Lorene says that after Hubert died, people looked at his business records which he had kept for himself over the years, and it was quite impressive the way he had kept accurate records of everything. Sometimes his payment had come in the form of goods instead of cash but it was all recorded.
The lumber business prospered. As new technology came along he upgraded the equipment. He would buy the timber from tracks of land and saw it. He got a planer and could sell dressed lumber. In the years just before World War II he got contracts to sell all the lumber he could produce, ran several trucks and employed quite a few people (in addition to all those sons – 8 in all.) Around the beginning of World War II the shortage of machinery parts and available labor forced him to close down the sawmill. The older sons had families of their own and work of their own. Three of his sons were drafted into the military, Clelan, Raymond, and Hoyle. Cleston and Claren who were already married and had children worked in defense plants in Memphis.
| In 1941 or 1942 Hubert and Maud built a new house on some land they owned in Concord on Highway 25. It had electricity, indoor plumbing with the running water pumped from a well in the basement with an electric motor. He had a good sized pond built near a spring below the house. I believe he stocked it with fish, and also he and others swam in it.
I don’t know how he learned to swim so well, but I remember as a child that the extended Martin family would have picnics on White River and one of the highlights for the grandchildren was to ride on Grandpa’s back while he swam with us. It was fun and exciting. It was not until I learned to swim myself much later that I realized how difficult it was to carry another person while you swim – even a child! |
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