, Charley in the Intermediate, our hero in the High School.  As there was not time to go home for lunch arrangements were made to let the three get their lunch at the Young Friend’s Assn. where a filling chicken potpie dinner could be had for a quarter!
         Our mother fearing that we might not be getting enough to eat, by the way we came home ravenously hungry each day, dropped in one noon to see.  Good old Doc Walton asked, “Would thee care to come see them?”  “Yes” answer my mother. So he led her to where her starving young ones were eating.  There they were with a heaping dishful of chicken potpie in front of each. “I hope thee is assured that they are being properly fed?”  with a sigh my mother said “Yes”, “ Would thee care to know what I had for my lunch?”  Envisioning a big juicy steak my mother said, “yes.”  “Three graham crackers and a glass of milk.”  Sorry but that was the last chicken potpie for three growing young persons.

         Then arrangements were made with Miss Hill, a very vinegary old maid to give us 15 cents each day instead of saving our lunch for us.  Well, that meant in addition to the lunch we ate at FCS another chance to put on the flesh and add to the energy of three young healthy animals.

         We went to church at Holy Trinity at St. James Church at 22^nd and Walnut.  Every time I walk Walnut St. from 19^th to 22^nd I do not see it as of 1948, but as of 1898-99.  In my minds eye I see E.T. Stoesbury coming out of his home at 20^th and Walnut, and greeting E. B. Smith coming out of his.  I see John Wanamaker as he comes down the steps of his home, now an apt. house just east of the 2^nd Presby. Church.  And I see other notables of that day.  At the SE corner of 22^nd and Walnut lived Geo. W. Childs, in that beautiful white marble palace.  On the SW corner lived Jeremiah Sullivan, the Pres of the Market St. National Bank and one of the owners of the trolley system.  Yes, and many more.

Our next move early in the spring of 1900 was to Miss Dungan’s boarding house, The Evergreen Lodge, on E. Balto. Ave. Lansdowne.  That summer I was given a job in Bert Loughlin’s drug store, and my mother often said that I always got more sodas on my clothes and over my shoes than I ever put in the glasses.  I well remember the present senior judge of the Municipal court coming to Miss Dungan’s with his bride. At that time Eugene Bonniwell was just a young lawyer, and had just married Miss Rose Cahill.

         In order to be near the factory where the white lead process was being perfected we next moved to a small house in Addingham, about 1 ½ miles north of Clifton Heights.  The outstanding event there was that a newly married couple Maury Crawford and his wife moved into their nice new home next door.  And one day, the grease in the frying pan caught fire.  The new bride ran screaming from the house leaving the door open.  This fine draught gave the fire a fine start; by the time the neighbors got together nothing was left but the chimney.  But my mother had other memories she often said.  “Arthur always had three dogs, the one I had just let go, the one we always had and the one he is bringing home, because I used to adopt every stray I found on the road.

         Then we moved up to the top of the hill not far from the mill.  It was a gigantic old colonial house.  The water was supplied from a spring at the foot of the hill, and with the aid of an automatic pump was pumped up into a huge cedar tank in the three story.  The walls were at least 18 inches think. The house had two “front rooms.” They were so big, that the two Eyles boys used the unoccupied one to ride their bicycles in.

         My mother acquired some chickens as who does not way out in the county.  She had a habit of naming each hen after the friend of mother’s whose walk resembled the hen’s walk.  So to Pat she would say “Mr. Zeller will be out for dinner tomorrow go out and kill Mrs. Gormley, and Mrs. O’Brien.  Mrs. Gormley was the washwoman.  Her specialty was getting drunk, then miss her footing and go rolling down the long hill to the road.  Mrs. O’Brien was a good old soul who ran a little candy shop near the covered bridge.  He daughter, Maggie, with her.  Then my sister and Maggie would play dolls, etc. My mother would ask, will you have a glass of milk?  Her answer was always the same, “If ’elen does, I does.”

Our next move was into 5250 Cedar Ave. in Feb. 1905, because both boys had gotten jobs in the city.