The Beginning – Clara Pauline Royer Holm

My interest in Family History started with my grandmother, Clara Pauline (Royer) Holm, or grandma Pauline to me. My mother died while I was in high school and was Pauline’s only child. After I married and had children of my own, she became my mother, coming to visit when I gave birth to my children to help out and holidays or whenever I needed her, teaching me some family recipes and then family stories.

One of her visits she brought me some tea cups, silver spoons and Blue Willow china pieces. She told me the dishes came from her aunts boarding house where her mother and father had met in Iowa. That intrigued me so I asked her to tell me more.

Her father, Perry Clinton Royer, rented a room at a boarding house in Glenwood, Iowa run by Mrs. M.G. (Aunt Emma) Edwards. While eating a meal one day, Perry spied a lovely young woman serving the evening meal. He remarked out loud, “I’ll marry whoever made these biscuits!” Quick to respond, Grace (Pauline Brown) replied, “I DID!”, although she hadn’t! Perry and Grace were married in December of 1903.

Perry and Grace moved to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada and it was there that my grandmother, Clara Pauline Royer was born. The family was boarding at the home of George Burwell, past Dundas Park (according to US citizenship records for Pauline by Grace Royer).

Pauline remembers moving from Canada to Illinois where they lived in tar paper shanties (I cannot find any record of that), then to Lodi, Ohio and finally on to Marion, Ohio. Mabel was born two years after Pauline in Lodi and they were very close.

Pauline remembers first living in an apartment while the house on Silver Street was being build. Once settled in, Pauline remembers getting baths every afternoon by their mother.  After their baths they would sit out on the front porch of their house on Silver Street in their rockers, which were identical except that Pauline’s was walnut and Mabel’s was maple, and wait for the Ice Cream man.

We sat together one afternoon going through her old photo albums and I listened with keen interest to the stories the told me. “Do you see how curly my hair is? Mother would wash my hair then twirl it around her finger to make those ringlets”.

“One day, sitting on the back steps of that house (Silver Street) with Mabel I got mad at her about something.  Daddy had been working out there (the yard or porch) and had a hammer laying there, I picked up the hammer and hit Mabel with it.  Boy did I get a spanking!”

I found a newspaper article written in the Marion Daily Star on Sep 16,1912:

Mrs. PC Royer gave a pretty birthday party at her home on Silver Street Saturday afternoon from 2 to 5 o’clock in honor of the eighth birthday of her daughter, Pauline and the sixth birthday of her daughter, Mabel. The children received many beautiful gifts and enjoyed the afternoon with games and later a luncheon was served, the table being adorned with two birthday cakes bearing tiny candles.

Pauline had two other sisters, Roberta (Bobbie) born in 1912 and then Avis, born in 1917. Pauline attended Warren G Harding High School and graduated in 1923.

In another newspaper article from the Marion Star dated 1 Jan 1921:

Miss Pauline Royer entertained a company of friends at a watch party at her home, No 336 Sought High Street, Friday night.  Progressive rook (card game) was played, and the honors were won by Miss Mary Rettig and Ivan Mayfield.  Guests were Miss Helen Bowers, Miss Mabel Balmer, Miss Mary Rettig, Miss Pauline Reid, Miss Ruth Pennell, Miss Mabel Royer, Lowell Hangborn, Ivan Mayfield, Frank Kull, George McNamara, Merle Hugh and Dale Hugh.

Mabel became seriously ill with rheumatic fever around the age of 16. Doctors suggested she might do better in a warmer climate. Pauline’s mother’s Aunt Emma had relocated to Los Angeles and she invited the family to move to CA and live with her. Shortly after her graduation the family joined Emma in Los Angeles. Shortly after arriving, a good friend of the family took them out to dinner. He told the girls, “you can order anything you want as long as it isn’t over a buck.”  “What’s a buck?” Pauline exclaimed.  “You don’t know what a buck is?” he answered and bellowed with laughter as he explained it was a dollar.

Aunt Emma’s husband was a small real estate developer. They hoped that the home they bought in one of the valleys of Los Angeles would be in the perfect spot to become important to the development of Los Angeles. It turns out, they were just a couple of valleys off from Hollywood and never made their fortune.

Pauline got a job at the Broadway store for $15 per week. She worked there for 3 years. In order to get from Monterey Street to the Broadway store, Pauline needed to take the streetcar. A handsome young man, who was the conductor of the street car, caught her eye and she made sure she rode his car to and from work. Apparently the feeling was mutual, as Ivan told his friends that he was going to marry that beauty.

And so they did marry on June 27, 1926 at the family home on Monterey Street. The matron of honor was Lulu Snyder of Hollywood (she and Pauline worked together at the Broadway) and Albert Sandstrom who came out to Los Angeles with Ivan from Aspen, CO.  

The couple lived in the family home for some time with Grace, Roberta and Avis. Then, their only child, my mother, Barbara Eileen Holm was born in Feb of 1931. Shortly after that the family rented their own apartment on Sherwood Ave. By this time, Ivan was a conductor for the railroad and in 1940 they had saved enough to buy a house on Patio Place in Los Angeles, near Alhambra.

Grandma Pauline is no longer with us, but her voice, her photos and her stories remain. The precious memories she shared me with allowed me to see the direct line of her life through mine. Because of her, I’m inspired to search for the voices, photos, and stories all the other fascinating lines that weaved through the past and make up my family tree. Often in my research I am struck thinking I can’t imagine doing what they did or living when they did — and the joy of realizing that those unimaginable stories are part of MY history. Thank you grandma Pauline for being the spark that ignited this curiosity in me, let this be a chance for your memories to inspire the same spark in someone new.