My mother's family came to the U.S. from Russia in 1889. They arrived in New York Harbor on Oct. 13th on a ship called the Victoria Augusta. At that time she was only four years old. I found her name included on the ship manifest at the Washington Bureau of Archives.

The family went to South Dakota where my grandfather became a farmer. I don't know the facts of why she only graduated from the fifth grade when she was fifteen.

Anyway, whatever the answer is, at that point she was hired as a schoolteacher in Strasbourg, North Dakota. As was the custom, at the time, the schoolmarm was taken in to live with one of the local families. Mom happened to live with Lawrence Welk's family. This was just the time Lawrence was either just born or at least was a baby.

She was very proud of the fact that she was able to maintain discipline after the previous teacher had quit because she couldn't achieve it.

I remember Mom's telling me of one terrible winter storm when she kept her kids at the school with a fire going. One of the other teachers tried to go home with her horse and buggy along with one or two children. The horse and three humans froze to death where they ran into the corner of a fence.

Several years before she passed away she, my wife and I went to a performance of the Welk orchestra in Seattle. She sent a note to his dressing room, telling him of her connection to his family. The next day he called, explaining that he had received it too late to call that evening. They talked for a half hour on the phone. I'm sure that was the high point of mom's life.

In 1987 my wife, brother in law, sister in law and I took a trip around the entire U.S. in two motor homes. One evening, just at dinner time, we were driving down a highway in North Dakota. I saw a sign for a restaurant and noticed it was in Strasbourg. The fact that it was the Pin Palace didn't register with me that it was in a bowling alley. Anyway, it was the only restaurant in the town which eliminated any other options.

I asked the waitress if she knew where the Welk farm was. She had no idea. However a man sitting at the next table heard me. He said he was Lawrence Welk's nephew and he and his wife would be happy to take us out to the farm.

We rode out in his car and came to this tiny house. It consisted of four small rooms and a separate summer kitchen. There was a rickety outside stairway that made its way to an outside doorway on the second floor.

I couldn't help wondering how this little Baptist gal got along with a whole tribe of Catholic kids in that tiny space. I wasn't about to climb those stairs to look inside. Curious I was, but stupid I wasn't.