A Biography: My Brother David’s Childhood

I, Patricia Charlotte Hill Peters, am three years older than David. My early memories of David are as a laughing baby – he was my mother’s favorite.  His mouth was always wide open in laughing glee.

His good humor was occasionally altered by a jealous older brother (Donald Roland Hill Jr.), who was my father’s favorite. David had beautiful strawberry blonde curls that were often fondled lovingly by his mom. Don cut them off – (see David’s poem “Take a Little Off The Sides”). Early on he was dubbed “teasy teasie”. Donald teased him alot – I thought too much. But it was David who got the name “teasy”.

I remember the night when he was six months old. The doctor lanced his ear and the incessant screaming and his red face calmed down. Mother was frantic. Father seemed to escape somewhere.

David had a series of women who “adopted” him. Aunt Jennie (I have a picture), “Olli”, Lou Mason, Betty Knapp, Aunt Carrie and Aunt Dot! David could endear himself so easily. Don and I were more withdrawn.

David went to be with Gram Charlotte Hill at various times as an infant when Lydia (mother) went on the men’s hunting trip. Gram said he had rashes and she proudly administrered to him. At 3-4 he swallowed a cup hook which now is at the Boston Children’s Hospital in the Foreign Body Museum.

We blew up dynamite caps when we were 10, 9 and 7. David had a large piece of the shrapnel go through his right foot. He had a cast and a brace. That summer he went to Gram Hill’s and she with her Christian Science background, threw away the brace and left him barefooted to heal beautifully. I don’t remember him ever complaining. The doctor was pessimistic about his walking well, ever. Gram Hill was a healer, I think. She saved cousin Bob Hill from sure death about the same timeframe.

This same year, at seven years old, he got both scarlet fever and diptheria and went to the contagious hospital. I was in the ward – 3rd floor. David hovered in danger for a week-long recovery. Our older sister Marge (16) had to go on street care with the the full blown case of chicken pox as mom had taken to bed with a migraine. What a happy reunion!

In this same timeframe, David had a ruptured appendix – emerency time! I didn’t want to go to school and ended up in the bed next to his crib as my stomach pains were taken seriously. He was really sick, I wasn’t. No wonder we looked like skeletons and Miss Kemp was so worried about our weight loss and failure to thrive.

Dave was a bit solitary – loved comic books – did not do much in school. He spent a lot of time alone in his room. He read the world almanac and quoted statistics alot.

Don ridiculed him, seemd miffed by his reclusiveness.

Dave and I used to sit and talk and do imaginings while I knitted. A favorite theme was that he was the fisherman and I the mermaid. We put together a series of adventures. Once I found a way for him to breathe underwater and we found old Spanish gallions and treausre and had such fun making believe. This would be evenings after Don and Ellyn went to bed, before Mom would come home on the 12:30AM train from the Dell Restaraunt in Newtonville. Our inventions were so wonderful or so we thought.

When Aunt Alice moved in with her three children, and Aunt Jenny took over after Marge eloped before I manned the fort, Dave had some trouble with mischief with Tom Rich that ended when Uncle Tom came home from WWII and we moved to 215 Auburn Street from the tenement.

The tenement was misery. I came home from two years with Gram Hill after I had a stomach problem to a different house. We had built an English Tudor in Bedford. It was lost and I moved to a four apartment at 237 Auburn Street when Donald (father) had become a full blown alcoholic, lost his tree surgeon business and seldom worked. He had a gastrectomy – depression – turned violent and disoriented. He left during Ellyn’s infancy and all of our illnesses. No wonder David withdrew and I hung out with the Johnsons.

Don played cards and outdid himself trying to do sports and improve at school.

The apartment at 237 Auburn Street was dark and dingy with bedbugs, trains ran by right in back. I remember being packed four in a small room. Dave was quiet.

We did have some neat outings on days off. Romping through the Weston woods, fishing at Norembega and games in the yard, many that were made up. Rollerskating – Camp Day – Welfare – fear of the social worker making unexpected calls and us having to go a foster home if we weren’t good.

Dr. Rogers, our minister, was an angel to us. He came with what we needed before Donald (father) died and mom went to work. Lydia (mom) claimed that she was a home Baptist but made us go to the Congregational Church every Sunday. Marge ended up teaching and David won an award for memorizing all the books of the Bible. He was seven or eight.

Dave moved to Lew Beach, NY at 14. I stayed with Marge to graduate at Newton High School and then nursing school at Newton-Wellesley Hospital.

I missed Dave’s high school years which I heard were good. He started working, gained weight and found a stage presence and starred in musicals. He won regents scores, typing also with only college typing course. I heard he had the highest Regents School of his class. The superintendant’s son got the prize that he earned – politics. Somehow David got inspired by a representative from Cortland, Alfred to go to school for engineering.