My father, Marius Christian Schmidt, was born August 31, 1913 on "Sandkroen" in Nr. Hjarup at Hovslund. He was the youngest of children and took apprenticeship with a cabinet maker in Over Jerstal. After then he got work at a carpenter in Gram 1933-1935.
Else and Marius met each other at a Midsummer's Eve celebration in Gram and started dating. Marius started his own wheelwrigt workshop in Kastrup, two miles from Gram. My mother moved in May 1st, 1937.
May 14, 1937 they got married and the wedding was held in their home. My grandparents brought half a pig to the young couple.
Unfortunately the business did not go very well. Rubber wheels made its entry to the farms and the money was small. The closed down the business in 1938-39 and Marius got work at Gram sawmill. They moved to Hindballe between Gram and Rødding and in 1943 the familiy finally moved to Gram in a flat. Later, in 1947, the built a house on Østerled road in Gram.
IMG: Else and Marius (at a party)
Else began to work on Gram carpet factory. She worked on the factory until she turned approx. sixty years old. Every day she took her bicycle to the factory and worked form 7 am to 5 pm. After some years she got herself a new bicycle and that was nice, as it was quite tough to climb the steep road home after a long days work. Later she had a moped, which made the trip a lot easier. She work at the factory for some twenty years.
My father worked at the sawmill until he was approx. sixty years old. When he retired, he rented a summer cottage lot at Loddenhøj in Løjt Kirkeby. Here he built a summer cottage by himself during some years.
They had good times there, but then he turned serious ill. He was diagnosed with painter's colic and fell more and more unwell. He was on convalescence care, but suffered a lot. Only 66 years old, he passed away March 18, 1980.
My mother had some good years, enjoying travelling. Every year she was on a charter bus trip to Austria and France and other places, as long as she could stand it.
Nowadays, my mother is 94 years, live by herself in the house on Østerled in Gram, and she has home care three times a day and gets her meals brought by car from the nursing home. Every Tuesday, she and other elderly people in the neighbourhood are picked-up by bus and droven to the nursing home. Here, the nurses gives her bath, makes her hair and that makes the day for her.
She also has a volunteer friend from Red Cross organisation who visits her every friday. In the summer they take a walk with mother in the wheelchair. She also brings her to church and outings with The Red Cross organisation.
My mother is well and still mental healthy. She cannot hear too well, sometimes she only hears half of what you tell her or she tells you what she thinks she heard. She has pain in her legs and fell herself worn out and sleep a lot, also during the day.
February 2, 2003
IMG: My mother - 1987
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My mother passed away peacefully January 29, 2004.