Orene's diary Orene Hardman's schoolgirl diary
Wetherall Family Collection
Orene's diary Inside front cover and front free fly leaf
Wetherall Family Collection
Orene's diary Fred Warren, Peck High school, 1929
Wetherall Family Collection

1930-1933, 1934, 1937

Orene Hardman's schoolgirl diary

Orene Hardman, my mother, began her diary from the 21 November 1930 entry like this.

November 21, 1930   My Birthday -- day I received this lovely gift. About 20 spankings from kids. Nice Presents & Jean [Graham] stayed all night with me.

At the top of the entry she added -- "And no one else but Fred [Warren] gave it to me."

Orene attended Peck High School from 1927 to 1931 and graduated with the Class of 1931.

Jean Graham, who graduated in 1933, was a close neighbor and friend, and a member with Orene and 4 other PHS girls of the SKP gang -- the "Six Pajama Kids" who "drove people crazy" as my mother told me when explaining the meaning of the initials to me around 2000, 3 years before she died. Jean later taught school in Kendrick.

Fred Warren, who graduated in 1928, was her boyfriend or at least good friend for a while. He later operated a sporting goods shop in Lewiston.

"Charley Coon killed self . . . New kittens, 3 of them"

"Charley Coon killed self" my mother wrote in the upper left margin above the entry for 3 May 1931. In the upper right margin she wrote "New kittens, 3 of them". The main entry reads like this.

May 3, 1931   Went to S.S. [Sunday school] Min [Minnie France] & Walt here. Didn't do much Went down new high-say in Hank's car. Ate supper at their place.

Charles (Charley, Chas.) Bruce Coon (1891-1931) was born on 3 October 1891 in Mercer, in Mercer County, Missouri, and killed himself on 2 May 1931, apparently in Clarkston. His 5 June 1917 draft registsration card, for Central Ridge Precinct, signed by Cora B. Steele, states that he was a farmer, married with one child, and describes him as caucasian, short, stout, blue eyes, brown hair, not bald. The 1930 census shows him living in Peck with his wife Dola Ann (McGee) and three children. He worked as a "Stock buyer" on "Own account". Presumably this means investment stock rather than livestock. I have no information about motives. Possibly he lost a lot of money in the 1929 market crash. Dora (1892-1965), widowed, married Sorenson, was again widowned, then in 1948 remarried Roscoe Allen Tasker (1894-1963) and is buried by him in Belcrest Memorial Park in Salem, Marion County, Oregon. Charley Coon is reporstedly buried in Normal Hill Cemetery in Lewiston, Nez Perce County, Idaho.

The following diary entries and captions are just starters. The captions will be redone and background stories will be included, and more entires will be added, in future revisions.

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