I have a few more stories about fifty years ago that I thought you might enjoy. A few days before Marianne and Phil, and the rest of the family left on their annual vacation to see their other son in Tennessee, he showed me how to light the heater in the house I was staying in.

I thought this was unusual and said as much. This Ozarks boy knew that you did not need a heater in July. Apparently, that is not true in the Allegheny Mountains. The weather forecast predicted a cold front coming to the area during the next week. On the morning of the fourth, the temperature was 32 degrees in Gifford. I lit the gas.

I mentioned in a previous column that I had made two trips to Niagara Falls that summer. The first was on the church bus with the youth from Bolivar Road and Hilltop. A month later, my brother Sam and I went back when he stopped to see me on his way from Chicago to Florida.

We visited some museums and spent a lot of time on the Canadian side. On more than one occasion, a young boy kept crawling under the ropes that were designed to keep tourists from getting too close to the cliff edge. Each time this happened, we remarked that the parents should keep a closer eye on him.

After we drove back to Gifford, we went to bed, and after seeing him off the next morning, I had my regular Sunday schedule. That evening, I went into the main house with the family to relax and watch television. The broadcast was from a station in Buffalo.

A story was headlined about an accidental death on the previous day in Nagara Falls, Canada. As we watched this story, they showed a photograph of a boy who had fallen off a cliff because he had gone beyond the safety barricades. It was the same boy we had seen the day before.

After returning home, Michelle and I spoke to a few churches about our experiences during the summer. Remember, Michelle was another student from SWBC who was in Bradford. Summer missionaries are out there right now working in churches and ministries all around the world. If you know one, thank them for me.

©Copyright 2025 by Charles Kensinger