1964 Alaska Earthquake Part II--Communities Today

In the fifty years that have ensued since the Good Friday quake, it is hard to tell that it ever happened in most places.  Most infrastructure and buildings have been rebuilt, often in better ways than they were before 1964.  This earthquake, along with others in various parts of the world, made it possible for engineers to see the effects on buildings, and emergency management agencies have set up ways for people to escape natural calamities.

Today, tall buildings in earthquake-prone areas are built with giant springs under their foundations so they will rock when the earth shakes, but will stay intact.  Walls are built with more structural reinforcements.  Coastal communities in the western United States, where tsunamis are more likely than in other areas, have tsunami evacuation routes, with clearly marked signs posted along the routes.  Some beach towns have sirens situated on their beaches, to alert everyone in the town if a tsunami is impending.  These are all good things that came from the bad of previous earthquakes and tsunamis.

In the early 1980's I used to work on Fourth Avenue in Anchorage for a time, and I routinely parked my car in the area near there that dropped down several feet during the 1964 quake.  Even then, less than twenty years after the earthquake occurred, there was nothing there that told of a previous catastrophic event, except the hill that I had to walk up every morning!  There were buildings on the land, the roads were the roads of any city.  Anchorage is a city that was able to completely come back.  Today, the area of Turnagain Heights that fell is called "Earthquake Park".  When I lived there, Earthquake Park was an other-worldly place of clay mounds, a few trees here and there, with dirt trails running through it all.  Now it is fully-developed, with a walking trail and large trees for the enjoyment of the residents.  One thing that I had my doubts about is that people built huge new homes on the newly formed bluff above Earthquake Park.  Great view, but how safe are they if another earthquake like the 1964 earthquake happens again?  They may be built with the newest in technology and safety, but that won't stop the bluff from giving way once more.  

Part of the Turnagain Heights neighborhood fell several feet, later becoming Earthquake Park

Earthquake Park today

 Seward has done a great job of disposing of the debris that still plagued its waterfront many years later.  Today sea otters frolic in the water and restaurants and other businesses line the shore, and the debris is gone.

Seward today

 

 

 

 

 

Valdez is probably one of the most changed places.  Because the old town was so decimated, it was decided to move the whole town to another location that was considered more safe.  Most of the buildings in the town are much more modern than their predecessors were.  When we lived there in 1969, there was not a building over two stories tall.  The roads were mostly oiled gravel roads, and the town smelled of oil everywhere you went.  It was extremely walkable, with a paved "parkstrip" through the middle.  It was a well-designed community.  Most of the roads dead-ended at the parkstrip, and the park- strip lead straight to the elementary school (which is now a community college).  No vehicles were allowed on this area.  During the time we were there, and we were only there one year, the method for transporting oil was transitioning from ships to the Alaska Pipeline.  We saw the last ship come in that was carrying oil to be distributed to faraway points, and the beginning of the Valdez Marine Terminal on the site of Old Valdez.  Where we had once gone to explore the interesting history of the area, was now inaccessible.  The remaining buildings were torn down to make way for oil storage tanks.  For me, that was a sad time, as if a part of my own history was gone.  Valdez today is still a fairly small community, but is thriving.

The Valdez Marine Terminal, on the site of Old Valdez

Valdez was relocated four miles to the west and thrives today

I mentioned on Tuesday that there was an area near Portage, south of Anchorage, that has remnants of the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami.  It is rather desolate and lonely, but beautiful in its own way.

Portage, south of Anchorage on the Seward Highway

As for other communities, there are many that I've never been to.  Kodiak, for instance, was heavily damaged by the quake and tsunami.  They are flourishing fifty years later.

The 1964 Good Friday earthquake, on March 27, 1964, was an event that drastically changed individuals, communities, and even the nation.  We have better ways to stay safe now.  Even though we really can't predict earthquakes any better than we could fifty years ago, we know how to prepare for them better, and how to escape tsunamis if the need arises.  I haven't been back to Alaska since the early 1980's, but I still have a great love for the state--its stark beauty, mountains that are like a mother's warm hug, and the independence of the people.  May she go another fifty years (or many, many more!) without another devastating event like the Alaska Earthquake of 1964!

1964 Alaska Earthquake 50th Anniversary Part I

There were some things that happened in the 1960's that were not happy events.  People can think of where they were when JFK got shot, or when Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated.  There are many veterans who remember the Vietnam War, and the Civil Rights Movement was also changing society.  Our nation was in an upheaval in the transitioning of the 1960's.

The ground was also in upheaval.  On March 27, 1964 the state of Alaska experienced an earthquake that changed everything for many communities.  It was Good Friday, at 5:36 in the evening.  Everyone was beginning their Easter weekend.  Alaskans have always been used to earthquakes, and when this one started they weren't alarmed.  At first it was gentle, relatively-speaking.  But then it got worse.  The earthquake measured 9.2 on the Richter scale, and lasted about three minutes.  We have seen the photos, and today we know the devastation.  But can you imagine yourself, not having the 20/20 hindsight we have today, going about your evening as usual, when suddenly your house is falling apart, or your car is coming in through your living room wall?  Possibly the ground is giving way under you in a terribly huge landslide, and you're being swept along with it?  Maybe you are like me, and have been in an earthquake or two that really frightened you.  You feel like the shaking is never going to end, and you don't know what kind of damage will be in its wake.  The earthquake was bad enough, but afterwards coastal residents wondered why the water was changing characteristics, so they went out to see it, only to be swept away in a tsunami.  Would you have gone to see too?

Communities up and down the Pacific Coast were damaged from the tsunami, as far south as Crescent City, California.

In 1968 my family went to Alaska with the idea to move there.  We spent all summer traveling around to different communities all over the state.  I can remember staying in Seward for awhile.  I don't remember much about the area near the water except that it was a beach one wouldn't want to walk on, or play on.  The water was definitely not a place to swim in!  There was wood, like old tree trunks everywhere, and rusted metal.  At the time I don't think I understood what had happened there, and wouldn't have been able to take in all that had happened four years earlier.

Seward before the 1964 earthquake

Seward right after the earthquake

We didn't find a place to live that summer, so we came back to Washington, only to go back up to Alaska with more serious intentions at the beginning of the summer of 1969.  We decided to put down what-would-be shallow roots in Valdez.  This was one of the worst hit towns during the 1964 earthquake, sitting very near the epicenter, which was in Prince William Sound, where Valdez is located.  We were staying at a location eight miles out of town during that first summer in Valdez, on the only road in or out--the Richardson Highway.  Old Valdez, which was what the pre-earthquake town was known as, was four miles away.  I can recall going to Old Valdez on our bikes, or walking, and exploring to our hearts' content.  It was such a fascinating place!  The town was completely abandoned, but many buildings remained.  There was a hotel there that had old newspapers under the boardwalk in front of it, and the dates on the newspapers were from the 1890's.  One time I found a rusted hitching ring there.  Some of the earthquake damage was evident in how the buildings sat.  The old post office had steps leading up to it, and the first step was sunk entirely into the ground.  In 1969 Old Valdez was a shell of its former self, with only a few dwellings and businesses situated apart from each other amongst large grassy areas and small trees.  It felt like a town from the 1800's, not like a town that had been populated and thriving only five years before.

Valdez was heavily damaged, not only in the loss of buildings and property, but in people.  Most of the residents of the town went to the dock to see the behavior of Prince William Sound, and many got swept out to sea during the tsunamis that hit the town.  In all, 32 people lost their lives in Valdez.

The devastation in Valdez after the shaking and tsunamis

Anchorage was also heavily damaged.  Along one of the most used streets downtown, Fourth Avenue, the ground gave way and buildings collapsed.  Cars were thrown every which way.  The land alongside Fourth Avenue dropped several feet, and in an area known as Turnagain Heights 130 acres was lost in a huge landslide.  This was a residential area, and great numbers of homes were destroyed.  The infrastructure of the city was decimated for a time.  I have friends who were living in Turnagain Heights during the earthquake, and they have fascinating stories.  One friend, who now lives in another earthquake-prone state, still has a need to know where her shoes are at all times because she couldn't find her shoes during the 1964 quake and as a very young girl had to hurry outside in the devastation of that March evening barefoot.
 

4th Avenue, downtown Anchorage, after quake

The J.C. Penney store collapsed during
the earthquake

Turnagain Heights, Anchorage, after the quake

One-hundred thirty acres of Turnagain
Heights fell in a huge landslide during
the shaking





 So many communities in Alaska were so severely changed.  Kodiak saw quite a bit of damage, as well as Cordova and Whittier.  Some towns and villages were completely wiped out.

All in all, 128 lives were lost in the 1964 Alaska earthquake.  Fifteen were from the shaking itself, the rest were because of the tsunamis afterwards.

On Thursday in the second part of this discussion, I'll talk about how things have changed for some of the communities affected, and some of the things that have been improved upon because of what was learned fifty years ago.

Automats in the 1960's

In this day of do-it-yourself EVERYthing, from pumping your own gas, to banking, to scanning your own groceries, it seems like the automat would fit right in.  If you've never heard of automats, you may wonder what I'm talking about.  Automats were cafeterias where you could walk in and choose and obtain your own food, pay for it, and sit and eat at a table and chair.  There were no waiters or waitresses, no hosts or hostesses.  It was truly "auto", as in "self".  It was liberating and novel at the time.  The automat was kind of like a smorgasbord, in that you could pick and choose your own food.  But whereas at a  smorgasbord , or all-you-can-eat restaurant, you pay one price no matter how much you might eat, at an automat you only paid for what you ate, a la carte.

A pair of men named Horn and Hardart started automats long before the 1960's.  They were a big thing in New York City, and also were in many other cities.  By the 1960's automats were on their last legs, fading out due to the proliferation of fast food restaurants, and by the 1970's they were all but extinct.

In the mid-1960's my grandfather had a work accident near Santa Barbara, California.  He was in the hospital for a little while, and eventually succumbed to his injuries.  When he was in the hospital, I have a memory of going there, and of having lunch in an automat.  My memory takes me to the hospital directly, but it may have been a separate business nearby.  It was a sad event, but my very young mind was not on injury or death. 

The automat was a huge room with simple tables and chairs set up all over for people to sit and dine.  Along the walls were small windows, and inside each window was a shelf with a plate or bowl of food on it.  Some of the cubbyholes were for hot food, such as entrees or soup, and others were for cold food, such as pies or cake.  There was just about any food your heart could desire, and it was made with care and good quality.  Each window had a label with the name of the food that was in it, along with a slot to pay for the item.  In order to pay, you took cash to a cashier, and got tokens to put in the slot. Once you paid you could pull the window up and take the plate of food from the shelf. It was so hard to decide; of course you couldn't choose everything they had!  But the novelty was so great, and the food so tempting!

When you were a customer in an automat, it seemed like everything was truly automatic.  The only employees you saw were the cashiers and the table cleaners.  I recall everything being very clean and well taken care of.  But behind those windows, there were many, many employees, always restocking windows when a customer took something from one.  There were people cooking and preparing food and then plating it.  Dishwashers too.

Automats seemed to me to be so modern!  I have often wished they would come back in vogue again.  Maybe some day that will happen.  Automats were another part of life in the United States that added wonderful style and character.  Did you ever eat in an automat?  Do you, like me, wish they'd come back?

Cold War Missile Tests--What a Sight!

The current situation in the Ukraine got me to thinking about the Cold War.  In the 1950's and 60's things were getting pretty intense between the U.S. and Russia and Cuba.  Some Americans were building bomb shelters in their back yards, and missiles were being built and tested, and ultimately, armed to be used against any aggressor.  We meant serious business!

In 1962, when I was four-years-old, our family moved from Washington State to Santa Maria, California, where my mom's family lived. Dad eventually got a job at Vandenburg Air Force Base.  I still don't know exactly what his job was there, but I know he was helping to construct "something".  We moved from Santa Maria proper to a mobile home park in Orcutt, which was a community that was nearer to the base.

Now, as a small child, I didn't know anything about the Cold War, or Cuba, or Russia.  I didn't know that tension was mounting.  All I knew was that my dad always knew when they were going to test missiles at the base, and if at all possible we would go to the entrance of our mobile home park and watch the launch.  Everyone else in the community was there too, so it was no secret!  It seemed like everyone had someone telling them that a test was to be performed.  (Today you can just go to the base website and there is a section on the right side of the screen that tells you about upcoming events such as this.)

Sometimes the missiles were tested during the day, with white-colored smoke.  They were a sight to behold--representing the power and defense of our country.  In those days Vandenburg was testing Atlas, Titan I and II, and Minuteman I missiles.  When they launched I had no idea which was which.  From my vantage point, they all looked the same.  The big difference for me was that once in awhile the smoke would be colored a different color than white.  We all oohed and aahed like we were watching 4th of July fireworks--even the adults!  Nighttime tests were beautiful, with the white smoke lit up in the setting sun beyond the horizon.

Beautiful Minuteman III test launch

Titan missile launch

There is something mysterious and mighty about watching a missile launch, even when you know it is "only a test".  If you're close enough you can see the missile itself, with its sharp nose straight up in the sky.  You can see the smoke from a farther distance away.  You don't get tired of seeing it, and it looks different each time.

During the summer of 1964 we moved back to Washington again, and that was the end of our missile launches.  I have many memories of our time in California.  Some of my favorite memories are of the camaraderie of our mobile home community during the missile tests.  It was like a party for young and old alike.

Of course, we can't forget why missiles exist.  We can watch their beauty, but underneath, inside their bellies, is something that hopefully will never have to be used. 

Carnegie Libraries

Most people know that Andrew Carnegie was a Scottish businessman who made it big in steel in Pennsylvania in the 1800's.  He is less known for the many libraries that owe him their existence.

Carnegie loved reading and wanted to enable industrious people who wanted to learn.  He gave grants to cities and towns all over the world to build libraries.  The towns would have to raise whatever other money was needed to build and maintain the libraries, but he gave generous grants towards the building.  Various architects were employed for the buildings.

What does this have to do with the 60's, one might ask.  When I was growing up in the 60's, my favorite place was our city library.  It was a Carnegie library built just after the turn of the 20th century.  It was a wonderful, magical place, full of nooks and crannies and some dark corners that really made my young imagination take flight. 

The whole building was heated with radiators.  If you've ever been in a building with the old-fashioned radiators, you know the peculiar sound they make as the water goes through them.  Along with the heat, the fluorescent lights hummed overhead.  As libraries are wont to be, everything else was silent. 

During that time smoking was still allowed in public places.  As our family would make its way back to the rear of the building to the children's section we would have to go through all the other sections first.  There was a large main room where men would always sit, reading newspapers and smoking cigarettes, pipes, and cigars.  They often wore suits and had hats on.  Contrary to what people may think today, the sights and smells and sounds at our library were calming and very relaxing. 

As I said, the children's section was in the back.  It was a room all to itself--now I look back and realize that this was probably well thought out to keep the noises children make separate from the adults.  I can remember when I was getting fairly old in my childhood, mom saying to my dad that she thought I was ready to read more adult books.  I was devastated!  I thought that meant that I could no longer even step foot in the children's section!  And it all came to nothing, because I was still allowed to choose my books from the children's section, just as always.  But if I found a book I wanted to read in the adult section, and it was appropriate, I was allowed to check it out.  Ah, the best of both worlds!

Our library had several different rooms.  I'm not sure I had the pleasure of being in all of them.  There were short sets of stairs going to odd areas--some up, some down.  That was part of the mystery of it. 

One of the most fun things about our library was the Book Mobile.  This was a panel truck or trailer that had a miniature library in it.  It would go to schools in the area, and on the day it was at your school each class had some time to go in and choose books, just as if they were at the big library.  Of course, each school had a library of its own, but when the Book Mobile came it was a special day! 

Inside a Book Mobile

Olympia Public Library

 Our library is now being used for a different purpose, and a modern one was built in a nearby location years ago.  But it is just a building full of books, nothing more. Some other Carnegie libraries nearby are still libraries.  They are still full of imagination and mystery.  I have enjoyed using a few of Carnegie's great libraries, and am including pictures of a couple of their exteriors.  Buildings today are much more streamlined.  They are no-nonsense, frill-less boxes, made for a purpose and nothing more.  The Carnegie libraries were built to be centerpieces of their towns, a feast for the eyes.

Centralia Library

Do you have a Carnegie library where you live?  If you do, and can possibly go to look at it, enjoy the detailing in the architecture and style.  Feel the imagination and the history of past generations who borrowed books there.  You will be richer for it.

Elementary School Reading in the 1960's

Note:  It appears that I forgot to post this on February 27th as I had planned.  Here it is, as it was intended!  My apologies for skipping a day!


No matter in what era you attended elementary school, you read a lot.  Being able to read was required over everything else, because if you couldn't read you also couldn't learn about history, read math instructions, understand how to do a science experiment, or sing a song from sheet music.

Reading class in the 1960's

 In the 60's we had the wonderful, iconic "Dick and Jane" books.  I honestly loved those books, so much so that I bought a compilation just a few years ago, just for old times' sake.  I also enjoyed "The Bobbsey Twins" and even "Nancy Drew".  I've been a voracious reader all my life, but especially so when I was in elementary school.

On a nice spring or summer day my dad would tell me to go outside and play.  I would hide whatever book I was reading, and take it out to a quiet area of our property and lose myself in another world.  That's what is great about books!

When I thought about this post today, I had two things in mind.  One was "The Weekly Reader" and the other was the Scholastic book fairs.  Coincidentally, according to Wikipedia,  "The Weekly Reader" still exists--under the ownership of Scholastic!  So they are tied together in my mind and in life.

"The Weekly Reader" was a small newspaper-like publication that we got once a week throughout elementary school.  It was full of news and photos, and was very engaging in its format.  I remember reading it from cover to cover.  In first grade the font was huge, and it got gradually smaller the older we got.  Some of my teachers covered each issue in class, and others just handed them out and let us take them home.  "The Weekly Reader" has actually been in publication since the 1920's, so most of us in the United States probably have memories of it.

A couple of times a year or so Scholastic would bring a library's worth of books to our school, and we could pick some out to buy.  Some of them were there for the taking, and others had to be ordered.  They were ridiculously inexpensive.  When our family had extra money I was able to buy all the books I could read.  They were as varied as the children in the school were.  What a fun time we all had when these book fairs came along!  Then again, when the ordered books came in.  The teacher would hand us our books bundled in rubberbands, with a note with our name on top of the bundle.  It was like our birthday and Christmas all rolled into one!

One of my favorite places when I was growing up was our town library, which I would like to talk about in another post.  It was such a special place, it deserves its own mention!

Nowadays many of us use tablets or phones as books.  It IS more convenient!  You can adjust your font, your background, put in a bookmark without dog-earring your pages, and it's all in one little compact place.  However...and this is a huge however...a tablet or phone will never have that real book smell!  You know that smell--you riffle the pages and all the memories of thousands of books come wafting out.  Of course, you never have to recharge a book either!

I know lots of people who have been readers all their lives.  How about you?  Do you enjoy reading for fun?  Do you spend more time than the average person in your public library, perusing the aisles?  What do you prefer--tablet, phone, or book?  So many of those I know who are readers prefer books over the more modern choices.  I'm glad we can choose the way we want to read!

Sweet 60's--Desserts and Sweeter Foods

When I grew up in the 60's, we didn't know anyone who had much money.  Our neighbors were rural wanna-be-farmers, like us, and our friends who lived in towns nearby were just regular folks trying to get by.  But even so, every evening meal ended with a dessert.

Most of the time we had ice cream in our freezer.  Well, maybe ice cream isn't quite accurate.  It was usually ice MILK.  Now some people might turn up their noses at that, but we enjoyed it immensely.  Ice cream (and ice milk) came in cartons back then.  There was no such thing as round tubs of cookie dough ice cream, or double chocolate fudge.  There were usually only a few flavors.  What I remember was chocolate, vanilla, strawberry, and neapolitan.  Neapolitan was all three of the basic flavors in one carton.  I always felt like I ended up getting strawberry, which was my least favorite.  The other flavors were all picked over by the time I got mine.  If you wanted to get very fancy you bought chocolate chip mint.  It all came in half gallon cartons, which were slightly rectangular boxes.  If there was no other dessert planned on any given evening, this sufficed just fine.

Newer (and slightly smaller size) of ice cream carton

My mom baked a lot of cakes.  She made them from scratch when I was very young, then later used cake mixes.  She made her own frosting though.  She had one recipe from the cookbook--something like "seven minute frosting".  It was a rather bitter-tasting chocolate frosting made by boiling the ingredients for seven minutes.  That was her go-to frosting.  I don't believe that canned frostings existed then, and she would never have used them anyway. The best thing about Mom's cakes was licking the beaters and bowls!  She gave a beater each to my sister and me, then one of us would get the bowl and the other the mixing spoon.  We'd bring her the dishes when we had thoroughly licked them, with the "evidence" all over our faces!  Mom also made pretty good pies.  I can remember watching her whip the meringue for a lemon meringue pie.  Once in awhile we enjoyed brownies.

One of the festive desserts Mom made was Jello Poke Cakes.  These were single layer cakes with holes poked in them with the handle of a wooden spoon.  Then hot, just-made Jello was poured into the holes.  The Jello would spread inside the layer of the cake, and it was delicious!  This comes out best using white or yellow cake, so you can see the Jello and the taste of it comes through.  You can use Cool Whip or another light whipped topping to hide the holes and add pizzazz.

One of our favorites was brownie pudding.  You can still find the recipe for that in the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook, among others.  It was a delightfully rich, chocolately pudding and cake all rolled into one.  You put the cake ingredients in the pan first, then the liquid for the pudding on top.  When it was baked, they had magically changed places!  Brownie pudding was best served warm, with a dollop of whipped cream on top, or ice cream on the side.

Something that we ate a lot was fruit salad.  We had it with our evening meal, not as a dessert.  I've served our fruit salad to many people over the years, and they had never heard of using the method we used.  Everyone has seemed to enjoy it, so I'd like to share the recipe with you.  The fruits used in this recipe are readily available all year round--you can use canned oranges in place of fresh ones, if need be.  It is not so much about the quantity of ingredients, because you can add and subtract various fruits to your taste and the size of the army you're feeding.
                                            

Our fruit salad, made with two of every fruit

                                               
                                                       FRUIT SALAD
at least 1 apple
at least 1 orange (alternatively, you can use a can or two of mandarin oranges)
at least 1 banana
marshmallows
mayonnaise

Slice the fruit into bite-sized pieces.  Put it all into a large mixing bowl.  Add marshmallows--lots if you want your salad sweeter, less if not).  Add mayonnaise, just a little at a time.  (I used about 1/4 cup or so when using 2 of each fruit).  Mix everything together until the fruit and marshmallows are just coated with mayonnaise.  You don't want too much mayonnaise, so be very careful when adding it to the fruit mixture!  You can always add more, but taking it out is very difficult!

Comfort Food--Entrees

During the 1960's people weren't as health-conscious as they are now.  We didn't care so much about calories or carbs.  Salt and sugar were natural taste-enhancers.  When you went to the store you didn't find "lite" anything, or "sugar-free" or "organic".  Food was, well, just food.

I mentioned in one of my early posts about my mom's three-day dinners, where she made a huge pot of something like spaghetti, and we ate that for three days straight.  There were plenty of those meals.  Aside from spaghetti, we had what we called goulash--which was kind of like spaghetti only with macaroni noodles.  We also had stew and chili, and navy bean soup.  We also enjoyed meatloaf, hamburgers, and hot dogs.  We rarely ever had pizza, and when we did it was made with one of those boxed kits.  The crusts were so thin they were barely there!  The sauce was horrible tasting.  No wonder I didn't know that pizza tasted good until I was an adult!

One of my favorite meals growing up was fried chicken, potatoes, and corn-on-the-cob.  I asked for that for my birthday dinner almost every year.  My birthday is in June, so strawberry shortcake was usually on the menu as well, though it's kind of hard to stick birthday candles in sponge cake.

When talking about entrees in the 60's, I can't forget about TV dinners.  They were every housewife's joy.  No longer did a woman have to slave in the kitchen for half a day (or more), just to make a dinner that would be eaten in less than half an hour.  With TV dinners you could just put them in the oven, take them out when the time was up, and you had dinner.  True to their name, I remember evenings when all of us sat in front of the TV with our TV dinners on our TV trays.  That didn't happen often, but when it did, it was a treat.

TV dinners were made by a couple of companies.  The ones we ate were Swanson.  Some of the Swanson TV dinners that are available today were basically available back then too.  But back then they were always in divided foil trays (no microwave ovens back then) with clear plastic over the food.  You had to peel back the plastic on certain foods, and leave it over others.  Dinners always had an entree meat, potatoes, a vegetable, and I think maybe added later, a dessert.  You had to hope that everyone's dinners took the same temperature setting, if not the same amount of time, and away you'd go. 

When I was six-years-old, in 1964, I got the mumps at Halloween.  Then my mom got them at Thanksgiving.  Dinner that year, for my dad, my sister, and I, was Swanson turkey TV dinners.  They saved our Thanksgiving dinner!  Poor Mom couldn't eat any of it!

One of our menu items all the while I was growing up was chicken noodle casserole.  I have heard various versions of it, like tuna noodle casserole, or casserole with peas in it, which everyone I have talked to seems to have universally hated.  This is my mom's version of chicken noodle casserole--without peas.  It is so good that my family and I still occasionally indulge in it.  If I've made you hungry talking so much about food, here is the recipe for you to try.  It is one of those unwritten recipes, so bear with me.  Enjoy!

                                              CHICKEN NOODLE CASSEROLE

about 1 pound egg noodles, medium or large is fine
16 oz. cream cheese, softened
2 cans cream of chicken or cream of mushroom soup, no milk or water added
1 soup can milk, give or take
salt and pepper to taste
1-2 tablespoons mustard
2 tablespoons or so of dried onions, soaked in lukewarm water for a few minutes to soften
2-12.5 oz. cans chunked chicken breast
potato chips--most of a bag, crushed fine

Boil the noodles in a large saucepan, following package directions.  In the meantime, soak the dried onions in a little lukewarm water so they soften.  In a big mixing bowl, add the cream cheese, soup, milk, salt and pepper, and mustard.  Drain the onions and add to the cream cheese mixture, then mix it all together thoroughly, so the cream cheese is mixed in well.  Add the chicken to the mixture and stir.  If the mixture seems gooey and not very workable, add more milk, just a little at a time, to make it thinner.  You don't want it runny at all, just fairly moist.

Drain the noodles when they're done.  Mix the cream cheese mixture and the noodles together till the noodles are good and coated with the mixture.  Put it all into a 9 x 13 inch baking pan.  Sprinkle the potato chip crumbs on the top of the casserole to taste.  Put casserole in a 350 degree F oven for about 30 minutes.  After about 20 minutes, check to make sure the potato chips aren't burning (they don't in my oven), and cover casserole with foil if chips are getting too done.  Makes about eight servings, but in our house it's usually less.  I don't know the nutritional aspects of this dish--if you have to ask, you'd probably better not eat it!  Serve with a vegetable--that will make it a little healthier.