Helen and Bill Mahood

Ethel, Helen, Bud, Bob, and Florence

Helen Mahood tells her story:

My first recollection was when I was four years old, coming to California from Colorado on the train. The first house we lived in was in Los Angeles, where Bob was born. Mother had him at home; Dad woke us up at 5:00 a.m. and here was a squalling little baby on the dining room table. Mother fixed dinner the night after Bob was born.

Bob had diphtheria and double pneumonia at two weeks of age. All of us but Bud had diphtheria, and he turned out to be the carrier. Bud went to the hospital and the rest of us were quarantined.

We moved to Glendale, then to Long Beach. Our first house was made for children. We had a doll house and swings, rings, and bars in the backyard. Mother must have loved to move because we moved seven times in Long Beach.

Enlargement of Helen

Ethel and Helen were in a Sunday School performance.

Ethel is at the top left of the picture,

and Helen is the second child from the left

in the bottom row.

Ethel would bring home a duck every Easter and our dog, Barney, would kill it. Except Donald--he survived. When Barney would get in a fight with another dog, the duck would leap on the back of the other dog and peck on it. Donald would walk us down to the bus stop.

When we moved, we had to get rid of him. We gave him to some people in the country. They dressed him like Donald Duck and entered him in a parade and won first place.

In the picture at left: Edith, Frank, Florence at the top and Helen and Bob below, with Barney.

Left: Another picture of Barney, with a duck named Charlie. Or this may have been Donald.

Right: The Judson home after the 1933 earthquake.

The March 10, 1933, earthquake in Long Beach threw the house eighteen inches off the foundation. Mom and the kids spent the first night in the car outside a friend’s house. The men stayed in the house. The owner of the house was a big man, and every time there was an aftershock, he and Dad would head for the door at the same time and get stuck.

The school I attended was completely demolished. The Lord must have been watching over us, because there was a play in the school. The principal thought the play was going too late, so she let us go ten minutes early. If she hadn't, we would have been trapped in the school. A janitor was killed when it collapsed.