History of John Smith Griffin
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High School  1924-1926

I remember especially that Fred Gentsch and I use to go out on old loggers trails out in the forests and Fred was a real artist at driving the old bug along these logging roads about as fast as it could go without hitting a tree. The following year he was doing this with Chick Treseador's Ford and they hit a trunk of a tree that was in the middle of the road and it just about bent the front axle double. Fortunately they were not hurt.

LETTERS
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(L250728) John Griffin to Brother Ben

Practical jokes were the rule during the summer and I will never forget the morning when I stayed in bed just a few seconds extra after I heard the whistle of the morning train. Being late, I jumped out of bed and climbed into my clothes as fast as I could. I wore high top boots at the time and when I pulled on the boots I found an egg in each one. Needless to say I was late for work that morning and had a nasty job getting all of the egg out of my boots. A few mornings later one of the boys across the court in another car found about a quarter inch of syrup in his boots when he put them on.

West Yellowstone in those days (1925) was really a wild western town. Although prohibition was in force at that time, beer, wine and whiskey were sold openly across the bar in one of the local saloons. One day while I was hauling out the garbage a man approached me and asked me if I would be interested in making a few extra dollars. Of course I was and after talking to the man I found out that he had a dog team which he used the run mail from Ashton, Idaho to West Yellowstone and other cities during the winter. He wanted to know if I would save the meat scraps from the garbage and bring them up to him each night to feed his dogs. While he at first offered to pay me off in money, he eventually got around to telling me that he was the local bootlegger and that he would pay me off in whisky if I would rather. I took the money and got 35 cents a box for meat scraps. I took him a couple of boxes each night.

Every Saturday night they would have a big dance in town and the lumber jacks would come from miles around. There use to be some wild and wolly affairs on those nights. West Yellowstone in 1925 was located in dense forests and there were rivers and lakes nearby. It was really the rough, raw open country and I learned to love the singing of the pines and the beauties of nature. Even now when I go out into the mountains and forests I get a thrill that is different from any other experience and is something that I first experienced during my stay at West Yellowstone.

Although the Church used to sponsor dances and socials, I had a great deal of difficulty in learning how to dance. My parents sent me to dancing school and I struggled along but did not do very well at it. In fact I have never been able to learn how to dance so that girls enjoyed dancing with me. This was quite a handicap in my early social life and I remember that my parents at one time were very apprehensive lest I should become a social misfit. To the best of my recollection, the first girl that I ever went out with is my wife, Dorothy. I took her to a show and when we were both in junior high school. I took out several other girls thereafter and one of them named Evelyn West, very steady during my junior year in high school.

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